A resolution.

I’ve been unhappy lately with the frequency of my use of the site but more so with my infrequency of making daily decisions to spend less and give more.  Yesterday I made a new resolution.  I will attempt to spend less any time I make a retail purchase.  Maybe that means drinking water instead of a soda if I have to buy food while I’m out.  The little sacrifices this will take are nothing compared to the good that can come from supporting the causes I love.

This morning I was meeting a friend for breakfast to discuss a book we’ve been reading together, the Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard.  We meet at Dunkin Doughnuts every Thursday at 6:30am.  Anyway, I got a little less food than I normally do and was able to save $1.07.  Hey, you have to start somewhere…

All Things New: Thrift Without Love is Puritan

Thrift without love quickly becomes legalism, inhospitality, joylessness and judgmentalism. But thrift informed by, or driven by love makes sacrifice possible, makes community possible.

Urbana’s “All Things New” blog has a new entry called Thrift Without Love is Puritan.

Tip: An account for giving

One thing that I am finding in my SpendLessGiveMore journey is that often my weekly savings are less than an appropriate gift to the causes I love.  But I am committed to setting aside the money that I save, which presents a dilemma for me.  While I wait for my savings to accumulate to a substantial gift I either have to put cash in some kind of holding tank or leave it in my checking account where it is at risk of getting sucked back into my monthly budget.

So my solution has been to open another checking account solely for giving that is linked to my main checking account.  Now, when I get my weekly summary email from Spend Less Give More I can just transfer that amount into my “giving” account and wait until enough is in there that I deem it a worthy gift to an organization that is doing work I want to partner with financially.

Lifehacker: 10 ways to save money in a recession

Lifehacker’s Kevin Purdy writes on 10 ways to save money in a recession.

3. Trick yourself into spending less, saving more

Curbing spending, like cutting back on calories, is something any self-help-ish expert can and will tell you to do, with few details given. So you’re left, just as with dieting, to come up with your tricks and techniques for teaching yourself to do and not do certain things. When it comes to tricking yourself into saving money, we like the kind that you don’t need much to start out doing, like Merlin Mann’s Crap I Just Don’t Need.txt file, in which he captures all his do-wants and must-haves, as if it were a wish list, but ends up checking it every so often to see just how well he’s gotten along without all those things. High-speed, low-drag spending psychology.

See 10 ways to save money in a recession for all 10.

Tip: “You saved $10″ on your receipts

User spudicus told us that he has begun entering all the money his Publix (a local supermarket) receipts show him he’s saved by taking advantage of sales and Buy-One-Get-One-Free (BOGO) offers.

So, if he saves $.50 by buying the sale toothpaste (or by buying Publix brand instead of name brand), he’ll log into Spendlessgivemore and enter that $.50.