Showing posts with label overspending. Show all posts
Showing posts with label overspending. Show all posts
7/23/13
Labels:
Decision making
,
Deprivation
,
Emotions
,
frugality
,
overspending
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Why Do I Overspend When I Have No Money?
I’m going through a quiet patch at work at the moment. It’s always like this in July, presumably because of the end of financial year. But it makes me a bit panicky – part of me thinks the slow pace will never pick up.
Yet I’m noticing a tendency to spend as if the quiet patch wasn’t happening. On a logical level this doesn’t make sense. If there is less money coming in, it should be easy to spend less, right?
Wrong. Humans are emotional creatures, and it’s for emotional reasons that we overspend. I was curious as to where my own urge to keep spending came from, and came up with a few theories. Along the way, I thought of some other motivations that can lead to overspending just at the very moment when you should be pinching your pennies. I’ve listed them below.
Once you know what’s really going on, you don’t have to beat yourself up about spending. Instead you can deal with the source of the problem, not just the symptom. For this reason I’ve provided some suggested solutions to the different reasons for spending when money is tight.
Scarcity – If you’re telling yourself you don’t have any money, that alerts your brain to a fear that you won’t have enough. Your unconscious may decide that it’s better to spend what you’ve got, and to ‘stock up’ on consumer goods because there’s no more money coming in.
Solution: Sooth yourself. Tell yourself that you’re in charge, and that you’ll do your best to spend wisely the money you have access to, even if it’s limited.
Giving up – if you’re already in debt then it’s easy to think ‘one more little thing won’t make any difference’. Your financial situation feels so hopeless that you may as well spend that little bit extra.
Solution: Start a budget, so that you know where your money is going. Keep checking it, and try to stick to it; if you go off track, simply adjust the budget and get back on the wagon again.
Treating yourself – If there’s not much work coming in and you’re worried about the situation, it’s tempting to spend in order to feel better and give yourself a mood boost.
Solution: Treat yourself with things that don’t cost anything, like a nice warm bath, a walk in the park, a nap on the couch, or just sleeping in on the weekend.
Boredom – If there’s not much work coming in, or you’re simply at home a lot, life gets boring. You may find yourself browsing your favourite shopping sites, or going to the mall, seeking visual stimulation; the human need for novelty is a classic reason why people shop.
Solution: Plan your time so that it’s quite structured. Include activities that are mentally stimulating and challenging. Seek visual stimulation in ways other than shopping, like going to a gallery or listening to some music.
Guilt – if you’ve been an overspender for a while, it’s easy to slip into a vicious circle. You feel guilty for overspending, and the guilt makes you feel bad about yourself – so you go out and spend in order to feel better.
Solution: Practise self-love, even if you don’t believe you’re worth it (you are!). Seek the support of a self-help group for overspenders or a therapist who specialises in spending issues.
Power – Not having much money can make you feel powerless. In contrast, finding a bargain, or choosing a tasteful bag, can make you feel very powerful. Ironically, this kind of spending is also disempowering because it’s preventing you taking control of your finances.
Solution: Look at ways you feel disempowered in your own life, and fix them. Work on your budget, and look at any issues you are having with self-discipline, motivation and changing habits. Learn assertion skills to use at work and in your personal life. Join a community group that works on a social issue you’d like to change.
Drop us a line!
I hope this helps. I’d love to hear of any experiences you have of overspending when you’re broke, and how you keep your spending in line. Meanwhile here’s a couple of resources if you have serious spending problems.
I hope this helps. I’d love to hear of any experiences you have of overspending when you’re broke, and how you keep your spending in line. Meanwhile here’s a couple of resources if you have serious spending problems.
Help for overspending
Online discussion group: Shopping Addicts Support
Debtors Anonymous
Until next time!
If you enjoyed this blog entry, you might also like Things You Get for Free: Making the Most of Free Events in Your Area and Three Frugal Tips So Obvious You Probably Haven't Thought of Them.
5/14/12
Labels:
Compacting
,
Families
,
frugality
,
overspending
,
Saving money
,
Secondhand goods
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Three Frugal Tips So Obvious You Probably Haven't Thought of Them
Getting serious about saving money can seem like an
onerous task. But it starts with simply changing your attitudes to money and
the way you approach spending it. Here are three new frugal tips that are so
obvious you may not have thought of them yet!
1. Assume you don’t need
anything
Apart from the basic necessities (food, housing, energy,
transport) we often say we ‘need’ new items. What we really mean is that we believe our lives would be easier, happier and better overall if we had those items.
