Transcript of I used Atomic Habits to reset my finances (my low buy year)

lifestyle inflation it sneaks up on us as we're busy living Our Lives it might start with eating out a couple more times a week buying a few more takeaway coffees or adding a few more things to our online shopping cart we tell ourselves I work so hard all week I deserve this I'm getting a raise so I can finally buy it if my friends and co-workers can afford it I probably can too it seems innocent enough a few more swipes here and there until a few months go by and we see the bill and wonder how our expenses have increased so much this spending habit eventually becomes a lifestyle unsustainable paycheck to paycheck one at that because no matter how much we earn we'll be right back to square one at the end of the [Music] month I am quite frugal and have a pretty low maintenance lifestyle but when I'm not paying attention my finances can get out of control pretty quickly too the worst part is that I look back on some of these frivolous purchases and always question if they were worth it like that takeaway Curry it was delicious but was it really better or faster than something I could have made at home whenever I feel like this I like to do a financial reset I decided to commit to another low by challenge this year but this time I'm taking all the lessons I've learned from the previous years to make it actually work I've done a few low by challenges before and even though they were not all successful I do feel like they helped me to become more intentional in my spending habits now I only buy skincare and makeup to replace whatever I use up I cut back on online shopping significantly and just prefer to buy whatever I need in person I would say overall my expenses have been more or less the same all throughout the years except for one area of my life and that is [Music] food eating out groceries deliveries takeout I would say all of it I think I mentioned this a couple of times on my channel but my husband and I we really Bond over food and I think we both agree that undoubtedly the best thing about living in a city is that there's just so many good options here we're definitely still discovering lisban so when we're out and about and just kind of exploring different neighborhoods I feel like we've used that as an excuse to grab some food at a different restaurant and have it as an experience also since moving here we kind of developed this little habit of ordering takeout and getting deliveries and I honestly think it started because one time we saw our neighbors do it and it's really hard to go back after you realize how easy and quick it is and it's not like we do it all the time it's just a new thing for us that we never used to do before I have Justified this in the past because it's something that we really Bond over and think of it as our quality time together but still I do feel like there comes a point where it starts to feel excessive and that's when we lose our appreciation for it it is not just food but pretty much everything it can be clothes skin care entertainment or even traveling cuz let's be honest these are luxuries and when these luxuries become a normal part of our routine we just stop looking forward to them and I think that's what really takes the joy out of life I asked you guys on my socials what you spend the most money on and a shocking number of you guys said food as well so I'm hoping that you can kind of relate to what I'm saying but even if it's not food if you feel like it's time for a change then you've come to the right place because we can reset starting right now and we can do this low by challenge together before we go on I want to thank today's video sponsor better help since moving to Portugal I switch therapist just to find someone in my time zone and I find it so interesting how the sessions can feel very different with a new therapist sometimes you just need a fresh perspective or new ways of working through things because you're opening yourself up I feel like it's very important to find a therapist that works for you I know better help makes it pretty easy to do so another thing I love about better help is that it's really easy to get started just go to their website answer some questions and you will be matched with the licensed therapist usually within 48 hours you can also do it from your phone computer video call phone chat whatever is the most comfortable for you if you want to try it for yourself you can visit betterhelp.com /m life or choose Mal life during the sign up process and enjoy a special discount for your first month thank you so much to better help for sponsoring this video so right now you're probably thinking of all the different things that you want to cut out from your budget but I think it's really important to stop and ask ourselves why do you need to save up for something specific or do you have a debt to payoff or do you just want to simplify your finances and your lifestyle with any challenge I feel like it's so important to have a Nord star otherwise it's just way too easy to just give into our old habits when we hit that first roadblock so I mentioned that I want to stop eating out and I want to stop getting takeouts and deliveries because first it's really pricey but my North Star is the fact that we're hoping to get a house soon in the near future and I hope to save up as much as possible for it and for my past chall challenges I noticed that 1 year is way too long for me to commit but 30 days it's very doable so this time I'm keeping it simple and I'm just going to be dedicating one category to every month so starting February I am not going to do any deliveries in March I don't want to eat out in April no impulse purchases and so on I do feel like it's so much better when you get really specific so maybe for you February you want to dedicate it to no Amazon purchases and in March online shopping in general you first have to look at your bills and see what you really want to cut out from your budget and then assign a month to it just focus on reducing that expense it's so tempting to kind of overcommit ourselves to this big goal I feel like it's always better to take those baby steps and have those small wins if you want to continue after the 30 days then you can continue on for the rest of the year another lesson that I learned is that if the rules are way too strict then I'm going to break them so I need to create some room for me to live my life obviously no deliveries for 30 days I know it's not going to be a problem for me but after March if I want to decide that I want to go out to restaurants then it's going to be for social purposes like if we're going out with friends and once a week for date nights on Fridays I think I can allow myself to do that if you're cutting back on buying clothes maybe your exception is to only buy secondhand or do the one in one out rule if you're cutting back on online shopping maybe you allow yourself to only by the essential stuff you know yourself the best so you have to find what works for you and your lifestyle and just be a little bit more realistic I recently reread the book Atomic habit by James Clear it's such a good book for habit formation and I thought that I would take some tips to apply it to this Challenge and the first thing that he mentions is to make it really obvious meaning you need to set up your environment for Success this means blocking certain websites unsubscribing from marketing emails having visual reminders of your nordstar everywhere the goal is to create an environment where this low by challenge becomes second nature to you and for me it's going to be deleting my Uber Eats app right after I filmed this video and the second tip is to make it attractive reframe the challenge as something really positive the more attractive the new habit seems the more likely we stick to it I want to make eating at home more appealing so I'm putting in the effort to make dinners an experience candle lights background music not having phones nearby so that I'm tricking my brain to not make it seem seem like it's a challenge tip number three he says to make it easy obviously removing the friction to make your good habits thick and adding barriers to the habits that you want to curb is going to make it easy for you in my case I'm going to have a collection of simple recipes that take about 10 to 15 minutes for those busy days also planning to go to the grocery store twice a week no matter what and I'm going to be packing some snacks when I know know that we're going to be out and about we're more likely to repeat a behavior when the experience is satisfying I will be setting up a reward system to celebrate my small wins along the way like I said if we can go a whole month of March without eating out then we're going to slowly reintroduce it to do once a week date nights again and also I'm going to be setting up a separate account for housing purchases and seeing the numbers go up in that account is going to be really a big motivator for me so I will be updating you guys and sharing tons of inspirational and motivational stuff on YouTube and also on Instagram I'm also thinking of creating a Discord for this community I feel like it's really nice to have a community there and we can share ideas and kind of motivate each other to keep going so let me know if you'd be interested I just think it would be so cool at the end of the year if we can just kind of reflect back on our journey and think about how we were able to reach our financial goals so take care guys I'll keep in touch and good luck