Episode three ten what We've learned from seventy five plus real people budgets.
Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to save money, embrace simplicity, and live your life here your hosts Jen and Jill.
Welcome to the Frugal Friends Podcast.
My name is Jill and my name is Alison, and today we're coming at you hot with another great episode as my friend Alison Baggerley joins me again standing in for Jen as she cares for her newborn babe. It's so special. I love these co hosted episodes. They're different from having guests on the show. It's fellow friends. Alison was here last episode, she'll be here for another episode, and she was all.
We've interviewed you tons.
And Alison was the host for me when Jen had her first baby, So when Ki was born four years ago, Allison stood in. And now Atlas is born and Alison is here, and I think Jen and Travis are done. I don't think there's going to be any other babes we'll see.
Here we are.
But how fitting it is that we're talking about real people budgets and some of the takeaways that can benefit all of us. Because Alison, in case you don't know already, is the creator and founder of Inspired Budgets, So you can find her on Instagram.
She's all over the internet. She's got a.
Blog with tons of really great content that you can read. You can also listen to her podcast, Inspired Budget, and she just wrote a book, Money Made Easy. So all sorts of ways however you want it. You visual, you auditory, you tactile like she's got it for you. Alison is a seasoned pro when it comes to talking about all things budgets. I mean, you talk about other things too,
but like you are really good with budgets. You help other people with budgets, how to implement, what to consider, the pitfalls, tips, tools, so much more so, we're going to gain some really great wisdom and resources from not just the internet. We're still going to do our typical show template today, but also from you, Alison, yourself and your own experience. So welcome, Thanks for co hosting.
Thanks for having me. This is fun. This is this is I like it. When Chen goes home, Eternity leave, no Jen, have a third, have a fourth. I've got you covered, girl. That's how I feel.
Amazing.
Wow.
Okay, well you heard it here first, folks, I choose.
All that medically possible now at this point.
But well, yeah, okay, well she had four years in between the first too much. I just really I just want to come back, So you know, maybe she could just have a sabbatical or something. Maybe you could each take a sabbatical and I can join it. It doesn't have to revolve aground motherhood or children or anything. So that's really what I love.
That love that. Thanks for that permission, Allison. You're welcome.
But first, before we get into the rest of the content you're really here for. This episode is brought to you by Easy psy Lemon Squeezy. That's right, Pithy Rhymes have quite the budget these days. Does something feel tough? Overwhelming, impossible, insurmountable, unaccomplishable.
Don't know if that's a word, but I used it. Well, forget that.
Do the things that are easy. Go squeeze yourself eleven and say hey, I'm good at that. And if you want to feel good at other things, maybe even things that used to feel difficult, like managing your own money, you should buy yourself a copy of Allison's book Money Made Easy. Because we love the easy stuff, especially when it used to be hard stuff and now it's easy psy lemon squeezy.
So yeah, money made easy.
Just buy it anywhere Amazon, whatever you want to say more about that, Allison, Where can people buy it?
You can buy it on Amazon, Barnes and Noble. Call your library out to your library, ask them to get it so you don't have to buy it. You can just send them the title and the author Alison Baggerley and be like, I need you to buy five copies of this book and then get it there and then tell all your friends about it, and don't even buy it yourself. Have someone else buy it for you and borrow it.
I love that.
Thanks for your just jumping in with some frugal friends' tips here.
Yes, and I will say do that for any book you want, not just my book. Do it for my book, but do it for other books too.
That's a great, great tip, great tip. If you are interested in this topic of budgets and this episode just isn't enough for you, you really want more content, queue up episode two thirty six, Why You Need a Budget with Jesse Meekham.
That was as a really good one.
That's the YNAB founder for those of you who love that app, but also really great tips that are given in that interview. We've also got episode two twenty two, Stop strict Budgeting and Start living.
In the Radical Middle.
I feel like this one's almost like Jen and I's love letter to our podcast listeners.
It really does encompass.
A lot of our motto around managing money, the concept of the radical middle.
So that's a great one too. Cue that one up.
But first, I mean, stick with us, stay here for this one because it's it's good and it's special and we love digging into real people's budgets. Now spoiler alert, like, we're not digging into people's budgets, we're talking about what we've learned from looking at all these different budgets and kind of weaving that through these articles. So the first one that we're going to talk about is titled how
to Stick to a Budget? Six Ways to Stay on Track, and this one comes from Inspired Budget, which is written by Alison Baggerley.
Here she is, folks, we've even got the.
Author with us as a co host of the Frugal Friends podcast How Amazing. So we're going to go through all six here, But first, what do you want to say about this is this? Would you describe this article as almost the summary for you of looking at real people budgets? That's a part of what you do, right, Yeah, you've helped people through their own budgets.
Yes, So actually I started something. This was back in twenty seventeen or twenty eighteen, maybe twenty eighteen, and I was on Instagram talking about budgeting and people were asking me all these questions like, well, how how does it like physically? Look, how do I physically do it? And I was like, I want to share my budget. And my husband, who is a very private person, was like, no veto, And of course I have to respect some of those things. I've wrote a whole book about our life,
so I guess I won't share that part. But I was like, okay, well then let me just ask my followers to send their budget in. So it started off just very like, send me an email with your numbers, and I started every week sharing real people budget. So it's probably more than seventy five, but I would say every single week on Instagram or TikTok, I will share a budget someone's budget. Now I look at the holistic picture,
I'm looking at their monthly spending as a whole. And it is fascinating because I love that I'm looking at other people's because it's not my numbers. We have high income, low income people in the middle single moms, parents, families, people who have lost a spouse to you know, all these things are on disability income. It has been incredible
to see how people budget their money. And let me tell you, I don't know if you know this, but people on social media they a little harsh and they go in those comments and they let it be known what they think the person that's sharing the budget, because it's all anonymous, is either right or wrong about And I'm like, you guys got to have a little bit
more grace. But it's just it's been very fascinating to see that and to see, like when they write into me where people do strug goal and where they get off track with their money.
