How To Save Money and Still Enjoy Life
How To Save Money and Still Enjoy Life
Did you know that it’s possible to make great financial progress while you spend money on things you enjoy? Yep, you read that right. You can figure out how to save money and still enjoy life.
It might be surprising to hear this in the financial space, but you worked hard to get to where you are. You already know saving money as a doctor is important. But you also deserve to enjoy some of the spoils and riches of all of the work you put in to go through college, medical school, and residency.
In the physician finance blogosphere, financial gurus will paint a dichotomous picture of only two possible money management options. Either you eat ramen for five years after you finish residency so you can meet your financial goals. Or you fall into the camp of YOLO hedonism, living it up, spending every dime and not saving anything.
This black-and-white approach skips the view that you can do a little bit of both.
You can be financially responsible for those first three to five years and for every year after that. AND, at the same time, you can actually enjoy life.
Saving money as a doctor is all about balance
I saw author Ramit Sethi speak before he made it famous on Netflix, and he’s all about “living the rich life.” Yet he teaches people important personal finance principles. These aren’t mutually exclusive concepts.
It’s possible to take care of your personal finance needs by paying your future self first. And you can also live the rich life as Ramit would say, or spend guilt-free as I would say.
It can be hard sometimes to find the line between “I actually can spend this money” or “Nope, I should have saved it”, but if you have a certain percentage diverted to your separate accounts first(investments, savings etc.), then it helps you know what’s safe to spend and enjoy that portion of your money.
I preach balance and moderation because I’ve seen too many doctors start judging themselves for their financial decisions, for not “saving enough.” Eventually, they become doctors who refuse to take vacation with their family because the cost of the trip added to the cost of taking time away from work feels like too much spending and not enough saving.
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