Omakase: The Japanese art of spending exorbitant amounts on food.

What do I really ‘deserve’ to spend money on? And before you ask, no, this isn’t a post debating the merits of fiscal conservatism and whether it’s unfair that I have more financial freedom than a family living under the poverty line. It’s more a growing thought around what, as a young professional, I should be spending money on given the ability to.

In this post, I’ll dive into how I view frugality, the pros/cons to being frugal, and how I think young professionals like myself can approach personal finances. For those skimming, my friend Adnan recommended I give a quick summary below, so here it is:

My parents instilled values of ‘frugality’ and ‘fiscal responsibility’ into my brother and I. The question is: how can I retain those values when it’s not ‘necessary’ to?
There are necessities in life (food, shelter, clothing), but it’s not a binary. My bar for shelter might be higher than others, and that’s something I need to figure out for myself.
Unnecessary categories / criteria to evaluate decisions against: wasteful, unreasonable price, done for social status / ‘to flex’.
I need to embrace frugality & fiscal responsibility for ‘the principle’ — it’ll help me live a more humble/fulfilling life, and enable me to teach my future kids the same when they’re even further removed from suffering / hardship.

If you’re still with me, let’s dive into it!

Immigrant Mentality

As I’ve written out in past posts (here), my family is pretty frugal. They owned the immigrant dream: coming with nothing and moving to middle-class / upper-middle class as my brother and I came into the picture. This was largely due to smart spending:

Short mortgage (<10 years) that was paid off early
No extravagant vacations; road trips to Ottawa, Gaspésie Peninsula (Quebec), Maritimes
Rarely ate out / ordered in (only special occasions, i.e. birthdays)
Modest clothing (lots of hand-me-downs), cars usually 10-20 years old

You get the picture. While my parents could’ve splurged on a lot of things, they instead chose a path of financial security. Through economic crises, my parents losing their respective jobs, etc., our family stayed well above water.

Fast forward to 2020: I run a marketing agency and don’t think about money as often as I should. I’ve picked Toronto as my home, over cities like New York and San Francisco, largely due to quality of life. I pay for a 1-bedroom apartment what I’d pay for a room + shared bathroom in those cities, while daily expenses (meals, coffee, etc.) are noticeably cheaper.

That also means that I’m more likely to spend the additional disposable income: eating at nice restaurants, going out with friends, travelling to those cities that I am otherwise missing out on. I want to live a comfortable lifestyle, but the ‘immigrant mentality’ weighs on me — what is comfortable and what is unnecessary?

Comfortable Necessities

Food, shelter, and clothing are considered necessities. If I am hungry, don’t have a reliable place to sleep, or am overexposed due to a lack of clothing, I should prioritize addressing those needs. It’s easy to think about this in extremes (i.e. poverty), but here are a few examples where that’s not the case.

Food; Taking in-person meetings, didn’t pack lunch + don’t have time to go home —> buy food
Clothing; Can’t find toque/gloves but need to go outside, buy them
Shelter; Commuting to Toronto is noticeably draining, justify renting a place downtown

While the first two examples I gave made sense, the last one is definitely debatable. That’s why I like to think about necessities as a spectrum — what is a ‘need’ for me, might not be for someone else. I like having peace of mind when returning to my own place VS having roommates. I might buy better cuts of meat, cheese, etc. so a meal is more enjoyable VS meal prepping with a kilo of ground beef. So, to some extent, you could say that these are ‘comfortable’ necessities.

Where, then, do I draw the line? For something to be unnecessary, I think it should satisfy one of the following criteria:

Wasteful: My mind initially goes to food; getting the combo when I don’t need it, an appetizer when the main is enough, etc. That’s in a literal sense. What about in a figurative sense? Is it wasteful to get another drink at a bar when I don’t need it?
Unreasonable Price: Luxury goods can be well-priced; but are they justifiable in their own right? Should I ever pay $75 for a t-shirt? What about $30 on an Uber when I could likely take the subway?
Social Pressure: My friends influence what I want / how I see the world. Usually this is helpful, but can I recognize when it isn’t? Do I need a new pair of shoes just because they look nice? Take a vacation when I don’t feel like I need one? Just to flex?

What are the ‘action steps’ here? I have a couple of ideas that I’d like to share:

Eat out, but eat well. I’m not great at cooking, but I think I’ve improved a lot. My family got me a sous vide machine for Christmas and it’s an absolute game-changer (think an Insta Pot). My co-founder is also a killer chef, so I’ve tried to learn a lot from him. Now, I’m pretty comfortable cooking for other people. $50 is enough for some steaks, veggies, bread, bottle of wine, etc. A visitor stays for ~ 3 hours. Contrast that to a restaurant where the total is likely upwards of $75, and you’re out in 1.5-2 hours. So my goal is to cook more for people and spend more quality time.
Double-take. When I was trying to lose weight, a massive win was to take out a portion for myself, then put 1/3 back. I’d realize after the meal that it was sufficient. I’d like to try and implement that in my day-to-day. Whether it’s eating out, buying clothes, or planning trips, there’s likely a 75% solution that leaves me just as satisfied without wasting money.

Principles & Values

Saying I don’t need to be frugal is accurate. Saying I don’t need to be fiscally responsible isn’t. And that latter point expands into saying I don’t need to be humble. Circumstance shouldn’t change who I am as a person, and how I view material wealth. My parents suffered so I didn’t have to. This clip from Aziz Ansari sums it up pretty well…

These value carry through to family. I don’t imagine that my future kids would have any exposure to suffering. How will I be able to teach them these values if I don’t embrace them willingly? Will they take for granted the wealth that I’ve built, and lose the hunger / drive that my parents gave to me? If I can retain these values throughout my life, and eventually instill them into future generations, then I’ll be satisfied.

It also extends to me, personally. I want to be a humble person — it should be rooted in my thoughts / actions and how I live as a Christian. Unfortunately, when I know it or not, I’m often prideful and lose that sense of humility. I don’t hesitate to show people why the untraditional path and entrepreneurship is incredible. I’m not as quick to embrace frugality and humility in light of material wealth / success.

Conclusion

How did a post about saving money (d)evolve into a discussion on values and principles? I think it’s because ‘saving money’ and ‘being frugal’, for me, stems from values my parents gave me and that I want to carry forward. I don’t want to feel bad for spending money in light of more disposable income. But I also want to keep those values central to how I live and see the world.