Yeah, And it kind of seems like this article then is almost like a response to these are the areas that trip people up in their budgets and how can we if we need to rein it in in certain areas, which it does seem as though that discretionary spending in whatever category, just where there is discretionary spending seems to be the place that trip people up.
I don't know if you've got other insight to that.
Oh, absolutely, kind of How do we rein in this aspect?
Yeah, it's when we have to make decisions.
Think about it.
Yeah, it's when we have to have control and make decisions. I've never known anyone that has overspent on rent or their mortgage, like unintentionally, or someone that's like, let me go ahead and send extra money to my electricity company. No, it's when we have to make those decisions and be the take ownership over those decisions and our money, and we mess everything up because we have bad intentions, but because there's so many things pulling at our attention, people, companies, family,
Unexpected events happen, and that's just it. There's life. Life happens, and we can't always predict what's going to take place. And as soon as you feel off track, you feel like, oh, let me just start over next month, or I'll start over tomorrow or next week, or this isn't going to work for me because of X, Y and Z, And honestly, it's not. Every month is ever going to be perfect. I've never had a month that goes directly as planned. But I can get back on track just because I
get off track. And so that's really what this article is about, is how to rein in that discretionary spending, how to be mindful about your spending, and tips and tricks and ways to do that that are actionable, because it's one thing just to say be better with it. It's another thing to like give actual things you can do.
Yeah, I would agree with some of the things that you've described stand out to you from people who have given you their real budgets. Similarly, people who are listeners of the Frugal Friends podcasts will share in a variety of ways where they experience barriers, and yes, it usually is with this discretionary spending. So I think this article is really helpful in giving some takeaways because it addresses those those.
That aspect of our budgets.
And so the first tip, and of course not all of these tips are going to be applicable to every single person. We're just going to go through all six and you identify what's going to be helpful for you and just start with one of these. Yes, but the first one is to stay out of the stores.
So if this is.
An area where you're finding Oh yeah, it's every time I go into Target, or it's every time I'm going to Marshalls, Cjmax, Ross were parting stores, is ware, grocery store, whole things. That's so tru Going into the grocery Store's so true because if you.
Go where ordering your groceries online, yes.
That helps, or just committing to only going once a week, because I find that if I make multiple trips to the grocery store, I'm going to buy random things that I might have in my freezer, or I buy just because I'm in there. So even places like the grocery store, just stay out of it, order online, commit to only going once a week, and if you forget an item, go without it, make do without it.
Yeah, it's amazing how often you really can go without an ingredient. The internet is chalk full of substitutes. Or you can get creative and your culinary experiences by trying to figure out, oh what could I do without this?
Then?
So yeah, just stay out of the store, stay out of the places that you're seeing provide you those just upfront temptations to be spending more than what you want to be spending. Again, this is not going to be deprivation for the sake of deprivation. It's because you've already done the other work of identifying what do I want to do with my money and what are the things
that trip me up? Is it the discretionary spending as it relates to shopping, Then how do we put these barricades in place that are going to help us exactly stick to those goals. This includes too, your online spending, So it might I mean, this could be like that loophole like, oh, I don't go into the stores, okay, but are you scrolling every night on Amazon as a way to kind of lull yourself to sleep.
If you're on Amazon, you're in their store. If you go online, That's the way I see it. If you go online to a shop's website, you are in their store. So create boundaries, create a boundary around intentionally what you want to do. And I mean it just because and I always remind myself this. I always tell myself, Okay, target will always be there, because I had to have I had to do a whole Target detox. I mean, I love spending money and I had to remind myself
Target will be there. They're not going away. Amazon isn't going away, the grocery store isn't going to shut down, so there will be time to come back and get that thing or add that item to your list for next time.
Yes, well said, so.
Tip number two in this article is to check your calendar before you make a budget. I have been guilty of totally forgetting, especially as my kids get older and they're invited to birthday parties, forgetting to include just smaller things that become just annoying to have to include after I've already written my budget. So I will even check my calendar. Chill. This might sound a little crazy, but when I'm making my budget, I do my best to
estimate how much our family will spending gas. And my husband is a lot better at this than I am because I don't drive very far. I work from home, and I drop off and pick up my kids from school, and sometimes I walk there. It's less than a mile away. And we will literally look at our calendar and say like, Okay, are we going out of town any of these weekends? Okay, well, how many tanks of gas is it going to tank us to get to this state park in Texas where
we're camping. Oh, it's going to take us one tank to get there and back and that's going to cost us sixty dollars. So by checking our calendar, we are just more intentional about the numbers we're putting down in our budget instead of just like totally guessing and then feeling like a failure whenever we get it wrong.
I love that example because I could see that being easily glossed over. For me personally, I have my budget generally stays pretty similar with how much I have for food, gas, parking expend I have made a line item for parking because I needed to. It gave me permission because some months I'll spend like eighty dollars in park pally just because we live in a tourist destination.
