For those of you making even a little bit more than you need for your fixed expenses, we are going to start a gentle and sustainable saving process that will help you build an emergency fund or, better yet, an investment fun.

After a recent personal budget review, I realized that I have been systematically spending more than I am making. I have a strict "no credit card debt" policy, so I was simply going to savings each month to pay everything off and thinking the following month I would be sure to spend less and make up for extra spending the month before. After 9 months or more, my savings account is teetering on extinction.

The cost of my children's after school activities started mounting and I could not say no to many expensive private lessons and sports activities.  Add summer camp to that, a new needed sofa and computer, and you can see how quickly the costs add up.

Hopefully by now you went through your budget and determined an amount that we can take off the top every month and set aside. The strategy is to pay yourself first. In this process, I am assuming you are receiving a traditional paycheck where taxes and  401k contributions are already taken out. I am assuming you are maximizing your 401k and now we are building a personal savings account in addition to your retirement account.

The amount you save per month can be as low at $25 or as high as you can commit to month after month. The objective is for you to put this money permanently aside for a 6-month cash reserve or begin a long-term investment account.

Once you determine that amount, remove it from your checking account and either directly invest in a mutual fund or directly deposit it into a money market savings account. It needs to be separate from your checking account and, emotionally, you must think of it as money you do not have for immediate consumption. Emotionally setting this aside for the future is the key to staying on track and building. If you can imagine a 30 year-old woman setting aside $100 a month in a mutual fund for 35 years and increasing it every year by $10 per month and the money growing at 6% or 8%, it will be a significant amount of money saved as an addition to your 401k or other retirement income. Get started today.