This post is from staff writer Kristin Wong.

I’ve been saving up for a big purchase, so I’ve seriously tightened my budget. Staying within my own strict boundaries has been frustrating.

When I get frustrated, I call my mom. Recently, I vented about my finances to her.

She reminded me of her story of rising from poverty. Here we go again. She grew up poor in China; saved ten grand working part time at the grocery store. I’ve heard this story my whole life, though admittedly, I’ve never really listened.

“How’d you do it?” I asked. Something clicked, making me realize it’s pretty damn impressive to save that much while earning minimum wage and raising a kid alone.

My mom is no expert. She has no advice to give that we don’t already know. But her story inspired me to stick to my financial goal, and I think that counts for a lot.

“I wore the same clothes every day,” she told me, “because those were the only clothes I had.” My brother and I often spoof this story, teasing my mom for laying it on thick. But this time, I let her continue, instead of offering my usual, Yeah, yeah, I get it.

“When you were little,” she said, “most people would consider us dirt poor. But I didn’t. I know what dirt poor is. I remember those times.”

I could hear her voice drifting to a difficult place. “I remember picking up a piece of candy from the ground, that’s already been half-eaten, and putting it in my mouth, because I didn’t have any food,” my mom told me.

I still thought she was exaggerating, but then her voice cracked. I realized what was a tall tale to me was a very real place for her. This wasn’t a “back in my day” story. This was my mother’s painful memory.

She recalled an exciting childhood dream she had, which starred a loaf of raisin bread. “A whole loaf!” she exclaimed. “You never got a whole loaf! They didn’t even sell them by the loaf.” In her dream, the sight of that bread made her salivate. She could taste it. She opened her mouth to take a giant bite. Right as she was about to chomp down, she woke up.

“I tried to go back to sleep so I could take that bite,” my mom laughed. “I couldn’t. So I was awake, but I bit into it anyway, even though there was nothing there.”

Sacrifice

Her family moved to the States. Years passed. I was born. A single mom, she found part time work at Kroger. “How much did you make?” I asked. “I don’t remember what minimum wage was. I remember my paychecks being four hundred dollars. Yeah, that number sticks out to me.”

“Every two weeks?” I assumed.

“Every month,” she said, casually.

It wasn’t as bad as it sounds. We shared a one-bedroom apartment with my aunt, and rent was a mere $225. “Food was so cheap back then,” she added. “And interest rates were high.”

She didn’t have many expenses, and she got a better return on her savings than nowadays, but still. How does one go about saving five digits on a three-digit living?

Plain and simple sacrifice, my mom says. She cites hand-washing laundry, not turning on the TV, walking to work and winging it with childcare among some of those sacrifices. (My aunt and grandma would watch me when they could. When they couldn’t, it was bring-your-daughter-to-work day.)

But it wasn’t just about saving. It was about earning more, too. She took on as much overtime as possible and got a second job working at a nearby convenience store.

“What about fun money?” I asked.

“No fun!” my mom balked. “You find other ways of having fun. Go to the park and get on the swing.”

Playing devil’s advocate, I asked her what kind of life this was to live — constantly sacrificing, never enjoying anything. She sighed.

Perspective

“I had a bad experience to draw from, so it wasn’t a sacrifice,” she responded. “These things didn’t seem like sacrifices to me. I just did what I thought I needed to do.”

My mom has her past to draw from in order to stay motivated. I, on the other hand, have been frustrated because I can’t eat out as much if I want to afford some fancy video equipment. But listening to my mom choke up about her past, I was able to catch a glimpse of it and briefly put things into perspective. My definition of sacrifice is what most of the world would call lavish.

We all know this, and there’s no point in dwelling on it — except that seeing our situation through someone else’s eyes might help us stay motivated to reach our goals. Experiencing what she did, my mom had an advantage — she knew she could keep going. In a way, by telling me this story, she was passing the advantage on to me.

“I stuck to it”

My mom recalls a conversation she had with my aunt, “the person you should really be talking to,” she says.

My aunt stressed the importance of saving; my mom bemoaned her earnings. “Even if I could save, the most would be, what, five bucks a week?” That was before she was serious. “Why bother?”

