Fact is that if you've never paid attention to how much you spend on your minor wants, chances are high that you can never make proper budgeting for your gambling.
Sometimes, the amount we spend on things that don't add anything to us is always more than the amount we spend on gambling and for gambling expenses, it's even better because there's a chance that you might win and get a return from what you've put into it but for the regular expenses, once it's gone it's gone for good and it's easy to spend so much on small items without even knowing that a lot is already going into such as long as you're not taking record of such expenses.
If you want to practice proper gambling budgeting and see that it works effectively, you first have to start from personal budgeting and then you can easily implement it in your gambling.
What's your take on this?
You understand the essence correctly, to make your gambling safe, you need to plan your budget properly. And while you are still defining what gambling means to you, you should play only with an insignificant part of your money. So insignificant that it should be even less than what you spend, for example, on coffee or other daily expenses.
If you decide that gambling is just entertainment for you, then you can keep this gambling budget at the same level. If you see that you are a good player and you want to try earning money from gambling, then try to increase the budget gradually and see whether you can actually make a profit or not.