I liken budgeting to weight loss regimens. Knowing that the feeling of deprivation often leads to failure - does anyone have any tactics to weave rewards into the budgeting or saving process that are motivators (& reprieves) to stay on track? Or, is this just a bad idea that leads to self-sabotage and disaster? Discuss!
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I budget play money into my monthly budget. Every month, I take $60 out in cash to do whatever I want without having to explain anything to anyone. Once it’s gone, that’s it until the 1st Saturday of the next month. It makes it easy to stay on budget and permits me to cheat without hurting my goal to be debt free.
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I personally have not thought about that very much but I get where you are coming from. I guess though that having a “cheat day” for a budget seams almost counter productive since the point of a budget is to keep you on track financially. I guess technically you could try to develop some way you could reward yourself for staying under budget in certain areas and use the money you saved for something special but if you are working to pay off debt or something it might be a better financial choice to just use that extra money towards debt.
Rewarding yourself can be very helpful but sometimes, especially when it comes to finances, practicing delayed gratification can lead to a much bigger reward down the road.
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We have an entertainment budget for the family & my husband & I each have money each month to do as we like. My husband uses to to pay his hockey fees & have the occasional beer with his team mates. I use mine for the extremely rare lunches with friends (maybe once every 2 months). I actually like the game of trying not to spend mine & keeping track of ‘little luxuries’ I get for free with rewards, apps, coupons, etc. Like free coffee days at 7-11 or coupons for free ice cream.
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Hi Theodora,
For some reason, I’m not sure why the previous reply didn’t post, but I wanted to pass this along based on the recommendation from one of the Admins from the Facebook group. I actually recently wrote an article about this and why I think it’s important to plan for a financial cheat day. Take a look: https://thesavingscientist.com…financial-cheat-day/
I hope that it’s helpful 
Have a great week!
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Hi Theodora,
I’ve actually just written an article about this on my blog - feel free to take a look: https://thesavingscientist.com…financial-cheat-day/
I hope it’s helpful!
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The Saving Scientist posted:
I’ve actually just written an article about this on my blog - feel free to take a look: https://thesavingscientist.com…financial-cheat-day/
Heading over to read it now @the.saving.scientist
