Yeah I think that my key was automating the big pieces. By the time I automated retirement savings, short-term savings, long-term savings, and all my big expen

Yeah I think that my key was automating the big pieces. By the time I automated retirement savings, short-term savings, long-term savings, and all my big expenses (really just rent since I don't have a car). With all that automated, and my savings levels being very aggressive, I just need to make sure the buffer in my checking account doesn't go down each month. If it gets a little lower then maybe I skip a few meals out for a month. But I will say, to get to this point took many years of trying to budget and "failing". Using those tools helped by letting me internalize my spending and re-baselining what "normal" spending felt like. I put "failing" in quotes because each time I went over budget or stopped tracking for a few months I felt like I had failed but in reality I was learning what worked for me.