We've got guests a lot, we're.
Going to events, We're sometimes parkings twenty.
Bucks a pops.
Yeah, But rather than be surprised by it, to know, this is where I live, this is the lifestyle that I'm living, and so I need to create a line item so that I'm not shocked by this. So that was a shift that was made. But now I kind of keep that as a line item. But I love the idea if it aligns with your lifestyle, to almost shift like, Okay, this month is going to be a little bit more for gas if needed, do I need to pull back in another area to give room for that.
Sometimes I'll oscillate between what my grocery budget or my dining out budget is going to be. You know, sometimes my grocery budget budgets higher for a month, so I know I'm going to be home more, Or I'll look ahead and say, let's add more to the dining out and decrease the grocery budget.
Yeah.
So I love that kind of ebb and flowing. And that doesn't mean that oh, suddenly we're just pulling money out of nowhere. It's still working within the confines of what you earn, but figuring out where's this going to be allocated. You don't find yourself spending what you did last month on groceries forgetting that you're spending more on gas and then your left.
And another thing I do is because I'm my husband is paid twice a month. I'm paid once a month. So when I write a budget, I'll look and see, Okay, we go to the grocery store on the weekends. How many weekends do I actually have to buy groceries with this paycheck? Is it two or three? Sometimes it's two, sometimes it's three. So my grocery budget, while I tend to keep it about the same amount, I kind of know our average and I just know what month some
weeks are going to be higher or lower. I have to look at am I setting aside money for three weeks worth the groceries or two weeks worth the groceries, because that's a two hundred dollars difference, and that's big. So checking your calendar is just making sure you're looking forward to the things that like. As life, your day to day life changes and as you have event or if you have people coming over, you might buy more
groceries that just the cost of hosting is increased. I look forward at the things we are doing and ask myself how much do I think this is going to cost me? Or will it change anything in my budget? And sometimes the answer is no, but a lot of times it's yes.
Yeah.
This one ties in really beautifully with number three, which is revisit your budget often, and it could be often could mean for some people monthly, that could mean bi weekly or even weekly, but Essentially, the concept here is keeping a pulse on how am I doing so that you don't find yourself looking back thinking, oh, I totally messed it up, And then the tendency can be throw the whole thing out the window because one thing didn't work, whereas if we keep a pulse on it, we can
make little tweaks along the way adjust and not feel so devastated that it didn't work out the way that we thought, and keep reminding yourself that for everyone, Like you even heard Allison just say, who is like the epitome of understanding budgets and other people's budgets that hasn't experienced a single month where it went exactly the way
she thought it was going to go. That doesn't mean that there's buffer that creates space for that to happen, but all the more reason revisit it often, keep a pulse on it, know what's happening, so that you can feel confident.
Really, that's what it's going to do.
Build confidence exactly, and you don't feel like you're going
in blind whenever you're going. When we don't revisit it, there's that fear of not checking, and as you continue to ignore it, it grows and grows and creates this monsters, just like my email inbox right, Like I literally told Jill earlier before we hit record that I have I have an designated hour set aside after this recording where I have yelled at myself in my calendar to deal with my important emails because for the past week and a half I've put them off and it has grown
into this massive monster that is causing me all of that anxiety. Don't let your money be the monster that my email inboxes. That's what I have to say to that.
Don't let your money do you?
Does anyone hear when I come over and deal with my emails? Please? Please? I will pay someone. I'm at the point where I'm like, if I literally feel like I need someone to sit next to me, I will pay them fifty dollars to sit next to me, and like they just literally deal with it. Like I don't know if this is ADHD or if it's just or what it is, but who.
Be there soon?
Okay, great, thank you, I'll just drive do a quick little bop over to Houston.
That'd be perfect. I appreciate it. Number four in this list is to keep your goals visible. So, whether you're paying off debt or you want to invest and you want to track your investments, you're tracking your debt payoff. I think that a lot of that discretionary spending tends
to be impulsive or based on emotions. And so if we have our goals visible, whether they are hanging on our fridge, it is the background on our phone, it can help you just pause and think through before you make a purchase and just remind you like, hey, is this I don't know what's something I bought recently? I'm trying to think I buy too many things? But is this I got this cart from a Target that I don't use anymore. I use it for one night, one of those metal rolling carts.
Is that I'm obsessed with carts. I don't know, okay, carts and tiny dishes.
Well, you can come over and check my emails and deal with my email inbox. I'll pay you fifty dollars and I'll send you back with a cart. How does that sound? The perfect cart that I don't need. But regardless, by keeping your goals visible, it can allow you to pause and just maybe be one more speed bump before you click by now or get something that might derail you or make that choice, or be the speed bump to say like, hey, I want this. It's not in my budget this month, but I'm going to find a
way to add it to my budget next month. Love it.
The next one, number five is track your spending every day. Now, I'm gonna say that, oh.
Sacious, I disagreeheartily. You are trash, Alan.
I don't disagree.
Whoa whoa.
Yourself? I would never know.
So I think that this is a really great tip for a specific period of time or certain personalities.
So for me, I actually do like to track my spending.
I don't know if I do it every day, but I am looking at my spending pretty regularly. I don't know that I could say that that is going to be the best move for everybody. Not everybody is wired the same way as me. For some, that might create unnecessary anxiety. So I think assess your own personhood and whether or not this is a reasonable way of going about things.
But I would recommend it.
