When I was a teenager, I spent several summers helping my father with his small-scale commercial fishing business. Early in the morning, just as the sun was creeping over the horizon, we’d push a boat out on the water, heading out to raise the lines we’d put out the night before. The water was still and brightly colored with the reflection of the dawn. The air was just chilly enough to warrant a flannel shirt (that would usually be taken off after an hour or so).

My father and I would pull in those lines. I would usually guide the lines in and dip the net into the water to scoop up the fish, while my father would remove the fish from the line and keep it from getting tangled.

It was a beautiful and simple routine, almost a ritual. For the weeks when we were both on our summer vacation, fishing in this fashion was simply our daily routine – and even in my teenage years, as jaded and reactionary as I might have been, I really did appreciate those beautiful mornings out on the water.

Quite often, the things you remember and keep with you aren’t the expensive things. They’re the nearly free things – the reflection of sunlight on the water, the time spent with someone you love, the moist chill in the air, the stillness of the water, the quiet dawn before the water fills with traffic.

The great things in my past aren’t things – they’re experiences.

For some, the way to draw upon that kind of nostalgia is to buy an expensive fishing boat and to take their own son out one morning on the lake, only to find out that after dumping thousands of dollars into that boat and the necessary equipment, the trip out on the water with their son just isn’t the same.

To put it simply, you can’t buy things to recapture the beauty of the past.

I offer a different approach. Next summer, I’m going to go visit my parents. Early one morning, before dawn, I’ll take my son down to the water’s edge – and if my father is up for it, he can come along as well. Maybe we’ll go out there on a boat if one is handy – maybe not.

We’ll be warm in our flannel shirts, with the cool and quiet air of the retreating night. And as dawn breaks over the horizon, spilling her pink and orange and yellow rays out over the still water to be reflected in an infinite kaleidoscope, I’ll watch it with my son and with my father, too.

I don’t need a boat to enjoy that moment, to taste a bit of the best moments of my past. I don’t need thousands of dollars in equipment, either.

All I need are the people around me that I care about, standing with me in a place that holds great memories for me.

Sure, my son might be restless. It’s not his memories that I’m touching. He might grow bored and begin to toss rocks out on the water, filling the air with splashes and disturbing the still glass of the water with infinite ripples.

I wouldn’t have it any other way. While it’s wonderful to touch the memories of the past, he and I have lots of new memories to create together.

It doesn’t take a wallet full of cash to make memories, or to touch them again. You’ll never have the full flavor of that experience again. What you can have, though, are tastes of it, flavored with the new spices of the changes in your life. Perhaps that will spoil the broth – or perhaps it will bring new flavors to the surface.

Either way, it doesn’t require you to sacrifice the things you have – and the things you will have – at the altar of nostalgia.

A reader asked me if I could break down my ideas into a handful of principles. After some careful thought, I came up with a list of fourteen basic “rules” that summarize my money and life philosophy. I’ll be presenting these as a weekly series.

Charity – in fact, giving of any kind – is often hard to explain in a general sense. Many people fail to see the purpose of giving. “What does it gain for me?” they’ll ask, and it’s difficult to point to how charity brings you a discrete, specific, calculable return.

Instead, giving is a reflection of what truly matters to you in the world. It’s your opportunity to actually make a tangible difference in an area that matters to you. Seeing that your effort has created change in someone’s life – or created slight change in a lot of lives – is incredibly powerful.

This comes back to your central values. What’s important to you with regards to the outside world? Perhaps you’re impassioned about the environment and wish to take action to reduce carbon emissions. Perhaps you want to protect animal habitats. Perhaps you’re fueled by a desire to help people in famine situations – or in natural disasters. Perhaps you’re committed to childhood education. Or maybe you just want to help out disadvantaged people in your own community. There are countless other causes that different people find valuable – yours may or may not be on this list.

Sometimes it can feel overwhelming – there are so many things out there that deserve a gift that it’s easier to fall into “analysis paralysis.” You can’t decide, so you choose to do nothing at all.

Just because a reason to give is worthwhile doesn’t mean that it’s the one you have to give to. Spend some time figuring out what matters the most to you. Is it the environment? Is it education? Is it famine and world food distribution? Is it poverty in your community? It could be any of these – or something else.

Once you’ve figured out what matters most to you, look only at ways to give in that area. For example, if I’m concerned about poverty in my community, I might dig into Habitat for Humanity and the local food pantry. If I’m concerned about education, I can get involved with the local school district.

