Well, today, I’ve declared the bottom $500 in my checking account to be off-limits, barring emergencies. What a great feeling to meet a financial goal! It could be a challenge to maintain this new checking floor, but there is one major thing that’s helping me. Instead of thinking of my financial worth as one lump sum equal to my checking balance, I think of my money value now in terms of the different accounts which affect my finances, and that has helped me see my bank balance and automatically break it into components. So, when I see my bank balance, I don’t think of having all of that to spend today.

I’m calling this complete!