I found out that if you spend money you don’t have the money anymore.

Spending more than you earn is the number one way to ensure a dismal financial future. Saving is next to godliness. Financial Independence is something you should strive for, not for the money, but for what it makes of you to become financially independent.

While the title may seem obvious and the feelings of distress caused by continuously being without money seem unbearable, there must be something else to the equation to explain why so many continue to live not only without capital but with high levels of debt, placing themselves on the losing side of the compound interest equation.

Finding the Financial Independence Movement is an important part of your financial literacy journey. For me, one of the big pillars was reading Early Retirement Extreme. The book gives great examples of just how far you can take things and then walk back a few steps to something you’re comfortable with.

Financial independence creates a goal worthy of postponing or putting off silly spending, often on something that you don’t need, the ultimate delayed gratification. Without FI as a Big Hairy Audacious goal, how some must see it, compounding interest seems like such an abstract topic.

While you can’t have your cake and eat it too, it’s worse for money because, in the current system of capitalism, holding money spins off more money. Learning to generate a profit, to save it, and then invest with it, is a foundation of success in life.