When we go shopping for a particular non-basic item we start
from a default position that’s so drummed into us we don’t realise it – that we
must buy whatever it is we’re looking for. We feel deprived and somehow inadequate
without the item.
One way to decrease your spending is to assume that you
already have everything you need apart from basic necessities. Then, when a fresh need comes to your attention – a new smartphone; a pair of Mahno Blahnik shoes – you start from the
assumption that you don’t need it and
work backwards.
Assuming you don’t really need it, ask yourself if there’s anything you already
have that could substitute for it.
Alternatively, could you borrow it instead? Find it secondhand? Swap something
to get it? Or, when you give yourself time to think about it, do you really
have enough of that kind of item already?
Of course, at any one time there’s a fair chance that you don’t have everything
you need. I often recommend people write a list of things that they intend to
buy to put some boundaries around their spending.
The beauty of starting from a default ‘no needs’ position is that you exhaust every other possibility before buying the item. Then if you decide you do really need it, you can buy it without guilt. The real,
genuine needs will emerge from the dross of your many wants like shining
diamonds, and you’ll find the right items easily at the right time.
2. First things first
I used to be in a 12-step program, and if there’s one thing that is
plentiful in these programs it’s wise sayings. Some might argue there are too many, but they can sometimes be quite
profound. One of the sayings that has stuck with me over the years is ‘first
things first’.
There are two useful ways you can apply this to your
spending. The first one is simply allocating enough money for the basic necessities of
life (food, housing, energy, transport) before buying non-necessities. Of course, there are many ways you can reduce your spending on
these necessities so that you can save more money or buy something you really
need.
The other meaning of the saying is even more straightforward, and involves how you spend your time. Shop for the necessities first, and
then do any leisure shopping you want to do. If you’re prone to overspending, getting
your priorities right in this regard could help you reduce the amount of
leisure shopping you do, and therefore your spending. Instead of tacking your food shopping onto the end of a
spending binge, take the time to think about what food you’ll buy, where you’ll buy it, and how you can buy the healthiest food to look after
yourself. Changing your priorities in this way is a signal that you’re
looking after yourself, and this could also have benefits for your spending.
You could also look more carefully at other basics like the transport you use to get around, and how you use electricity and gas. Putting time and energy into thinking about those things that you might otherwise spend, say, shopping online could not only reduce your carbon footprint but give you a more mindful experience of life.
3. Look at your family’s money history
You’re not stuck with the spending habits that were instilled in you – it is possible to change your attitudes, and looking at how you came to develop them is a great way to start.
A useful exercise is to sit down and write a history of your family’s attitudes to money. Ask yourself:
How did my parents and grandparents spend money?
What were the attitudes to money that lay behind their
spending habits?
What are my attitudes to spending?
How have the attitudes and habits of my family helped form my own attitudes?
Once you’ve answered these questions, you’ll be able to look at your spending habits much more objectively and start to get some distance from them. And you’ll begin to understand that you don't have to be stuck with them!
After taking a serious look at my parents’ attitude to
money, and those of my maternal grandparents, I now have a completely
different approach to saving and spending from the rest of my family.
Have you found that you gained more control over your spending after changing some of your basic attitudes? What were your original attitudes and how did you go about changing them?
Until next time!
If you enjoyed this blog entry, you might also like Are Any of These Negative Beliefs about Money Holding You Back? and Be a Creative Stinge – 12 Great Tips for Cutting Your Spending and Saving Money.
9/28/11
Labels:
Bricks-and-mortar stores
,
Friends
,
Leisure shopping
,
overspending
When you shop with friends, are you encouraging each other to overspend?
Writing The Inspired Shopper really got me thinking about how I buy fashion. Currently I have a moratorium on most mainstream brands, and am buying only from those with ethical (but not sustainable) accreditation, as well as secondhand clothes.
Recently I went clothes shopping with a friend in Acland Street, a tourist precinct near St Kilda beach that is famed for its cake shops, but in recent decades has succumbed to commercialisation. We wandered into one of those overstocked stores that sells obscure brands made in China and has prices that scream ‘sweatshop’. I didn’t buy anything myself, but when my friend held up a bright red fitted jacket and asked me what I thought of it, I found myself encouraging her to try it on.
While I was still completing The Inspired Shopper, I visited my dentist for a check-up and clean. I mentioned that I was working on the book as I was getting seated on the dental chair, and this gave my dentist and her dental nurse permission to discuss their shopping lives – I listened avidly, only able to nod vigorously, as tubes and drills were stuck in my mouth! The dental nurse confessed that her friends often encouraged her to buy expensive items that she often regretted when she got home.
