#holidayspending

Holiday Hangovers: Stuff, Stuffing, and Stuffed

Last week’s blog post mentioned Halloween spending hangovers. As of 2019, Halloween had become the second biggest holiday for consumer spending, after Christmas. What used to be a couple hours of candy collection with a homemade costume and a paper grocery bag is now practically a national holiday. More candy is consumed. More costumes are purchased. Yard decorations have grown to need extension cords with extensions. When it’s all over, where does all the stuff go? In the attic, the garage, the storage unit, or the garbage? Thus, the Halloween candy-and-stuff hangover.

Next comes Thanksgiving, where we stuff ourselves with, literally, stuffing. We stuff our brains with football and TV. Some families stuff all of the important conversations for the past year into a few hours at the table. Emotions can run high, especially this year. Thus, the Thanksgiving stuffing-football-and-family hangover.

And finally, Christmas, the king of holiday stuff. Decorations, trees, food, family, parties, gifts, more candy, cake, and alcohol can all lead to some kind of hangover. When it’s all over, depleted bank accounts and depleted emotions can cause the same headaches as chip dip and eggnog. Christmas – king of hangovers.

Help Avoiding Hangovers

When it comes to holiday hangovers, how do you get through without them?

What do overdrinking, weight gain, TV watching, family dynamics, and overspending have in common? The most successful way to deal with them starts with the same concept: mindfulness and awareness.

One example of a mindfulness program is Weight Watchers, which I joined in December 2000. The best tool the program gave me was the daily journal. Logging what I ate every day had more impact on my decision making than any other single factor.

As another awareness example cited by behavioral economist Richard Thaler, when a group of experimental homeowners were given an electric meter next to their thermostat, they used 7% to 19% less electricity than those with outside meters. Another proof that awareness works.

3 Spending Mindfulness Ideas

The most effective, and for some, drastic, way to become aware of your spending is to switch to cash. However, in today’s world, with fewer in-person transactions, you might use a prepaid debit card instead. Recommendations for those with no fees and other features can be found here: https://www.thebalance.com/best-prepaid-debit-cards-4160419.

As you are spending, you see your cash disappearing in your wallet, or, your balance going down on the card.

Debit cards are safer than cash, but still a big pain if your number is stolen online.

Credit Cards? Not Very Mindful

Credit cards are like having the electric meter on the outside of your house. The awareness comes after-the-fact, in the bill. You never get to compare what you have spent to a predetermined budget, or to the amount available in your bank account. Psychological studies show that when used in stores, since the credit card is handed back to us, it reduces the feeling that we have spent anything. Similarly, when we use it at our computer, we still have the card. Our wallet looks the same afterward. To the primitive part of our brains, we don’t feel any loss like we do when the cash is gone from the wallet or the debit card balance is lower.

But I Get Points! Or Cash Back

Credit card companies have done a great job getting consumers to use them habitually by offering points and cash back. To build spending awareness and still get the credit card benefits, have the company send a daily or weekly reminder of your charges and the current balance. (Not all companies will do this, tragically.) Then, transfer your charges for that period from your bank account to the credit card balance. At the extreme, you might make 30 payments on your credit card over the holidays, but so what? It’s helping you avoid the hangover.

[For a post on points vs. miles vs. cash back, see https://www.hollydonaldsonfinancialplanner.com/might-as-well-face-it-were-addicted-to-miles/]

So if you are concerned about how you will get through the holidays without financial regret, switch up your spending habits. Use some tricks and tools to stay mindful.

However, if your hangovers are of a different kind, you’re not alone. There is help. Check out AA.org, NA.org, or talk to a Certified Addiction Professional.

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6 Holiday Spending Styles – Which One Is Yours?

How do you decide (if you decide) what to spend at the holidays, and on whom? When I first earned my own real money at the age of 15, I made a list and a budget for each person on it. Yikes – a few years later in my 20s, I looked at the list of names, each with a dollar sign beside them, and felt awful. So then I made a “total” budget, and tried to keep track as I went along on how I was doing. Yet that didn’t work very well, since I could always find an excuse to break the budget on something to keep it “fair.” I didn’t know it, but I was operating under one of six spending styles, one involving “status.” In other words, I was too concerned what other people would think about my spending decisions, and as a result, I spent too much.

Let’s look at 5 other spending styles and how they apply during the holidays.

Security – If you spend very little on others, and on yourself, because you are concerned you may need it for an emergency, you might have this spending style. You might do the bare minimum necessary to get invited back to next year’s turkey dinner. Or you might find other ways to celebrate than spending money.

Idealist – If you reject the materialism of the holidays, then you might give everyone something home-made, like cookies, or your own artistic creation. You have the hardest time of all styles making a spending plan, because you despise handling money matters.

Spontaneous – This style can’t wait to see what great ideas are presented to you by retailers. Perhaps you make a spending plan, but you have a tough time sticking to it because of all the fun temptations and opportunities to purchase the “perfect” gifts.

Caretaker – You see gift-giving as a way to show how much you care about people, so your spending plan might be more generous than other spending styles (but hopefully not more generous than is financially wise).

Goal-Oriented – Your most important concern is staying within your spending plan. It may take you longer to get your shopping done in order to find the right gift-cost combinations.

You may find you exhibit a combination of any or all of these, and that is not a bad thing. The key is not to take one style to an extreme. If you can make a spending plan that is wise for your situation, shows your love and affection for others, and still allows for some guilt-free spontaneity, you have probably found the style that will indeed bring you, and those you care about, lots of joy this holiday season.

For more on this topic, see The Mindful Money Mentality: How To Find Balance in Your Financial Future.

Or to schedule a call with Holly, contact us.

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Holiday “Shoulds” and Money Mindfulness at the Holidays

Have you got a case of the holiday “shoulds”? Natalie Wagner, CFRC, of VitalFinancials has an interesting program for those who want to learn why they spend, share, and save the way they do. Called the “Money Energy Cycle,” Wagner’s program allows an in-depth look at the value we create in using money to support our lifestyle.

In a series of money mindfulness thoughts for the holidays, she begins with shuffing off “shoulds,” such as:

– “I ‘should’ serve 10 holiday side dishes, like my mother did”,
– “I ‘should’ buy my children elaborate gifts, like their friends’ parents do,”
– “I ‘should’ buy a brand new holiday outfit each year, because that’s the way it’s always been.”

There are other “shoulds” I have heard around the holidays. “I ‘should’ fly to visit family.” “I ‘should’ attend all of my spouse’s after-hours work events.” “I ‘should’ be giving more than I’m receiving.” All of these things may be ok. When the words “want to” are substituted with “should” that could signal there’s a money-based belief worth re-examining.

What Can You Do About the Holiday “Shoulds”?

For more information on getting ok with supposed and real holiday obligations, visit VitalFinancials’ website (www.vitalfinancials.com), or contact Natalie at 303-507-9250 for a complimentary consultation.

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