How to Make Better Spending Decisions

Welcome back to the Holistic Money Podcast! I have a treat in store for you in today's special episode. We'll be diving into intentional spending through a behind-the-scenes recorded call from the Holistic Money Program. This insightful conversation focuses on the distinction between impulsive and emotional spending versus intentional spending, providing a valuable framework for understanding your spending decisions. By exploring this topic, you'll gain the necessary tools to start spending more intentionally and in alignment with your goals.

During the call, I also share a set of thought-provoking questions to ask yourself before purchasing. These questions are designed to empower you to use your money as a tool that supports what truly matters to you. With each decision and purchase, you'll learn how to make choices that contribute to building your desired life. This episode is packed with practical tips and reminders to guide you toward a more intentional approach to your finances, helping you identify what truly matters to you and how to align your spending accordingly. Get ready to embark on a transformative journey as we explore the power of intentional spending together in this episode of the Holistic Money Podcast.

Key Highlights

[00:00:00] Holistic Money Podcast intro

[00:00:58] Introduction to today’s topic: How to spend money in an intentional way

[00:02:00] Behind-the-scenes call on intentional spending

[00:03:31] Differences between emotional, impulse, and intentional spending

[00:08:10] Questions to help you become more intentional with your spending:

[00:08:14] #1: Do I need it, or do I just want it?

[00:08:39] #2: Can I borrow it?

[00:10:32] #3: Can I get it used?

[00:10:44] #4: Can I get by without it?

[00:11:25] #5: How much do I actually have to work to buy this?

[00:12:33] #6: How often will I use it?

[00:13:39] #7: Would I rather put the money towards something else?

[00:14:15] Upcoming announcement about the Holistic Money Program

[00:15:18] Holistic Money Podcast outro

Notable Quotes

• No matter what level of income you have or what level of assets you have, you still have a finite amount of money you are stewarding. You are directing the flow of that money towards what is most important for you, and you will have an opportunity to spend your money bazillion in different ways.
• When you're intentionally spending money, you're thoughtfully spending money. You're sitting and asking yourself, “Is this in alignment with my values? Is this really what I want to build with my money? Is this actually how I want to be using my money?”
• Everything you want to buy costs you your time, and if you start to look at the amount of time you have to work to buy the things you want, you have a new framework for financial decisions.
• “Can I borrow it?” is such a powerful question if there are things you won't use often. Ask yourself, “Is this something that I can borrow? Or is this something that I actually need to buy for myself?”
• It's not that we don't want to buy things that we don't love or thin

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Transcript

0:01

Hello and welcome to the Holistic Money Podcast. I'm your host, certified financial planner and money mindset coach Whitney Morrison. Over the past seven years, I've taken myself from credit card debt and no savings to a seven figure net worth. I did this without a budget or a restrictive money plan, but instead, smart, sustainable wealth building strategies combined with changing my relationship with money. In this podcast, you'll learn the ins and outs of my no budget philosophy, practical wealth building strategies and key mindset shifts to make it happen. There is no shortage of information out there to tell you what to do with money, but teaching you how to think and feel about money. That's my secret sauce. If you've been waiting for a podcast that gives you actionable strategies to not only build wealth, but also feel really good while you're doing it, then you're in the right place. Let's get started. Hello, everyone. Welcome back to the holistic money podcast. Today's episode is a special one because I'm going to be sharing a behind the scenes call that I recorded for the holistic money program. And this call is all about how to spend more intentionally with your money in this call. I go over the difference between impulsive spending and emotional spending versus intentional spending. So you can start to have some framework to understand. Your personal spending decisions. I also cover questions to ask yourself before you make purchases. So the, you actually use your money in a way that is most in alignment with what you want. I love this episode because it has so many great reminders on tactically, how to use our money as a tool to actually build the life that we want. It is one decision at a time, one purchase at a time. And I think this episode does a great job of helping you start to identify what's most important for you with money and how to spend your money in a more intentional way. I hope you enjoy.

