When Pandemic Covid-19 has spread all over the world, despite taking great care of physical health, financial health does not seem to be able to escape from it. It is the moment of anxiety that every morning when people wake up, they will worry whether they can sell anything today or whether the job they are having is still a stable one. Thus, let us decrease our anxiety, warm our hearts with saving, and reduce expenses as much as we can.
1. Change the Mindset or Thinking Process. We should be ready and accept that the effects of Covid-19 will remain long-term on our planet Earth without an appointment to leave. The most important thing is to tell ourselves that “we have to survive”. When we are determined to be a survivor, we just have to remember the magic spell. It goes like this, “from now on, let’s spend wisely on the necessaries, embrace cash as much as possible and if there’s an opportunity for more income, forward we go!”
2. Set daily expenses with the help of an application. We should set our goal on how much we will spend per day and record incomes and expenses with a mobile application that will immediately show our lifestyle from spending. It will alarm us that we have exceeded our spending goal. There are many applications for us to download, free-of-charge. For example, Money Lover, Money Manager Expense & Budget, Oh My Cost or Metang, etc.
3. Save what can be saved. In every expense, if we can get someone to share the burden, we will spend much lesser than solely spend all by ourselves. We can try searching for people to share those expenses through the application called “PartyHaan”, an application that was launched especially for this purpose. More importantly, we should not create more debt. We should clear our current debt first as we can never know how grim the economy can be.
4. Do not belittle low income. We have to save all those small incomes that can change into the emergency funds in the future. Every day when we reached home, just try to save small notes or coins in the piggy bank. It is an indirect method of saving that could give an incredible result.
5. Put reasons before emotions. Before any decision in buying, try to take some time and count 1 – 10. We should use reasons to make decisions more than to use the emotion of “wanting” as an answer. We should reconfirm with ourselves whether the product is necessary for our life and not just buy because the product is on promotion or cheap.
6. DIY stands for Do It Yourself. We have now entered the era of saving that whatever can be fixed, let us try to fix it first. Also, do not just decide to throw old and shabby goods away. We should try to DIY them first and we might even make something new out of them with our pride in making it. For example, some furniture will often be used during the Work-from-Home period. If we do a makeover, even the smallest change can create refreshing vibes without having to spend money on new furniture.
7. Eat what we grow and grow what we eat. During the lockdown period that required every individual to stay at home, one of the activities that many people have tried must be growing vegetables. This activity must have become many people’s cup of tea because we get to eat vegetables that is free of chemical and good for our family and our health. Also, it can definitely reduce expenses, especially, for big families.
8. Turn a hobby into a job. This never gets old as long as having one job is a risk because nobody can guarantee that the sole job they are doing is so stable like a mountain that cannot be moved. It is now a time for us to turn our hobby into our strength or develop it into another job to seek more income. Apparently, during the outbreak of the pandemic, many people have shown their strengths on many platforms for more income such as cooking, baking, hand-made products, photography, etc.
If we can follow every point that was mentioned above, no matter how many more crisis we will face, we can be sure that our purse will still be packed. The important thing to remember is how sincere and discipline we are to seriously do this. Without further ado, let us get started!
