My frugal February

Earlier this year, I stated that I wanted to increase my total net worth by $15,000, a task made a little more uncertain by the fact that my freelance work isn't guaranteed (especially now with some key changes in my industry right now) and my full-time gig nets me just under $2000 a month more or less, not including overtime and holiday pay.

And then there was December and January where I was a little less than well-behaved when it came to controlling my spending and general restraint on my part.

In short, I was terrible with the whole money management thing the last two months.

So for the month of February, I decided to do something a bit drastic to try and help this goal along for the year and basically atone for the error of my ways.

I'm grounding myself from spending most of my money.

Well perhaps grounding is the wrong word. Grounding implies that there is a punishment involved and really, this isn't really a punishment. At least I can't look at it this way, or else I'll become resentful. Really, this is something I'm choosing to do to get better acquainted with just me and what I already own. And not what I want.

So for the month of February, I intend to slash nearly all discretionary spending, the exception being around $100 to cover the cost of a small amount of food.

The exception is being put in place because frankly, I live with roommates so not everything that is lying around waiting to be eaten is mine. And I don't intend to peeve them off by doing so while not putting in my fair share of replacing what's been eaten one way or another. And even still, $100 is still only half of my usual food budget costs! But I digress.

My discretionary spending budget is normally around $400 a month, give or take expenses during the month. So by slashing it down to just $100, I'm aiming to have around $300 extra freed up to then direct to my savings and student loans.

Well, not quite rolling in this kind of dough.

So why February? Well besides the fact that it's the shortest month of the year and therefore minimizes the pain as much as possible without time-travel (and minimizing the number of days in which things can go wrong) it is also the month where I have the fewest "extra" financial commitments to make. I don't have birthdays to celebrate, events to attend or holidays to buy gifts or goodies for (except Valentines Day, but not even a concern right now). For all of these reasons, this makes this month ideal for me.

So here's to a money-free month. How long will it take for me to get restless? Will I crack? Will something "bad" happen to blow it? Hopefully not. I'll try my best to chronicle the trouble I run into and the temptations I deal with.

But for now, putting away all but my grocery list and living like I have (almost) no extra money seems like a good exercise in why I should count myself lucky to begin with.