alright, so maybe the brokeness is not over...

i needed a $5 book off amazon for a research paper i'll be working on and i checked my account to find that:

i have $47 to my name.

i also have $75 in savings, but the point is to not spend that.

Gah. I had $600 at the beginning of the month. Where did it all go? I know it wasn't much, but that's exactly why it so terrible that i just did not keep track of it. I want to start jotting down everything I spend my money on. I started out by saving all my receipts....also, my bank statements are readily available online...i need to force myself to look at all that though, and therein lies the hard part.

I've gotten a little better at discerning the difference between what you want and what you need, but I need to stop justifying wants into needs:
-i wanted to get my best friend a moderately expensive birthday present because she's really helped me out the last couple of months
-i wanted new books because they were on sale and were relevant to what i've been trying to do in my life
-i bought drinks at dinner and totally inflated my bill because i felt like i "needed" a drink

You get the idea. And of course, the answer is to spend less than i earn and save a little of it.

It's difficult because I grew up in a middle-class family, I got everything I wanted almost all the time, my parents can't budget or save well and neither did they teach me, and now I'm trying to teach myself and I've already developed bad habits.

Well, I have $47 and I have to start living within my means right now.