For people earlier on in their journey, particularly those who are wondering where their money goes every month? Why do I seem to keep getting tripped up? Where's the disconnect. I think that this is definitely a tool for a season that could be really helpful to rein it in.
Gain an understanding.
We really can't respond to anything in our lives until we have a decent grasp on what is the issue, what's going on. I can't intervene on an argument or a conflict if I don't have a decent understanding of, well, what are both sides saying about this. It's a really kind of random example, but I can't.
Get political politics here.
Now. I'm a social worker, and so sometimes that is a part of the equation, like.
I can't Yeah, I can't mediate well anyhow, we can't shift behavioral aspects of ourselves. We can't know what needs to shift in our finances if we don't have a good grasp on well, what are the things that need to shift the biggest things. And sometimes we almost are like throwing spaghetti at a wall or a dart while we're blindfolded, thinking we know, oh, it's probably my eating out, Oh it's probably this, probably that many times, and you
can probably speak to this too, Alison. What we hear from people when they actually dig in is there's surprises. There's surprises somewhere maybe it's oh yeah, yeah, it is the eating out, and maybe it's more than you thought it was, or maybe it's less than you thought it was. So there's some sort of knowledge that can be gleaned from doing this. So yes, I agree with it to a point. Yeah, to be tracking your spending dimers.
Yeah, and I would say that tracking your spending all it is is you looking at the facts and finding patterns in it. And that's like, I don't know. I've been reading this book on anxiety with one of my children who is struggling with anxiety, and it's like, when you have a thought, and this is how they teach it to children. When you have a thought, you have
to act like a lawyer and defend that thought. So when you don't know where your money is going, when you feel like you're constantly getting off tracked, when you start uttering the words like oh this doesn't work for me because or I don't know why I make decent money but I feel like there's nothing ever left, or why am I still stressed about this? Or I make too much money to feel this way. Well, then you need to be a lawyer. And a lawyer digs into
the details, and they look at the facts. So we have to look at the facts and the patterns of our spending, and we do that by tracking our spending. And so that allows us to make decisions based on facts, not decisions based on emotions. Because even though even though it's all our spending, we think we know it to a t, but we don't because we're sometimes blind to it.
So yeah, that's helpful.
Be a lawyer in your own money, track your spending by and then look for the patterns and make decisions based on those patterns, not based on what you think you do, how you think you act with me, but based on what your past has told you, the facts.
And then charge yourself three hundred dollars per twenty minutes Jerry.
Gowers, absolutely, which will cost you zero dollars because you'll pay it back so at all even out Okay. And then the last one, which I think is one of my favorite personal favorites. Not everybody has to do this, is to find yourself a budget buddy. I think that there is so much power and joy and accountability. It doesn't even have to be someone you physically know in person. It can be someone online. It could be a community
I mean, you guys have the Frugal Friends Club. Even that adds in this layer of accountability and feeling like you're not doing it alone. So whether you ask a partner to get on board with you, a friend that you can just talk about these things with, a parent, a house plant, just don't do it alone is essentially it comes down to.
And I love alliteration.
So budget Buddy is so fun and it makes it fun too, I think, and I love to talk about accountability from the lens of knowing and being known, not just to have some drill sergeant in your life who shames you. I think sometimes we can associate the word accountability to that just someone who's going to say like, well.
Did you did you do it? Or did you follow? Really, why are you?
I think I'll feel like, no, that's great. Interesting.
If you are someone who sees it that way, then then knowing and being known might be a more approachable term where okay, for you're sharing and you're encouraging one another, not just checking in on did you didn't you, which can often lead to shame.
Yeah, that's interesting how everyone sees it different. I love that.
Yeah, it does well.
This kind of blends into our next article, which comes from Aaron Gobbler and is entitled how to Stop comparing yourself to others Financially? And I like the segue here because I think one of the pitfalls to knowing the realities of other people's budgets is this comparison trap and so being able to talk about how to take the meat, spit out the bones where it can be helpful to Okay, here's what we've learned from seventy five different people's budgets.
But as you've already talked about, everyone's money is different, and the way that we all approach money is going to be different, and some people are really going to want to rake us over the coals for the decisions that we make with money, but to really highlight the permission and the freedom and to know that there is
things that can be gleaned. There are some of these overarching themes, and knowing what other people's budgets are there can be really beautiful benefits and even following people who show the budgets because it can highlight oh I didn't think about that, or yeah that I need to rein that in too. But where it can go awry is in comparison. Oh man, I don't make that much. I'd love to be able to spend that amount on this thing,
or I'll never get to that place. Or man, I'm not investing as much as that person, And that can be a really awful trap. And so for that reason, I think it's worth saying, how do we stay out of that comparison trap? Allow other people's budgets and financial decisions to inform us, but then not get like sucked into this vortex.
It's not helpful.
Yes, okay, so here's a confession. And I have never confessed this or said this publicly or out loud.
Oh my, but this all the episodes are just getting too seeable forgetting.
Ok So, my intention behind my Real People budget series was really to show different numbers and not even informed, but to inspire. My thought was, and I'm really to teach, like here's what it could look like, but to inspire people to to write their own budget. That was honestly my intention, and that is still my intention. However, people it has I see that it has had some negative impact,
which makes me really sad. Honestly, when I do see people responding in the way of this is so unrealistic, and I will have people say this is unrealistic, There's no way I can make this much each month, or how people say this is unrealistic. I live in California and make this much each month, and I could never like live off of the same rent that someone in a you know, country town in the Louisiana is getting.
