Goals & Mindset Archives • Page 5 of 8 • Bitches Get Riches

5 Easy Things You Can Do Right Fucking Now to Help Your Finances

March 12, 2018May 31, 2022 Piggy 19 Comments

When you wake up from the capitalist, consumerist nightmare that is our socioeconomic system (#SJW #eattherich), the thought of getting your financial shit together can be daunting. Where do you begin? What can you do right away to make an improvement in your financial prospects? How do you avoid fucking everything up even further?

It can all be a bit overwhelming.

But it doesn’t have to be.

Here are five easy, lightning-fast things you can do right fucking now to help your financial situation. Do them.

Ask the Bitches: I Know How to Struggle and Fight, but I Don’t Know How to Succeed

February 15, 2018May 30, 2022 Lauren Torres ("Kitty") 13 Comments

Oh, everyone, I have a great treat for you today. It’s a very interesting letter from one of our Patreon supporters!

If you don’t already know, readers who makes a small donation to our Patreon account will get to ask us a question. Any question! And they may do so privately or publicly. This was a private question, but I asked our patron (whom I’ll call Hope) if I could share it with you. Because despite Hope’s rather specific situation, I think it speaks to a surprisingly universal experience.

I’m a single mom and have spent the last 7 out of my son’s 10 years of life struggling HARD. I’ve climbed my way up my professional ladder with no formal education or degree. I accrued $20K in debt during these hard years, but I have a plan to pay it off over the next two years, and overall my prospects are good.

My problem is this: I’ve always dreamed of putting away money for a down payment on a house my son can grow up in. But my son will be 12 by the time I’m ready to start saving. By the time I can afford a house, we’d have little time to enjoy it together. I can’t see myself being stuck with a house at 40 years old and my son gone off to school or whatever he ends up doing.

I know it sounds like this isn’t a problem, but I’m afraid that without a plan or goal, I’ll end up squandering anything I’m able to save once I get this paid off. I’m afraid of having money and not struggling and wasting money. I’m thinking of starting a college fund, a travel fund, I have no idea fund, but other than the small-scale budgeting I can do, I have no idea how money works.

How can I “get riches” and be smart and not lose them for lack of a plan? is it too late to set my son up for success in other ways? Should I just be talking to an accountant?

Any advice you could give would be great. I know how to struggle and fight, but I don’t know how to succeed.

Ask the Bitches: How Can I Absolve Myself of Financial Guilt Over My Pricey PS4?

February 12, 2018May 30, 2022 Piggy 19 Comments

It’s hard out there for a broke-ass bitch. You try so hard to be frugal and disciplined, to make sound financial decisions and never waste a dime.

Yet still, financial guilt happens to the best of us. It can sneak up to bite you in the ass like some kind of slippery, perfidious garden snake in the Eden of your good monetary habits, leaving one trembling and sweaty with remorse and second thoughts.

Regretting a purchase or agonizing over a financial decision builds anxiety and stress migraines and is just generally no fun.

Recently loyal citizen of Bitch Nation Bettedavissighs (one of our darling Tumblr babies) asked a question about financial guilt. Her concerns are near and dear to my anxious little gazelle heart:

Hey Bitches, I just bought myself a PS4. It’s a big splurge on something non essential (I am fairly responsible w money, esp. now that I’m getting into FI stuff). How do I stop feeling guilty about it? I’ve wanted it for months (newbie gamer), but I keep having moments of extreme anxiety (how much I spent on it!). I had the money, so don’t get why I’m feeling like this now. Maybe it’s just a result of growing up poor? Love your blog! (ps any game suggestions, prefer w good female characters?)

Honey, I feel you.

Go Ahead and File Your Taxes Right Freakin’ Now

February 8, 2018May 30, 2022 Lauren Torres ("Kitty") 11 Comments

Ah, late winter. What a fine season!

Thick stews and steaming hot soups for dinner every night… haven’t seen my friends in weeks… onto our second tank of expensive-ass oil heat for the season… so pale and wan I look like one of the tuberculoid Brontë sisters, but with fewer published novels to show for it… people asking me what I want to do for my birthday…

Oh. Wait. I hate late winter!

I’m a procrastinator when it comes to nearly everything, but the one exception is filing taxes early. I love getting my taxes out of the way in February. And there’s a few really good reasons for it.