People often argue that the small amount that they can contribute won’t make a difference. If you’re in that situation, look for ways where you can see that your small gift can make a change.

Give $10 worth of food to the local food pantry, then volunteer there. See for yourself that the food you purchased is going to a family that really needs it. Your gift directly put food on the table for those children.

Take $30 and use it to plant a tree in a park somewhere (obviously, after getting permission). Water it yourself and watch it grow. That tree will help clean the air and will provide shade and natural beauty for the people in the park, and you can see with your own eyes how it benefits others.

Keep a $20 bill in your pocket and wait until you see someone who’s really in a pinch, then just put that $20 in their hand. Watch what happens next – their emotional reaction, the story they tell you. You made a difference.

Give your time, too. Spend an afternoon building a Habitat for Humanity house in your community. Spend two hours volunteering at the food pantry in your community. Spend a Thanksgiving afternoon at a homeless shelter.

Giving has a profound secret: when you give to something that truly matters to you, you feel incredibly good. That good feeling radiates throughout your life. People pick up on your good feelings and they respond better to you.

Your gift also contributes to the happiness of others. Children and families enjoy that tree you planted. A family makes a dinner out of your donation to that food pantry. A family is able to finally have a home of their own thanks to your labor on the Habitat for Humanity project. A family is able to sustainably eat because you gave them chickens via Heifer International.

Someone’s life becomes better. Their outlook moves just a bit higher. They make a few better choices in their life: the family decides that a family afternoon in the park is pretty nice because of the cool shade and decide to do it again. This family bonds a bit more and, later on, their child will make a difficult, positive choice because of that closer bond.

Life is full of these little chaotic effects. Our actions cause many, many things to happen, many of which we don’t see. Giving of ourselves freely in a positive way sends out ripples of good events, and over time, those ripples come back to you and to everyone you care about. You might not see the direct effect, but those indirect effects echo throughout your life.

Give what you can, without regrets. The positive benefits echo throughout your life, the lives of everyone you care about, and lives you’ve never crossed. Walk away knowing that the work of your life has gone to truly make the world a better place.

I love reading essays, and I have a collection of essays that have truly inspired me and made me think. Among these is Benjamin Franklin’s classic The Way to Wealth – something I often read when I need a piece of financial inspiration. If the circa-1750 language is rough on your eyes, here are the principles summarized well by Art of Manliness.

Just a few days ago, I read The Way to Wealth again. I was inspired to read it by our survival of the “summer of low income” – I made a tough choice to switch my advertising revenues for The Simple Dollar that resulted in basically no income during the summer, but we made it through to the other side with little problem.

As I was reading through The Way to Wealth, one phrase really stood out at me this time:

The sleeping fox catches no poultry.

What exactly does that little phrase mean in terms of our modern lives? I see it as a call to five things.

It’s a call to be alert. Our world is full of opportunities. Sales. Small investment opportunities. People trying to get rid of things. New jobs. New careers. Love interests. Friendships. Ideas. Purely lucky events, like finding fifty dollars in a parking lot. Every day, we’re brushed with many of these things. If we’re alert, we can see them – and if we choose to, we can take advantage of them, jumping in with abandon. You’ve got to keep your eyes open and see the world as a field of blossoming opportunities.

It’s a call to have resources in reserve. Of course, many of those opportunities are hard to pluck if you don’t have anything to pluck them with. It’s incredibly useful to have some money in reserve. However, money is just one of many resources that’s useful to have in reserve. Do you have relationships you can tap for advice or other things? Do you have time – are you not booked to the maximum with no flexibility in your schedule? Do you have patience to wait for good things to come? Do you have skills and talents that you can apply and share? Resources mean more than just money – much more.

It’s a call to know what you want. The fox sleeps outside the henhouse because he has a hunger for chickens. What are you hungry for? What are your passions? Figure them out and follow them, because when you’re chasing your passions, you’re showing others – and yourself – that this is a life direction that you want. You see more opportunities because you’re passionate, and you’re able to follow up more often because of the knowledge and insight you’ve picked up chasing your passions.

It’s a call to be aggressive. If you’re sleeping, you’re letting the world pass you by. Instead, seek out the opportunities in life. Instead of glancing at that yard sale, stop there. Instead of debating whether to pay $35 for that oak desk, offer $20 for it. Instead of thinking how fantastic that job would be, ask for it. Learn how to be assertive and go after the things you want.