So it's like both ends. There is this almost this anger Jill, And sometimes I'm like, am I making people angry? Or my budgets making people angry? And some of them do. But I have to come back to that is our own way of choosing to respond. And so if we we can take any type of information that comes at us,
we get to choose how to respond. So, whether you are comparing your financial situation to someone else when it comes to the amount they're investing, the type of car they drive, the house they can afford, the places they can take their kids, or the trips they can go on with their partner, it all comes back to how are we responding to that? Because I fully believe we have a choice. We can choose to become angry or we can choose to become inspired.
Yep, yeah, And we can choose what we are allowing to inform us. I guess the meaning we're attaching to that thing, because yeah, I'm talking about financial personal finance influencers online, but it's not just that it's our it's the people in our own lives as we just see these nuggets of what they are affording or doing with their lives, and maybe they're not affording it, which is one of the reasons why. Yeah, we're going to talk about not falling into this comparison trap. So let's go
through at first. So the article's kind of broken into
two pieces. First, why you need to stop comparing yourself and I think that this is helpful to kind of build the foundation of Okay, but why why we focus in on this and then and then how So we're going to first start start on why and the first one that they listen that they list on here is because you're only seeing the highlight reel and I would I would say, yes, this is absolutely true about those in our personal lives, those on Instagram and TikTok, who
aren't even personal finance people just influencing you in other areas. We are only seeing for the most part, the best of the best, even the situations where we get to dig into other people's budgets, I still feel as though it misses a good amount, right, It still is only the budget picture of that person. It is not their physical life, their emotional life, their mental life there you name it, their a life. It still is only a
fraction that we're seeing there. And I think sometimes I'm not saying this about your budget reviews, but sometimes I see budget reviews online where I'm like, well, where's the internet bill, where's the phone bill? Where's that? Like it still feels like sometimes there are things lacking there that we're not seeing, and that's the reason why we can't take that and make it work for us. And so just reminding ourselves for that reason, like we're not seeing
the full picture. Even if you're seeing the full budget, you're still not seeing the full picture. And so it just might not be super beneficial. Again where it goes off the rails. It can be beneficial in highlighting things for you, whatever meaning you choose to attach to it, but still recognizing it can be a trap because we may be only seeing the best of the best.
Yes, if you find yourself like looking at someone else's finances as people share it more online these days. If it starts making you feel icky, if it starts making you feel bad about yourself, that is your red flag to come back to this episode and listen to it again and do the work on it right, because we can't force that person to stop, but we can't think about why does it feel that way and what are some things you can do moving forward so that way
you don't feel icky and gross after doing that. Another thing, another reason why it's important for us to stop comparing our finances to other people's is because, and I fully believe this, it can slow down your progress. It can cause you to doubt question things. It could even make you say like, oh, my gosh, this person their goal is to pay off their car, but I wasn't paying off my car. I was investing because my car is not it doesn't have a high interest rate. Maybe I
should pay off my car. And when we go back and forth, it can slow down our own progress with our money.
Yes, oh, it's so true, because you don't know the reasons, but the decisions that they're making, and that might not be the best decision for you. They also list here that comparison can lead to more spending and they reference a survey from twenty nineteen that found that forty eight percent of millennials had spent money they didn't have and even gone into debt to keep up with their friends.
And I do think that this is a relatively somewhat unique problem, a current issue with the amount of access we have to all people celebrity. We have so much more access to celebrity, and they're rich and the famous, and we're getting all these behind the scenes things that I feel like that resurgence has only recently happened with the Internet within the past few decades, where we have this overwhelming ability to see into the lives of others
and realize what we don't have. Then that can lead to how do I get that then, which might lead us to compromise our own goals and spend beyond our means, And that is a that's a real trap of comparison y for sure.
Exactly it used to be you can only compare yourself to your neighbor or the people in your town, and they were, you know, all working in the same place, same type of living, costs of living, everything. So now it's definitely changed. And the last one I think might be my favorite.
She says.
Another reason why we need to stop comparing is because your priorities aren't the same. And I have seen this in my own family with my children. As my kids have gotten older, my oldest son has questioned, why is it that so and so gets this much spent on their Christmas, but I only get this much spent? Why is it that they can have this but I can't have this? And I have had that conversation. My husband I sat and down and we said, listen, there priorities,
what they are doing with their money is different. We spend money every month, and we invest money every month so that way we can retire and you don't have to help us out. We are setting aside money for your college. They aren't doing that. We don't know if they are doing that, but we would rather set aside money every month for your college, which means that you might not get all this extravagant, over the top Christmas gifts.
And that's okay. Our priorities are different. This is what our famili's priorities are, and our spending is in alignment with them. We don't know that family's priorities, and so we have to make choices based off of our own and just even teaching a ten eleven year old that has been very interesting because he still doesn't really.
Get which which starts at a deeper level of even knowing what your priorities are. And I think sometimes that's what can trip people up is if we've not done that previous work of identifying what do I value? Where are my priorities, then we will get pulled in all these different directions.
Oh what are they doing? Okay, that's probably what I.
Should do without any thought given to Is that actually smart for me? Is that where my priorities lie?
Yeah?
