Audit Your Wallet: Understanding Your Money
Didn’t I just pay those people?!
(If you wanna watch my video around this? Click here).
The bills just keep coming it seems as soon as you pay them. And with the mounting cost of “life” due to inflation or people uncertain if they are in a recession themselves or the group project grade is becoming due - the tone in your voice about bills, money, and how it flows can be a bit loud.
I retweeted context over Twitter about the notion of not only how people budget/manage their money let alone are designated “poor” is a mark often missed by many financial institutions, advisors, educators, content creators, or even that random family member who seems to know it all:
We even heard commentary about how people shouldn’t balance their money between saving and investing along with only investing. The Context of the Content we digest about finances shows that our country has developed a gut based upon the unbalanced meal we’ve gotten about our “mills” (Yes, you might not have a million dollars - but follow me). I wanted to not tell you about the budget ‘ratios’ without keeping a realistic view of their balance sheet.
Now that I started with all of that fanfare - I wanted to talk about why you should view and vantage your budget, cash flow, and other things that come monthly when it comes to your money. It’s either close to being or is the first of the month when you’re viewing this. And some of you are building your budget along with some thinking “Damn, it’s the first again”. So I wanted to give your 3 things to do to have a better balance over your check and checkbook each month:
Align with your financial goals. Checking in with your goals is never a bad thing. Don’t just make goals at the top of the year - check in with how they are flowing - quarterly, monthly, weekly, and daily. Oh, with the things that are working - understand what makes them work to align with those hiccup goals. Celebrate your wins!
Don’t just check your account when a check comes in and you’re a check out. Pull your statements to see what statement you’re making with your money. Understanding how your money flows will let you know how to build a budget that makes sense for YOU. No matter if it’s the Zero Based, By the Paycheck, Ratios, or a real one that’s a fusion of it all. Heck, I check my budget halfway through the month to be sure I’m aligned.
Peep at your other money goals - savings, retirement, and investing. No matter if you automate it, you still have to know how things are accumulating. Shift stuff around that doesn’t give you stacks. Also, split your money up. I talk about this in my 3B Method.
Budgeting isn’t restrictive as many call it. It’s about taking the stamina of how your stacks are moving. It’s about understanding what’s not holding balance and moving the scale. Also, knowing how much your life costs - so you can build towards it. I talked about previously how people should understand not only how much their paycheck is but how it pays out. In my other article about 3B - Bills, Build and Blow - I give insight into how building those buckets will allow you to develop your budget. If you don’t fully understand where you are financially and how things are going - how can you budget properly? It’s like using a GPS without knowing the address or which route to go down.
Here’s some content that I’ve done around understanding how your money works and even how to rebuild your emergency fund:
The 3 tips that I gave are a great starting point for knowing your money but also managing your money not just to build generational wealth, but your gains now.