“Even a quarter adds up,” my aunt told her. Finally, just to see how much it would add up, my mom decided to commit to saving. It was worth a shot, she thought. She wanted to see if my aunt was right. Her saving started as an experiment more than anything else.

“But once I started, I didn’t stop,” she told me. “I stuck to it. That’s why you had crappy clothes when you were little.”

Patience

One trait my mom has that’s always eluded me is patience. I guess when you’re poor, time is one of the few assets you have. My mom always took advantage of it.

“Time heals all,” she would say when I was young and crying over a breakup. She acknowledged how trite it sounded and always added, “But it’s true.” As someone who’s always on the go and trying to beat the clock, I’ve never understood my mother’s bond with time.

But when it comes to saving, this patience has worked in her favor.

After putting her mind to it, my mom soon had a hundred dollars. I remember seeing it in a shoebox in our closet once. Woah, a hundred bucks! I yelled, and my mom quickly hushed me, warning that you don’t announce things like that.

She put that money in a savings account, where it garnered something like “five percent or eight percent interest. Nothing like today.”

Six months and as much overtime as possible later, her $100 had grown into $1,000. She put it in a CD.

“Getting to ten thousand probably took me like, three or four years,” she recalls.

Seizing opportunities to save

“What about things like health insurance?” I asked. “It’s expensive to raise a kid.”

“Fully covered,” my mom said, remembering clearly. “I made sure to work enough overtime to be eligible. Anytime they offered overtime, I volunteered.”

Later, my mom would go back to school and focus on earning a real salary, but at this point on her financial journey, she was stuck.

Only, she didn’t see it as stuck. The more she got to work, the more she saw it as an opportunity to save. She says the overtime, high interest rates and low rent were “lucky breaks.”

“Not everyone sees overtime as lucky. Everybody gets lucky breaks, but it depends on you seeing it as a lucky break.”

“But what if you’re worth more?” I asked. “What if your time is more valuable than the overtime they’re offering?”

“Oh, I don’t know. When you’re poor, it’s not about how much you’re worth; it’s about how much you need.”

It sounded sensible, but part of me couldn’t help but find it sad. She reminded me of a guy she worked with. He was an engineer, making good money, she said. When the economy turned sour, he turned to the meat department at Kroger. “Of course he was worth more. But he was broke. What are you supposed to do?”

From overtime to interest rates to a job opening at Stop-N-Go, what others saw as normal, my mom saw as opportunity. She took full advantage.

“It’s like your Dad — ” she said, turning her voice into a whisper. ” — how your Dad used to be with money. When he changed his mind-set, he got this refund check. He said, ‘Gee, when you’re saving, money comes from nowhere.’ I told him, ‘No, these things happen all your life. But before, they were gone before you could think about it.”

To be fair, my dad is more money savvy than my mom in many ways. He’s taught me to negotiate, earn more and value my time, for example. But she convinced him to look for opportunities to save.

My mom’s story isn’t for everyone. Some would balk at it and argue that, sure, a quarter adds up, but it’s a realllllly slow way to get rich slowly. But considering where she is now, compared with that little girl eating trash from the street, I’m pretty damn impressed. It makes me think I can do even better, as she’s afforded me a better situation.

“I’m so happy where I am, and I feel like, financially, I’m blessed,” my mom now says. “But I do have regrets. I could have done better for you. You could have had better day care. You could have worn better clothes.”

And again, my mom starts to pause, and I can hear her tears, thinking about our past.

“Maybe you would have had better days, Kristin. I didn’t have to sacrifice for you. Your childhood could have been better.”

Ironically, those years include some of my very favorite memories. I had no idea we were giving anything up. If that’s sacrifice, I was happy to take one for the team.

GRS is committed to helping our readers save and achieve your financial goals.Savings interest rates may be low, but that’s all the more reason to shop for the best rate.Find the highest savings interest rate from Ally Bank, Capital One 360, Everbank, and more.

This post is by staff writer Honey Smith.

There are many personal finance books out there, useful to people in all stages of personal finance. I have a lot to learn before reaching financial independence, and the editorial elves thought it would be useful if I shared some of what I learn with you. So for the foreseeable future, I will be reviewing one PF-related book per month. My first review was of “All Your Worth.”

