The first thing u have to do is set a retirement fund target. Say RM2mil by the age of 50 for example. This will need to be based on a number of factors e.g salary, fixed expenses, debt levels, family needs, quality of life at retirement, etc

Once uve done that, u then work backwards and come up with a annual target to achieve. This will need to be weighed vs inflation, economic conditions, etc.

Once you have your annual target, then work backwards and set monthly targets.

In most cases, these monthly targets may be a bit out of reach. But that's the challenge question you need to ask yourself which is what do I need to do to achieve these targets?

First step is to closely monitor your daily expenses. If u don't plug the loopholes, you are still going to be bleeding unknowingly. For me, I do a expense check every week. If 1 week my expenses are high, the following week I immediately cut down to bring it back to normal. If u let it go out of control, then ure in trouble.

Once uve got this in check, then focus on what investments to go into based on your disposable income.

Remember the golden rule of investment:
The best investors are those who invest with the least effort, smallest capital, shortest tenure, lowest possible risk and yet make the highest returns.

So when u consider any investment, ask yourself if ure keeping to the 5 criteria above. Note that everything is an investment and there are millions of investments out there. But not all investments are the 'correct' ones to go into. Just because u're investing in something doesn't automatically mean ure making a profit. Every investment needs to be risk adjusted e.g making a 5% gain from a investment which has a 15% risk factor is foolish.

Keep in mind that even the best investors will lose money on some ventures at some point. Nobody makes a profit from everything. But the key is to invest in a number of product classes and spread the risk so that even if 1 goes down, u have another 2-3 schemes to cover that loss.

Remember the 4 step process about risk management:

1) Risk identification
2) Risk impact assessment
3) Risk probability
4) Risk impact mitigation

In everything we do (investment or general decision making), we must go through the 4 step process above. But sadly when it comes to investment, most ppl stop at No 1. If they perceive something to be risky, they just ignore and brush it aside before giving it due consideration through Steps 2,3 & 4 thus missing out on a potential investment opportunity. 

The key reason behind this is many do not even know the meaning of the word 'risk'. Therefore they assume something is high risk when it could be a low/medium risk product. We need to also know the source of the risk. Quite often you will meet ppl who will assume something is high risk because they lack the knowledge in that particular scheme. But lack of knowledge is a personal limitation and not a product risk. So we need to deal with that ourselves.