All this is good advice, but I haven't seen any prospective on personal budgets:
- Remember that money exists to be spent on useful things, it's not a video game score
- Understand your monthly spending and monthly take-home. If you're in a role that grants equity, I bet you've got a healthy surplus. If not, I bet you could make some lifestyle changes to achieve that.
- Take a moment to really accept that you are fine. You are not in danger, and shouldn't carry a fight or flight anxiety.
- Then think about your future. Can't sugarcoat it, you might have had more vacations or whatever if your options didn't decline, but I bet that you can chart a course to a decent retirement. Use an online calculator. Again, your future is fine. Not great, but fine.
- Think about what your future looked like when you graduated high school (or equivalent, wherever you did it). Did it definitely include being rich? If not, then you have lost nothing relative to that. And it's possible that on this company, the next one, or the one after that, you'll end up there anyway.
- Finally, spend a little money on something you like, and cut a little money on something you hadn't gotten around to canceling (streaming service, routine meals out, etc) You have so much control over your life.
This is great advice. One of the things I learned from the pandemic experience was how little money I needed to spend to be happy. I spent countless hours making music using iOS apps that cost next to nothing. The possession that’s given me the most joy over the past year is an old acoustic guitar that someone gave to me, free of charge, that sent me down the path of learning a traditional musical instrument for the first time.
I used to think that if I had enough money I’d travel. We have savings now that would support living abroad, and I can work anywhere, but after doing a bunch of traveling I find I’m always happy to be back home. I like cooking my own food, seeing family and friends, sticking with my familiar routines, and so on.
I recognize that sometimes funds are needed for things that would truly make a material difference to happiness, such as being able to sponsor family to immigrate or pay for a child’s education. If your decline in wealth impacts those things, then you (OP) have my sympathy, and I hope if you are patient then these things will still be possible for you. But if that is not the situation, the old aphorism that money does not buy happiness is very true. We don’t often live like it is, but it is.
- Remember that money exists to be spent on useful things, it's not a video game score
- Understand your monthly spending and monthly take-home. If you're in a role that grants equity, I bet you've got a healthy surplus. If not, I bet you could make some lifestyle changes to achieve that.
- Take a moment to really accept that you are fine. You are not in danger, and shouldn't carry a fight or flight anxiety.
- Then think about your future. Can't sugarcoat it, you might have had more vacations or whatever if your options didn't decline, but I bet that you can chart a course to a decent retirement. Use an online calculator. Again, your future is fine. Not great, but fine.
- Think about what your future looked like when you graduated high school (or equivalent, wherever you did it). Did it definitely include being rich? If not, then you have lost nothing relative to that. And it's possible that on this company, the next one, or the one after that, you'll end up there anyway.
- Finally, spend a little money on something you like, and cut a little money on something you hadn't gotten around to canceling (streaming service, routine meals out, etc) You have so much control over your life.