Whitney: 2:02

welcome to our call on Intentional Spending. I am so excited for today's call, like most calls that we have because this call and what we're gonna talk about today. Is really the framework of wealth. It's the framework of our mindset with money and how we actually get to a place where we can use money in a way that actually creates the life that we want, that builds wealth versus just mindlessly spending money on the things that we want and have an impulse to get for ourself in the moment. No matter what level of income that you have, no matter what level of assets that you have. You still have a finite amount of money that you are stewarding, and you are directional the flow of that money towards what is most important for you, and you're gonna have an opportunity to spend your money. A bazillion different ways. We are constantly being targeted with ads. We're being targeted with, reasons to spend money, events to go to people, to see things to eat. There are so many ways that we spend money. And so we just wanna make sure with the money that we steward, are we really building the thing that is most important to us with our money? Or are we using our money in a way that is mindless? That is emotional spending or impulsive spending versus actual intentional spending. So I wanna tell you all the difference between emotional spending versus impulse spending, versus intentional spend. Emotional spending is when you are spending money in response to an emotion in your body. So you either feel stressed or you feel angry, or you feel hungry, or you feel frustrated, or you feel happy, and in response to that emotion in your body, the action. That you wanna take is you wanna go buy something. Maybe you go through a breakup and you wanna go and buy yourself a new outfit to look really good, or you decide that you're really hungry and you go to the grocery store and you spend a lot more money on groceries than you would if you went to the grocery store. Not hungry. I don't know about y'all, but I find that to be the case every single time I go to the grocery store. But I'm hungry. I'm throwing a lot of stuff in my cart that really I wish I wouldn't buy. Right. So when you're emotionally spending, it is not predetermined. It's not thoughtful, it's not according to your values and what you really want in your life. It is in response to an emotion. Impulse spending is very similar except you don't necessarily. Actually you do, even with impulse spending, there is an emotion there that's driving your impulse, right? But it is spending from a trigger, some kind of trigger inside of you that makes you want to spend money immediately. It's a quick purchase. It's not well thought out. You tend to do it quickly. You see it, you want it, you buy it. And then there's intentional spending. And when you're intentionally spending money, you're thoughtfully spending money, you're really sitting with this and you're asking yourself, is this in alignment with my values? Is this really what I wanna build with my money? Is this actually how I wanna be using my money? And oftentimes, When we're spending, we don't take a lot of time to really check in. And ask ourselves, Hey, is this really an intentional purchase? Because we're very used to the convenience of our lives, we're very used to being able to get something at the click of a button or at the swipe of a card. And what I want us to start to practice and bring in to our spending is more intentionality, more questioning, more really discerning. Is this something that I really want? I'm gonna give you all. 11 questions and you can hold on to the one that really resonates with you. You may decide you like all 11 of them, but me, for example, the one question that I practice out of this list all the time is, do I need this right now? The other day I made an impulse purchase. I bought a waxing kit on Amazon. It was$60, and it is a little pot. That you pour wax into and you can wax whatever you want on your body. So you can only imagine what my Thursday night with Craig looked like when I was like, let me wax your back. It was totally an impulse purchase and I look at that now three days after I bought it, and I'm like, why on earth did you buy this wing kit? I wish I would've taken it through my list of questions, but the point is, is these things happen sometimes, but we wanna get better at, better at really using our money. In a way that really is reflective of what we want. And like I said, the thing that I ask more than anything is do I really need it right now? reason why I love that question is because I truly believe that every financial desire that I have for myself, I will meet. It doesn't have to be today, it can be tomorrow, it can be next year, it can be in five years. But I know that everything I desire for my life, everything that I want. If my soul is really in alignment and really wants it, then I know that thing wants. Me too, and we're gonna come together and we are going to realize my dreams. So I don't have to be in any kind of hurry or any pressure to get the things that I think I want right now. I can just be patient with the process. So that's a really big question that I'll ask myself. You know, do I really need it right now? And it helps a lot with my money map too, because you all know every month we have an amount of money that's put towards our habits, and we're always trying to stay within that habits amount. So I will ask myself, is this really something that I need this month that I wanna put my habits money towards this month? Or do I wanna move it to maybe next month or the month after? Like tennis shoes, for example. And that helps me really understand what's most important to me today. So here are questions that you can start to ask yourself in order to become more intentional with how you spend, do I need it or do I just want it? That's a big one. You can ask that at the grocery store, you can ask that at the gas station. You can ask that every time you log into Amazon. You can ask that when you're going to an event and when you think you need something new to wear. You can ask, do I need it or do I just want it? Number two, can I borrow? I had a client, we were working on her money map. She was at a point in her journey where she really, really needed to build an emergency fund for herself to start to feel more safe with money. However, she had three girlfriends coming in town saying at her apartment, and she didn't have enough bed. So she was telling me, Whitney, that I really need to buy this air mattress and I found this air mattress for$150 and I really need to get this cuz otherwise they're gonna have to sleep on the ground. And the question is, do I really need to buy this air mattress or can I borrow it? I said, is there anyone you could borrow this air mattress from? What are the things that you actually don't need to own for yourself, but you can borrow? I had a friend come over to my house a few months ago and she walked in my house and she was like, Whitney, where is all your stuff? And I said, what do you mean? I said, like I said, I have closets. Do you mean like, where are my closets? She was like, no, you just don't have like stuff in your house. I did not understand what she meant until I went to her house. Right when I walked into her garage, I saw every single kind of lawn equipment that you could ever think of. It was like a sher a mower, a cutter, a like, So many things. And then I saw the tools, so many tools, and then I saw her, sports equipment and her lawn chairs, and it was like anything you could imagine was there. And I thought, oh, this is what she means by stuff everything that she wants in a moment, She gets and she has and she accumulates a lot of things. So, can I borrow it is actually such a powerful question if there are things that you're not gonna use often. Absolutely. Is this something that I can borrow then? Is this something that I actually need to buy for myself? Number three, can I get it used? This is one two Facebook marketplace. Versus Amazon Prime. Next one is, can I get by without it? Which is very similar to Do I need it? But like if I would ask myself this about my waxing kit, I probably would not have bought that waxing kit. It's like such a silly example of just a way that I was like$60 just totally down the drain. Do I already own something similar? This one is huge for clothes, for shoes. I don't know how many times I have tried to buy the same shirt over and over again, and then I asked. Do you really need another white V-neck because you already have three white V-necks at home, right? Like, do I already own something similar? Do I really need to buy this Same thing over and over again? Next one is, how much do I actually have to work to buy this? Have you all heard of the book Your Money or Your Life by, I think it's Vicki Row. She wrote an incredible book, about this idea that everything that you wanna actually buy costs you your time. And if you start to look at the amount of time you have to work in order to actually buy the things that you want, you have a new framework for financial decision. So if you were to think about your salary, for example, you could divide that by 12, which would give you your monthly gross income. Then you could divide that by four, which would give you your weekly gross income. Divide that by 40, and you would get your hourly income, which that you could really look at. Okay. If I.$40 an hour. If I make$30 an hour or$70 an hour, how long am I really gonna have to work to buy a$300 shirt for myself? And do I really like that time for product exchange? Do I really like that. It's kind of an interesting way to think about purchases. And how it really impacts the amount that you have to work. How often will I use it? This one is a big one, especially when it comes to clothes. For me, I'm the type of person that I'll get really inspired by a totally unique piece of clothing that I wear a total of one time around my house, and I really had to stop doing that you know that kitchen gadget, you know, you see the slicers or the DICs or whatever it is, the toys for kids. How often will they really play with it? How long is it really gonna last for them? That is the same question as, what is the return of this product in my life? Right, because I want you to think about your favorite pair of shoes, for example, your favorite pair of shoes, the ones that you wear most often. That is a purchase that gets you an incredibly high return. So it's not that we don't wanna buy things that we don't love or things that aren't luxurious and nice. We just wanna buy things that get us a high. And so every time you wear those shoes, every time you wear that shirt that you love, you're getting a return on it, right? And that's an investor mindset. How do I get the highest return on the things that I actually buy for myself? Last question is, would I rather put the money towards something else? Is there something else that is actually more important to me that I would rather put the money around? And this is actually a big one for me too, now that I think about it, because there are a lot of times where I will not buy something because I know I wanna use the money to make something else better for myself. For example, if I'm at the grocery store, And I know like Craig's birthday is coming up and I have a massage plan for us. I have a really fancy dinner that we're gonna go out to. I'm so excited and I'm getting ready financially for that. And so every decision that I've been making up until this week, except for that damn waxing kit, I've really been thinking, okay, what can I do this week? To be more intentional with my money so I can put more money towards that dinner out with Craig so I can put more money towards that massage than I know we're gonna get. And I will do things like, instead of buying, we like to get these dark chocolate caramels instead of buying their$12 for the whole thing. I'm like, okay, I'm just not gonna get those this week. It's. So I'll just make these little trade offs in my mind and it just naturally kind of happens for me because I think to myself, what is really most important to me with my money?

