30 Day Money Reset
Your one month challenge to develop healthy, biblical financial habits.
DAY 16
TRACKING YOUR SPENDING
Are you still tracking your spending?
Hopefully, you have a week’s worth of expenses written down somewhere – on a spreadsheet, in a notebook, or an app on your phone. Tracking your expenses can seem tedious or burdensome, but it’s really important if you want to have an accurate budget and meet your financial goals.
Truthfully, tracking your spending is a great way to establish a habit of self-discipline. In the natural order of things, God designed us to be disciplined people. The lack of self-discipline usually leads to all kinds of problems: debt, obesity, bad health – just to name a few.
True self-discipline is not self-oriented at all. It is God-oriented.
Only by knowing and applying God’s self-discipline can you and I be free, and therefore, receptive to God’s direction.
After just a week of tracking your spending, you should already be able to see habits in your spending. Some common spending traps are actually things meant to save you money – free shipping, buying in bulk, couponing, sales, samples, free trials, and store credit cards.
But these can actually force us to spend more money than we planned because we see the value, the money saved, etc. and fall into the trap. Overspending, even with coupons, is still overspending!
This is where your habit of self-discipline will help keep you on track.
Today's action item:
Review your week's worth of spending. Write down any insights you have, things you learn about yourself, etc. Identify any spending traps that you may be falling into.
As you review your spending, write down any changes you want to make going forward. If you don't see anything significant in your spending habits from the past week, just make plans to review it again next week!
