Personal Finances Getting Tighter?
If your personal finances feel tighter right now, just like last years swim suit, get the message quick. If you ignore just simple exercise during the course of your day, you'll plump up and when you go to put on your swim suit, it will be tighter than how you remember it fitting a year ago. Personal finances, just like your body, will swell up if not attended to on a regular basis. Do you feel strapped right now? Trapped? Nowhere to turn? Confused? Now that you're in this mess, you want some fast and easy to implement solutions to your overhead bulge. Sure, I'll show you some solutions, but I will warn you that there will be some pain. 1) Right now, stop living on tomorrow's income. Spend now pay later is what got you into this bind and complaining about the price of gasoline like so many other losers isn't going to help matters. It's not the price of gas; it's the fact that you can't afford fuel for your car(s). The problem is not with the cost of fuel, but your lack of managing your money. Don't spend what you haven't earned; because once you're in that spiral, it never ends. 2) Quit complaining. What good is complaining? It is a complete waste of time. So stop wasting time. It's easy to join in with the rest of the criers and blame and complain. You only add to the misery of your own existence by complaining. We can all complain about something, but so far in my life I found it to be useless, so I gave it up years ago and you should too, right now. 3) You weren't prepared for the jump in the cost of living. Most people live paycheck to paycheck, spending all that they earn on many things that they really don't need, but really just want. They don't even understand why they want stuff, but the media all around them, along with a heap of peer pressure, puts them in the "pull out the plastic" mode. The more important question should be; why weren't you prepared? The answer to this question is a bit vague because you can go off on any number of tangents and in different directions. The truth, which isn't easy to face, is that you were not paying attention and now you are paying through the nose. Could you have changed the course of world events? Perhaps, but it's unlikely that you could have. You have to just etch it in your brain that no matter how good times are, there will be a downturn. If you look at the economic condition of any country in the world, there are hills and valleys. True, some countries appear to be stuck in a valley, but the bigger, much bigger, story says something else. Remember that expression; saving for a rainy day. Rainy days happen and once you get zapped by a downpour of luck, circumstance, or situation, it can take years to recover. Five dollar coffees just didn't happen, you aided the cause by standing in line and rattling off some concoction to the clerk who smiled and took your money. Your car needed a repair, but you chose to replace and accept a payment schedule with a smile. (Oh boy! My new car!) Ten pairs of shoes wasn't enough, you needed twenty, apparently to go with your forty pairs of jeans. Cable TV wasn't good enough; you thought you could build a bigger and better DVD movie collection. You needed surround sound and a bigger screen to view your movies on. The payments came with the gear, because you pulled out the plastic and signed your name. (You love credit.) This list of your weaknesses could continue, but I promised to show you how to get out of the spot that you are in, stuck in, or heading toward. Unfortunately, these are things that are not taught in schools. Fortunately, you discovered this article to help you. Here comes the pain. Why do you go to work? If your answer is "to make money," than you have to adjust your thinking. Change your mindset to, "the reason I'm going to work is to become wealthy." In both situations, you are going to work, but the first situation is to survive, the second situation describes that your purpose of going to work is to become wealthy. Same job, same pay, but it's the different mindset that can change the reckless path that you have been walking down everyday. Now that your mindset is in the right gear, I have to slap your hand like your mother should have when you went into a store with her and started picking up everything that you saw. Maybe that's why you buy so much stuff, because nobody is around to tell you no and slap your hand. From now on, you have to have a real reason before you buy anything. I'm hungry, is not a reason. Hey, I'm always hungry and can eat, but I don't. Schedule when you are going to eat and eat well, this will curb your impulse to buy a candy bar, five dollar coffee, or eat junk food that will make your bathing suit, fit a little too tight. What are you spending money on each day? If you don't know what you are spending money on, you'll never know how to modify your spending. The quicker you stop buying without thinking, the sooner you'll have more money in your wallet. Why do you think all the gas stations have counters of goodies and coolers of beverages, it's because they know you are trained to impulse buy. Now, and I mean right now, put yourself on a budget. We have to fix the leak before we can mop up the mess. Be reasonable with your budget, you're in charge and you are responsible. This leads us to responsibility. You and you alone are responsible for your current situation. It's not the government, the price of gas, your job, your spouse, your education, or your neighborhood. It is you and you alone. To sum up what you have to do right now; 1) Take responsibility for your life. 2) Adjust your mindset from working to becoming wealthy. 3) Stop the impulse buying habit. 4) Know what you are spending your money on. 5) Create a budget that you can handle with just mild discomfort. Now we'll dig out of the whole you have dug. When there's too much month left when you run out of money, you have to make a radical adjustment. 1) Liquidate everything that you possible can to raise cash. You can buy a new version of whatever it is that you sell once you build your personal empire. For now, sell and raise cash. Don't take this lightly. Rather than having a modest garage sale, run ads, approach people that you know or know have an interest in the things that you have. An extra television for the kids' room, an archery set for the sportsmen, your coin, bottle, and plate collection should all go. If you just said no, you're missing the point. If you want out of this downward spiral of debt, you have to get liquid. You've collected it for years, now it's time to cash in. Since it is painful to sell a collection, it should be more painful spending the money that you get from selling it on things that you really don't need. 2) Eliminate the payments. I'm not saying reduce, I'm saying eliminate. You want a vehicle that you own, not one that is a negative cash flow alligator. Work out an arrangement with a neighbor or relative so that you can share one vehicle between you. 3) Go for the big money. Just because you are selling things that you own, doesn't mean that you have to give them away at dirt-cheap prices, hold out and get the money, unless you are that desperate. 4) Those little monthly memberships and subscriptions have to go. Sell or terminate your gym membership, you can bench press a sack of potatoes. How much are you spending on subscriptions, memberships, cable, lawn care, pool service, trash service, and baby-sitting? Are you talented? Do you have more skills and intelligence than you are being compensated for? Does your job just make you want to throw in the towel, because you hate it so much? Clean up, write a new resume' and get a better job. You need to increase your money supply. 1) You can beg for a raise. 2) Do nothing. 3) Get a second job. 4) Get off your behind and get a better job. 5) (My favorite and the easiest.) Reduce the amount of money that you spend on a daily basis. 6) Do a combination of the above 5 items. In closing, I'll tell you simply; hard times come into all of our lives. You can sit and complain, adjust your lifestyle, increase your income, decrease your expenditures, or make a serious plan to live better on less and give up the useless frills. Watching television probably won't help you earn more, but it will help you escape, but when the alarm goes off in the morning, it's the same world. If you are lazy and full of excuses you will probably go down, but if you are smart, willing to make some adjustments, and can see that it really isn't that hard with a little discipline, you'll do fine. All your big creditors will work with you to help take the monthly pressure off, but if you see the brick wall coming, do something now... don't wait until after you crash. Even if you move in with your in-laws, just swallow the humility and promise yourself that once you're out of the predicament, you're never coming back to destitute flats. Lazz Laszlo is a former Investment Executive and Radio & Television Financial Reporter with many entrepreneurial endeavors to his credit. He spends his time as an emcee, public speaker, enjoying life and writing articles and eBooks about business, travel, retirement, strategy, and pleasure.
