Happy March first!
I’m drafting this post from a Starbucks. It’s 7:30am on a Sunday morning- I went to bed extremely early last night and was up by five. It feels like I haven’t written here in a while, even though I know that isn’t true… I think it’s just because I’m late in posting a week four update for my Low Buy challenge. Life was pretty hectic this week: I had a six-day workweek which I balanced with a few nights away from home (thank God for hybrid work!), half-marathon training (nine weeks to go until the race) and a lot of Animal Crossing: New Horizons play time.
I feel a bit like I’m eating my words from last week’s blog post about the weather finally starting to improve in Toronto. These last two weeks, the city has been back to very sloppy snow, rain and ice conditions (though, at least temperatures have increased to about the freezing point). I realize I talk a lot about the weather on this blog, but it’s something I’m just hyperaware of. As an outdoor runner, I keep track of what the best days of the week are to run, and how to dress appropriately.
In other news, I officially finished my low buy month challenge last week and want to give a final update. To summarize, I spent $224.97 last week.1 Most of it went to necessary expenses: $99.47 on groceries and $36.84 on transportation.2 I also spent $47.87 dining out socially and $13.45 dining out on a solo date (the only solo date I went on throughout the entire low buy). Finally, two monthly subscriptions renewed- Microsoft at $13 and Spotify at $14.34.
Despite the challenge being over and meeting my savings goal for February, I honestly feel more pessimistic than ever about my personal finances. I found that the extra focus on money genuinely caused me to feel unhappier throughout the month: about the state of my finances, and the state of the world more generally. This isn’t something I expected to experience; it’s not something I’ve ever heard other no-buyers and low-buyers talk about. Any sense of accomplishment was eclipsed at the end of the challenge by negative feelings: resentment about how expensive life is, dread about upcoming expenses (spring car maintenance, anyone?) and hopelessness about ever being able to reach my long-term financial goals.
The best way I can describe how I’m feeling is financially “red-pilled”.3 My new hyperawareness of my personal finances is bringing me a sense of unhappiness- would it have been better to have stayed ignorant? Obviously, there’s an easy correct answer to this: with knowledge comes power; being aware of your personal spending habits and financially planning for your future is the better option, regardless of how it makes you feel.
In saying all of this, I have to acknowledge the position of privilege I’m speaking from. I make enough money that I was able to afford to live without micromanaging my finances for a few years: I wasn’t struggling to pay my bills and I was even putting away some savings. Not everyone can say this. There are so many people struggling to make ends meet who can’t afford to be ignorant- they’re forced to be painfully aware of where all of their money is going.
In any event, despite how it makes me feel, I know I need to continue tracking and restricting my spending. As I noted in my last post, I plan to continue following my low buy rules for the next little while. I’m hoping that the longer I follow my rules, the more likely they’ll be to crystallize into habits I can follow without thinking. One change I’m making is that I’m also going to give myself 2-3 “approved” items every month that I permit myself to spend money on even if they don’t fall within my rules. For March, I’m choosing (1) a dress for a wedding I have in April, (2) a device charger and (3) binder dividers. I don’t plan to post as frequently about my low buy moving forward, but rest assured I plan to stick with it.
Until next time,
Laura Kate
- Not counting my hydro bill which was due. ↩︎
- Notably, I was forced to spend $26.94 on parking for a four-hour time period when I went to a friends’ apartment… parking in Toronto is completely out of control. ↩︎
- I’m obviously aware of the negative, right-wing connotations that the term “red-pilled” carries these days- as a disclaimer, I obviously don’t associate in any way with this and the context of this post should make that clear. ↩︎
Laura Katherine 