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Is "Budget" a Four-Letter Word?

by Judy Hoctor

The term “budget” used to feel like a four-letter word in our house. It meant restrictions and deprivation. In some ways it is understandable since the only times we talked about a budget was when we were having trouble paying our bills and needed to reduce spending. Although we are both fairly intelligent, we could never get a budget to work for us, either.

I used to be content with earning enough money that I could spend whatever I wanted (within reason) and not have my heart beat faster when I went to the grocery store because I wasn’t sure I’d have enough money to cover the cost of the food in my cart.

Although I wasn’t eager to look at our finances, I knew we needed to clean up our spending, and I wanted to get out of debt, so I was perhaps more open to the word “budget” than I had been previously. Plus, we now had Moneywell that we could use, which is supposed to make developing a spending plan easy to do.

The surprising part of the process was realizing that some of the blind spending I had been doing was taking money away from the more important things I wanted to do with my money. For instance, although I had been spending lots of money on tolls, lunches, and coffee, what was really more important to me was to take a family vacation. Unfortunately, we hadn’t had money for a vacation in the last several years. Looking at my spending allowed me to see that I was spending approximately $70 per week on things that weren’t even important to me!

Facing the truth about my spending was one of the best things I’ve ever done. It’s allowed me to be more intentional with my spending and to do the things that I really want to do instead of handing over my cash to the first thing that comes through the door.

Do you know where your money is going? Are there things you are buying that have no real importance? Are there things you’d like to have or do but your income doesn’t cover them? Maybe you’re like me and you simply need to reprioritize your spending. It doesn’t have to be restrictive. You just have to “buy” into it. It makes all the difference!