I like the idea of budget - its fun to play with spreadsheets - but a budget feels like I can't really enjoy my life. One of my goals for 2011 is to be debt free by the end of the year, however, which means I not only need to work on a usable/practical budget I have to actually stick with it.
When I began the number crunching last night I was surprised to see I hadn't made nearly as much progress as I'd thought in 2010. When it comes to money I'm the queen of denial - denial of reality that is. I'll happily borrow from my savings to go see a movie, try a new recipe with fantastic ingredients, purchase some item I've wanted for ages that now happens to be on sale - you get the drift.
This go-around I approached my budget a bit differently. After estimating my annual income I worked up an annual budget - which I then broke down into monthly allotments by paycheck. I even went so far as to think through the grocery and household items I purchase each month (and with which paycheck) to make sure I had accurate estimates.
The key for me will be two-fold. 1 - Religiously track how much I spend on what item. 2 - Use the coupons I clip and put the saved money into savings/debt repayment immediately. Even if its puny little amounts. This should help deter my tendency to spend the "saved" money on free items.
So I've got it all worked out if I stick with what I'll be debt-free by November. Which is much later than I'd thought (I had May in my head), but just seeing that its doable gives me hope. This is one monster I've been battling for quite a while and I'm confident that I'll see victory in 2011.
No comments:
Post a Comment