Efficient Saving Is Not About Mere Budgeting!

Every time, on getting my paycheck, I eagerly make a list of my expenditure and try to cut up on areas that I think are ‘unessential’ for my living. These included going out for a movie and eating out every weekend; pizza treats from the nearby fast-food center, getting my laundry done at the laundry store nearby; and buying dresses and cosmetics every month. Now these are things that you might consider unessential too and might want to budget on all these at one go. That’s what I did, but the results were not too good.

I stopped going out for a movie and eating out and stopped buying cosmetics and dresses. I also stopped the pizza delivery and washed my clothes myself. Spending time at home in the weekends was too boring and eating only homemade food was pretty uninteresting. My taste buds craved for those pizzas. Also without cosmetics, I don’t like to see my face in the mirror. Only work without any entertainment made life monotonous. I was disgusted of my self-imposed penurious life and flew back into the happy shelter of my more lavish lifestyle. I’m not a person to curb all life pleasures to save up a few dollars. Budgeting never works for me. A patron of freedom, I don’t believe in imprisoning money in the dark chambers of a bank. Rather, I’d like to see it move like Aladdin’s jinni, bringing me all the good things in life. Hey…just wait, I think I got carried away a bit! Well, its not that I don’t want to save money and spend it aimlessly, it’s just that I believe that frugality should not become a pain in the neck! So let’s see what people like you and me can do to have the cake and eat it too!

The first thing that most of us do when on a budget is to cut down upon small pleasures. I stopped buying those $1 pizzas, but I did not save much- just about $ 15 a month. By denying myself those really tempting pizzas, I not only saved less, but was giving myself an emotional overhead which I did not like much. I knew, for a passionate foodie like me, this kind of budgeting is not going to work for long. Going on a crash diet has always made people eat more afterwards, so will a crash budget. Apart from pizzas, it was impossible for me to slash expenditure in all other areas at the same time. The reason is very simple. It’s very difficult to change your entire lifestyle at one go. So here are some tips that are workable and with which you can save a lot of money. Read more on budgeting.

What Are The Areas On Which I Spend The Most?

When I realized that giving up on trivial but gratifying expenditures was not making me save much ; and slashing my expenditure on all categories in one go was almost an impossibility, I started identifying the area on  which I spent the most. To my surprise, the areas on which I spent the most are entirely different from what I mentioned above. One area that I was spending a lot of money on was telephonic conversations. I got huge bills to the tune of hundreds of dollars from there. It would vary between $150- 200. The next area was of course, a dinner at a star restaurant of the city. I quickly worked up on these two areas and saved quite a bit. I stopped holding long conversations over the telephone with all friends, except a select few and would converse with them through internet chat sessions. Internet chat sessions really helped while communicating with my sister who lives in India. I would spend some hundreds of dollars making international calls every third day. Now, the other thing about feasting in a restaurant was something that I could set aside without much. It was not as urgent as my daily dose of that irresistible pizza. I still went to those restaurants but just once a month. Rest of the time while returning from the movie, I’d get a delicious dinner packed at one of the quality food joints on my way back home.

This was how I saved up quite a bit on my expenditure, without having to cut out on everything. Life was a pleasure! I had saved money and did not deny myself much. So focused budgeting is the key to successful money-saving.

Too Many Cooks Spoil The Broth!

If you go to a financial expert or visit any financial blog you might come across thousands of alternatives for saving the money. You might think that you are all set to save your money, when equipped with all those techniques. True, they are all effective strategies to save your money, but choosing a strategy from hundreds of options is quite difficult. If you’ve read the Book The Paradox of Choice- Why More Is Less by American psychologist, Barry Schwartz, you might be aware that when you have a lot of competing choices, selecting one becomes difficult. Today, if you want, there are thousands of information resources available for easy access. A common man is stumped by these options and he does not know what to choose. Being focused on one or two effective strategies can ensure efficient money management, rather than applying a whole lot of techniques aimlessly without any results.

Identify Only Two, Not One, Not Three!

Identify two areas on which you need to save up. It’s better to have two, not one, not three areas on which you need to save up. Having only one area will run the risk of failing any moment, and more than two are again a large number of options which you might not be able to live up to. Suppose you are slashing your expenditure on telephone bills only and it so happens that during a particular month you’ll have to make some extra calls inevitably, you’ll be loosing out on your focused budgeting.. At that moment you cannot really perform a drastic unplanned cut on any other expenditure. If you just have one more area to slash on, you can adjust your extra telephone billing with cutting down on the other area. For example, you’ve been going for a movie. Now for a few days, just stop out on the movie-going. Watch some DVDs at home instead. As mentioned earlier, having more than two areas for slashing your expenditure will not make life worth living.

Don’t Gobble Big Mouthfuls, You Might Get Choked!

Once, I set my goals for telephone bills as not to exceed $ 30 a month. I started out on that goal but slashing down on my expenditure from $ 200 to $ 30 in a single step was something that was quite difficult for me especially when I was in the habit of excessive usage. It was something like asking my self to go on a crash diet. We all know how unsuccessful and short-lived crash dieting can be! Instead, I set realistic goals for myself and was happy working towards them. If not to $30, I could always successfully strive to bring it to $ 100.

Slow And Steady Wins The Race!

Though in a fast paced world, you might be skeptic about the validity of this saying, but in most cases this holds true. Set that goal that looks impossible now as your ultimate target and try to achieve it in steps in a slow pace. You want to slash your telephone bills to $30 a month. This is quite achievable. But you’ve got to take short and steady steps towards it. Don’t try to take long jumps if you’re not used to, you’ll only fall! Try to achieve that target over the next three months, through intermediary stages of $ 100, $60 and $30.

Make Your Saved Money Difficult To Access

Here I can give you a very good example of my father. Though he had accounts with a number of banks, he did not take ATM or Credit Cards from any of them. I, on the other hand, have a couple of ATM-cum-debit cards and a couple of Credit Cards. My father says that possessing these cards will only make you withdraw more money from the bank fro anywhere. Now to cash a check, he has to physically visit the bank which is a less frequent mode of accessing money in comparison to an ATM Card. Read more on money saving.

To sum up, aimless budgeting is not going to get you anywhere. Be focused and you’re sure to end up saving a lot of money for a secure future.

“I don’t want to go through life spending this much time and energy to save a few bucks, or give up my right to any kind of enjoyable brand experience.” -Kelly Mooney