Tips from the health world to help with wealth.
Q: “I love how you related your financial plan to a wellness plan! So my question is: what are some examples of weekly goals/small steps we can take towards paying off debt, saving, and a sustainable budget plan instead of jumping all in and giving up after a few weeks/months?”
A: Uh oh I started with the metaphor, so now I have to keep the metaphor going. Ok, I’ll give it a try. 🙂
In my mind, losing weight is basically eat less, exercise more.
Getting out of debt is basically spend less, save more.
So some eat less ideas – eat less calorie dense foods. Money version – buy less money dense stuff. So if you are going to buy clothes, can you buy on consignment/pre-owned? Honestly, if I donate at The Salvation Army/Goodwill I usually then park and go in to see what I can find. 🙂
You might also cut out snacks to reduce your total calorie intake. What shopping are you doing that is the money equivalent to snacking?
Food version – maybe only go to a restaurant once a week. Money version – only go to Target once a week. Actually, only going out to a restaurant once a week helps with your weight loss and your money saving goals, so that one counts double!
I think it comes down to knowing where the money leaks are. If you do the 30 days of spending, you’ll notice the patterns.
And it’s tradeoffs, right? Buying vegetables is cheaper than buying pre-made salad, but my time is valuable, too. It’s a balance.
The biggest thing is breaking the big spending habits like restaurants, shopping for fun, and buying stuff on credit. One of the few good things about the pandemic is that a lot of our habits got interrupted anyway, so it’s a good time to make changes.
There’s not a fitness analogy here, but RENT stuff. You don’t need to buy the boat/jetski/vacation house/ski equipment if you don’t use it all the time. Once of the biggest mistakes we make is buying stuff we use very infrequently and could easily rent instead. This is a mindset shift if you are in your 40s, as the sharing economy didn’t really exist when we were coming up and getting our patterns set. Ask a millennial for ideas. 🙂
Are you ready to change your financial life? If so, I can help. Schedule a time to talk to me about options for working together at https://lisaduke.net/schedule
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