It’s a call to get out there and DO something. Today.

Are you the sleeping fox? Or are you out there, alert, aware, drawing on all of your resources, and catching those hens that you hunger for?

One of my favorite activities during a year is spring cleaning.

After a long winter of being stuck inside and intimate with our possessions, the arrival of warm spring weather makes me throw open the windows to let the breeze blow through and just start tossing accumulated junk. I usually wind up with enough stuff for a yard sale, along with boxes of items to give to Goodwill and to mail out via PaperBackSwap and other such online trading services.

When I’m done, the house usually looks empty – much more spartan than it once did.

This has several interesting effects.

With less stuff in my home, I’m happier. I find that, time and time again, I don’t miss the stuff that I toss. At the same time, I enjoy the cleanliness and orderliness of what remains.

I also have more free time. I spend less time on regular cleaning and maintenance of the things I have and I spend less time trying to find things when I need them.

Even better – it saves – and earns – me money. Cleaning out the vents and moving the furniture away from the vents reduces home energy costs, as does unplugging any items that we rarely use. At the same time, I usually earn a fair amount – directly and indirectly – from selling off the extra accumulated stuff that we’re no longer using.

Truly, it’s addition by subtraction – by removing things, I make my life better.

Over time, I’ve come to love that “spring cleaning feeling” so much that I try to do a big cleaning every few months. For example, as soon as I hit my upcoming book deadline and turn in a manuscript, I intend to spend a few days doing a “big clean” at our home. Here’s what the plan looks like.

Empty out all of the closets and storage spaces and evaluate the things that are there. Sure, some seasonal items need to stay, but many of the items that get stuffed into closets are simply items that aren’t used any more. If that’s the case, sell them, swap them, or give them to Goodwill. Then, re-pack the closets and storage areas so that it’s easy to find things.

Go through all clutter collectors – and toss as much of the clutter as I can. The built-up magazines have to go, as do the junk envelopes and other materials in the clutter collectors in your home. Go through each area where clutter builds up and deal with every item. If you’re thinking, “Well, I might someday…”, trash it, because, quite honestly, you won’t.

Clear all vents – and make sure none are obstructed. Obstructed vents are a sure way to reduce the efficiency of your home’s heating and cooling efforts, increasing your energy bills. I check each vent in our home during a cleaning, moving any obstructions and cleaning inside the vent.

Thoroughly clean everything. This usually takes multiple days, as I go from room to room and scrub everything down carefully. I shampoo the carpets, mop the floors, and wash the walls (in some rooms). At the end, the house smells great.

Invite some friends over. Once everything’s clean and more spartan, have a small party. It’s the perfect time to show off your living quarters – everything’s clean and uncluttered and smells good, too!

This weekend (or next, or the one after that), consider doing a fall cleaning. Empty out your closets, sell off the things you’re not using, and freshen up your home. Not only will you earn some pocket money from the things you sell off, but you’ll save a bit of money on your energy bill and make your home a lot less cluttered and more inviting to guests.

This is the fifth of sixteen parts of a “book club” reading and discussion of Keith Ferrazzi and Tahl Raz’s Never Eat Alone, where this book on building a lifelong community of colleagues, contacts, friends, and mentors is teased apart and looked at in detail. This entry covers the ninth and tenth chapters, “”Warming the Cold Call” and “Managing the Gatekeeper – Artfully,” which appear on pages 79 through 93.

In getting to know a person, the absolute biggest moment I dread is that first moment of introduction, when you don’t know each other. Knocking on someone’s door to introduce myself or greeting someone I don’t know in a public situation makes me feel really uncomfortable. Even worse: trying to get through a “gatekeeper” (an administrative or personal assistant) to get a meeting with someone.

Ferrazzi feels the same way, it seems. He focuses two thoughtful chapters on this very problem. Let’s dig in.

Draft Off a Reference
Ferrazzi mentions four rules for turning a cold call into a “warm” one – in other words, making the ultimate introduction of yourself to another person much more friendly by taking the time to put some pieces in place. He often relates this process to making a sale, since salesmen are often in the business of establishing such a rapport, although that connection is just as important for anyone. His first tactic, discussed on page 83, is straightforward – find a person that you have in common:

Credibility is the first thing you want to establish in any interaction, and ultimately, no one will buy from you unless you establish trust. Having a mutual friend or even acquaintance will immediately make you stand out from the other anonymous individuals vying for a piece of someone’s time.

