If you think about it, money is everywhere in our day-to-day lives. It lets us go out to dinner or a movie with friends, visit special places, and help out members of our community. And when all our adventures are done, it even lets us buy toothpaste so we can brush our teeth!

But how do you know that you’ll have enough money for all these things? Deciding how to spend something that’s limited—like time or money—isn’t always easy. We have to find the perfect balance of the stuff we must do and the stuff that makes us happy. It’s more of an art than a science. 

Now, here’s a short story about finding balance…

She knew she should get started studying and practicing for the week ahead—but she already had some plans for the weekend too. She had promised to babysit her little sister, Tenley, and her best friend, Zoe, invited her over to try out their new makeup palettes.

Cece was starting to feel overwhelmed. She had a ton of things she needed to do, but also lots of things she wanted to do. Would there be enough time to do everything in just two days? 

So, Cece made a plan for how she would divide up her time, and decided to stick to it all weekend. 

On Saturday, her mom dropped her off at Zoe’s house around lunchtime, and they spent the afternoon watching makeup tutorials on YouTube. She had planned to spend all day with Zoe, so Cece called her mom to ask if she could stay for pizza and didn’t come home until bedtime! Friend time? Check!

On Sunday, Cece woke up early so she could do her math flashcards before taking care of her chores around the house. Studying? Check! Chores? Check! She also needed to pick a song for this week’s audition, so she holed up in her bedroom, settled on a song, and practiced her vocal warm-ups. [la la la la la la laaaaa] Audition prep? Check!

That afternoon, she babysat Tenley and even tried to teach her some Spanish. It was a win-win: she got to entertain her sister and prepare for her presentation on Thursday! Check and check!

Because Cece was able to plan out how she would use her time, her weekend was a lot of fun, AND she also felt prepared for the week ahead. 

One budgeting method we love is called the 50/20/30 rule. Let’s pretend, to keep it simple, that you have $100. With the 50/20/30 rule, we’re going to put that $100 into three categories:

50 dollars goes toward your essentials. As a kid, maybe your must-haves are things you need for school (like books or pencils).

20 dollars goes toward the future. Right now, it might be saving for college, or even a trip to Disneyland.

Now you have $30 left, and that can go toward all the fun decisions you get to make, like going to the ice cream store with friends or buying a new outfit.

When you use the 50/20/30 rule, you know exactly how much you can afford to spend. You can apply this rule to any amount of money you have – just use 50%, 20%, and 30%. That’s it! Happy budgeting!

To learn more about how to make a budget, invest to grow your money, and save for what you really want, check out our book, Growing Up Powerful: Money Matters. And check out greenlight.com/rebelgirls to get your first month at no cost and start building money confidence for life.  

That’s all for this episode! Tune in next time for more money tips, and don’t forget to staaaay rebel!