Jake (my very attractive husband) and I wanted to start out the year with a spending fast. (A fast is when you go without something.) So, for the whole month of January we planned to only spend money on basic groceries, utilities, and other essential expenses. That meant no eating out (sad for this foodie!), no Amazon purchases, no spending money on entertainment (except for our $12.10 Netflix subscription), etc. Nothing besides what we needed to get by. It seemed like a great idea.

(This page contains affiliate links that we may be compensated for. Your clicks and purchases help support The DIY Lighthouse at no extra charge to you. We only put links to products we love and would recommend anyway.)

Why We Went on a Spending Fast

Believe me, we had good reason to go on one. We just got done spending money on Christmas and our anniversary night getaway (my first time away from my 1 year old baby and it was a-maz-ing).

We moved in October which was pretty expensive for us. Not only did we have moving costs, but we went from a tiny condo to a house, so we swapped out our furniture. We sold our smaller furniture (goodbye IKEA couch and Jake’s queen-sized-bed-from-high-school) in Seattle so we didn’t have to move it, and we got bigger furniture (hello big sectional and king-sized bed) to fit our new space.

On top of all of those purchases, our “new” water heater and garage door broke which (thanks loopholes) weren’t covered by warranty.

All in all, we had spent a good chunk of money in the last few months and thought a spending fast would be nice. Refreshing. Good for us.

Our Spending Fast Began

We were legitimately excited to do a spending fast. Even though we always budget, always invest, and never spend more than we have, the thought of saving most of our paycheck for the month was thrilling. I could totally see and almost taste all the zeros on our categorized monthly budget spreadsheet.

Our fast started out great. For the first week, it was going exactly like I imagined. We didn’t spend any money except for a trip to the grocery store for meager food: eggs, milk, bread, vegetables, fruit. The basics.

I felt thrifty and awesome. I used pantry items when I could. I got creative with low-budget meals. (If you want some ideas check out this post of cheap meals on a budget.) We weren’t spending much money.

Spending Fast Hiccups

And then… on January 7th we bought a car.

Haha before you freak out, know that we had been planning on this purchase for a while and had saved up for it. We thought we were going to be buying the car at the end of the year when all of the end-of-year discounts are going on. But we held out for a used, but nice minivan we knew was coming in soon. Really we weren’t planning on having this car purchase “count” in our spending fast because we were going to make the purchase anyway.

And then… we wanted to get mats for our car because our floors were getting dirty. We decided to just buy the mats now instead of waiting for February to come when our spending fast was technically over.

And then… our refrigerator water filter light came on. So we decided to just buy a new water filter (this brand is cheaper than the GE version) instead of waiting for February because the purchase was going to happen anyway.

And then… Google sent me a replacement for my phone because the old one wasn’t working. And I have two little kids so I need a screen protector. (This one in fact.) So, you guessed it, we decided to buy the screen protector instead of waiting.

Our Spending Fast Failed

Technically, we failed at our spending fast. Which I’m slightly mad about because I’m a stubborn person. And I told myself and the world that I would do it. But I didn’t.

Lessons Learned From Going on a Spending Fast

Even though we failed our spending fast, I did learn a lot. Here are my two main takeaways.

1. Sometimes Not Spending Money is Stupid

Honestly, we think doing a spending fast is dumb. (For my family at least. Depending on your usual spending habits, maybe going on a spending fast really would be beneficial for you, so don’t let me discourage you from trying one.)

I quickly discovered that sometimes trying to not spend money is stupid. In all of the spending fast hiccup examples listed above, the purchases were going to happen anyway. By sticking to the fast we would have been delaying the inevitable and causing harm by doing so. The money would eventually be spent (yeah, like on February 1st), but in the meantime we would have made our car floor dirtier, been drinking unfiltered water, and potentially cracked my phone screen.

2. It’s Better to Focus on Controllable Categories

One thing we appreciated about going on a spending fast (*cough cough* or trying to at least) is we saved money in two of our budget categories: Eating Out and Fun/Entertainment. These categories are easily controllable and it really just takes us self discipline to not spend money on these things. Plus, by not going out to eat you are not delaying the inevitable purchase. You’re just picking homemade spaghetti instead of Chef Alfredo’s Black & Bleu Filet Mignon (which is amazing btw… “mushrooms & onions in a creamy gorgonzola sauce, topped with toasted walnuts. Served with fettuccini pasta”… please, just stop).

So, moving forward, I can see us doing a more focused fast by cutting out all eating out purchases and fun/entertainment purchases for a month.

What Do You Think?

Have you had good and/or bad experiences going on a spending fast? I would love to hear your stories. Please drop a comment below!

Pin It For Later

Other Posts You Might Like