So, if you want to meet someone important, your first step is to find someone in common that you know. Research that person and see who their obvious connections are – and see if you know any of them. Ask around your own social network and see if anyone knows this person.

I’ll use myself as an example. Let’s say I’m wanting to meet a particular writer at a meeting in the future. I could either walk up to that person without anything in common and make some awkward small talk (making that person want to be anywhere else), or I could identify someone we have in common and use that as an introductory point.

Why does this work? If you mention someone that person knows in an introduction, the person likely feels some obligation to listen to you, not just because of you, but via a sense of obligation to that person you have in common.

Remember, though, that the person in common is just enough to get your foot in the door. It’s up to you to carry it further.

State Your Value
If you do finally have someone’s attention, you need to quickly make it clear to them that you represent some sort of value to them. On page 85:

Once you have someone’s commitment to hear you out for thirty seconds, you’ll need to be prepared to deliver a high-value proposition. You’ve got very little time to articulate why that person should not try to get off the phone as quickly as possible. Remember, it’s all about them. What can you do for them?

Why exactly would I want to talk to Stephen King? Obviously, for me, it’s to get some advice on writing.

But why should Stephen King possibly be interested in talking to me? It would be an enormous stretch to call myself a peer of his – I’ve written one very simple nonfiction book that wasn’t a bestseller, while he’s written piles of bestselling fiction. Why would he want to talk to me at all beyond fifteen seconds of greeting a fan and signing an autograph?

Honestly, I don’t know the answer to that question. I do know that anything I got beyond that from a conversation with him would be solely from his good graces – but it’s never a good idea to bank on anyone’s good graces.

Instead, it’d be a waste of time for me to ever talk to him (besides attending a reading or something like that) unless I have something of value to offer that he might be interested in.

Just think about it this way – unless you can offer someone some real value, why would they talk to you? And remember that real value doesn’t mean that you’re offering them a “great deal” – it’s only a “great deal” for you, not them.

If you can’t figure out what value you’re offering, you shouldn’t expect to build a great relationship with someone.

Quick, Convenient, and Definitive
If you want to extend your relationship with someone beyond a quick meeting, you have to make it as easy as possible for them. On page 85:

You want to impart both a sense of urgency and a sense of convenience. Instead of closing with “We should get together some time soon,” I like to finalize with something like “I’m going to be in town next week. How about lunch on Tuesday? I know this is going to be important for both of us, so I’ll make time no matter what.”

At the bare minimum, exchange contact information – or at least get theirs. If you don’t do that, then there’s no way you can establish any sort of lasting relationship with that other person.

A much better step is to set up some sort of follow-up connection. Perhaps you can send along some additional information. Maybe you can meet later on for something else.

The key is to extend the conversation – make something concrete that has the expectation that at least one of you will be taking action to exchange more info (and it should be you making that action happen, since you’re the initiator).

Compromise
Ferrazzi’s final tactic for making those “first meetings” go better appears on page 86:

Robert B. Cialdini’s book The Psychology of Persuasion shows how compromise is a powerful force in human relations. An example used to illustrate this idea concerns Boy Scouts, who are often turned down initially when trying to sell raffle tickets. It has been statistically shown, however, that when the Scout then offers candy bars instead, a less costly item, customers will buy the candy even if they don’t really want it. In giving in to the concession, people feel as if they’re holding up their social obligation to others. So remember, try for a lot – it will help you settle for what it is you really need.

In other words, suggest something big, like going out to lunch next week. If they hesitate, suggest something simpler, like swapping email addresses or Twitter usernames or phone numbers – a compromise.

Why? The “compromise” means that you’re doing them a favor by effectively reducing their commitment – you’ve made it easy for them to follow up instead of hard for them.

Since, in the end, all you really want is a way to keep the conversation going, you still get what you want out of it with a much higher degree of success.

The Gatekeeper
How do you handle administrative assistants? On page 87, Ferrazzi begins to discuss it:

First, make the gatekeeper an ally rather than an adversary. And never, ever get on his or her bad side. Many executive assistants are their bosses’ minority partners. Don’t think of them as “secretaries” or as “assistants.” In fact, they are associates or lifelines.

