Tough to answer empathetically in the light of what people younger than me are dealing with today, but here’s my take:

In one sentence: Wanting stability from an early age and willing to make some serious sacrifices to achieve it.

Worked for over 10 years before taking a holiday.

Decided we couldn’t afford to have kids and never had any.

When we finally bought a house, we stayed in it for 26 years, while our peers would keep moving to bigger and better homes with bigger and better mortgages.

Paid off our mortgage as quickly as we could.

Never paid a penny in interest on a credit card.

We saved for absolutely everything, no matter how long it took. A life with very few impulse purchases.

The single biggest “thing” we did was to save 50% of every ‘windfall’, however hard it was (and sometimes it was very hard). Every pay rise, we only ever took half of it and saved the other half. Every time we got a new job with a salary increase, we saved half of it. Christmas/birthday presents that were money - 50% saved. You get the idea.

Compound interest is a wonderful thing!

I sometimes wonder if it was worth it. We’re definitely financially comfortable by most people’s standards, but I nearly died 2 years ago and I now I often think - was it worth it?