This month, I’m reviewing “Debt is Slavery: and 9 Other Things I Wish My Dad Had Taught Me About Money” by Michael Mihalik (no relation to Joe Mihalic, author of “No More Harvard Debt“). Like “All Your Worth,” J.D. originally reviewed “Debt is Slavery” on GRS here. (Persnickety copyediting note from Ellen: We are lowercasing “is” in the title because that’s how it is styled on the book. But the rule is that verbs in titles are capitalized — even if it’s a two-letter verb.)

Next time, I’ll review something that’s never been covered on GRS. But I think I bought this book after I read J.D.’s original review and never actually read it myself. I wanted to rectify that situation. Additionally, like “All Your Worth,” I wanted to see whether the book was as useful today as when J.D. originally reviewed it.

Philosophy behind the book

Like many with an interest in personal finance (including J.D.), Mihalik made financial mistakes when he was younger. By the time he woke up and smelled the coffee finances at age 24, he owed over $27,000 but was only making $28,500 per year.

He wrote this book mainly because he wasn’t satisfied with the other resources that were available when he began his debt-payoff journey. Many books were really long, and he wanted to get started right away — not slog through an encyclopedia.

Additionally, he felt that many of the books on personal finance were just advertising. One of the 10 things he wished his dad had taught him was “Don’t let advertising brainwash you.” As a result, he wondered if he could trust authors who were trying to promote their other products.

As a result, “Debt is Slavery” is short. At 120 pages or so, it can be read in an afternoon. Additionally, Mihalik didn’t try to create a name/brand within the PF industry. He wrote this book and then faded from the limelight. While I do think there’s a place for established names, Mihalik successfully establishes his credibility as someone who’s not out to part you from your money.

What I didn’t like

There were a few things I didn’t like about the book. First, while I empathize with the fact that his father died while he was young, I wondered where his mother factored in all this. He suggests that if he had only had a mentor/teacher during his early adult years, then he might not have ended up in financial trouble. Was his mom a negative example and he just doesn’t want to throw her under the bus? Did it never occur to him to seek her help? This hole in the narrative frustrated me.

Second, he was a bit obsessed with Stuff. The most notable example of this is that he kept bringing up boats as items that are expensive to own and that could/should be sold if you are starting a debt-payoff journey. While I can’t deny the truth of that, I also wonder how many people have boats lying around. Maybe I have a hard time relating because my debt was for education, not stuff.

Third, his description of his accomplishment was a bit misleading. He says he paid off all his debt except his car loan in just over a year. Since his car loan accounted for $13,000 of his total debt, he only really paid off half his debt in a year. Obviously that’s still impressive. But why did he keep that car loan? When did he finally pay it off?

There is a section on his car-buying philosophy. However, it’s about 70 pages after he mentions not paying his car loan back right away. The very first question he suggests asking of someone who is trying to give you advice is “has he done what he is teaching?” Since he doesn’t connect his car-buying section back to his own debt-payoff story, it’s hard to tell what the answer to that question is here.

Things I loved

Although Mihalik lists 10 things he wishes his dad would have taught him, the ideas that debt is slavery and that money is time are the big takeaways. The first thing that I really loved about this book was the idea that you should think of the price of something not in terms of dollars, but in terms of how long it took you to earn those dollars.

For example, you wouldn’t say to yourself, “That book costs $25.” Instead, you’d say, “That book costs two hours at work.” That gives you an additional criterion to determine whether something is worth the price to you. If the book costs two hours of my life but will take me 50 hours to read, that’s a pretty good value. A DVD, on the other hand, might cost the same two hours of my life to buy, but only take two hours to watch. Now I know where my money’s going!

I really liked his chapter on controlling your money and planning your finances, largely because the method he uses is very similar to mine. His debt-payoff method is also solid advice, though it’s essentially the debt snowball method.

However, he doesn’t simply have you add up your income and expenses for the month. While that’s the first step, he also asks you to plan with a calendar and note when your paychecks arrive and when your payments are due. That way you can adjust due dates if necessary and make sure there aren’t times in the month where you’re in the red. Especially if you’re at the beginning of your personal finance journey and every dollar counts, this can be vital.