So, And that actually is bleeding into the how to stop how to stop comparing ourselves where they talk about putting your own goals front and center. Goals, values, priorities. We can use these similar terms, all within the same pool of each other. And this is going to require some of that beginning foundational work of what are my goals? What do I want to see in my life, both in the short term, medium term, long term, and how
can I keep those things at the forefront. You and I Allison talked in episode three or nine about your book where you start off with talking about catalysts, what is your motivator. What is the thing that you can keep front and center that's going to be longer than the daily frustrations that you face, that's going to be stronger than the comparison trap. What are those things? And it can be really good to actually write these things down to give yourself some time to engage in what.
Are my goals?
And if you've already done that work because you listen to three oh nine, the great you can kind of like move on.
To step two.
But this is really where we talk about values. What do you value? Put those things front and center so that you are more You've got a little bit more teflon? Is that not teflon? Chain mail around you, like you've got more protection? Okay, probably using a real red illustration like.
Forward this to nights and Shine. I'm thinking you said chain mail. I'm thinking forward this email the thirty nine people or else you will have a curse place upon you, like that kind of thing.
Isn't that what they call isn't it chain mail that like you put on as like armor, like protective armor, steel armory way back in like the fourteen hundred whatever.
Okay, I'm losing you. What I'm saying.
Is these things are protections in that comparison trap.
Once you've done this work, it's not as if.
You're not going to encounter other people who you might get these tinges of jealousy or should I be doing that?
You can quickly be at ease because you can.
Remember, well, no, because of this, because these are my values, these are my priorities, these are the things I've identified and I'm working on.
Yes, if you don't identify your own priorities, goals, and values, then everyone else will try to identify them for you, and you'll be trying to work towards everything. Don't do it. It's not worth it. You don't have enough time, money, energy, or mental space to do all of it. So figure out what you want to say, what matters the most to you. The second thing is to change the way you think about money, which really goes into having a
better mindset around money. I know that I know that I entered the adult world, I will say, with not a great mindset around money, and honestly a lot of
inger around money and the way I saw money. And so in this article she talks about how to change your mindset and the way you think about money, and how like if you're paying off debt instead of thinking about it in this super negative way, being able to say, like, okay, even though I did go into college debt and I have these out of control student loans, think about, okay, well, even though that sucks and I don't like it, what has that debt allowed me to do?
Like?
What has that opened the doors for me? And even like I would say credit card debt, there's so much shame and guilt surrounding credit card debt, and you might be sitting here thinking like, well, Allison, how do I change my mindset about my credit card debt? That is, I'm so angry that I did. And the way I see it is saying like, okay, you change your mindset by saying this was in the past and I did the best I could with what I knew at the time.
And just because I made that choice in the past doesn't mean that it identifies or tells me who I am now or in the future. So changing your mindset around it can honestly just help you not compare your personal finance situation and where you found yourself to other people, because you know that where you are now doesn't necessarily mean where you're going to end up.
Yeah, yeah, Really just creating freedom and permission and kindness to yourself for the decisions your previous self made. It's going to go better for us in future financial decisions that we make if we can remove that shame that's attached to Oh, but I have all this dead or exactly yeah, for vacation or for student loans or whatever. And then from there, and this is related to mindset
as well, practicing gratitude for what you have. I think that this is one of the best, most tangible tips when we find ourselves comparing on anything, whether it's experiences or money or what people get to have, when we can look at, well, what can I be grateful for? I think that this is really what leads us into a mindset and lifestyle of contentment, which that can follow us throughout a lifetime and make significant dents in our
financial approach and what we experience within our finances. Not necessarily as a means to an end, like I'm going to be grateful so I can be rich, but just gratitude for the sake of contentment and training and practicing that I don't need to get caught up in just this jealousy or striving or shame for the things that I don't have, but rather practicing gratitude for what I do have. And I love that that's something we can
do regularly. It's an action item that can be something that we do each more or afternoon or evening to think about what am I grateful for and even what did the mistakes that I feel I've made with finances allow me to do? Okay, I may not love the fact that I took out a ton of student loans, but that granted me an education that I now am working in that field and I'm able to, yeah, have a more easier time getting hired because of that education
that I got. Or I got to meet this person at the university that I went to, or I got to have a really just fun four years you want to look at it, But practicing that gratitude, which can lead to contentment, can really help us get out of the comparison trap across the board.
And I will say one more thing added onto gratitude. I really think it's a skill that needs to be practiced, especially if it doesn't come easily to you or you didn't see it modeled for you. It has to be something that you intentionally do until it becomes part of who you are. And that's okay. It's okay if you have to like set a timer on your phone every day an alarm goes off at this time, that's like write down three things, or think about three things, or
tell one person three things that you're grateful for. That's okay. It is not always going to be that way, but we have to practice that skill for it to become part of who we are. And then the last one, which I love personally, is to reduce time on social media. And basically, I know you guessed it. Social media is the root of all evil. No I'm kidding, it's not really, But as someone who uses social media to help my business grow, it can take a stronghold over our life.
And when we find ourselves just continuing to scroll on whatever platform is and current and hoppen at the time, doesn't matter, it applies to all of them, it can lead us to start comparing because we have such easy access, like we talked about earlier, to so many people's lives, and we can use that to highlight what we don't have. And when we are using social media to highlight what
we don't have. That's when we need to say, Okay, I need to create some boundaries around my social media use because it's not good for my own emotions and my own mental health right now.
Yeah, I think this one touches too on what we've found is really important for people when it comes to their finances, which is community. And I think often we will turn to social media for that. Sometimes it can provide that, but many times not. The online platforms can provide community and are real in life people that we're interacting with can provide community, but we're less likely to find it just in the common and section.
