On Frugality and Flourishing

It’s February, and I have a yearning to finally finish this project. I’ve been putting it off for so long, but it’s time that I actually attempt to press some keys and create some prose. This is a topic I feel is especially relevant these days as I’ve been having interesting conversations and thoughts about money and the value of frugality. If my first several months into the world of true financial independence as a fully fledged ‘adult’ is any signal, I am obsessed with saving money. I’ve read books and countless articles on how to optimize my finances into retirement accounts, how to invest the spare income I have beyond an emergency fund, and how to think about money as wealth, which is a bit of a paradigm shift. Money represents the liquid asset that allows you to buy goods and pay for services. Wealth on the other hand feels a bit more immaterial and is something that grows over time.

Coming from an immigrant household, it’s been hammered into me that the only way to have financial success is to be as conservative as possible with money and to never inflate your lifestyle beyond what is absolutely necessary. For a long time, this made total sense to me. After all, the most logical way to grow the amount of money you have is to save as much of your monthly paycheck as you can, right? This thought process makes sense in many scenarios but breaks down when you consider inflation and other…