Every time I have ever tried to go heat-to-head with an administrative assistant, I’ve lost.

You will lose if you antagonize an administrative assistant. So don’t – it’s not worth it. You’re better off just backing off and letting it drop than you are getting in a war with a schedule-keeper.

Personally, the best approach I’ve ever found is just to be flat-out honest with administrative assistants. Tell them flat-out why you’re there, why you’re making that contact, and who suggested that you do it. Most administrative assistants vastly prefer straightforward honesty and humility to almost anything else – providing the information they need as easily as possible makes their life easier and makes them like you better.

So, whenever I’m trying to schedule something with an administrative assistant, I’m as straightforward as can be and provide as much information as can possibly be necessary right off the bat. I’m also usually just honest about my situation.

That approach has rarely failed me.

Respect
On page 91, Ferrazzi touches on how to keep on an administrative assistant’s good side:

Always respect the gatekeeper’s power. Treat them with the dignity they deserve. If you do, doors will open for you to even the most powerful decision makers. What does it mean to treat them with dignity? Acknowledge their help. Thank them by phone, flowers, a note.

Yes, the good old handwritten note. It works time and time again.

Let me make this as clear as I can: whenever someone helps you in a significant way in your career or your life, send them a handwritten note thanking them for it. This will always be a big positive for you.

Here’s a detailed guide for writing an effective thank you note, no matter what the occasion.

On Saturday, we’ll tackle the eleventh and twelfth chapters – “Never Eat Alone” and “Share Your Passions.”

There is no such thing as a free lunch. From my experience, that’s completely true. Yet, I constantly advocate using free services all the time – the library, the parks, and so on.

Lately, a few readers have called me on this seeming contradiction, pointing out that, indeed, these things have costs. We pay those costs when we pay our taxes. And some people with a certain political perspective think it’s wholly unfair that we should pay for libraries and parks and the like.

Here’s the thing, though. It’s a sunk cost. We’ve already paid our taxes – and those taxes paid for those libraries. The money is already paid – so why not enjoy the fruits of those dollars? If you politically disagree with such services, act in a political fashion against them – but don’t eschew services. You’ve already paid for them. Use them.

Tyler Durden’s Guide To Personal Finance This is a humorous reworking of “Fight Club,” translating the themes of the movie into pretty sensible personal finance advice. I enjoyed reading it. (@ man vs. debt)

Thomas Carlyle’s Advice to Young Men This is brilliant advice for everyone today. Don’t follow advice to the letter – instead, explore and learn what works for you. A truly worthwhile person is able to find their own path and utilizes advice only in terms of trying to see things through another’s eyes. (@ art of manliness)

In Defense of Solitude (Part Two) I spend multiple workdays in solitude. For me, being alone is essential – a key part of being able to bear down and focus on tasks at hand. I find that interruptions make it much more challenging for me to complete anything well, so solitude is a key tool for my work. (@ soul shelter)

Banishing the No Momentum Monster Without some sort of crutch, I find it’s really hard to maintain the momentum of continuous work, like writing or exercising every day. For me, the “chain method” works well – I have a printed calendar on the wall in my office and each day I accomplish my specific goal, I put a big colored X on that date on the calendar. When I get a string of them going, I *really* don’t like breaking that chain, so it gives me motivation to do it. (@ unclutterer)

Off My Giving List I do the same thing – if a telemarketer from a charity interrupts me, I cease giving to them. I am a charitable person, but I value my family time and I don’t want it intruded on by some ham-fisted telemarketer. (@ free money finance)

Are Online Savings Accounts Worth It? We use an online savings account (ING) for most of our banking, but we also have a local bank for some specific teller services (cashing checks, mostly). We have the two accounts linked and everything just works like a charm. (@ bargaineering)

20 Cheap and Fun Date Ideas Most of these sound like a whole lot of fun to me! My wife and I already do several of these things, sometimes even with the kids in tow. (@ christian pf)

How to Destroy Your Investment Portfolio You can solve all five of these problems by simply buying a broadly based index fund and just sitting on it. Sure, you won’t hit a home run, but you will have consistently strong investment results over the long haul. (@ frugal dad)

The sixteenth episode of The Simple Dollar podcast deals with college advice. What did my own college experience teach me in terms of what’s most useful during your college years? Here’s a hint – too much time in the classroom is a negative. Total time – 9:25.

Listen In!

