Hey, everyone!
First time poster but I've been following the sub for a good long while now. Today, I just wanted to say how great it feels to make the decision to live a more frugal life. I'm 29, have a decent salaried job, but I felt like I was living paycheck to paycheck when I shouldn't be. So I took a look at my life and my habits and discovered this:
- I buy a lot of shit I do not need (I just cancelled an order for multiple, expensive Phillips Hue Play lights that I was going to attach to the back of my gaming PC monitors, for example).
- I ordered delivery 5-6 times a week (which, if you've ever used Doordash or Grubhub, means you're paying an extra $10 or more per meal than what you'd pay at a restaurant).
- I had racked up 6 different $5-$10 subscriptions on Twitch, essentially paying $55 a month to watch people play video games
- Every weekend consisted of drinking with friends and, being a whiskey snob, I would buy more expensive bottles all the time. (Not to mention buying anything worth drinking at a bar)
And all of this finally hit home when I realized that all of the freelance money I made apart from my salary last year could have paid off my auto loan and credit card debt in a matter of months. Now that freelance client is gone and I am paying those bills from my primary income. While I regret spending all that freelance money on stupid stuff (clothing, video games, alcohol, etc.), that realization has hit me like a ton of bricks, and I've developed a plan to live smarter and more frugally. Starting this week I've:
- Put into effect a snowball method of paying off my most annoying but lower-amount debts (which will now be paid off before the year is out instead of the end of 2020)
- Cancelled all my twitch subscriptions, paired my existing Hulu account with my Spotify premium which gives you Hulu for free, and deleted all food ordering apps and relevant payment information (just so it will be a hassle if I ever have to order food)
- Set a sensible weekly budget for groceries, a daily budget for vices I can't give up yet (I have an energy drink every morning, it's one of those "life's little joys" things for me, despite how bad they are for you), and am using all freelance (side) income that I receive to pay off any and all debts.
- By far the biggest choice I made (and my girlfriend is going to do the same) is to QUIT DRINKING! As much a part of my life as it was since I was in college, it no longer makes me feel great, it takes up most of nights on the weekends, and it ruins Sundays for me (I never get anything done).
- I'm also starting a new side business (graphic designer) and continuing work on my second novel in the free time I'll now have on weekends and evenings.
There is a lot more I can do and will do, but I think for deciding to turn my life around financially in the last week, it's a pretty good start.
Thanks for listening to my story!
April 18, 2019 at 10:23AM