Lower your risk for identity theft

If some kind of l33t haxx0r gets their hands on your social security number, it’s relatively easy for them to file a fraudulent return in your name and pocket your return funds. Joke’s on anyone who tried to do this to me from 2008-2012! Self employment taxes are a bitch!

This is one of the most common forms of identity theft. Although it can usually be sorted out, it takes a long-ass time to do so—an average of 278 days. I’m sure that involves untold hours of bureaucratic headaches and heartaches.

A tightly protected social security number is a great place to start, but identity thieves could phish this information from gullible family members or steal it from employers with poor information security. That’s why the best secondary line of defense is filing taxes early. Knowing that most people wait until April to file, identity thieves work quickly to file their fraudulent returns first. Beat them to the punch.

It’s especially crucial this year due to the recent Equifax breach, which we wrote about here.

The Magically Frugal Power of Patience

January 29, 2018May 30, 2022 Piggy 26 Comments

When I was a little kid, my dad explained the power of prayer to me. He said, “When you ask God for something you really, really want, He’ll give you one of three answers: yes, no, or wait.”

And kids? That’s when I became an atheist.

Just kidding. I didn’t apostatize until I was about nineteen, and the decision to leave religion forever had nothing to do with my dad’s words of wisdom.

But at the time my dad told me this story, I was pretty fucking disgruntled. “Wait”? Dafuq kind of answer was “wait” from an all-knowing, benevolent, magical guidance counselor in the sky? “Wait” was not in my eight-year-old vocabulary and I was damned if I was going to be patient for anything.

But with the perspective and wisdom of years, I now have good reason to embrace this concept of waiting, of being patient for the things I want.

My dad thought he was teaching me about faith and adult-level patience and serenity and shit. But what he really taught me about was far more interesting:

Money.

I’ve Succeeded at Every New Year’s Resolution I’ve Ever Made. Here’s How.

January 8, 2018May 27, 2022 Piggy 22 Comments

Ah, January. The time when everyone bravely makes a super ambitious New Year’s Resolution to Lose Weight™, Get Better At Money™, and Stop Stalking Exes on Facebook™. And then, before the Ides of February, quietly shelving said resolution and wallowing in nihilistic self-loathing. “Nothing ever changes, so why bother?” millions ask as they wipe Cheeto dust from their fingers to scroll through the Facebook profile of ex-boyfriend Doug Jackson and wonder how he can look so happy and fit now that he’s dating what’s-her-face.

But what if it didn’t have to be that way? What if you could make a New Year’s Resolution and actually keep it?

According to Kitty, I am the only person in America who ever completes a New Year’s Resolution. I therefore consider myself a bit of an authority on the topic.

For the past five years, I have made a New Year’s Resolution. And every single year, I have succeeded at my resolution. Here’s a quick tally:

2013	Read a book a week (52 in all)
2014	Run a 5k comfortably by the end of the year
2015	Write 100,000 words by the end of the year
2016	Save $10,000 by the end of the year
2017	Do a good deed every week (52 in all)

Every one of these goals was made in the spirit of self-improvement and creating a life I love. They were rewarding, challenging, fun, and empowering. I am #livingmytruth and a dozen other inane platitudes AND SO CAN YOU!

Below, I’ll use each of my goals from the past five years as an example of effective New Year’s Resolutioning. Buckle up.

The Bitches Get Riches Annual Review and Soirée

December 18, 2017August 14, 2021 Piggy 18 Comments

‘Tis the season… for the Bitches to take a hiatus!

That’s right, my darlings. Your humble hosts are fucking tired as shit. So we’re going to take our own advice and go on a brief two-week hiatus for some R&R.

During this hiatus, we will be busily contemplating the mysteries of the universe and researching all things economic and adulty. That way, when we come back from our vacation in early January, we can continue to give you the same mildly useful, humorously tasteless, unrepentantly self-referential content you’ve come to expect from us.

Just kidding. We’ll mostly be doing this:

Ask the Bitches: I Was Guilted Into Caring for a Sick, Abusive Parent. Now What?

December 8, 2017March 7, 2024 Lauren Torres ("Kitty") 13 Comments

We’ve been talking a lot recently about unequal circumstances. Some people, through no fault of their own, have a harder time achieving financial independence than others. This is why the “anyone can do it,” one-size-fits-all success narrative is harmful and exclusionary.