Who should read “Debt Is Slavery”

If you’ve been reading GRS for awhile now, you’ve probably already been exposed to most of the ideas in Mihalik’s book. However, if you’re a new reader and want to get a complete overview of sound PF philosophy, “Debt is Slavery” is a solid choice. Better still, if you know someone who is just getting interested in paying off their debts, this is a great recommendation.

Similarly, if you’ve got children who are grown up and leaving the nest, tuck this into their suitcase. Since the author was so young when he accumulated his debt, his stories about why he wanted to be “cool” would resonate with the college-aged. If your kids are recent graduates with some debt, the fact that Mihalik paid his debt off on such a low entry-level salary would be really motivational and show just how much is possible if you’re determined.

Have you read “Debt is Slavery”? What did you think? What other books would you like to see reviewed on GRS?

GRS is committed to helping our readers save and achieve your financial goals.Savings interest rates may be low, but that’s all the more reason to shop for the best rate.Find the highest savings interest rate from Ally Bank, Capital One 360, Everbank, and more.

This post is from staff writer Kristin Wong.

I mentioned in my last post that I read Barbara Stanny’s “Secrets of Six-Figure Women.” Stanny interviewed 150 women who earn more than $100,000 annually and sought to find what traits, experiences and motivators they shared in common.

Unlike most books, this one didn’t take me three months to finish. It’s a fast read, and I think that has a lot to do with how relatable it is. I’m not saying I fit the bill for every six-figure trait Stanny has outlined; but you can’t help but compare yourself to the high-earning women she’s interviewed.

Although the book is meant to empower women, I think much of Stanny’s research is every bit as helpful to men. Here are the strategies and milestones of high earners Stanny outlines in the book. Some of them hit home; others I questioned. Tell me what you think.

Declaring your intention

Stanny says all the high-earners she interviewed got their start by declaring an intention to profit.

“Each women would describe that point in her life when she says to herself, ‘It’s time to make some money.’… When you recognize the power of the profit motive, you take your first major step toward financial success.”

Six-figures or not, I think most of us can relate to this one. At an early age, I decided I would grow up to earn a healthy living. There was so much we couldn’t afford when I was kid; I wanted to be comfortable enough to afford those things as an adult. Whether it’s getting rich, earning more or simply getting out of debt, I think most of us have experienced this milestone. For high earners, this is just the beginning.

Letting go

Stanny uses the metaphor of hanging on the edge of a cliff. If you could just let go, you’ll experience all kinds of high-earning opportunities, but most of us are too terrified to stop clinging. It’s simple: “You must let go of where you are to get to where you want to go.”

Sometimes the cliff is a low-paying but stable job. Sometimes it’s an unhealthy relationship — the cliff is whatever keeps you from taking the plunge into success.

“How do you know when you’ve been holding on too long to a ledge? There’s one irrefutable clue. Whenever you feel stuck, it’s time to let go.”

In my decision to pursue a different career, “letting go” was the most difficult part. I had good friends, a decent-paying job, and I lived near my family. It was a great life, but I felt stuck. Letting go was tough, but it was worthwhile.

“Every successful woman I interviewed, when she finally let go (hard as it was), cited that single act as the springboard to higher earnings and happier times.”

As much as I can relate to this strategy, I also find it to be the scariest. Is it always a good idea to let go? Should anyone let go? What if you have children to think about? One part of Stanny’s advice made me feel a bit less apprehensive:

“Take your time. Who says you have to rush into anything? Sometimes it’s better to gradually let go of a ledge than to take a flying leap. That’s often what most of the women I talked to did. Instead of going cold turkey, they released their grip little bits at a time.”

‘Get in the game’

Get in the game, just do it, power through — however you want to say it, I think this is the most important strategy on the path to earning more: the work. Stanny rounds up a few rules for trucking through the heart of the journey:

Decide which game to play

She echoes the words of motivational speaker Larry Wilson, who told her there are two games in life. “The one most of us are playing, called Not to Lose, is an avoidance game. We’re so afraid of taking risks, looking bad, that we never really win.” The other game, Wilson says, is “To Win.” People who play To Win are willing to take risks and, yes, even expect some losses along the way. But people who play Not to Lose are more concerned with comfort and convenience.

