Are Frugal Sacrifices Worthwhile?

I’m an extremely frugal shopper.  A lot of people wouldn’t do the amount of work I do to score sweet deals and pay next to nothing for food.  It might embarrass some people to bring along 2 coupon organizers to the store for grocery shopping, but not me.
Being the frugal mom that I am, I plan my grocery shopping trip ahead of time so thoroughly it’s as if I’m planning out a dinner party!  I cover all the details: map out the route for the stores, the items to buy, read all the weekly ads and clip coupons, and search for printable coupons for the items I know I’ll be buying.
A cashier once asked me where I got all my coupons. I told her I printed them online, and she said, “Wow! You’re so lucky…” It struck me as an odd thing to say, and I told my husband that exact thought. What would luck have to do with me spending the time to print out coupons? As if anyone couldn’t do it…
This distant memory popped back into view as I read Catherine’s article at Frugal Homemaker Plus: Frugality and Luck. Once you read it, you’ll know why it reminded me of the cashier story! The choices we make to be deliberate with our actions and our money have nothing to do with luck. Sacrifices are born of determination, will, focus, and strong, concrete goals.

Are Frugal Sacrifices Worthwhile?

Are the sacrifices we make to live frugally really worthwhile? When you give up luxuries – items, vacations, services- does it necessarily mean you are lowering your quality of life? It depends on several things, and the qualifiers will be different for each person / family / situation. The big question is: What does money mean to you?
It is important to look at your large goals and make sure that the way you live now is helping you to get your money to be meaningful for you. Does your frugal life now allow you to reach your goals with your money?
My husband and I gladly skip movie rentals and eating fast food with the knowledge that the money we save by sacrificing is going to buy our family a home. Owning a home is important to us and that gives our money meaning, making our sacrifices worthwhile.
Conversely, what if you live a strict frugal lifestyle, denying yourself vacations and life experiences when all of your basic needs are already met? If your goals have already been reached, and you continue to deny yourself the use of your money “just because it’s better to save,” remember that money only has the value you give it. If your savings account is robust when you die, but you never did the things that were important to you, you will have lost the meaning of your frugality.
At times, we can start to feel down (see article When Budgeting Gets You Down) about being frugal, about choosing to not do things or not buy things. When people around you buy expensive gadgets or go out to fancy dinners every week, it is easy to feel deprived. Sometimes we even wonder how they can afford to spend money on these things when they don’t appear to make any more money than we do.
My husband and I remind each other at that point that they are probably living above their means, incurring credit card debt, and living for the moment instead of for their future goals. In a society where consumption is rampant and living above your means on borrowed money is the norm, frugal families are bound to feel out of place.
The biggest pick-me-up of all is when we pull up our savings account online and look at the balance of our house down payment account! Every time we skip a dinner out, we get $50 closer to our house. We keep our goals visible and real, and we physically look at our goal when the sacrifices seem too much. Thinking of the positives – what we DO have – instead of what we’re missing out on is enough to make frugal living worthwhile.
We originally published Are Frugal Sacrifices Worthwhile? on April 17, 2008.