According to statistics, only 6% of the people who make resolutions actually follow through on them for the entire year. Despite our gung-ho enthusiasm for losing weight, exercising more and saving money, by February most people go back to their old ways. I think I know why.
If you know you want to lose weight, and set a start date for doing it, you probably aren't as committed to it as you'd like to think. In the meantime, it also gives you a period of time in which you essentially do whatever you want, as far as eating, saving, whatever goes. So to say, "for the new year, I resolve to start a diet and lose ten pounds," probably means that you're actually okay with being ten pounds overweight, and if you don't lose that ten pounds, then it's okay, which is why people who make such resolutions rarely follow through on them. On the plus side, many gyms and companies who cater to such whims are ready and willing to take the profits from such failed dreams.
Same goes for saving money. When I graduated college, I had my first salary-earning job. I was making the most money I had ever made ($28K) in my life, and I wanted to enjoy the fruits of my labor. All throughout college, I envied the other girls who had tons of clothes in their closets. I was not one of those girls. I had to earn the clothes I bought through waiting tables, being a merchandiser for Brita water for a brief stint, and doing whatever else I could to pay rent, bills and buy a few outfits on the side. So when I landed my first job, I had a choice to make: save the money, or spend it. I decided to spend it; and spend it, I did. I also decided that I would start saving money by the age of 25, and I was happy with that.
Meanwhile, my husband began saving money as soon as he was out of college, and I have to say, his savings exceed mine by far. I can't say whether or not he was better off for it in other ways. He hated his furniture, where he lived, his clothes, etc. Meanwhile, I would go ahead and put a coffee table on my credit card and pay it off in 4 payments, rather than dropping all of my money on one table, and I had cash left over each month, just in case. I also bought a keyboard, new bed, furnishings and many other things I wanted to have a decent apartment. Even though I decided I wouldn't worry about saving money for three years, I did manage to have enough money set aside so I could quit working full time and concentrate on grad school full time while working part time.
The point of that little story is that I was okay to not save money for a while, and by putting a deadline on myself, it made it easier to be a little less responsible with my money and to not be as well set as my husband. And I'm actually okay with that. I've still managed to save more than your average 30-something, and I no longer put large ticket items on credit cards. Now saving money is no longer discretionary, it's mandatory.
So I contend that people who put new year's as a date to start losing weight are actually doing themselves a disservice if they TRULY want to lose weight. The time to start is not an arbitrary date, but as soon as you can. It also takes going through your cabinets and throwing out all of those things that held you back from keeping off the weight.
By the same token, if you want to save money, don't wait until a start date. Do it as soon as you know you want to do it. Make a plan for eliminating any outstanding debt, work it into your monthly budget, and as soon as you know what you can comfortably afford to do, do it. Don't wait for new year's. Let the new year be a celebration for all of your accomplishments, not a chance to look back and see where you went wrong and try to make amends with the past. There is, as they say, no time like the present.
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