Shopping with friends is a recreational pastime that never loses popularity. It’s fun, uplifting and a great distraction from whatever problems we’re dealing with. But friends can exert undue pressure on you to buy something, particularly when it comes to fashion. This can be difficult to resist, but often it’s their own agenda they’re pursuing, not yours.
Why does this happen? I think the human tendency to help other people spend their money actually starts with empathy rather than greed. Perhaps your friend is urging you to purchase that bright orange sundress because she’d like to buy it herself but it doesn’t suit her; or perhaps it’s beyond her budget and she knows that you can afford it.
Or perhaps your friend is addicted to shopping and, like a heavy drinker who needs to get drunk with others, wants a spendthrift companion to justify her own overspending.
In my case, the red jacket didn’t fit with my ethical beliefs, but I was still willing to encourage my friend to buy it.
My friend doesn’t have a spending addiction – in fact, she’s pretty careful with money – and neither do I. But what if she had had an addiction? Can friends shopping together encourage each others’ compulsive buying habits? Are you more likely to overspend if you go shopping with a friend?
The answer to the last question may be yes. According to retail guru Paco Underhill, women often spend more time and money when they shop with a friend than when they shop alone. (This is especially the case with teenage girls, who spend more money when they’re with a group of friends.)
It doesn’t have to be that way – when you’re shopping with another person it’s possible to have fun even if you arrive home empty handed. Here are some tips:
* Give yourself a breather before buying. If you're out shopping with friends and you see something you think you want to buy, ask your friends what they think, but don’t buy the item; ask the store to put it away for a few hours. Wait until it’s time to take a coffee or food break and then use the time off to decide whether you really want it.
* Use the day purely for recreation, not buying. If you think it might be too hard to make a buying decision with friends around, you could decide to simply enjoy the socialising and browsing aspects of the day without buying anything. If something catches your eye, you can always ask to have it put away for a few days, and return later to buy it if it still feels right.
* Try the ‘broken record’ technique. If your friends are insistent about you buying something, you can calmly refuse, without changing your tone or expressing anger, every time they insist. Each time you have to repeat yourself, change the wording slightly, eg ‘Thanks for your input, but I’ll have to think about it’; ‘I value your opinion, but I just don’t feel like buying that’.
* Shop with friends who are in touch with their intuition. It’s sometimes possible to harness the intuitive energy of others to make better decisions. I have a friend who is quite intuitive, and when I’m having trouble making a decision, she lets me know what her intuition is telling her; this sometimes helps me get more in tune with mine.
* Get into the habit of shopping with friends at thrift shops and recycle stores. Because the choices made at these stores tend to be more individualised and you have to hunt for goods that are right for you, you’ll probably put less pressure on each other to buy.
* Let other people make their own decisions. It’s important to let go when you think that a friend or loved one is making a poor shopping decision. Offer your opinion if it’s sought – and if you’re sufficiently close, even if it’s not – but let the other person make up their own mind.
* Look at your own motivations when shopping with friends. If you sometimes play the role of shopping addiction ‘enabler’ yourself, ask yourself why you want your friends to spend their money and whether you need to work on your own attitudes to spending.
Until next time!
If you enjoyed this post, you might like How to Distinguish between a Good and Bad Impulse Buy.
Read More
Are You a Shopping Addiction Enabler?
When you shop with friends, are you encouraging each other to overspend?
Writing The Inspired Shopper really got me thinking about how I buy fashion. Currently I have a moratorium on most mainstream brands, and am buying only from those with ethical (but not sustainable) accreditation, as well as secondhand clothes.
Recently I went clothes shopping with a friend in Acland Street, a tourist precinct near St Kilda beach that is famed for its cake shops, but in recent decades has succumbed to commercialisation. We wandered into one of those overstocked stores that sells obscure brands made in China and has prices that scream ‘sweatshop’. I didn’t buy anything myself, but when my friend held up a bright red fitted jacket and asked me what I thought of it, I found myself encouraging her to try it on.
While I was still completing The Inspired Shopper, I visited my dentist for a check-up and clean. I mentioned that I was working on the book as I was getting seated on the dental chair, and this gave my dentist and her dental nurse permission to discuss their shopping lives – I listened avidly, only able to nod vigorously, as tubes and drills were stuck in my mouth! The dental nurse confessed that her friends often encouraged her to buy expensive items that she often regretted when she got home.
Shopping with friends is a recreational pastime that never loses popularity. It’s fun, uplifting and a great distraction from whatever problems we’re dealing with. But friends can exert undue pressure on you to buy something, particularly when it comes to fashion. This can be difficult to resist, but often it’s their own agenda they’re pursuing, not yours.
