What does it mean to have financial freedom?

Financial freedom means having enough money that you don't have to work anymore. You can have freedom in most areas of your life, and although you may choose to work, you don't need to because you have a surplus of money that will last you throughout your life.

Do I consider myself financially free? In short, no, but we continue to build on our current financial situation in hopes of achieving this goal.

Often I get asked, why I use frugality even though I'm debt-free. I often reply I enjoy the minimalist lifestyle and frugal living helped my husband and I pay off our student loans and mortgage.

Yet, even though we are debt-free, we still have bills and we are raising a family. We enjoy taking vacations and living life without too many restrictions. Therefore, we do not have financial freedom yet. But we do consider ourselves to be financially sound.

So how are we able to be financially sound and remain debt-free? We continue to live a frugal lifestyle to help maintain our current lifestyle.

We live below our means and often use our extra money to invest and earn. In this way, your money works for you.

We see frugal living as a fun challenge and we like to coupon and save on everyday items

Although this saves a little here and there, we also like to buy quality over quantity so we don't have to replace items often.

We continue to have financial disciple where it counts we don't need the latest and greatest of everything. I enjoy saving and keeping our "house fund" the same for the last five years so when we find a new house, we will be able to put down a down payment. (Currently live in a condo with two kids.)

Investing our money has helped us build up our retirement accounts so we can sleep soundly and don't have much money stress.

Yes, we do occasionally have a surprise bill and since we keep an emergency fund, this doesn't throw us off track too much.

Final Thoughts...

If we are asked if we have total financial freedom, I think both of us would say no, but as of now we are financially sound and we can continue our lifestyle by taking vacations, buying food we want, going out to eat once in a while and our favorite - family movie and pizza night. We continue to invest in the hopes that we will eventually have financial freedom.

I'm Sarah, author of I Heart Frugal. I am a mother of two, wife, and personal finance blogger. My husband and I have paid off over $100,000 in student loan debt combined and enjoy saving money on everyday things so we can use our money to travel.