How to Motivate Yourself While Saving

I’m a changed woman when it comes to my finances. Once when I was happy to spend hundreds on an ASOS order (how I miss my uni-loan paydays), now I’m quite content with putting my pennies away. I’ve grown out of living from paycheck to paycheck. I hate that feeling for when you get paid and you see it all disappear on rent and bills. Now, I will always see it disappear (damn the adult world) but I have much more of cushion to enjoy life and put money away without feeling like we can’t do any of the fun things. Right now, it’s just saving for rainy day funds. Soon it will be big things (true adulting). But for now, I’m happy saving little by little. It can, however, be rather difficult to motivate yourself while saving.

From first hand, I know how hard it can be. If it’s a specific goal, like a holiday or event, I’m a pro at packing the pennies away. If however, it’s general saving, I find it rather difficult. Getting my head around that saving for a rainy day that might or might not come was difficult to do. The key, however, is to dive in, small steps at a time. That and a few other things that helped us put the pennies away…

How to Motivate Yourself While Saving

Don’t starve yourself of fun. This was one tip I got from a mortgage advisor. Her one advise was not to stretch your savings too much so you have no money to have fun. If you do, the process will not be fun and you’ll not enjoy what you’re saving for. Keep a little leniency so you can go out on date nights, buy yourself a cute top or have cocktails with the girls. There’s a balance to it and you will find the best balance for you.

Do it yourself. I’m talking lunches and most importantly coffee mainly for myself. I’ve managed to combine the cost of three takeout coffees into a month’s worth of coffee from Grifbucks. It takes five minutes in the morning to do and it tastes just as good. Lunch is the same. I’ve managed to perfect the recipe for mac & cheese that tastes almost the same as the Pret ones. Try it for one week and see how much you save.

Create yourself a vision board. It sounds cheesy but making yourself a vision board of what you would like to save up for. I find this is a great way to motivate yourself while saving. A house, a dog, a holiday, that handbag. That way, when you’re tempted to buy something, look at your vision board. Something has to move from the board in order for you to buy it. So what’s going to budge? You’ll be surprised how easy it is to save when you can see what you’re saving for.

Reward yourself. The reward system is proven to work in order to motivate good behaviour. So set yourself mini goals and when you hit it, give yourself a treat. Is it buying a bottle of wine, or rewarding yourself with a new nail polish. The key is to keep the treats small but things you want. Hey, that coffee shop coffee could be one of them. Setting small goal steps is a sure fire way to motivate yourself while saving.