Of some posts exactly.
So I think that identifying Okay, what is it that I'm looking for when I'm going on social media and can I find a more beneficial version of that for myself that's related to community and belonging and knowing and being known and feeling seen and supporting others and encouraging others. That helps me to get out of the comparison trap. Find that, engage in that, invest in that more with your time and energy. And I think, yeah, this all kind of ties into what we learn from people who
talk about their money barriers. It's both like the discretionary spending and tangible tools and how to rein that in, but it's also when it comes to real people money, all of us, real people find ourselves in comparison traps.
So I think these two kind of go hand in hand, where it's talking about what can we actually do, what are the action points and what are the mindset shifts that we need to be implementing, and some of the work on our personhood that needs to happen in order to earn from those around us, those who have gone before us, those who are currently working on different goals.
So yeah, and speaking of just what we've learned after so many years, and it's to stick with the good stuff, give the people what they want, and just keep coming at them with a beautiful segment.
Yeah, and you know what that is, right, the bill of the week.
That's right, it's time for the best minute of your entire week. Maybe a baby was born and his name is Williams.
Maybe you've paid off your mortgage, maybe.
Your car died and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore. That's bill Buffalo bills, Bill Clon, this is the bill of the week.
Hi, Jenn and Jill.
This is Elizabeth from Nashville. As an avoidant kind of person, my favorite kind of bill is the kind that you don't open.
Well.
For some reason, I decided to check my mail today and I got a wild hair and decided to open a statement from my mortgage lender. Well, they told me that I've been putting an excess amount of money into my escrow account, and they're going to reduce my total mortgage payment at least for the next year. So I'm going to have about fifty dollars extra per month. So sometimes opening your mail and looking at your bills can be a good thing.
Amazing, Elizabeth from Nashville opening your mail finding bills reduced, how beautiful.
And not even what would be but every month that's six hundred dollars Like that's amazing. Look, could you you know? Thanks?
Wow?
This half twelve time.
You know, Elizabeth, what you're gonna choose to do with that extra fifty dollars, I, if it were me, would put that towards my principle on my mortgage.
That's what I would do. That's what I would do to.
Me if you choose to buy chocolate with it, I'm also here for you, Elizabeth.
I love that. I love that idea.
I mean, chocout fifty dollars a month for chocolate?
Is the lot a lot of chocolate? What about ten dollars for chocolate? Forty dollars for the principal M? Sounds good?
Yeah?
Yeah, let us know it, Elizabeth, what you choose to do if you all are out there listening and you're opening your mail and you're finding bills in there, bills reduced?
Bill's you?
Oh, but you don't mind paying them? Or or your mailman's name is Bill. Your male person's name is Bill.
I love that.
Oh, I'm just daydreaming about that. Does Aprougal Friends podcast dot com slash Bill leave us your bill? You No, We're here for it. And now it's time for the liner around.
That's it.
I was like, what do I say?
Did you feel more prepared for it? I did? I did?
It wasn't so aggressive, it was nice. I enjoined it.
You're welcome, thank you?
All right.
So this question again comes from our amazing podcast manager Goldie, who asks, how do you reduce instances of comparing your financial situation to others? I love the wording of this reduce instances, not get rid of it altogether, because I think it's a reality of being human, Like we see what other people have.
I want, I want, that's cool. How do I have that?
It's just like how marketing and sales is built on always and forever. So there's something to that. But how do we reduce instances? Okay, Allison, what you got for us?
Mine is something that actually I had to go through therapy to figure this out. This is actually something that I have talked about in therapy, and it is to remind myself that I'm not seeing the entire picture of someone's life. And also I don't really want to see the entire picture of someone's life. That's too much information. But I'm only seeing what they want me to see versus what's happening behind the scenes. So I fully understand
that everyone's financial situation is not just about money. It's not It is about their choices that they're making when it comes to their hobbies, their activities, where they live, their family, everything like that. It's so nuanced that I have to remember that there's no way I can see everything. And so just because their financial situation might look better or something that I want I might not actually want that.
And particularly I went to therapy once and it was about comparing myself to another person and their business, and I was like, they're making so like I was comparing my my business income and my growth to theirs. And she said, but you don't know how many hours a week that person is working. And one of the things you told me was that you don't want to work more than thirty hours a week or twenty five hours a week. And lo and behold, Jill, I ended up
like becoming friends with this person. We're good friends. And she told me, she was like, I was working like sixty to seventy hours a week when I was doing that, and I'm like, it's very it was very eye opening to be like, Okay, I don't see the full picture. I don't know what's happening, and I don't want to work that I would trade. I wouldn't trade that time
for money in my own case. So remembering you don't know the entire picture, and that your people's financial situations well has less to do with money a lot of times, and more to do with so many other things in their life.
