Isn’t Budget Another Word for Money Diet?
It’s January and how many of you are on a DIET? How long do you typically stay on a diet before you have to break out of JAIL? For most it’s only a few weeks. You feel deprived, you’re hungry, grumpy, have less energy (no kidding – you’re not feeding the cells of your body and they are letting you know). But, you lose the 5 or 10 pounds and you feel good. YEAH!! And then what? If you don’t have a PLAN to stay conscious, very conscious, about what you’re eating you will gain it ALL back and more. WHY do we keep doing this to ourselves – year after year?
Well one reason for this is we don’t like to suffer by not eating what we want - get it. And, most humans hate change. To stay on a plan month after month, year after year – BORING.
Isn’t the deprivation and the breaking out of jail the same way a BUDGET affects you?
First of all, most of us put off making a budget or avoid them all together. If you have a resolution or commitment to change your money habits in 2012, GREAT. Just be aware the same break out of jail mentality will assault you at some point when you least suspect it. You’re stressed or upset about an event of the day, you go to the mall just to browse. You see something that you MUST have but it’s not in the budget. You start to rationalize about how you’ve been working really hard, you really NEED that top for that event you’re attending. You see where this is going?
After 25 years of working in the field of addiction and specifically with women that have weight concerns my recommendation if you want to lose weight or create a spending/saving plan is to not kid yourself and think this is a quick-fix one time solution.
1) Look at the people who are successful – I recommend only two programs for those that are serious about losing weight and keeping it off - Weight Watchers or Take Shape for Life. Angela Jones is local and great: Jonell is in the Lodi area and both these women have kept their weight off for 2 years or more.
2) For a Spending Plan I recommend talking to Diane Hinkley, Dave Ramsey Certified Money Coach for the nuts & bolts and numbers around spending.
3) And, myself to understand and explore your emotional relationship with Money as this is what pulls you off budget (or diets) and keeps the saboteur in charge. Read more about Money Coaching now!