Sharpen your tools

Proper tools can save you a lot of time. For example, chopping some wood with a blunt axe might take 2 hours while chopping with a sharp axe might take one hour. Chopping wood with a knife could take 20 hours, and chopping with your karate kicks could take several days.

All of this might look obvious, why should I spend 20 hours when I could do it in one hour? Usually we don't make such great mistakes in our tool selection. However, chopping with a blunt axe and chopping with a sharp axe are quite similar psychologically. In this area lies usual time wasters. Why we don't sharpen our axe? Here are some possible reasons.

- Laziness
We tend to live a life using as little energy as possible. Our mind thinks that sharpening and chopping is to complicated and it is simpler if we just go straight to chopping. That line of reasoning is OK when you have a sharp axe.

- Lack of "good" habits
A good habit is to check your tools before start doing anything. Train yourself to check tools you are about to use.

- Lack of information
You might have a habit to check your tools, but do you know how to that. For example, how do you know if you axe is sharp?

- Lack of skills
You should be able to prepare your tools for work. For example, you might know that your axe is blunt, but if you don't know how to sharpen it, you will have to use it as it is.

- Complete ignorance
It is possible that you are a complete novice in a certain area. In that case, you might use a knife instead of an axe.

What you should do?

1. Get information
If you don't know anything about chopping, find someone who knows. Ask what tools should you use, how to know if an axe is blunt, how to sharpen an axe, ...

2. Master sharpening skills
Mastering sharpening skills might take some time, but if you have to do it everyday it will pay out.

3. Develop a habit to check tools
Train yourself to check tools before starting any job. If necessary sharpen anything that is blunt.

Now, make a self inventory and find the tools you use, and if this could apply to your life.

Example: Carol works on computers and she waits for the response of her PC about 30 minutes per working day. With a new PC she would wait 15 minutes per working day. Upgrade costs 100$. Should she upgrade her PC or not?

Answer: Yes. Let's assume that her hourly wage is 10$. Saving 15 minutes per day will result with about 50 extra hours per day, meaning that investing 100$ will result with saving 500$ in working hours.

Five frugality tips for shopping

1. Reduce the number of shopping trips

Dedicate one day in week for shopping. Don't buy anything on other days. The reason for this is to reduce your exposure to temptations. At the moment when you decide to buy something, you are at risk to buy something else that you don't need that much, and that could be even harmful for you (alcohol, junk food, ...). Therefore, reduce the number of shopping trips and you will reduce the number of temptations and save money.

2. Buy from the list

Before shopping make a list of things that you want to buy. Buy only things that are on the list. Make the list even if you want to buy only one thing. Buying one thing is a waste of time and sign of bad organization. At each buy you spend some fixed amount of time (going to the shop, waiting to cross the street, ...) probably at least 5-10 minutes for shops that are in neighborhood. Imagine that you go shopping 10 times a week that takes 35-70 minutes. Shopping three times a week will take 15-30 minutes. The difference is about 30 minutes. Find your hourly wage and calculate how much money you can save only on your time (probably about 5$ per week).

3. Make a don't buy list

If you have problems with buying things that you don't need. Make a list of forbidden things (alcohol, junk food, ... ). Before buying anything read a list of things that you absolutely will not buy. Make a promise to your self or even somebody else.

4. Track your expenses

Note each thing you buy and its price. That will help you to memorize prices, find the things on which you spend the most of your money. Using this book keeping, you can now search for shops with the best offers for you. For example, you might find that groceries you usually buy costs 2$ less at shop A. That might sound little. But shopping 3 times a week, will result in saving 312$ per year.

5. Reduce shopping list

Go through your shopping list and ask yourself for each item "Is this item really really necessary?". If the answer is no delete it from the list. After that you could delete the most expensive item from the list. With that you will delay spending money.

You can now calculate how much money you can save. 312$ on better deals + 300$ on free time + 350$ on things that you don't need and therefore don't buy. In sum that will be 962$ per year.