Happy New Year!

I hope all of you have had a good holiday season and feel ready to face the year ahead. I got to spend some time with my family and good food, and that always feels like a celebration to me.

Celebrating is really important, no matter how grim things may seem. It's all a matter of your perspective. We can have a big pot of chili on the table, an inexpensive meal, and it feels like a party because we're together. I urge you this year to make more memories with the people you love. It will make a difficult economy a lot easier to tolerate.

I don't know if you're into New Year's Resolutions but I am. I make one every year and it's generally detailed and outlined. Not a huge general thing like "I'm going to lose weight" but "I am going to do this by changing or adding habits x, y, and z." I also find it easier to add habits than take away habits.

This year, for me, is all about getting back into enjoying life. I work so many hours and spend so much time at the computer that it feels like life is passing me by sometimes. And while it may seem silly to some to focus on pleasure when the economy is so grim, when IS the perfect time to embrace happiness? Something is always going to be in our way. We'll be too sick, too fat, too old, too broke forever more. There's no perfect time, so it might as well be now.

Part of our philosophy on OP's sister site, The Frugalite, is that you can achieve Big Goals, like travel or college without debt or early retirement. You can nearly always have one area of magnificent splurge in your life, but there are other areas of strict frugality to fund it. What you choose is unique to you. One hundred people would probably have one hundred different ways they imagine as ideal.

That isn't what most folks do, however, focusing on one big splurge. They try to spread the splurge around to all areas of life, and then they just can't pay for it all. Then they don't end up doing the one thing that will make them happy because they can't afford it.

So, I'll be taking some drastic steps to cut expenses in some areas this year to fund some travel and exploration. I'm never happier than when I'm having an adventure. And even better, it spills over - that happiness makes me more creative and more productive.

I hope that you have some big dreams for the year ahead and that every single one of them comes true.

Love,
Daisy

Whether you like it or not, the economy will force us to change the way we spend money - or the way we don't. How you handle it depends a lot on your state of mind.

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