When you think of Financial Literacy, and living a disciplined and frugal life, think of these seven letters of the alphabet: A, B, C, D, E, F, G.

They are key to utilizing and living the 5 practical steps below.

A – Accountability. Be accountable to yourself! If you cheat, you are cheating yourself.

B – Budgeting. If you are struggling to make ends meet, create a budget and follow it. Budgets work.

C – Communication. Communicate with your loved ones and people that can help you. Don’t be afraid to ask questions.

D – Discipline. Make a plan and stick to it. If you can’t go out, tell your friends that you need some time to catch up. Save a minimum 10% of your paycheque.

E – Education. – Learn about financial literacy and never stop learning.

F – Frugal. Live a frugal lifestyle. If you learn to live within your means now, it will be so much easier when you retire and you will happily grow old.

G – Goals. Create your own goals. Just like my parent’s goals when they came to Canada, Goal #3 was to pay off their debt.

Which takes us to the five practical steps to living a debt-free and anxiety/stress-free life:

- Stop impulse buying. Don’t live in denial.

- Save $5 per day. After 21 days, it will become a habit and it will be easy to save for your retirement or emergency fund.

- If you can’t pay off your credit card, more often and pay much more than the minimum. NEVER just pay the minimum.

- Don’t get sucked into FOMO or YOLO. Live a disciplined and frugal life.

- Cash is king, if you can’t afford it, don’t buy it! Pay yourself first, buy on sale and save!

Everything that I have said here is not just about personal finance and it can easily be applied to your business, as an entrepreneur as well.

Just remember, when you take on debt, you no longer own yourself or your company, the bank or credit cards will own you.