My mother once told me that a penny saved is a penny earned. Well I never considered my mother's pennies to be of much value, but one day I realized that all of those pennies can add up, and I understood that perhaps my mom wasn't just talking about individual copper coins, and that there was a bigger picture. In business, the bottom line is important, and it's not how much you make, but how much you have left over after you deduct the expenses from the earnings. So every dollar I could save means one more dollar I could earn. That makes sense.

I've learned to apply this thinking to other parts of my own personal finance, because I haven't found too many ways where I can improve how much I earn, but there are always ways I can think of to reduce how much I spend, and so my mom's advice comes into play whether it's when I'm shopping, paying bills, or finding other ways to save. One time, when work was slow, I had to make a decision about not paying a bill, and paying it with a credit card or getting a loan or a cash advance from a payday loan business. It was going to cost me one way or the other, but when I applied my mother's principles I decided that the cash advance made slightly better sense, in that I would prevent an unnecessary interest payment that would have outweighed the service charges.

It was kind of like the way that some people are able to consolidate loan payments or credit cards because they have been able to secure a lower rate of interest on the consolidate payments rather than paying several different creditors at different rates of interest and with different fees or charges. There might also be other intangibles, such as if your bank charges you a small fee for each check or transaction, or if you have the ability to make payments bi-weekly instead of monthly, you can reduce your interest charges even more.

So mom, I'm sorry if I scoffed at your idea and walked past that penny on the ground that one time. I should've known that you had more wisdom in mind. I would've paid a penny for your thoughts, but then that would've gone against your advice.