It's both. You have to control the urge to spend or an increase in income will have a commensurate increase in spend, leaving you no better off.
Breaking the nexus of the 'more stuff' mindset is important as groundwork in increasing income. I have read quite a few stories on here where someone hit a wild payday with an online venture but were broke again in 2 years. That is because they never tamed their desire to spend, and when lack of income was removed, all of it got spent, and more. Worse still, their expectations of life increased to the point where being happy again required a much bigger income.
So it's better to put a frugal mindset in place and practice - and be ok with that- so that any increase in income can be channeled into building assets that will increase financial independence.
My personal framework is not to worry too much about small purchases (i.e. coffee, eating out, etc) but to consider it when making a larger purchase (i.e. a holiday, car, house, etc).
Before I spend money on a larger purchase, I tend to think: would I rather spend/waste money on this, or have it compound over many years. For each million invested properly, you can get annual gains between 50-100k.
Breaking the nexus of the 'more stuff' mindset is important as groundwork in increasing income. I have read quite a few stories on here where someone hit a wild payday with an online venture but were broke again in 2 years. That is because they never tamed their desire to spend, and when lack of income was removed, all of it got spent, and more. Worse still, their expectations of life increased to the point where being happy again required a much bigger income.
So it's better to put a frugal mindset in place and practice - and be ok with that- so that any increase in income can be channeled into building assets that will increase financial independence.