In advance, I was not sure where to post this; OffMyChest, NoStupidQuestions or here. Decided to do it here because it is mainly a question. However, I thought it do be better explaining it a little as well.
When I was younger, I could not really get the luxuries I wanted. Just like many others, my parents did not have heaps of wealth to spend. I did not have it bad, got a roof above my head, education, food and such. Parents would spend on luxuries if they could. My siblings usually bought the more expensive things (Atari, Nintendo, PS1 and PS2 etc). My parents did purchase PS4 and a decent gaming pc for me back in the day. One time my father told me ‘’if you just show that you are seriously studying and if money allows, I will get you anything in luxury. However, money is the boss’’ (money is the boss as in, only if we got enough money to spent for it and not get into financial issues).
Because of that I have learnt to live kind of frugal in terms of money (for myself). I find it hard to spend money on expensive things. It took months to purchase a great gaming PC and a Steam Deck (loving the heck of it though). However, spending money on my parents (mostly my mother) is no issue. I do it without a thinking, as long as I know it makes them happy.
Now, I always wanted a MacBook since I was a teenager. I can afford to get one, I saved up for it and will not have any financial issues. I budget ever since getting my job, everything is already set (saving up for car stuff, emergency funds for both myself and parents, pension saving and even saved up for new glasses for whenever that’s needed). Yet with all of that, I still feel not comfortable paying a lot for something that’s ‘’not necessary’’ and that’s just a ‘’luxury product’’. I feel like the money, I would spent for the MacBook could better be saved towards either emergency funds or car stuff (car theory exam, the car itself etc).
Now, I’m curious if other people deal (or have dealt) with this and what is this called? How to be more at ease with spending for fun instead of always being on edge.
Note: I checked the rules and it said this is not a support community but that seemed more related to tech-stuff. If it was also meant for this kind of question. Apologies, I will ask in another community.
If I need it and it’s worth the price then I don’t worry about spending money on it. Especially when talking about one time or long term purchases such as a laptop (which as an extremely satisfied MacBook user I highly recommend)
Subscribtion services and meals are the ones I take issue with. I dont want to pay high price for something and then have nothing to show for it. I will not pay 5 euros for a cup of coffee no matter what - it’s not worth that to me. With items you technically didn’t lose any value - you just traded cash for an object.
My partner and I share all money, and we don’t really spend a lot other then on food, shelter, and the like. This means we have a fairly decent sum of money pooled for the future.
Similar to your first paragraph, if there’s something either of us have been talking about for a while and we find a really good price on it, we just get it without worrying. I was looking for deals on a new Apple Watch a couple months ago because we’re still using the first one that came out and it’s crazy slow and the battery only lasts eight hours now (they’re like a decade old.)
I didn’t find any watch deals, but I found a killer deal on an m4 MacBook Air. We’ve been talking about transferring our pictures off of our 2011 15” MacBook pro that still works great (added SSD, doubled RAM) because it’s so old. Instantly picked up the air. (Turns out a couple weeks later I had to hospital for a week and a half and that air was the BEST THING EVER for me there, being able to watch any movie I want ever and play games was a BOON)
I did recently find a big discount on new Apple Watches too, so I picked us both up a new one. We’ve been alluding to wanting a fresh one for five years or so—if we keep these new watches for a decade again, that’s an extremely worthy purchase!
I know Lemmy hates Apple, but I gotta say, all of the Apple shit I buy, I use for stupidly long times. Each phone has been 4-6 years, my 2011 MBP still serves me well, both of our old AirPods are like eight years old and my partner and I used them 40+ hours a week at work for years, and they still hold a charge fine…
I love my W10 machines for games and Linux for doing behind-the-scenes stuff, but damn if that little MacBook wasn’t the exact thing I needed sitting in the hospital for an eternity. I hope I can keep it for a decade lawl
My only white whale lately has been a Herman miller aeron. As soon as I find a good quality used one cor 300-500USD, I’m on my way. We took a trip a couple towns over recently to look at one for 400USD but I realized the recline lock was broken so they wouldn’t sell it to me, they just took my number and said they’d call if a fully working one comes in. …I’d take the broken one for 150 bux if it can’t be fixed… It was so damn comfy I would just leave it in the living room and sit there whenever company is over.