I was never very good at saving money, I am impulsive and if I have money laying around I feel the urge to go spend it and regret it soon after. On the black-friday of 2021, I discovered, however, that I can manipulate my own willpower by postponing the date I want to buy stuff. I still feel impulsive and want to spend but I lie to myself that I am going to buy whatever it is tomorrow and just do not buy it today.
To illustrate it, I kind of need a new laptop, my main one broke down and I am using a 10 year old one, it works and is powerful (Alienware 18) but it literally has no battery and weights over 5kg. Since last November I have been searching for good deals on laptops but telling myself "ok, this is a good price, I will buy it tomorrow if the price stays the same, maybe it will even drop further" and by doing that I have managed to not buy anything for 2, almost 3 months.
I even started cutting on expenses like taking Uber, eating out, and streaming services, in order to save money for a better laptop, but because I kept lying to myself that I am going to buy tomorrow, without ever actually buying it, I realized I have learned to actually save money.
I still need a laptop, and it is risky having only one since I depend on it to get work done (although I think the company should provide computers to employees but I digress), so I do need to buy a new one, but saving money becomes addictive. I have the money to buy a good laptop up front, but I don't want the feeling of spending money again. I may say I became cheap, but I like the feeling.
I may even need to come up with a strategy to convince myself to spend this money on a laptop because I became too good at not spending it for my own good.
CES 2022 is coming next week and with it, new laptops will be announced at it, so I may buy a new laptop after their presentations, but one thing I know for sure:
