Women can accomplish this easily, Men need to read this!

How is our industry handling the economic downturn in the market in 2009?

What changes are we doing in our daily, weekly, monthly activites to make a shift in our business?

How will December 31, 2010 realistically look for us?

Is there a lifestyle change during these times?

This is a question I pondered one weekend that changed everything I did and will do in the future. My Mom always told me to save the money I earned for a rainy day, I really never paid much attention to her advice to me, I knew what I had for a nest egg (an apartment building ) would keep food on the table when I retired and the fact that I would not need to rely on social security or retirement.

My spending habits were like a rock star up until last year, I would easily go out on a weekend and buy a couple pairs of Pradas, custom made shirts, eat lavishly, buy expensive wine, and blow a couple thousand dollars like it was play money knowing I had money coming in every month. I always had hundreds in cash on me to make me feel secure and hardly used credit.

Then it hit me one saturday afternoon, I was lazy, sat at home all day and started to get hungry, I left the kitchen bare and had to go get something to eat. When I got out of the house, I realized that I had only $6.00 dollars in my pocket, when I normally carried no less than four hundred at all times. I panicked, I don't use credit, have no debit card, (don't know how to use it). I asked myself " How am I going to survived the weekend on $6.00 dollars"? I went to the grocery store and learned very quickly what little six bucks gets you. I had to be very cautious to what I bought that day, If it would last me the weekend, I learned an extremly good lesson that day on survival.

Take the $6.00 dollar Challenge!

What are your experiences on money and finance? have you had to go through something like this to survive? tell us your story.