I didn't jump. I took a tiny step and there conclusions were

[purplerabbits]

*opens purse, moth flies out*

I am rather sick and tired of having no money, even though I know that a) this is mostly All My Own Fault and b)I am not actually hard up compared to many people I know. I am, however you look at it, not quite living within my income, so I should like to throw the question as wide as I can and ask - what should I or anyone do to live within my income. Obvious ideas are welcome: even though I am usually the one giving this advice to other people, I seem not to be very good at it myself...

Comments

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

The 'obvious' solution is to increase your income but not your expenditure. There are plenty of people offering ways of doing this (including several people from West Africa, it would seem), but I'm not sure they're sure-fire wins.

My boring answer would be to work out where the bulk of your money goes, and then see what scope there is for reducing the spending on each item - and also how you can rearrange your habits so that it requires extra effort for you to spend money you don't want to (e.g. if you're prone to spending too much when you go out, you could try going out with only the cash you're prepared to spend on you). Some things you can't do much about in the short term (e.g. rent/mortgage) but others you can (mobile phone bill).

Not that this is actually much help. I do this periodically myself, but rarely make dramatic savings as a result.


I've more-or-less managed to live within my means so far, but if I knew what the trick of it was I'd write a book and make millions - and make millions happy in to the bargain. Part of it is probably having had the good luck to have only had a small number of periods of time where my income didn't monotonically increase, coupled with being fixed in my ways and hence reluctant to change my habits, which means I don't instantly spend more when I earn more. But I think a bigger part of it is having an almost morbid fear of debt. Whenever things get a bit tight, I can't forget about it and it casts a terrible pall over everything. This makes it pretty damn miserable, but it does make it easier to remember not to buy stuff.