Tag Archives: decisions

How to Have Anything You Want

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I go to a lot of music festivals and concerts.  Particularly bluegrass music.  That’s really my thing.  Everybody has their thing.  It seems like I’m spending a lot of money on live music.  And I am.  But that’s because live music is a priority for me.  I’ve made tradeoffs in other areas of life to make room in the budget for the thing that is important to me.  I live in a very small house.  I buy most of my clothes secondhand.  My “newer” car is 12 years old.  I buy store brands at the grocery store.  I’ve never been to Europe.  I don’t spend much money on beauty products or self-care rituals.  These are the things that are not a very high priority for me.  I have what I need.  I don’t need new or fancy or high end.  I DO need live music for my life to be satisfying and happy.

Every financial decision comes with a trade-off.  Your home may have the space you like and the location you like, but come with a roommate you didn’t initially want.  Your food may be delicious and nutritious, but you may be substituting cheaper proteins for more expensive options.  You may have chosen a less expensive college than your dream school, or you may have taken on student loan debt in order to afford your dream school.

Adulthood is full of decisions.  Some decisions are big.  Others are small.  But every decision comes with a tradeoff of some sort.  Every single thing you spend money on makes it so you can’t spend that money on something else.  I’m sure there are wealthy folks who can spend freely on absolutely anything without thinking about it, but even those folks are making the decision not to invest those funds or donate them to charity.

The next time you face a financial decision (which could be anything from selecting a box of pasta at the grocery store to deciding which job to accept), remember this:  You can have anything you want.  You just can’t have everything you want.

 

Accepting What You Can Get

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Sometimes you just have to accept what you can get.  We all learned a lot about this at the start of the pandemic…back when whatever brand of toilet paper you could find was good enough.  Then with paper towels.  Then with disinfecting wipes.  These are all things where having something is much better than having nothing, even if it’s not the exact thing you wanted.

This past week the availability of Covid vaccines opened up to an expanded group 1A in Pennsylvania.  This means that my parents (who are in their late 80’s) are now eligible for the vaccine.  But getting scheduled for a vaccine appointment is quite the challenge…especially in the part of rural Pennsylvania where they live.  Because technology isn’t their strongest skill, they reached out to me for help with the process.  And I very quickly learned that getting them scheduled near their home was going to be a challenge.  Even using my best Ticketmaster concert ticket purchasing skills, I struck out on day one.  On the second day of my efforts I expanded the radius and was able to secure them appointments about 60 miles from their house in mid-February.  Is it ideal?  No.  But it is something.  And something is better than nothing.

There will be a lot of times in your life when this kind of choice will come into play.  It could be something little, like having to buy a different brand of soup than you really wanted.  It could be something huge, like finding the perfect home to buy…with the exception of the fact that it is the same color as Pepto Bismol.  These are situations where you take something less than perfect because you need something…and something is better than nothing.  Pretty much any financial decision you make in your life will leave you wondering if the choice you are making is right.  Because perfection almost never happens.  So you have to focus on the option that meets your needs, even if it isn’t perfect.  Because sometimes you just have to accept what you can get.

The Scarcest Commodity

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The scarcer a resource is, the more valuable it becomes.  It works this way with oil and diamonds and the minerals that help to make up your smartphone.  And it works this way with your time.  The further we get into the spring semester the scarcer time seems to be.  Exams (and commencement!) are only a few weeks away.  Your schedule is likely full of papers and events and planning and bar exam applications and outlines and study groups and…..well, you get the idea.  I’ve been finding the same thing in my world as both my personal and professional responsibilities seem to be more than I am able to squeeze into my waking hours.  But we trudge on, we compromise, and eventually we get through it.

The compromising is the tough part.  Every decision to spend your time on one thing means not spending it on something else.  Your priorities become clear.  When faced with the decision of spending my Saturday night seeing some favorite musicians perform or meal prepping with my Instant Pot, I chose the concert.  But that left me without lunches for the week.  Yet another decision.  Do I buy lunch out, or buy something pre-packaged?  I’m busy, but I’m not rich, so I hit the frozen food aisle at my local grocery store and bought an assortment of reduced-calorie frozen meals to eat for lunch this week.  And while I was at it, I grabbed a frozen veggie lasagna for Sunday dinner.  Not the most delicious food ever.  But also not bad, and not outside my budget.  And I didn’t have to give up the Saturday night concert.  I chose to spend my time on fun rather than food, but also didn’t give up too much of my money in the process.  Quality of food is less important to me than quality of life (which for me generally means live music).

Every decision has a trade-off.  But it’s important not to let money be the thing you sacrifice.  You can do or have anything you want.  But you likely can’t do or have everything you want.  What’s most important to you? What are you willing to give up in order to have it?  Can you do that without blowing your budget?

You Can Have Anything

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Every time you spend money on something, you are making the conscious decision not to spend it on something else.  Every penny is an exercise in prioritization.  When you decide to eat out instead of cooking at home, you are making a trade-off.  You are giving up the chance to spend that money on something else in order to enjoy the experience of eating out.

One of my mantras is “You can have anything, but you can’t have everything.”  So when I think about making any purchase, I think about what I have to give up in order to allow for that.  I can go out to dinner on Friday, but that means I have to cook for myself on Saturday and Sunday.  I can go to this concert, but that means I have to take a pass on that other concert.  I can go to this music festival, but that means I can’t do that weekend getaway to New York City.  I can buy this new pair of running shoes, but that means my next “new” work outfit will come from Goodwill rather than a retailer of new clothing.

Everybody has different priorities.  I’d rather have a camper in my garage than a diamond on my finger.  I’d rather have a weekend at a music festival 8 times a year than a week at the beach once a year.  I’d rather that my husband and I have two old cars than have to share one newer one.  These are my priorities.  Yours likely vary.  But the thing we all have in common is that every purchase comes with a tradeoff.

You can have anything.  But nobody can have everything.  Your priorities will tell you how to spend.

Conscious Spending (a classic tip from 1/31/2011)

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More and more often I’ve been hearing the phrase “conscious spending.”  But what does it mean?  It’s more than just knowing where your money is going.  It’s about making a conscious decision to spend more money on some things and less on others—in fact really scrimping in some areas to allow yourself to spend more on the things you truly want.

Conscious spending is about defining your priorities and spending your money to best meet those priorities.  It becomes clear to me every time I talk to my friend Heather.  Heather’s top spending priority is travel.  She will cut back in every other area if it means she can take a trip…to anywhere.  I’m exactly the opposite.  I don’t care if I never travel, because my top spending priority is my home.  Home is the place I most want to be, and I do spend a relatively large portion of my money on not only the house itself, but also improving it and decorating it nicely.  That is what is important to me.  I’m content to buy my clothes at Goodwill, drive old cars, and vacation in a tent in a state forest only a few miles from home if it means that when I come home, it’s the home I want.  Heather doesn’t care if she stays in her rental apartment forever, as long as she gets to travel (without sleeping in a tent).  And we are both very happy with our decisions.

Everyone’s spending priorities are different.  For some it’s clothing.  For some it is a car.  For some it is food.  For some it is entertainment.  For many reading this, I suspect it’s education.  But the thing to remember is that you should make that conscious decision about what things are important to you and make a plan that allows you to spend some of your money on those things—even if it means you have to make cuts in areas that are less important to you.

What are the things that are most important to you?  And what are you willing to give up in order to spend your money consciously on the things you most value?