One Down, 11 To Go

Month 1:

The following are the numbers/statistics regarding how I did during the first month of my Give It Up experiment:

% of Income spent
Credit Card repayments: 30%
Mortgage: 14%
Taxes: 12%
Insurance: (life, medical, dental,
car, homeowners) 7%
Work Expenses: 6%
Various Savings Accounts: 6%
Student Loans: 6%
Home Living Expenses (phone,
electric bill, condo maintenance
fees, internet, Netflix,) 6%
Car payment 4%
Monthly pet fees (daycare,
insurance) 2%
Retirement 2%
Medical bills/Health
Savings Acct 2%
CPA fees 2%
Self-care (Gym, Float) 1.5%
Bank Fees .25%
Investments (additional) .25%

Grocery Budget: $200/month – Spent $168.87
Spending Money Budget: $320/month – Spent $315

Other expenses:
I took money out of my “Fun/Vacation” savings to pay for Hall and Oates concert tickets as well as to renew my yoga package. Additionally, I took money from my “Race Fee” savings to pay for the majority of a new triathlon suit, with the remainder being paid from my allotted spending money. I did not include these expenses in my breakdown above, as these savings plans are specifically for such spending.

Measurable “Add On” Goals:

(Number of times I achieved vs. planned)
Orange Theory workout (OTF) 6/12
Meditation 8/12
Outdoor activity 5/8
Strength Training 1/4
Yoga 4/4
Acts of Kindness 4/4
Social Activity 2/2
Massage 1/1
Float Therapy 1/1

Measurable “Give it Up” Goals:
Take-out tea 2/2
Eating out 5/5

Additional Goals:
• I was able to stick to my goal of no spending whatsoever on clothing, home goods, electronics, itunes music, high-end skin care.
• My goal of no pastries or donuts was missed when I did succumb to a tasty cheese danish at Starbucks on morning. Other than this, I
have not gone back on this goal.
• My goal of no snacks at the movies was missed only once when I bought nachos and a coke on a cinema gift card. I’m giving myself half
a win on this – the winning half going to the fact that I didn’t spend any money on said snacks, although the calories were still
there.
• I achieved my goal of drinking only water when eating out, to save on money and calories.
• Although there’s no easy way to measure, I feel like my road rage, cursing, self-deprecating talk and unnecessary apologies have
decreased as well.

Overall, it looks like I did well during this first month. As you can see, a huge portion of my income went to credit card debt as this is one of the main goals of this whole experiment. It’s interesting that I’m spending nearly the same amount on my mortgage as I am on taxes, but maybe not when you think about how much taxes actually cost us. I don’t like that I’m only putting 2% of my income back for retirement at this point but, again, the whole goal of this is to get unnecessary expenses paid off so that I can begin padding those accounts to the max – hopefully this is what I will be able to focus on in 2019.

OTF, Meditation, Outdoor Activities and Strength Training were the only areas I lacked in achieving my measurable goals – which is interesting since these are typically some of my favorite things. I can’t think of any good excuse as to why this is other than “life got in the way.” At the very least this gives me an idea of where I need to step it up for March and beyond.

As for additional spending, I've discovered it’s a good thing I do put additional money back into specific savings accounts for things that come up. As of today, I have separate savings accounts for:

Quarterly and Annual taxes, including CPA fees
Race Fees and gear
Emergency Living Expenses (this doesn’t get touched)
Vacation/Fun Fund
Practice (work) Expenses

If it hadn’t been for these accounts I couldn’t have paid for the Hall & Oates tickets (on my approved spending list, by the way), my yoga package and my tri suit.

The only thing that I’m tweaking for March is the amount of time I’m allotting for OTF, due to tri training starting soon as well as cutting back on monthly expenses, and trading out the “No Sweets” goal for the “No Television,” goal. Unfortunately, I went a little sugar-crazy at my last grocery visit and have some Little Debbie’s and Breyers ice cream left in the condo that are sure to be consumed for the simple fact that they’re there. By April, all of the on-hand sweets will have been eaten so there will be less temptation. To say the least, that will be an interesting month.