You know the ritual. January 1st happens, and you are on it. You hit the gym, you create a budget. This is going to be the year you keep your resolution. But after a month, heck maybe even after 2 weeks, you can’t find time for the gym or to track your spending. I think New Years Resolutions are a great idea, but only if you stick to them, here’s some tricks I’ve learned.
The easiest way to get derailed from your budget is if you get far behind in tracking your spending. How do you get behind? Either a combination of being too busy or forgetting. Here’s a hack if you feel you do not have time for something:
Wake up an hour earlier on a weekend. So if you normally wake up at 8am, set your alarm for 7am, and don’t do anything else except the task of tracking your personal finances. If you make this a ritual every weekend, it will soon become a habit.
The next reason for not following your New Years resolution is you may just forget. You can configure BudgetSimple to remind you daily, weekly, or monthly to update your budget. I find a daily reminder to be just the thing to make me think about my purchases that day. Daily can become a noise you just ignore though, so pick a frequency that makes sense to you so that the reminders will still be meaningful.
Finally, you probably had a goal in mind when you created your budget. It’s important to look back on this goal frequently and see your progress towards it. Set a reminder up monthly to look at your goal. It’s a lot easier to get yourself back on track in February then in October!
Have any other tips for keeping your New Years Resolution? Let us know on Twitter or Facebook and we’ll share with others.
