If you’re looking to save money, who better to take advice from than multi-billionaire Warren Buffett? Clearly, the man knows a thing or two about not just making money, but also holding onto it.
Perhaps the biggest thing to take note of is the fact that although he could spend roughly endless amounts of cash, he’s famous for adopting a budget mindset and promoting the same to his fans.
Indeed, he told college students in a speech that “the biggest mistake is not learning the habit of saving properly.” He places a strong emphasis on the idea of habit and how hard it can be to break out of a bad one once you’re in a routine.
“Most behavior is habitual,” said the 91-year-old businessman. He also added another small dose of wisdom, saying that “they say that the chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken.”
Buffett’s words ring true on so many levels. Habits have a tendency of creeping up on us without us even realizing them. In that sense, they seem very light and benign at first. However, it’s only when we start to realize how they’ve affected us, for better or worse, that we realize how hard they are to shake.
The trick, according to Buffett, is to train ourselves to have productive habits instead of bad ones.