Spendy Wendy to Saver Savvy

Spendywendywoo

@Suffolk_lass, yes of course. 

So I am determined to hit some of my personal goals (as I have my financial goal this year) and I have found that having a spreadsheet that I maintain keeps me on track. I've read a few self development books over the past year and the reoccurring advice is to track. what gets rewarded gets repeated, habit stacking and also focusing only on a few habits as opposed to lots whilst addressing the process rather than focusing on the goal / end result. So I plan to create a chart, in Excel, that lists 100 days and my 5 daily habits that I want to build up; 

* drink 2l water
* read for 20 minutes
* movement for 20 minutes (this could be a walk, workout or even intense mopping, as long a I am moving faster than I would be usually and break a bit of a sweat)
* brush teeth PM - I do sometimes forget and wake up in the night needing to brush my teeth so I am hoping that by reinforcing this habit that it improves my sleep further
* Bed by 10pm, lights out

I will build formula into the tracker so that it calculates daily and total % completion so I don't have to. Then each month I will review progress and see what I need to improve / change. I am also going to track my weight so that I can see if the movement and water are helping, or if I need to introduce a more robust calorie count / healthy eating habit - but, if possible, I want to keep it as easy and maintainable as possible. 

The only rule... I can't skip a habit on two consecutive days, so if I don't read tomorrow then I have to read on Wednesday (I've already read this morning). 

I hope I've explained it well enough

liselle

Oh good plan! I now clean my teeth at night directly after clearing away the dinner things, then I know it’s done.

Sun_Addict

I know people who use the Finch app for habit tracking. Great to have a plan for the things you want to become habits and track consistency. 

FootyFanDan

Another vote for the finch app, although i was a bad finch owner and neglected him…oopsie.

You are making fab progress with the decluttering. 

Spendywendywoo

Is the Finch app expensive? I’m trying to cut out subscriptions, if I can but if it does have good reviews then it may be worth it 

Sun_Addict

Spendywendywoo said:

Is the Finch app expensive? I’m trying to cut out subscriptions, if I can but if it does have good reviews then it may be worth it 

It's free. There's a paid version but people say you don't really need it. Having said that I don't use it just know people who swear by it. 

It's the same with the FitOn app you can get brilliant content without subscribing. I subscribed to the paid version for a year and found I didn't use the extras so went back to the free one. 

Spendywendywoo

Ah amazing, thank you. I'll take a look this evening

Spendywendywoo

So...I've taken a look at the Finch app and I agree, it's great so far. I've done some tasks that it set me and I've agreed to a 7 day commitment for goals (all on the free option). I'll customise it in time but for now I'm going to do what it suggests as it seems relevant. I'll also still aim for my personal goals and see how I fare.  Thank you for suggesting

Spendywendywoo

My tracker hasn't faired very well this week as it has been manic, I need to adjust what I'm doing and how...I'll think on that. For the time being I am just concentrating on drinking 2l of water a day, which I am achieving. 

I've just updated our budget (a week until pay day) and we are already over on the grocery category- it's so expensive to shop. I already plan meals so need to think about what I am making without it being a 'freezer junk' tea every night. 

Spendywendywoo

Ok so I should be celebrating as I have just made the car payment and therefore we are DEBT FREE!!! 

However, my bank firstly blocked the payment and my card as it looked like a fraudulent payment (clearly I don't spend 12.5k very often) so I followed the instructions and unblocked the card and account and processed it a second time and the website processed it, it's come through on my phone's notifications that payment has been made but the webpage of the finance company is saying 'referred'... I'm assuming it just means that they have to check the payment has gone through?? Kinda taken the shine off the money but either way....we are …

DEBT FREE!!