Your top priority as a mother is giving your kids the best life possible. Wanting them to have a better life than you did is a natural response when parenting, but of course upgrading their life comes at a cost. Raising a child and providing for them is never cheap, and learning how to balance giving them what they deserve and be reasonable about it is a balancing act within itself. It’s not impossible, but it requires the strength to keep priorities in order and to make tough decisions.

The first thing you have to do is know that giving your kids a better life involves the big moments, not the small ones. With the prices of new cars and home expenses you can’t afford to indulge your child’s every wish. You have to be smart enough to know that the big moments will matter more. No child remembers all the fast food meals that you might have declined to give them, but they will remember the school you were able to send them to. They might not remember the discounted school supplies they had to use growing up, but will remember being able to go to their high school prom. You have to remember that the bigger moments matter more, so save your money on the small moments.

The hardest thing to do is to tell your child “no.” It’s a word that we, as adults, seldom like to hear. It’s a word that inflicts pain on a child, but it’s a temporary pain and one that will be long forgotten someday. The bigger gratification for a child is being rewarded after accomplishing something and having security. Save the money and your indulgence to reward good behavior. This will give a child an incentive to be good. Don’t sweat the things you can’t give them and instead focus on the things you can.