I’ve always been pretty honest that food is the expense that gets out of control for me fast. I’m actually pretty good at keeping other expenses in the budget, but when it comes to food, that’s the one that gives me the most grief.

Back when Katie and I were first married, if we overspent on food, it really wasn’t that big of a deal. Now things are different. With a mortgage and three kids, money is way tighter. We don’t have the money to spend on eating out like we did when we were first married. 

But is losing our ability to blow money like we used to necessarily a bad thing? 

What if what we’re learning is making us better?

Even though we feel like we’re currently going through a choke point, the lessons learned during this time may end up proving to be invaluable. 

We’re definitely learning how to be more disciplined with our plan than we’ve had to be in the past. The truth is, we’ve been lucky enough to be sloppy in the past and still be able to get ahead. But by being in a choke point, you no longer have those luxuries.

The choke point requires a greater level of discipline and planning to successfully navigate. 

But here’s the good news. What if this was a skill that we never had to spend the time learning? What would we be missing out on?

Learning to tighten things down will help us in the future to prioritize the things that really matter to us. If you’re wasting a whole lot of money on things that don’t matter, your goals will be the first thing to go.  

Is it possible that we’ll be able to hit our goals faster and with greater clarity in the future simply due to the lessons that we’re learning now?

Your expenses can always swell to meet your income.

If we had more than we needed, would we just be overspending on more things that don’t matter?

That’s really the question to ask yourself. You have two levers that you can use to expand your margin. You’ve got the income side and then the expenses side. The problem with income is if you haven’t solved the problem of getting your expenses under control, then you won’t have a lot of success no matter your income. 

So the lessons we’re learning now in this choke point are ultimately making us better. It’s teaching us to be more disciplined, it’s teaching us to stick to the plan better, and it’s teaching us to say no more often. 

When building your margin, always want to work on your expenses first. 

You should absolutely work on earning more. But you also want to make sure that when you do, you’re able to fully maximize the benefits of the extra cash each month.