To Secure Your Company's Financial Future, Do This Until you really understand your spending, you'll never be financially secure.

I'm a financial strategist. I tell people how to manage their wealth. But I have a confession to make: I didn't have my own personal-finance aha moment until several years ago. For decades, I had blissfully blurred the line between "wants" and "needs" -- until I got a divorce, which is when those two things were put in stark relief. To maintain my predivorce lifestyle, I realized, I needed to immediately bring home five figures each month. I didn't need or want that kind of pressure.

Each of us may have a moment like this. You may think you're protected from it; I did, too. But here's the thing: Even if you do avoid a life-changing financial shake-up, you should always understand how you use your money. And you can't accomplish that until you divide your spending into many little pieces.

Here's how I learned to do it.