I saw on the news the other day that one of the things that has changed the economy, and prevented it from "recovering" to what it was a few years ago, is that people have actually been saving money and living more within their means. (To which I'd ask why people are driving around Porsches and various luxury cars around here, until I remember that probably is within their means.) The going theory is that there has been a larger psychological effect that's deeper than simply "people are po."
And dare I say that I am somewhat in that camp, at least relative to my current salary. I've tried to at least be responsible. We landed here with about $26k in credit card debt between our personal accounts and the business. Not counting the recent moving expenses and a grand for the biz, that debt is gone. We had ridiculous and somewhat random expenses like the replacement of the stolen plumbing from Diana's house, and less random expenses like travel and a little extra down payment on my car. Oh, and we made a new little human. The bottom line is that we had a shit-ton of expense in the last year, and we still managed to dig out. That's discipline I've not had before.
Granted, it does seem like it's always something. Everything we're saving now will go to the feds when the tax bill comes due for the "income" on Diana's short sale, and that's going to suck. After that, I have to save to finance a wider loss on my house than I can afford today so I can get rid of the damn thing.
But again, I think we've been fairly disciplined without putting a halt to our lives. I put more into investment accounts in the last year than I probably have the rest of my life combined. The driving force for this has been the mental kick in the nuts from navigating the shitty economy. From layoff to first day of new work, seven months exactly passed in 2009 (thus the huge card debt), so I know first hand what that's like to have suboptimal cash flow, and I don't want to be in that position again.
The financial strategy going forward is pretty simple: Don't be an asshole. Also, don't be overly focused on stressful things like selling my house, or buying a new one. There are constraints outside of my control for those things, so I need to let go. Saving is remarkably easy, especially when you never see it, so hooray for my 401k and IRA.
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