Pay Yourself First

Most people approach saving by waiting till the end of the month seeing whats left an saving that amount. This approach is the wrong mindset and while you may save some you probably won't save as much as you would if you were to Pay Yourself First.


There's nothing fancy to this approach when you get paid you pay into your savings before you pay any bills, Some people may argue that they would worry about running out of money before the end of the month and not have enough left to pay bills. If you do look like you will not have the money left to pay all your expenses come to the end of the month you have two clear options,



Cut back on some of your expenses. make the decision to not go out for dinner this month, cut back of some other luxury items you may normally purchase.
Up your income. That doesn't mean going out to find a higher paying job. This could be simply selling some of the stuff around your house that you never really use anymore. That Christmas present you haven't touched since you opened them last year.

There is a reason that experts advise that you go to the gym first thing in the morning and it's not for physiological reasons. It's all to do with psychological reasons. You wake up thinking I will leave the gym this morning and go on my lunch break, then you get to lunch you are too busy and put it off again until after work. Suddenly you end up working late or making the kids dinner and the gym gets put off completely. It's the same kind of reasons that lead to you not saving at all come to the end the month. That new watch was just to good a deal to turn down. You starting thinking it's ok I'll just make sure I save next month. Next month comes around and you have an issue with your car and you can't afford to save again this month but not to worry you'll have a nice watch too show for it.


Paying yourself first I would say is the first step that you need to take to achieve financial freedom. Firstly you should look at your income and expenses and figure out what you think we can afford to save. During this process, you may find ways that you can make changes to your lifestyle to allow you to save more. This could be from bringing lunch into work with you or canceling the gym membership you haven't used since last January.


The next step would be to set a payment goal if you can only afford a small amount now try and up that figure in small amounts for future payments. Try and set a goal for the figure you want to be able to pay yourself and work towards that goal as soon as possible. Dreams without goals are just that dreams.


One book that will keep mentioning is



Rich Dad Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not!






it's very easy to read and was really eye-opening to what changes can be made to help us achieve financial freedom.


https://amzn.to/2PTtAoV

Starting The Journey

• Who am I

First things first, who am I? Paul Green currently living in Dublin Ireland originally from the UK. I moved to Ireland with my partner who grew up in this area 5 years ago. We have 2 beautiful daughters and they are my reason why. Currently, I am part of the accounts team for 1 of the largest hospitality group in Ireland.

• Why am I doing it 

So, why have I started doing this blog? After a conversation with a close friend early this year, I realised I wasn't getting any younger. I needed to start looking towards retirement. At first, I thought I'm not even 30, why would I need to look towards retiring? that seems a million miles away. A few YouTube videos later and it opened my eyes completely. I needed to start investing and I had no choice but to start right there and then. This blog is all about documenting my journey and trying to learn something new every day. I plan to use this as a platform to connect with other people on the same journey and pick their brain a little. If this, in turn, inspires others to get financially free that will be amazing. 

• What am I blogging about

If you haven't guessed it already this is going to be about investing and all the different forms of it, Creating a portfolio that will grow for retirement. For everyone in my shoes that is new to investing I hope this will be a chance for you to join me on the journey, And for everyone who has the experience of being a lot further along on their own journey, I hope to be a sponge and take any every bit of advice I can get and grow my knowledge every day. I'm a firm believer in hard work and education and trying to learn as much as possible. 

• Blog goals 

So what are my goals? Ultimately to gain financial freedom and to set my family up for retirement, Having the freedom to spend more time with my children and get out of the rat race. To put a timeline of a specific goal that would have to be in 12months I want to have added to my portfolio the funds to be able to purchase a rental property. Goals are so important something i have not doing nearly enough. This is something i will be going into more detail about in a later post.