Breaking the Cycle: Turning Paycheck Struggles into Financial Freedom

Introduction

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It’s the 24th of the month, and your account balance is already bleeding red, almost down to zero. Children school fees is already at the corner waiting for you, utility bills are piling up, fridge is whispering it’s emptiness. You sighed, and promised yourself that, this won’t repeat next month. Next month finally comes, the same cycle repeats again.

Living paycheck to paycheck is a big financial challenge that millions of people face a lot and has weighed them down and in this year 2025, I will be talking a whole lot about our finances.

The Causes

• Low income vs high expenses.

Some people salary is just enough to cover their basic needs like transportation, rent and food. I use to work in a place where I was earning just #60,000 every month. After deducting my transportation, foodstuffs and light bill, there is nothing left again.

• Debt Dependency

Credit cards, borrowing from friends, and all these companies that offer quick loans are usually lifesavers to help meet some expenses. Unfortunately, they often create a trap when loan repayment takes up a huge part of your salary.

• Unforeseen Emergencies

Think of a single mum that works two jobs just to put food on the table for she and her kids. One day, the first kid becomes very sick, she’s now forced to use the food money for treatment. How does such a mum choose between her kids health and feeding her family?

The Consequences

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• Financial insecurity causes anxiety because you’re not sure how you will make it through the month and this can affect your mental state and cause anxiety.

• Once you don’t have savings, even minor issues like getting fuel for your generator to power your house and cars can be catastrophic to whatever you’ve budgeted your money for.

• You’ll find it very difficult to live a debt free lifestyle because taking loans has now become a norm, enslaving you in a vicious cycle, where you have to service your debts with your salary.

• You get so frustrated and feel guilty when you work so hard, yet can get something as little as new school bags for your kids

A Practical Solution

Step 1:

Put into practice 50/30/20 Rule. What this simply mean is that you have to break your income into three different categories.

• 50% needs: needs are the most essential things you can’t do without. Like monthly rent, foodstuffs and transportation.

• 30% Wants: this are non essential things . You enjoy doing them but you can live without it. for instance, buying fast food, Netflix subscription etc.

• 20% Savings and Debt Repayment: no matter how little it is, just keep something aside for savings. That #1000 you have saved is better than #0 in your account.

Step 2:

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Download any budgeting app of your choice or you can use a notebook to track every single cent you spend to the tiniest bit. Did you spend #5000 buying fast food from restaurants last week?? that could have gone into savings account.

Step 3:

Try to set a target for yourself like saving one month rent. This emergency fund will go a long way and reduce the way you rely on credit card as an emergency fund.

Step 4

Side hustle, freelance jobs are really important to boost your income especially when you know you earn a low salary and have high expenses. In my own case, I will say Steemit is the only side income I’ve for now and it has been a game changer.

Conclusion

Living paycheck to paycheck doesn’t have to be anyone’s forever story. We just have to understand our finances, build a good spending habits and make sacrifices.

Be like lizzy who spends about #6000 on coffee runs in a month and decided to take a decision by getting a thermos, started brewing at her house and have saved that excess monthly spending for coffee on other things like credit cards and emergency cases.

After reading this course, sit down and ask yourself, what can you do differently this new month to ease this financial pressure and get back your peace of mind.

When next we meet, we’ll talk about “Mastering Budgeting: A Path to Financial Security. Get ready to take control