Why does this happen? I think the human tendency to help other people spend their money actually starts with empathy rather than greed. Perhaps your friend is urging you to purchase that bright orange sundress because she’d like to buy it herself but it doesn’t suit her; or perhaps it’s beyond her budget and she knows that you can afford it.
Or perhaps your friend is addicted to shopping and, like a heavy drinker who needs to get drunk with others, wants a spendthrift companion to justify her own overspending.
In my case, the red jacket didn’t fit with my ethical beliefs, but I was still willing to encourage my friend to buy it.
My friend doesn’t have a spending addiction – in fact, she’s pretty careful with money – and neither do I. But what if she had had an addiction? Can friends shopping together encourage each others’ compulsive buying habits? Are you more likely to overspend if you go shopping with a friend?
The answer to the last question may be yes. According to retail guru Paco Underhill, women often spend more time and money when they shop with a friend than when they shop alone. (This is especially the case with teenage girls, who spend more money when they’re with a group of friends.)
It doesn’t have to be that way – when you’re shopping with another person it’s possible to have fun even if you arrive home empty handed. Here are some tips:
* Give yourself a breather before buying. If you're out shopping with friends and you see something you think you want to buy, ask your friends what they think, but don’t buy the item; ask the store to put it away for a few hours. Wait until it’s time to take a coffee or food break and then use the time off to decide whether you really want it.
* Use the day purely for recreation, not buying. If you think it might be too hard to make a buying decision with friends around, you could decide to simply enjoy the socialising and browsing aspects of the day without buying anything. If something catches your eye, you can always ask to have it put away for a few days, and return later to buy it if it still feels right.
* Try the ‘broken record’ technique. If your friends are insistent about you buying something, you can calmly refuse, without changing your tone or expressing anger, every time they insist. Each time you have to repeat yourself, change the wording slightly, eg ‘Thanks for your input, but I’ll have to think about it’; ‘I value your opinion, but I just don’t feel like buying that’.
* Shop with friends who are in touch with their intuition. It’s sometimes possible to harness the intuitive energy of others to make better decisions. I have a friend who is quite intuitive, and when I’m having trouble making a decision, she lets me know what her intuition is telling her; this sometimes helps me get more in tune with mine.
* Get into the habit of shopping with friends at thrift shops and recycle stores. Because the choices made at these stores tend to be more individualised and you have to hunt for goods that are right for you, you’ll probably put less pressure on each other to buy.
* Let other people make their own decisions. It’s important to let go when you think that a friend or loved one is making a poor shopping decision. Offer your opinion if it’s sought – and if you’re sufficiently close, even if it’s not – but let the other person make up their own mind.
* Look at your own motivations when shopping with friends. If you sometimes play the role of shopping addiction ‘enabler’ yourself, ask yourself why you want your friends to spend their money and whether you need to work on your own attitudes to spending.
Until next time!
If you enjoyed this post, you might like How to Distinguish between a Good and Bad Impulse Buy.
7/25/11
Labels:
frugality
,
Materialism
,
money
,
overspending
I’ve got a confession to make – I used to be a spendthrift. Basically that meant that I spent whatever I had. This seemed natural to me, an unwritten law: money was there to buy stuff, not to be saved. I’m ashamed to say that during my school years I even distrusted school friends who had managed to put away nest eggs!
We all have beliefs about money and spending, even though we may be unaware of them. I’m not one of those people who claim that you will achieve instant prosperity as soon as you change those beliefs – life is much more complicated than that.
But if you do have negative beliefs about money, until you face them fair and square they will almost certainly influence how you shop and how much you spend, and you’ll have trouble being more frugal, saving money for significant goals, and gaining control of your finances.
Here are some destructive beliefs that may be holding you back, starting with the most obvious. (I’ve subscribed to many of these beliefs at various times of my life.)
Note: you may still be holding onto some of these destructive beliefs even if you are being successfully frugal; even if you’re not acting on those beliefs any more, they may be making you unhappy.
• Money is there to be spent. When money comes in, it has to go out again.
• When I get a windfall, I need to splurge, otherwise I’m missing out.
• I always need to have the latest piece of technology, otherwise I’ll be uncool and out of the loop.
• I need to keep up with the standard of living pursued by my friends, family and neighbours.
• I need to be rich before I can start giving.
• I deserve to have [insert item of your choice!] because I am a good person.
• The world is an uncertain place. It’s safer to spend money rather than save it.
• Saving money is boring. It’s the kind of thing accountants do, not creative people like me.
• I don’t have to worry about money because the universe will look after me.
• I don’t have to worry about money because my parents will bail me out if need be.
