Ahhh, another week begins. Another week of my back to the basics challenge. For those of you new to the blog, this is a challenge where I attempt to get into domestic shape in the hopes that it will help me to accomplish my other professional and community-related goals. Week three of the challenge has me contemplating my finances since money management is a BIG piece of keeping an organized home.
Now normally when it comes to good money management, the basics are the focus. Like saving money and keeping a budget and getting out of debt. And certainly I agree that those things are important. It's just that after writing last week, I realized that the root of my rather loose management issues wasn't necessarily the absence of those basics, but more a problem of mindlessness. Mindlessness as in impulsively spending on stuff I fancy, and not paying attention to my receipts, and not being intentional about saving.
The opposite of mindlessness, I suppose, would be mindfulness. And that is really what I need to work on. Yes, I can clip coupons and make lists and set budgets. Yes, I can do all the right things. But if they don't help me to be more mindful, then I'm essentially treating the symptoms and not the root problem.
So I guess I'm changing my financial goal. I no longer want to be a "good money manager." I want to be a "mindful" one. The tactics, I suppose, are relatively similar, but the end result is different.
In sum, it is interesting to me that the way we manage our money--which is essentially just a basic domestic chore--probably says more about us than anything else we do. More than our jobs. More than our clothes. More than our talents. I guess that for me what that means is that I want my money to say that I'm mindful.
That said, I think it's time for some experimenting!
Don't go far! Stay tuned later today for my first ever Marketplace Maven, featuring Amanda Blake Soule of Soule Mama!
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