<prompt> Human: The title pretty well sums things up. For my income, my situation is shameful--I know. I used to have a decent savings usually around 10,000 but have repeatedly applied it toward paying off loan debt my total debt was around 120k a few years ago. Basically, Id like help getting my spending under control, as I am an emotional spender from a lower middle-class family that never taught me how to handle money. I need some way to constrain my day-to-day purchasing power so that I know Im living well beneath my means. I suppose Id rather find a way to earn more and save more rather than going the altogether frugal route I like being able to eat out some, but my current situation is obviously absurd. Im providing more information below and will provide more as requested. Thanks for any help you could prefer. Income: 3,846week; 15,384month; 200,000year Ive been making greater than 100k for some time now but only recently became self-employed and am not certain as to how to handle all this money. I just figured Id pay half my profits toward quarterly taxes and expect a tax refund later. This is probably stupid, I know. Rent wutilities: 840month Gym: 20 Car Insurance: 100month when paid six months at a time Therapy: 400monthWhere things get incredibly sketchy is my discretionary spending. I spend probably 150 per month on cups of coffee. I spend at least 1000 a month eating out--no alcohol. Honestly . . . I have no friends, am in a dysfunctional relationship, and just like being out among other people. I spend probably 100 per month on books on KindleAudible. I would largely attribute to this--i.e., lots of self-education--my good income. For all of the money Ive spent on personal-finance-related texts, you think Id make smarter decisions with my money, though. I spend at least 100 per month on iTunes movies, albums, etc..Other miscellaneous item: Prior to becoming self-employed, I paid around 1,000 per week on my student loans principle. Ive saved nothing for retirement because I figure it would make more sense just to pay off said loans first. My student loan debt is my only debt. I could probably pay it off within the year if I got my shit together.Edit:My goals Pay off my debt. Save for retirement I likely will not retire, though. Build a multi-million-dollar business within the next five years. Okay, this is admittedly beyond the scope of Personal Finance.Edit 2: The average interest rate of all my student loans is 4.5. There is one loan--for 2,600--thats at 7.5 interest. Ill be paying it off in a couple of weeks. Also, Ill more realistically be paying 1,600 per week 6,400 per month toward my loans, now that I make so much more than I was three months ago.  <response>: It sounds like you have an income you are comfortable with. I think your situation sounds more positive than you may think. Based on what you described your monthly income is I am not sure if that is revenue or your take home. In either case, you may consider a few ideas of approaching your goals. 1Tracking: if you are aware of how and where your money goes you may find that you have less desire to spend it a resource like mint.com is great. It gives you a layout of where your money goes. on the other hand if some of the money you are spending, like eating out, helps your emotional stability and not feel alone, I dont see it as a negative, maybe just as a cost of living at the moment.2 Automatic deposits into specified accounts. If you have read the book the Richest Man in Babylon, or Automatic Millionaire , or How we got out of debt by Robert Kiyosaki. You will find an overarching theme of putting money away every month, or week, or day, into specified accounts that you dont have easy access to.By the way you are already doing it by overpaying for your taxes, at leat that is what it sounds like from how you described it For example, if you want to save 10 of what you make, you can set automatic with drawls or transfers from your checking bank account to something like an ING Orange, you will still have relatively easy access to your money, but it will take a few days to get to it, and in the mean time you may change your mind about using it. 3 Pay off debt investing. This one is more tricky, because you havent provided enough information about how much you want to be involved in investing. Also not sure what you do with being self-employed, aka you can invest in your own business The short and simple answer is that if your loans are lets say 6for example purpose, because I dont know how much your interest rate is and you feel that you can not get an investment that will make you 6 or more a year, then pay off your loan. But, if you feel like you can get more that 6, then invest, and pay the loan off with the money that you make from the investment. Here is an example of what i mean. If you find an investment that gives you 12 yearly return, and your debt is at 6, you will then make and additional 6 towards your retirement while also paying 6 towards your loan debt. The reason this works is that you will use the 1,000 a week towards investing vs paying of loan, and achieve both. Here is the math: 12 returnon money you invested instead of paying off student loan6interest you owe to debt6profit:which you can use to pay off student debt or save for retirementIf what I described in the second portion of this paragraph sounds like too hard, or too much hassle, then paying off the debt is the simplest way to go.4 Retirement: because everybody has a different idea of what retirement is, I can not answer this question with integrity. The reason I say that, is because do you consider retirement a certain amount of money you have in the bank, or a certain amount of money that comes in every month, or do you consider retirement a certain net worth? Depending on what you want out of retirement, the answer changes. The answers are similar, but are distinctly different. I hope this helps, and gives you some things to consider. I wish you the very best. Bill Gates said that the best thing that you can do is to invest in yourself, it sounds like you are doing that already, you are on the right path. 