The following is a guest post by Marci from Overcoming Busy:

I am in no way a financial guru.  Don’t take any advice from me about balancing your checkbook or budgeting or investments.  What I can share with you are some principles that my husband and I have learned over the past 7 years of being self-employed.  We don’t have the whole financial thing figured out, but I can tell you we are a lot farther along that we were before learning these things. Not only did these principles help us financially, but it helped our stress levels go down.  Face it; nothing stresses couples out like money!

1. Money is just a tool.

Money is not the end all.  It is not the most important thing in the world.  It is not the goal.  Money is just green pieces of paper.  That being said, we all like to eat and live indoors and money is necessary to meet those ends.  My point is that money and making money is so glorified in our society that we tend to put a higher value on it than we should.  Wrong ideas about money can consume our thoughts and our lives.  They can damage relationships and ruin families.  Why do we give so much power to green paper?

We used to let money stress us out and run our lives until we realized that money is not the most important thing in our lives.  It is a tool to help us with the important things in our lives.  We can use money to feed and clothe our families.  We can use money to give our families the type of lifestyle we deem appropriate.  Money is a tool we use to build our business and ensure our future.  And money can be used to bless others.

Figuring out that money is just a tool was huge.  It took the pressure off of making money and let us direct our energy toward our life with our family, our goals and our dreams.

2. There is more to work than just money

Have you ever had a job you endured just for the paycheck?  Where you miserable every second?  Did the countdown to quitting time start as soon as you got there?  As you look back, was it really that bad of a job?  Would your employer consider you a good employee?  How did your fellow employees feel about you and the job?

Now, think about the last time you volunteered to help someone out.  Maybe it was something that took all day and was a lot of work.  Did it feel good to serve someone?  Did the time pass quickly?  Do you think back on that time fondly?

What is the difference between these two scenarios? One situation is all about blessing someone and the other is all about “me and my money”.  Have you ever thought about looking at your job as way to bless your employer or fellow employees or your family?  It will change the way you work.  Owning our own business taught us that if you put others first, success and fulfillment will follow.  I wish I would have figured that out a long time ago.

3. If you don’t have it, don’t spend it

I know this is a radical concept brought back from a bygone era, but this one common sense principle can avert many tragedies.  Look at the financial shape our country is in.  We’d be a lot better off if more people would have grasped that concept.  That’s all I think I need to say about this one.  I’ll elaborate on a similar principle next.

4. There is a difference between needs and wants.

Once you figure out this principle, #3 is a whole lot easier.  We live in a society where our needs and wants are all flip-flopped.  Keeping up with the Joneses and instant gratification are the rulers of the day.  Do we really need the latest cell phone?  Sure, the iPhone is awesome, but I got a free phone with my plan that takes pictures, texts, has a calendar, a timer and a whole bunch of other features I don’t use…oh yeah…I can make phone calls with it too. 

Our houses have doubled in size in the last 50 years, but the sizes of our families have decreased.  We own more cars and TVs per family than ever.  As Americans, we live a pretty good lives and I love it.  There is nothing wrong with living the good life with all the modern conveniences, as long as we realize a lot of those conveniences are wants and shouldn’t be on our shopping list if we don’t have the cash.  See #3 above.

These are some of the principles we have learned about money since starting our own business, but they can be helpful to anyone.  When money is starting to stress us out, we can look back at these principles and do a self check.  Are our attitudes toward money right?  Where is our focus?  Are we spending more than we are making?  Is that a need or just a want? 

 Apply these to your life and see if your finances and your attitude toward them don’t improve.

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Are you self-employed? How do you work your budget and control your spending. If you have tips, leave a comment here for other readers! 

Marci is a stay at home wife and mother of two – daughter 7 and son 4. She blogs about her quest to overcome “busy” and accomplish what is really important, because life is just too short to waste on stuff that just doesn’t matter! You can find Marci at Overcoming Busy sharing all her thoughts about making life meaningful.