Yeah, Oh, that's such a helpful example. It's occurring to me that this is a difficult tension because the complete opposite of comparing ourselves too much to people that we get caught in that vortex. The opposite of that, I would imagine is thinking, just like so highly of ourselves, and look how great I am and how much better my decisions are and my circumstances are. Like if there was two extremes, I think those are the opposite ends
of each other. And so finding yourself somewhere in the middle, or maybe holding the tension, like allowing one person to inform or multiple people of Okay, what can I glean from their life circumstances while not going so far to the other end of Well, my situation is just superior and I make all the best decisions, and sometimes personality can play into that. So for me, it's helpful to remind myself of my own story and the progress that
I've made in the last one two five years. I think what can happen for me is a similar honestly to what you're describing, but I'll see other people and especially when it comes to personal finance, I mean, that's a world I am more and more steeped in as a result of this podcast and hearing I can think, oh, I'm doing I feel really good about the decisions that we've made and the growth that I've seen, And then I can hear someone else who's like doing all of
these things and they are like ten steps ahead of me, and that can inform goals. It can open this door to oh, that might be the next step that's available for me, but yet not becoming so down on myself that I'm not there right now that it's okay to be where I am now. It's okay to then have goals, but there's not going to be that snap of the fingers to be where someone else is ten steps ahead of me, and then to remember, oh, but I've already
made progress. Like you know, five years ago, and I've talked about this on the podcast, Eric and I were
making significantly less money than we are now. So while maybe we're at this point where we are very similar in our earning to someone else that I might be looking up to, I still might not be able to make the same investing decisions that they can because I'm still recovering from recovering from and say it that way, it feels that from like whoe income, Like, there are still some things that I am getting in order as a result of you know, maybe this this tier of
income that that I'm in that I don't it's still not available to me to make the same decisions that someone else is making. So I think it's it's that it's that tension, and I think having this conversation makes me realize it's not so simple as just stop comparing yourself,
because there's benefits. Allow it to inform you about what the decisions that you want to make, but then also move yourself to gratitude, contentment, reminders of the decisions you've made for yourself and how you can inform yourself in beneficial ways, but stay away from the shape.
Yes, it's definitely a delicate dance and one that changes over time. So I'm glad we're talking about it. It's important. So thank you so much for listening. Many of you know that Frugal Friends has a membership for their listeners who are paying off debt, and it's so awesome because they do monthly money challenges and offer accountability groups, which so many of the members love. And we want to
congratulate one of our members for a big win. This win comes from Rebecca Parker, and she says, I have been working to save some money so that I can buy five pound bags of coffee at my local shop and save about three dollars per back. First off, I love that she's shopping locally and buying in bulk finding those savings. My husband gave me a gift card to the shop, so I'm going to be able to buy my two bags today. I drink half calf, so I get a bag of regular and a bag of DCAF.
Small differences make bigger long term wins. I love that finding ways to save money by buying things in bulk that you're actually going to use, especially when it comes to caffeine. I'm all about that.
And keeping it local.
There.
I see so many values coming out of what you've shared in this win, which is really cool.
Rebecca, congrats.
Thank you for listening to another of one of my favorite Frugal Friends episodes because I get to co host with Jill while Jen is out. If you want to check out the BFF club membership where they have all kinds of courses, interviews, challenges, and more, head to Frugal Friends Podcasts dot com slash club to check it.
Out see you next time.
Frugal Friends is produced by Eric Siriani.
Okay, Allison, one of my favorite things to talk with Jen about once we wrap up an episode, especially a doubleheader okay, because we just recorded two episodes back to back, which always makes me tumbly rumbly?
What are you having for lunch? Food? I always go to food.
You always go to food. I haven't decided yet. I haven't. I haven't gotten there. But I did have my breakfast. I have the same thing for breakfast every single day. I love the same thing. It's simplicity. It's two eggs with some cheese on top. So I had that right before we hit record, so I'm not quite hungry yet it's on. But I did want to protege sustain zoo. I did want to say, well, what are you having for lunch?
I have a meal plan, but I forget what I put on it. I think it's going to be a sandwich. There you go, some type of sandwich.
Okay. So whenever the woman called in with the bill of the week, Elizabeth, okay, and you know how we said we would put it towards our principle. Yes, yes, I I'm the one that's like in charge of the details of our money. I'm very much a detail oriented person. I enjoy being in the details. Matt does not care for it. So we've received we actually received a very similar letter that our payment was going down, but it was by like a dollar thirty a month, and I
got on there, I went online. I had to go online and either accept it or reject it. And I have everything on auto draft, so I was upset because it was going to change my auto draft amountain it was going to be an even number. I like to round up. So I go in there to round up, and it's like, I see this calculator, Jill, and it's like, how much can extra payments do for you? And as you slide the sliding bar, as you're paying more to a principle, you see the months go down on your
loan and the interest you pay over time. So I just kept sliding and sliding and sliding, and I was like, ooh, this.
Is so dangerous game.
So I said, I set our extra to principle to be almost two hundred and fifty dollars a month, and the next month Matt was like, gosh, our our escro must have gone up a lot because this is a lot more. I was like, actually, that was me. I just got really excited when I'm using the problem. It's me. I got really excited when I was using the sliding tool, and I got to see, like, we'll be we'll pay off our mortgage in you know, one one year and
three months sooner whenever you contribute this much. And he was like, yes, okay, but like if we need to make changes down the line, we can, right. I was like, yeah, we're not locked into this, but I was excited about it.
That's such a relevant story and so good. That sliding tool is exhilarating. It is, and you're so right.
Yes, I'm like, oh, and it just as you as you add more so anyway, I we're sending extra to principle, and we had refinanced to a fifteen year, so we're like, we only have like eleven years left on our mortgage.
It's crazy, Yeah, crazy.
It takes to a sliding tool.
Not that far away.
We would be at like thirteen years, but thanks to the sliding tool. But if we don't end up paying out by then, that's okay too.
Well, enjoy your lunch.
I will whatever I