Joys of Frugal Living
Let’s list all of your joys of frugal living.I’ll dive in first and post (un-numbered) my joys about frugal living as it is good to be reminded why we do this, why we love it and why it brings us joy:
- Going to work knowing that I have paid less than $20 total for everything I am wearing
- Bring my lunch and enjoying the company of those around me or catching up on quiet time alone.
- Wearing pajamas’ around the house when I know I have no where to go for the day
- Not using the car on my days off and saving gas and the environment
- Eating in so often that when I do eat out, it is a luxury I truly enjoy and don’t take for granted
- Having money to sock away for the fun stuff I like to do, when I want to do it
- Going for walks and knowing that I am losing weight without spending money
- Using my imagination to re-use/re-cycle items
- Finding cool, and sometimes expensive, clothes at the thrift store
- Being a home-body to save money and realizing it isn’t as bad as you would think
- Getting a lot of books to read from the library with all the ‘˜home-time’
- Having no shame at going dumpster-diving and getting neat free stuff
- Having more control of money instead of letting it have control of me
- Making great friends online who also are into frugal living
- Having a great feeling knowing I have saved money at the grocery store by being money smart
- Learning new frugal ideas and being able to pass them on to others
- Enjoying the sunshine and the wind coming through my home and not relying on the heat or AC
- Knowing that tomorrow I will learn something new to increase the value of my frugal living
What are your Joys of Frugal living?
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Dawn C. is site owner of Frugalforlife.com where this is a repost from: Joys of Frugal Living. Dawn is residing in Colorado with her spouse, Teri, of 11 years.
Some of mine:
The smell of clothes dried on a clothesline.
Feeling free to leave a museum as soon as my child gets tired and grumpy, even if we’ve only been there an hour, because we got free admission thanks to a library pass.
Lying out in my yard, in the hammock I got for free at the swap section of the town dump.
Mine: Driving my 8-year old Volvo in a town where most people drive fancy cars.
riding my bike past the gas stations while the people filling their cars complain about the price.
Because over 95% of people who intentionally lose weight will regain it in 5 years – even if they maintain their “good” behavior (gotta love our moralistic language there), because the body compensates to return itself to its favored survival weight – I do hope you can discover the joy of feeling better physically and enjoying the outdoors so the behavior won’t stop if/when the weight loss does. In our culture, where even health promoters buy the health=fitness=weightloss line, it is easy to be motivated by weight loss (and to tell oneself it is “about my health”)… But this feeds into the prejudice that thinner is better than fatter, more worthy of support and congratulations and admiration. If it were really about health, we’d say “Going for walks and knowing that I am IMPROVING MY HEALTH without spending money.”
Really want to help people save money? Help people discover what medical practitioners refer to as the “health at every size” paradigm and stop feeding the diet and beauty industries’ piggy banks. Health at every size = eat intuitively (not by externally imposed rules), move enjoyably (not as forced punishment at a gym), and accept size diversity. Clinical trials have shown that such an effect lowers cholesterol and blood pressure and depression while raising self esteem and enjoyment of physical activity — all while never causing any weight loss in participants. The comparison traditional “healthy eating and exercise” weight loss programs, however, did not lead to any long term improvement in health. Hm…. 😉
(see Linda Bacon’s 2005 article in The Journal of the American Dietitic Association for more)
Here are a few of mine:
Making a soup from leftovers in the fridge (and taking it for lunch all week long)
Getting tons of fresh veggies for my family of four adults at the flea market.
Checking out interesting movies from the library and using their request service to read all the newly issued books that I could possibly want.
Really enjoying eating out or a matinee, because they are now special occasions.
Stocking up on double fiber bread at the bread store!
Looking for the perfect bistro set that meets my price point for under the trees in our new house (on Craig’s list)