These 4 Money Mistakes Left Me Hungry and Broke

Read time: 5 mins

As I stood in the grocery store checkout line, I was slowly taking things out of my cart and leaving them behind.

Each time the line grew shorter and the checkout register grew nearer, my heart sank deeper into my stomach and I ditched a few more items onto the shelves next to me.

I was a few months away from graduating college and trying to survive until I could start my first full-time job. A job that would mercifully end this game of guilt and dread called grocery shopping.

But for now, here I was, comparing the cost-per-ounce of each brand of mini wheat cereal.

I had already maxed out my small credit card, and only had a little more than $25 left in my bank account.

It was all I had, but it was not enough. I would be skipping some meals that week.

But before you start feeling sorry for me, let’s stop for a moment.

The truth was, I had put myself in this situation.

That’s right, this entire experience didn’t have to play out this way.

Had I put even a fraction of effort into learning how to manage my money, I would have made it through college without this hungry period of my life.

Here are the 4 biggest money mistakes I was making at the time and why they put me in this spot.

If you find yourself constantly wondering where your money went, chances are, you might be making some of them too.

In today’s issue:

• How a simple 15-minute exercise could have prevented this altogether

• The common trap 90% of us fall into

• The mindset switch that will protect you from making the same mistakes

• What I could have done to fix the situation, even if I didn’t change anything else

1) I didn’t plan ahead for future expenses

This seems so painfully obvious looking back, but at the time I never thought to plan out my expenses for the semester.

Expenses like rent, textbooks, and yes, groceries, are fairly easy to predict.

I could have sat myself down and in 5 minutes figured out how much money I’d need to cover each of those for 4 months.

Here, let’s do it together.

Monthly rent $450 x 4 = $1800

Utility bill average $75 x 4 = $300

Groceries needed for a month $200 x 4 = $800

Textbook average for the previous 6 semesters = $600

Total needed to finish semester = $3500

Then a 2-minute Google search would tell me how much to save up for moving expenses to get to the job waiting for me after graduation, which would have saved me from living in a furniture-less apartment for my first month out of college (a story for another time).

All-in, the whole process could have been done in 15 minutes (30 minutes if I really wanted to nerd out), and it would have given me a clear savings target for that final semester.

Read that again.

15 minutes.

That’s all the time it would have taken to plan ahead and easily set aside the money I needed at the beginning of the semester, long before those bills were due, leaving me with the rest as guilt-free fun money.

2) I got emotional and splurged

The summer before this unfortunate trip to the grocery store, I had big plans.

I was going to propose to my girlfriend.

Flat broke, I spent the entire summer working hard to save up money for a ring.

I rented a room for $300/month from an elderly lady while I stashed away all the money I could from my summer internship.

After work, I would head off to one of my two side jobs painting garages until the sun went down at 9pm.

I even sold my plasma to make more money. $40 and a free snack? Yes please.

I was hustling.

By the end of the summer, my bank account felt FLUSH. $6000 stared back at me, more money than I had ever seen in one place in my entire life.

I quickly used that money to order a $1,000 ring from a jeweler that was simple but beautiful, leaving me plenty of money to make it through the semester.

But as the proposal grew closer, I became more and more guilty that the ring wasn’t my girlfriend’s dream ring. It began to look simple and plain to me, not worthy of the incredible girl I was proposing to.

So I did what every reasonable person would do.

I impulse traded it in and bought a $3500 ring.

Now, let’s remember back to the math we did earlier, or rather, the math I SHOULD have done earlier.

$6000 minus $3500 for a ring left me with $2500. That wasn’t enough to get me through the semester.

Only I didn’t know that yet.

And that’s because I was making the next mistake, which is one of the most common financial mistakes I see people making.

3) I spent based on my bank account levels

It’s probably obvious to you reading this now, but 21-year-old Zach wasn’t the best of planners.

Instead of planning ahead for the money I would need to spend over the semester and making sure I had it, I was budgeting based on feel.

If my bank account had a few thousand dollars in it, I felt good. Stable.

And if I had more than that, I was prone to get a little spendy.

The problem is, spending based off of your bank account balance is a TERRIBLE way to budget your money.

Having $2500 after buying the ring felt like enough money to make it through the semester.

But that mindset completely ignored the very real expenses I had coming around the corner.

And the decisions I was made that August set me up for that hungry November.

Dumb, dumb and dumb.

Don’t be like me. Before you indulge in a splurge, take the 15 minutes to plan your future expenses. Your stomach will thank you.

4) I gave up too easily when looking for work

Remember the hustle I had during the summer? The 3 jobs and blood-selling?

For some reason, as soon as I got back to school, that disappeared.

At first, yes, I applied for jobs around campus. But after a few quick rejections, I got discouraged.

And after looking at my bank account, figuring I’d be “fine”, I gave up applying.

ZACHHHHHHHHH. WHYYYYYYYYY?!?

I lived in major city. There were tons of jobs. I could’ve been one more application away from a great opportunity.

But since poor old Zach assumed it should be easy to find a job, when it turned out to be hard he quickly folded.

What a mistake.

Even if I didn’t take any of my own advice from the previous 3 points, I would never have missed a meal due to money if I had refused to give up in my job hunt.

Lesson learned. Sometimes the things we need aren’t easy to get. Expect it. Then do the work to get them no matter what it takes.

If it’s possible within the laws of physics, you can do it.

I wish someone had told me that then, and I’m telling it to you now.

Rejection is not the same as failure. Rejection is just a step.

Quitting is failure.

Don’t quit.

P.S. If this email resonated with you, share it with a friend! Chances are, if you can save them from making one of the 4 mistakes, they’ll thank you for it.

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