Photo by Karolina Grabowska
How to hack savings?
Are you finding it increasingly hard to save? You are not alone; a lot of people have experienced barriers that prevent saving. I have been drowning in the idea that the best life to live involves passion projects and spending quality time with family. As the economy recovers from the pandemic, it’s time to hit the ground running and save for the future. I’m talking about making your money work for you, so you can strictly work on passion projects. To me, that sounds like heaven.
In this article, I will discuss how to save alone, with a group of colleagues, and save for the future. There is a catch for all of this to work, you ready need to have a mental awareness of where you want to be financially in a few years. An article by Big think asks a question, How would you spend a $100 bill that you found on a sidewalk?
It is fair to say that we would spend it on items like Shopping, shoes or dinner. Reward and Habit systems in the brain work towards immediate gratification. Interrupting these systems and focusing on critical thinking in terms of saving can go a long way in achieving financial liberation.
The article continues to prove something we all know is true. It is easier to dump today’s problems on our future selves. – Brain hacks for saving money by Stephen Johnson.-
>https://www.quora.com/Why-cant-most-young-people-save-money<
Save Even if you are broke. This little habit allows you to develop a culture of saving regardless of your financial situation. This practice demonstrates that you can save with little resources and pumps you up for the future no matter how little. This way, you have a greater potential for saving when you have more resources. Also, saving Long term can convince your brain that it is very important to do so.
Create or Join a Sacco, A Saving and Credit Co-operating Society; another common way to save is with a CHAMA (an informal version of a Sacco). These kinds of organisations are built on Trust. In my life and are not that common in the west, at least not in the same ways. I belong to only one Chama, a family self-help group where we all contribute a fixed amount of money every 15th of every month. The combined funds either pay for Family Vacation or go out as financial loans to members in need.
Members of the group must have goals that align, this doesn’t mean that all the members’ needs are the same, but the outcome must be. In East Africa, organisations like this are formed by members who share a common bond like working for the same employer, belonging to the same church, working at the same market, or living in the same community.
Some SACCOS are also for the general public. Even employees of large corporate banks have formed their SACCOS. These models could go a long way in paying off student loans, or in the case of those who are still in school, they can contribute to paying your monthly tuition fees altogether.
Let’s go back to the article by Big think; there are ways to Hack your brain to get yourself committed to saving. I’ll leave you with an assignment, Download AgingBooth, use it, and imagine who the person you see is. What are their desires, and are they different from what they are today?
