Last year my life changed significantly. I moved. I was single again. I had new goals to fashion, and I was at a bit of a loss. I was also a small business owner in the midst of a recession, and that felt something like wolves gnawing at my rented front door.
The impact the recession had on my business impeded my ability to meet my retirement savings goals. While I’ve long kept emergency savings on hand, I didn’t want to tap those reserves, my current security, in exchange for my future financial well-being. Determined to get through all the changes and find a way to save for the future I hunkered down and began experimenting with cutting back.
There was only one problem: I was already as cut back as one can get. The nature of my work requires a smartphone and I’d previously negotiated an uber good rate. I get my produce at the farmer’s market when it’s open, and when it’s not I buy what’s on sale. My friends and I potluck more than we go out (which ends up being more fun, btw). Following my mother’s lesson, I keep the lights off unless I’m in the room. I was doing a good job on the frugality front.
Already daunted I got the ultimate blow on my scale. Yep, while most people lose weight when they get divorced, Alicia the contrarian had managed to pack 10 on. Lovely. Enough was enough. I could get divorced, move and weather financial changes, but there was no way on earth I was doing this FAT!
I only watched TV from the treadmill. I got a dog, and he and I started walking 3 to 6 miles a day. After a lifetime of eating pretty darn healthfully, I actually started counting calories and figured out how many I should eat in a day. I struck a balance that allowed me to drop 3 sizes and feel good not only about myself, but about all the other stuff.
I now had a ton of clothes I no longer needed. I also realized that in my previous life I’d been suffering from excessive weight not only on my waistline, but in my closet as well. I was in possession of 27 pairs of jeans. Twenty. Seven. How did I unwittingly manage to collect at least 5 pairs of jeans, per year, over the last half decade? This totally goes against my belief about excessive consumerism at the expense of financial goals. But obviously, it didn’t. I was guilty of mindless denim consumption, and I was self-imposing a sentence of downsizing my closet.
Everything I hadn’t worn in 12 months was designated for Goodwill or the local consignment shop. I schlepped 8 bags of clothes out of my house and amazingly, 6 weeks later I picked up a check for over $300! While that money wasn’t entirely going to make up for my retirement savings shortfall, it had me looking through the rest of my house and realizing that I have the same problem with books that I did with clothing.
While selling my clothes and my books won’t fully stock my retirement account, guess what? I no longer need a three bedroom house to hold all the stuff I thought I couldn’t live without. I will be downsizing shortly and that will create the resources I need to meet my savings goals.
Certainly this isn’t always the answer, but sometimes finding the money is simply about shifting your perspective. And one year later, I find myself wholly grateful for the shift.