Skipping the pricey coffee and bargain hunting won’t get you ahead

Maybe you’re doing everything you think you should be doing: hunting for discounts, packing lunches, skipping coffees. But you end up feeling exhausted, with little progress to show for it.

You can’t figure out what’s wrong – are you just not built to be good with money? Maybe you don’t earn enough? Maybe it’s the economy, you know … inflation? Maybe others just got lucky?

All of that could be part of it. But in my experience, there’s also another factor that’s often at play.

Having supported countless people in achieving big financial goals, I’ve noticed that one thing that makes a big difference to the size of your results is how big you’re willing to play.

To cut the cost of your wants, you’ll need to make some sacrifices.Credit: Marija Ercegovac

Often people aren’t taking the big actions that are required to get them the results they really want. They’re stuck playing $10 or $100 games instead of playing $1000 or $10,000 games.

So much financial content focuses on small, quick wins because these feel safer and easier in the short term. The problem is that small actions lead to small results. Sure, it’ll add up over time, but skipping a $4 coffee every day for a year is still just $1460. That’s not nothing, but it might feel woefully inadequate compared to what’s needed for bigger goals like buying a house.

If you want bigger financial results, you might want to start making bigger financial moves. Here’s why you might be playing small, and what will help you start playing bigger.

Prioritise growth over comfort

The reason you might be stuck playing small is because that’s your comfort zone. It’s comfortable to find another budgeting app or spreadsheet, shop for bargains and penny pinch. You know how to do it. You’ve done it before. It’s not scary. It feels safe and familiar.

Meanwhile, figuring out the right portfolio for your super, learning how to invest, creating an automated savings system, or understanding taxes enough to maximise tax incentives are all uncomfortably unfamiliar territory. It feels too complicated, too hard, too risky. So you avoid it.

But that’s where the growth is. That’s where the “big wins” are. If you’re too scared to do the things that will actually get you results, you’ll always be stuck playing small.

Detach from the outcome

The more you care about money, the harder it might be for you to make bigger moves. Ironic, I know. We tend to think that in order to be good with money, you need to care about money.

This is true, to an extent. You can’t be disengaged and careless, but at the same time, if you care too much, you will be overly detailed, perfectionist, and micromanage every detail.

This makes it much harder to play big. It’s easy to get so busy stuck in the details that you don’t have time or capacity to take the bigger opportunities. You might also find yourself getting so attached to every dollar that you have a hard time allowing yourself to take the risks that are required to grow wealth longer term.

The idea of potentially losing your money in investments will scare you so much you won’t want to do it. The idea of getting a decision wrong will scare you so much you’ll stall for months on making it. If you get anxious over $10 decisions, you’ll have a tough time getting yourself to make $10,000 decisions.

You can’t build long-term wealth on a short-term mindset.Credit: Getty

To make bigger financial moves, you have to let go a little. How? This partly comes with building confidence in your ability to make good financial decisions, and learning to enjoy the process of building wealth and managing your finances instead of fixating only on the outcome.

Dream a little bigger

If you’re playing small, there’s a good chance you’re not dreaming big enough. Why stop yourself at getting excited over saving $50, when you could be saving $500 or $5000?

Part of the reason people have a hard time dreaming big is because they’re scared it’s not possible, and they’re worried about disappointment or failure. But it doesn’t cost to dream. You don’t have to share your dreams with anyone. It’s a pretty low-risk endeavour.

How do you think you would show up differently if you added a few zeros to your current dreams? What actions or strategies would you be taking that you’re not right now? The trick is to stretch yourself just a little – it should feel exciting, not overwhelming or daunting.

While there is a lot of wisdom in taking small steps that build up over time, there’s a good chance that if you stretched yourself a little, you could be taking larger steps than you’re taking right now. You could be making bigger moves, that would inevitably lead to bigger results.

Paridhi Jain is the founder of SkilledSmart which helps adults learn to manage, save and invest their money through financial education courses and classes.

• Advice given in this article is general in nature and not intended to influence readers’ decisions about investing or financial products. They should always seek their own professional advice that takes into account their own personal circumstances before making any financial decisions.

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