• I don’t have to work for money - I’ll just attract it if I believe I can.
• I always have to buy only cheap goods and sale items otherwise I’ll go broke. It’s not safe to spend extra money to buy higher quality or ethical goods.
• It’s not fair that my sisters [or brothers, friends, neighbours, colleagues] can afford [their own house, an overseas holiday, a renovation, private schooling for their children] and I can’t, so it’s okay for me to borrow and overspend to obtain these things myself.
• I’ m a progressive and believe there should be a decent welfare safety net in place, so there’s no need for me to look after myself financially.
• The cost of living these days is outrageous. It’s not worth trying to live within my means.
• I’m too chaotic to develop the organisational skills that would enable me to save money, eg preparing my lunch in advance rather than buying it.
• There’s no point in trying to save money because whenever I start to get ahead, something happens that sets me behind again.
Identifying your negative money beliefs
Here’s an exercise: grab a piece of paper and brainstorm a list of negative beliefs about money and spending that may be holding you back. Note that some of these beliefs may lead to underspending rather than overspending.
Keep the list handy. Start to notice whenever any of these beliefs (or ones you haven’t yet pinpointed) are in play when you’re shopping, or doing anything that requires spending money, including paying bills. Add to the list any new negative beliefs that you’ve discovered you have about money.
Next time I’ll look at some helpful beliefs that can replace the unhelpful ones.
If you enjoyed this post, you might also like 11 Positive Money Beliefs That Can Help You Save.
Read More
Are Any of These Negative Beliefs about Money Holding You Back?
I’ve got a confession to make – I used to be a spendthrift. Basically that meant that I spent whatever I had. This seemed natural to me, an unwritten law: money was there to buy stuff, not to be saved. I’m ashamed to say that during my school years I even distrusted school friends who had managed to put away nest eggs!
We all have beliefs about money and spending, even though we may be unaware of them. I’m not one of those people who claim that you will achieve instant prosperity as soon as you change those beliefs – life is much more complicated than that.
But if you do have negative beliefs about money, until you face them fair and square they will almost certainly influence how you shop and how much you spend, and you’ll have trouble being more frugal, saving money for significant goals, and gaining control of your finances.
Here are some destructive beliefs that may be holding you back, starting with the most obvious. (I’ve subscribed to many of these beliefs at various times of my life.)
Note: you may still be holding onto some of these destructive beliefs even if you are being successfully frugal; even if you’re not acting on those beliefs any more, they may be making you unhappy.
• Money is there to be spent. When money comes in, it has to go out again.
• When I get a windfall, I need to splurge, otherwise I’m missing out.
• I always need to have the latest piece of technology, otherwise I’ll be uncool and out of the loop.
• I need to keep up with the standard of living pursued by my friends, family and neighbours.
• I need to be rich before I can start giving.
• I deserve to have [insert item of your choice!] because I am a good person.
• The world is an uncertain place. It’s safer to spend money rather than save it.
• Saving money is boring. It’s the kind of thing accountants do, not creative people like me.
• I don’t have to worry about money because the universe will look after me.
• I don’t have to worry about money because my parents will bail me out if need be.
• I don’t have to work for money - I’ll just attract it if I believe I can.
• I always have to buy only cheap goods and sale items otherwise I’ll go broke. It’s not safe to spend extra money to buy higher quality or ethical goods.
• It’s not fair that my sisters [or brothers, friends, neighbours, colleagues] can afford [their own house, an overseas holiday, a renovation, private schooling for their children] and I can’t, so it’s okay for me to borrow and overspend to obtain these things myself.
• I’ m a progressive and believe there should be a decent welfare safety net in place, so there’s no need for me to look after myself financially.
• The cost of living these days is outrageous. It’s not worth trying to live within my means.
• I’m too chaotic to develop the organisational skills that would enable me to save money, eg preparing my lunch in advance rather than buying it.
• There’s no point in trying to save money because whenever I start to get ahead, something happens that sets me behind again.
Identifying your negative money beliefs
Here’s an exercise: grab a piece of paper and brainstorm a list of negative beliefs about money and spending that may be holding you back. Note that some of these beliefs may lead to underspending rather than overspending.
Keep the list handy. Start to notice whenever any of these beliefs (or ones you haven’t yet pinpointed) are in play when you’re shopping, or doing anything that requires spending money, including paying bills. Add to the list any new negative beliefs that you’ve discovered you have about money.
Next time I’ll look at some helpful beliefs that can replace the unhelpful ones.
If you enjoyed this post, you might also like 11 Positive Money Beliefs That Can Help You Save.
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