Your Money or Your Life – Official Website – Vicki Robin

One of the few personal finance blogs I read on a regular basis is Get Rich Slowly by J.D. Roth.  He had two great posts in the past few days that I wanted to share with you.  The first one was about (more…)

David Brooks and I don’t always see eye to eye, but his Oped in the NYTimes today is a ten. In The Next Culture War he speaks pragmatically and strongly for the moral imperative of material restraint – a stand that will make strange (and wonderful) bedfellows. He says:

If there is to be a movement to restore economic values, it will have to cut across the current taxonomies. Its goal will be to make the U.S. again a producer economy, not a consumer economy. It will champion a return to financial self-restraint, large and small…A crusade for economic self-restraint would have to rearrange the current alliances and embrace policies like energy taxes and spending cuts that are now deemed politically impossible. But this sort of moral revival is what the country actually needs.

Why the need for a “moral revival” now? Well, the signature of the US has been, since the beginning, two values that restrain one another: greed and frugality. (more…)

When we updated Your Money or Your Life last year, we took out a lot of the hints and tips on how to save money in chapter 6.   We knew that some of them had become outdated and that the Internet had emerged as a new and powerful cost-cutting tool.  Today, I want to share with you three ways that I recently used the web to save money:  (more…)

Your Money or Your Life helps you live within your means. Below your means, really, so you liberate yourself from debt, excess and overwork. Did you know, though, that our collective human consumption has an “enough point” – a limit of spending beyond which more isn’t better. Yesterday, September 25, was Earth Overshoot Day, according to the Ecological Footprint. When we’re kids we often weren’t aware how little allowance we had left until it was almost gone. Same with the earth’s resources… (more…)

A woman who attended one of our workshops in NYC recently sent me an article on how a family shed $106,000 in debt.  If you or someone you know is feeling overwhelmed by money issues, I encourage you to read this article and forward it further.  It’s quite inspiring.     

Also, if you have any interest in examining the true value of a college education, I encourage you to check out this article which was posted recently on Get Rich Slowly.  Since the costs of college have risen so much faster than inflation, it’s always useful to  (more…)

Last week we received the following email:

Just wondering if you might address the issue of those of us who have recently lost everything financially when our long-time industries took a dive, and are starting over? It’s clear as a bell what “enough” is now. If you have cautions or suggestions as we start over, we’d love to hear your advice. Your book is such an inspiration!

Vicki and I were both moved by this message.  The idea of having someone lose all the money they’ve worked so hard to save is a trial we wish no one had to endure. But the bright tone of the email above suggested that this person was going to overcome the setback just fine. I reflected on what I would do in such a situation and recommended the following ideas: (more…)

We’re going to be writing in months to come about the dinosaur economy (dying out but still dangerous) and the new economy, the shape of things to come, as described in a recent article (link below). Disoriented and scared, many people are madly looking for a new winning formula – a new way to make money on their money, a new way to be secure and to profit, a new way to make the old way work. Our view is that the smart money is on Your Money or Your Life like strategies: (more…)

Financial independence – ahhh, what a dream! Doing as you please, not as you must. Having all the money you need without needing a job. Travel. Adventure. Relaxation. Time to write that book you’ve been thinking about for years.

Well, I’ve been there and done that since I was 25 years old. (more…)

Goldilocks was right. There’s a place of pleasure where things aren’t too hot, aren’t too cold, but just right.

That “just rightness” is available to us in every domain of life, but it takes practice. Lots of it in a culture that says nothing and no one is ever enough. To call “too muchness” an addiction is to blame the victim of a culture of excess. We’re habituated, yes. But we can stop at enough. It’s neither easy nor obvious, but when you get the hang of it, you’ll want it always and everywhere. I want to share tools with you for doing that in my upcoming telecalss Discover your Enough Point. Teachers, therapists, writers, financial planners, leaders, coaches, public servants, workers, shoppers  and all people willing to grow will benefit. Here’s the skinny (more…)

I went to the doc yesterday (nothing serious) and it became something of a confessional during my treatment. Hearing I’d written Your Money or Your Life he at first was dismissive (oh i read all those money books), then curious, then confessional. He’s been a wise tighwad for years (his ex hadn’t been, ergo ex)  but his nest egg lost half its value in the stock market plumet. Which is why he was treating me rather than fishing – he can’t afford to retire. A recent AP article (link below) (more…)