Other options for enjoying The Simple Dollar Podcast include:
Listen to this episode on a separate page
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Though I hope you do subscribe using one of the above methods, don’t worry – each episode will be featured in its own post, much like this one, on Tuesday afternoons. The podcast itself may appear earlier than that, however, if you subscribe using one of the above forms, but the notes won’t appear until I post about it here on The Simple Dollar.

Episode Notes
Here are some additional notes that go alongside the comments in the podcast. Approximate times for the corresponding links and notes are listed.

0:00 – The theme song is a snippet of a Camper van Beethoven concert on October 25, 1986, shared via their very open taping policy. Listen to the concert in its entirety.
0:35 – Here’s some basic advice for managing cash in college.
1:10 – Is college even really necessary?
2:01 – Here’s how to minimize accumulated stuff in college (which amounts to lost money).
3:41 – Here are ten key things any college student can do to prepare for success in life.
5:02 – My college career wasn’t exactly perfect.
7:11 – A great book on the college experience (from a financial perspective) is Dara Duguay’s Please Send Money.
8:40 – Some advice to college students at the end of their college career.
9:20 – A preview of next week.

One thing I’d like to do in a future episode is have an audio reader’s mailbag. If you have a microphone on your computer and can record an MP3 of a simple, short question you might have on personal finance, careers, pop culture, or anything else you’d like me to answer, record it as an MP3 and send it to me. Keep the total recording under 15 seconds, please. Also, if you use Skype, feel free to ask your question that way – my username is trenttsd.

Comments and suggestions welcome.

Of all the posts on The Simple Dollar, the post that seems to drive the most emails to me is my homemade laundry detergent guide. People seem to hardly believe that I actually make my own laundry detergent.

My response to these dumbfounded emails has evolved over time (yes, I get so many emails on this that I have a “standard response” that I insert into such emails), but now it looks something like this:

I make my own laundry detergent because I save about $18 per 100 loads – about three and a half months’ worth of laundry at my house. That $18 goes towards other goals in my life – paying down debt, saving for my dream home, and so on. I’d rather have my $18 go towards that than supporting a mega-corporation pumping out millions of gallons of detergent a week. Plus, it’s fun to make.

The real core idea here is that I’m “transferring” my money from spending it on detergent to saving for my dream home. Sure, it’s only $18 every three months or so, but that’s $72 a year. $720 a decade. And that’s assuming I don’t earn any interest or investment income at all on that money.

Homemade laundry detergent is just one avenue of such savings. I make up my own bottle of Windex and “transfer” $4 a year from household chemicals to debt repayment. I turn down the temperature on my hot water heater to 120 degrees Fahrenheit and transfer about $40 a year from the gas company to our dream home savings account. I eat leftovers for lunch and transfer $3 from a food producer to my emergency fund.

In each case, all I’m doing is taking money from something less important to me – household chemicals, natural gas, large food producers – and giving that money to something more important to me – debt freedom, our dream home, my emergency fund.

Once you’ve adopted this kind of mindset, many of the “ordinary” choices people make begin to seem a little odd to you. They certainly do to me. Every time I choose to not maximize my value in some relatively unimportant place in my life, I’m taking money away from the things that are truly important to me.

If I choose to just go buy Tide at the grocery store, $18 disappears from my debt repayment plan (and goes to Procter and Gamble) every three months, leaving me beholden to Chase (or some other entity) for longer.

If I leave my hot water heater at a high temperature, $40 disappears from our savings for our dream home (and goes to my energy company) every year, making that dream less and less attainable.

If I go out for lunch every day this month instead of eating leftovers, $60 (at least) disappears from my emergency fund (and goes to a food producer), making me more susceptible to major life emergencies.

The list goes on and on. In each case, I find it’s better to keep that money in the areas of my life that are truly important to me.

So, when I look at someone else spending money on Tide, I think to myself “they must place a higher personal value on Tide than on getting out of debt.” Perhaps they do – and that’s fine. However, I can certainly say that those values are far away from my own values.

I never advocate trimming spending on areas that are truly important to you. If something has a high value in your life, by all means, spend money on it.

But in areas in your life that don’t have a high value, why are you spending money? Every extra dollar you spend in an unimportant area is a dollar taken away from an important area.

Frugality, in the end, is just a “spending transfer” – transferring your money from an area that’s not important in your life to an area that is important in your life. People talk about frugal misery – that, to me, is the opposite of misery.