“The desire to avoid fear … is what keeps most of us in the Not to Lose game — and in low-paying jobs.” Stanny writes.

Jump in

Even if you don’t know where to start, it’s important to just get started, she says.

“You don’t need all the pieces in place or your route all mapped out … jumping in cold can be very scary … it’s especially disconcerting at the very beginning, when you’re not quite sure what you’re doing … Unfortunately, a lot of people bail out before they realize how close they are to taking the prize.”

Keep on truckin’, Stanny says, once you jump in.

I can’t help but think of a personal example in which this advice is a little cringe-worthy. As a kid, my friend’s parents opened their own business. It was killing them financially. After some time, the father wanted to back out, but the mother insisted they keep on trucking. Long story short, it set them back for quite a few years, until, eventually, they surrendered. Should they have kept going?

I hate to seem cynical and counter this empowering advice. But what do you think? When does “keep on truckin” become “feeling stuck”?

Grab opportunities

If you start the game To Win by jumping in and play it by persevering, you succeed at it by grabbing opportunity, says Stanny.

“I can’t tell you how many of these women’s success stories started out with a lucky break. The truth is, everyone’s life is full of happenstance. The ‘lucky’ ones realize that in every synchronicity lies potential opportunity and are quick to capitalize chance occurrences.”

Recently, I was talking to my mom about this. She noted that, when you make a financial decision — to start saving, for example — these “chance occurrences” are usually things that are always there. You just see them more clearly because you’re focused.

A couple of other rules Stanny mentions: avoid excuses and ignore naysayers.

• “Some of the women I interviewed had valid explanations for why they couldn’t succeed … the true test of a six-figure woman is her refusal to buy into these pretexts.”
• “[Naysayers] actually perform a valuable service. They come to test our level of commitment … if you’re determined to succeed in spite of these killjoys, then you most certainly will.”

Thick skin is another rule. The author points out that high earners never personalize criticism. Anyone who writes for the Internet can certainly relate to that one.

Negotiate and speak up

Admittedly, this is the strategy I find most difficult. I’ve often bragged that I’ve never had to ask for a raise, but looking back, this isn’t much to brag about.

“I heard this same rueful observation from virtually all the women who were slow to hit the six-figure mark. Call it the Lament of the Latecomers. Their greatest regret was their reluctance to speak up.”

I can recall one instance that should’ve taught me the importance of speaking up. I once worked in retail. My coworker bragged that she got a raise. I didn’t, even though we’d started at the same time and both worked hard. This was the only time in my life that I’ve ever asked for a raise (sorry, I lied), and here’s how my boss responded:

“Ridiculous. This is why I tell you not to discuss your pay. I’ve already given you a raise. I just didn’t tell you about it.”

I kicked my sixteen-year-old self for speaking up.

However, I later discovered that she hadn’t already given me the raise; paperwork proved otherwise. Maybe she planned on it, maybe, but she certainly hadn’t done anything to initiate it. My coworker was earning more for a full month before my raise was processed. “If you wouldn’t have asked, she would not have given it to you,” my Dad insisted. He’s always encouraged me to speak up, and this should have taught me that lesson. Unfortunately, it’s still something I’m working on.

All of the advice Stanny has in her book is powerful and inspiring. I can even vouch for the strategies I’ve had experience with.

But I can also understand how some of this advice might seem too risky. In describing some of it to my boyfriend and mother, they instinctively pulled back their teeth.

I can imagine some instances in which people “jumped in” and “let go,” and it didn’t work out so well for them. I can’t help but wonder, if she had interviewed people who “lost it all,” how many traits they would share with the high earners?

Again, I’m definitely not discouraging — merely questioning. While I’m not quite a six-figure earner, I think I’ve done pretty well for myself by utilizing some of these strategies. But I can see someone looking at them with a more skeptical eye.

So what do you think? Is “let go” and “jump in” necessary for women (or men) who want to earn more? Or can this backfire? Do you have experience with any of these strategies — if so, was it a negative or positive experience?