14:35

All right. Y'all so I decided to cut the live coaching call here. Because the next part of this call, I invited everyone that was joining to do an exercise with me, where we reviewed their spending for the past month. Started to identify those purchases that were in alignment with their values. Versus the purchases that were meaningless or impulse purchases are those emotional purchases. So they could really start to identify what feels like a value driven purchase versus what feels like an unintentional mindless purchase. If you've never done this for yourself, this could be a great exercise for you too. Just so you can start to have more awareness and align your spending. With your goals,'cause like i said at the beginning of this podcast wealth building happens one decision at a time all right. Y'all. If you found this episode useful, I want you to get on the wait list for the holistic money program. I have some really exciting surprises that I'm going to be announcing and the next few weeks about the program, and you definitely don't want to miss this. You can learn more@wwwdotholisticmoneycourse.com. All right, everyone. Have a great week. And I will see you in the next episode. Have you ever built a budget but within weeks felt exhausted by the spreadsheets, the upkeep, or the restrictive spending categories? If so, you are not alone. Budgeting has never worked for me, so I created a new way, money mapping. Money mapping has all of the things you need to be successful in your wealth building journey. It's simple, organized and automated, but most importantly, it offers a completely new way to relate to money and manage it in your life. If you're ready to kick off your no budget strategy for building wealth, sign up for my Free Money Map training at www.holisticmoney.com/money map. Here's to building wealth with ease.