The stuff that makes you unhappy is actually stuff

In the 1990s, Graham Hill could be foun­­d in a giant house with the latest electronics, cars and appliances. Today his 420-square-foot studio apartment is populated with six dress shirts, 10 bowls for food and no CDs or DVDs.

courtesy of Crate Barrel

He considers his life today, “a bigger, better, richer life with less,” according to a New York Times article.
Hill’s motto is that you can live with a lot less and be happier. He discovered this after he sold an Internet start-up, became financially independent and bought everything he wanted. But eventually his stuff didn’t make him happy any more.

So actually more stuff makes us less happy. This inspires me to eliminate like half of my stuff.

A UCLA study showed that mothers’ stress levels increase when they have to deal with all the stuff in their homes. Based on observations of 32 middle-class families, a mother’s hormones spike during the time she spent cleaning and tidying up belongings.

“Intuitively, we know that the best stuff in life isn’t stuff at all, and that relationships, experiences and meaningful work are the staples of a happy life,” Hill said.

When you think about it, Americans have waaaay too much stuff.

 75 percent of us can’t park our cars in their garages because they have so many things stored there. Americans' penchant for accumulating things supports a $22 billion personal storage industry.

From iheartjunkremoval

Hill said his life became fuller and happier when he ended up moving into a small apartment and he eliminated most of his stuff.

“I like material things as much as anyone,” Hill wrote in the article. “I studied product design in school. I’m into gadgets, clothing and all kinds of things. But my experiences show that after a certain point, material objects have a tendency to crowd out the emotional needs they are meant to support.”

Gene Hong

I dare say my dad is one of the smartest people I know. Some may argue that I haven't met a lot of people, but my response would be "then you probably haven't met my dad."

I am continually amazed at how knowledgeable my dad is and at times wonder what he doesn't know.

But his biggest passion - as you may have guessed it - would probably be finances. Of course that's not including family and church.

I know my last post had a little bit about my dad, but I didn't really go into detail about why having my dad's approval for being financially savvy was so important to me.

In my family my dad is known as financial guru .... okay maybe not publically but let's be honest, we all think that.

He could spend hours telling you the details about the stock market, why it's important to clip coupons, teaching you how to budget and quoting famous financial speakers such as Suze Orman.

Gifts at time tend to be book about how to be financially smart. And family meetings were us gathering around learning about how to stay out of debt, interest rates, taxes and credit cards.

Though many times these meetings would put me to sleep. I always held on to the handouts he gave because I knew he knew what he was talking about.

You see, my dad was first born in America, where his parents traveled from China. His parents owned many Chinese restaurants in Utah trying to save up some money to get by. But the business wasn't a huge money maker.

Leaving restaurant business my dad and my mom were able to put themselves through college and raise four kids. We never once went in debt, and we never once had to worry about not having a home to live in. We were able to go on trips to see the beauty of the United States and other surrounding areas and we were able to be cultured through going to museums and plays.

We lived a good life.

Unfortunately, none of us were good at sports, extraordinarily smart or anything else that would deem us a college scholarship. And yet, without going in debt or asking others for money my dad was able to earn and save up enough money to put all of us kids through college, and buy us each a working, reliable car as an aide for college life.

From poverty to a healthy financial stability, I know it was because of my dad's careful studying, perseverance and living without that helped my family feel like we had everything.

So thank you dad for giving me a life where I had everything I ever wanted and more. And for not just holding that knowledge for yourself but for taking the time to teach all of us kids how to be financial savvy so we too can help our future kids feel like they have everything.

The 3 battling F's of life

When married at 20 with still two more years of undergrad and an additional two years of grad school ahead of her, Elaine Lake knew it would mean being creative. Fortunately, she married a creative man and so started small ways to live happily on a students budget, which is generally non-existant.

Warren and Elaine Lake and me when I was 16. Oh and also their adorable first baby.

So when I lived with them when  was 16 I learned that having fun and being frugal and ... can't remember what the third 'F' was, was possible. It was a wonderful summer time and I soon learned you could have fun without spending money. These were some of our activities:
-subscribed to the month trial of Netflix and got all of our movie wish-lists fulfilled in a month.
- Went on picnics
-Used the cities free family pass that came out once a month to go to the children's museum
- went on lots of walks
- Found a fountain so we didn't melt
- Hiked
- Cooked fancy meals just because
- Made random cards for normal occasions just for fun
- Went running to the dollar store in the evenings

When I think of the other 'F' I will let you know. But thanks to the Lakes for the cheap entertaining summer.

Discovering being cheated while getting dad's approval

I don't think there's many things I want my dad's approval for. But being financially smart is one of them. Since I've been married I've been clipping out coupons, studying the local grocery ads and I even got myself a handy coupon organizer.

I've saw my dad during the holiday season and I just "happened" to have my coupon book laying out.... in a place that he could see it. "Oh what's that dad? Oh that's just my coupon book."

"Alright!" my dad exclaims with a proud father smile on his face. That's right, strike a point in Erin's direction for being financially savvy. 