This question about an abusive parent is a good example of one such set of circumstances. This came to us from an anonymous Tumblr follower.

“Bitches I need advice, I have never had a job because I was guilted into caring for an emotionaly abusive sick mother right out of high school. I am twenty three and have no idea what to go into now that I am free. I’m mostly afraid of going to school because I don’t have any money, but I have no idea what jobs I can get without an education! I don’t want to work in fast food and retail until I’m thirty, please tell me you can advise this poor bitch :(“

A poor bitch indeed. Oh, my sweet child of winter.

My poor child of winter with your sick, abusive parent to deal with.

You have opened the door to my heart, and also my memories. Because I, too, spent a precious chunk of my young adulthood doing the exact same thing—caring for a sick, abusive parent.

I ask myself why I did it all the time. The only real answer is that there is immense social pressure on children to care for their ill parents—particularly daughters. Friends and family members I hadn’t spoken with in years (or ever) tracked me down. They got my phone number from my mother, or found me on social media, and twisted my arm until it broke. I was too young and inexperienced to tell them to fuck off.

I share these details because I want you to know that you are not alone, and you will never be alone. Abusive and toxic people—especially an abusive parent—are very good at turning illness to their advantage. Their greedy hearts are fed by the sympathy and attention, and they will manipulate the situation to get what they want from you.

And the people who were absent? Who enabled them? Looked the other way? They’re tumbling out of the woodwork like termites to volunteer you for the job they don’t want to perform themselves.

You Won’t Regret Your Frugal 20s

November 30, 2017April 7, 2022 Piggy 14 Comments

The topic of regret is a controversial one, especially in personal finance. Whole treatises have been written on the premise that if you live frugally during your twenties and make sound financial decisions for the future, you’ll regret wasting your youth as a joyless loner.

We reject this characterization of a frugal youth for a couple of reasons:

It doesn’t take a lot of (or any) money to have fun with your friends. In fact, some of the best times I’ve had with friends involved spending zero dollars!
You can (and should) pursue fun long past your twenties. A great woman once said that if you’re not getting happier as you grow older, you’re fucking up. And I whole-heartedly agree! Life has only gotten better after thirty for me.
You’re at more risk of regretting not saving than you are at risk of regretting not going out to da clerb that one time. Saving for retirement in your twenties isn’t a ticket to Regretsville or Unfuntown. It’s a way of ensuring you’ll be able to have fun later in life instead of working forever.

And yet fear of this kind of regret persists.

FOMO

I get it! No one wants to constantly feel left out. FOMO is real! But I also firmly believe that no one wants to get to retirement age only to realize that all the money they could’ve lived on for another twenty to thirty years got puked out after a night of binge drinking. (It has been said that you’d have to drink a lot of alcohol to puke out your retirement savings. These naysayers underestimate both the power of compound interest and the alcohol tolerance of the average 23-year-old.)

Yet I don’t fear regretting my frugal twenties when I get to my twilight years. Now, depending on a single, barely funded income stream after retirement, one that could easily go up in a puff of smoke… that’s something worth regretting.

Share My Horror at the World’s Worst Debt Visualization

November 13, 2017June 16, 2021 Lauren Torres ("Kitty") 24 Comments

Some days I wake up ready to crush my debts. I am filled with fire and vinegar. (No, the vinegar does not put out the fire.) I double down on everything I do on that day—I spend less, work harder, and plan more.

Other days, I wake up feeling like Idgaf, Queen of the I Don’t Give a Fuck Tribe of Greater New England. On those days, I find myself wasting time with stuff that distracts me rather than enriches me. I play old video games I’ve already beaten three times, and mewl at my partner to take me to Five Guys. On those days, it can feel like the sacrifices aren’t getting me anywhere.

What can I learn from this? Besides the fact that I suffer from intermittent depression, because I already knew that.

I have a sprinter’s attention span and marathon financial goals. My current financial goal will take at least nine years to achieve. Maintaining momentum and motivation over such a long period of time is really hard.

I’ve tried making visualizations to help me stay on track, and I’m going to share two with you today. Including an old one that is weirdly fucked up and embarrassing.