When he'll call I'll occasionally mention "Luke and I just saved $20 on our grocery bill...." It doesn't get quite the effect as seeing his face brighten up but by the tone of his voice I'm sure he was beaming.

I was so excited to have a Costco card in my strides to become financially smart. And with a place for just me and Luke I thoroughly enjoyed stocking up on our favorite items. 

But then, just like every friendship, relationship and job, you've got to make sure they are as trusting as they say they are. And thus began my untrusting relationship with Costco.

I started with price checking the laundry detergent, dishwasher soap, shampoo, conditioner and body wash. Did I go a little extreme? Maybe. But I had to know... was Costco cheating on me??

I begun price checking things from Smith's to Costco - since those are the stores we frequent. I tried rationalizing that Costco gets a slight unfair advantage because coupons for bulk items aren't found in RedPlum coupons that fill my mailbox. 

But even without the coupons, I had to be real. 

Costco was just not the place I thought it was going to be. 

All of those items were cheaper at Smith's. I hung my head down in disappointment as I walked out of Costco empty handed. 

Don't get me wrong, I haven't completely kicked Costco to the curb. I still maintain a relationship with it, though I'm a lot more cautious. Costco keeps me coming back like a sweet-talker. 

Yet, when I left the parking lot headed towards Smith's I couldn't help think "I can't wait to tell my dad about my new savvy discovery and hear his proud father voice."  

What do good humans do?

On Tuesday I saw Beasts of the Southern Wild for the 4th time. I love absolutely everything about that film. Its raw, honest, generous storytelling is rich with answers to the most important question good art can ask: what does it mean to be a good human? [[full disclosure: literature geek talking here]]

Sidenote: as much as I loved J-Law in Sliver Linings Playbook (and I really, really did!),  Quvenzhane Wallis deserved to win the Academy Award for her performance in this film. Stunning.

"You da man!"

Most importantly, every time I see it, I walk away with a heart flowing with love and the desire to be a better person.

I am inspired by the characters. Hushpuppy, her dad (Wink) and the rest of the citizens of The Bathtub live off the land and--essentially--other people's trash. They are resourceful suns a guns. I really admire that wild self-reliance.

Reflecting on this, I wonder how I can be more like them? I mean, I'm privileged to have never needed to kill a chicken with my bare hands. I can afford to buy a new shirt every now and then. Not as many new clothes as I would like, but enough. My roof keeps the rain out. Society has never rejected me.

But being like Hushpuppy and Wink doesn't neccessarily mean living that life. It means working every day to snuggle myself into the self-reliant category. What do self-reliant humans do?

Beasts poses several answers: 

The self-reliant build beautiful places. 

The self-reliant never stop surviving.

 "It wasn't no time to sit around cryin' like a bunch of babies."

And, most importantly,
 

The self-reliant take care of things smaller and sweeter than they are. 

Frugality isn't simply a matter of living within means. It is a matter of living in such a way that one is secure enough to help someone else survive. Even if it's only a bit of encouragement. Or a meal. Or shoes. Or help getting a job.

We all have something worthwhile to give. 

.........................Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand one more video, because duh...I have a crush on Wink. 

No shame. 

Chunky milk and all

It was a normal day my freshman year when I realized my parents were more than your average frugal.
"Seriously? Gross!" my roommate said in reference to me smelling my sour milk, putting the lid back on and placing it back in the fridge deciding it wasn't sour enough to not be able to eat with cereal.

It seemed fine to me. The thing is, I remember mom cooking with milk that was so sour it had clumps in it.

Known for not throwing food away unless it's absolutely not salvageable, my sister and I once cleaned out the freezer while my mom was out of town to get rid of things we considered inedible but she didn't. Amazingly though, even with garden-grown beans frozen since 2000, Mom's meals are still lovely. 

I've long looked up to my parents frugality whether it's creatively using up leftovers (the blenderized soups were my least favorite) do-it-yourself projects that most people would give up on in frustration, patching my favorite jeans for the fourth time, or creating super cheap and creative school projects.

 They know how to save so when the time comes to party with traveling and family, they sure know how to do it.

Extreme couponing: Utah style

During my almost 2-month stint of being jobless I occasionally enjoyed watching TLC's show Extreme Couponing. It was crazy to see how low they could get their prices with just a little bit of planning. 

Besides watching occasional TV I attended a networking meeting provided by the LDS Employment services. My last time attending I found out about the Utah Deal Diva from Jessica's brother-in-law. He told me that Jessica, the Utah Deal Diva, discovered different ways to save money after her husband lost his job. She loved it so much she decided to create a blog out of it.

What I immediately loved was that she wanted to share with people her great saving tips and was able to create a job from it! She lists different tips of how to coupon, find the coupons you want and even how to make cheap healthy meals. Seriously, what more do you want? 

Okay there was one thing, she's from Utah! This is a great bonus for me because she'll give tips on local places too. How cool is it that there's basically an "extreme couponer" in my hometown - one that I can imitate my life after so that I too can be a savvy shopper.