I’ve been trying to take a closer look at what I eat. I’ve not been gaining weight, but now that I’m back at the gym, I’ve decided to try to be a bit better about what I’m putting in my body. Why bother to workout if I’m just going to fuel my body with junk?
One thing I’ve noticed is that I much less likely to make impulse purchases at the grocery store. Yesterday, after waiting nearly two and a half hours to vote, I went to the grocery store to buy some soup for lunch. Naturally, I was starving, which is the worst time to go to the grocery store. I found myself looking at ice cream and cookies at one point, and I kept looking at the price and the calories, and thinking that I didn’t need the calories and I didn’t need to spend the money. Combined, those two reasons were enough for me to keep my money in my wallet and keep me eating healthy.
But really, I just need to not go to the grocery store while I’m hungry. It’s better for everyone involved.
Megan is a 40-something government employee in the Washington, DC area. She got interested in Personal Finance when she got out of college and realized that her paycheck wasn’t going to go as far as she had hoped. Since starting this blog, she has managed to buy a house and make a solid start on her retirement goals, and hopes to help others do the same. Here is her story:
In 2007, I was a gainfully employed 20-something with no debt but not a lot of knowledge about personal finance. It was a co-worker’s comment about Roth IRAs that sent me to the internet, searching for information. It was then that I realized that I really didn’t know a whole lot about personal finance and that my current financial situation was due a lot to inherent frugal tendencies, generous family members, a fear of debt, and good luck. While that was working for me, clearly I needed a better plan.
While I had no debt, I was also pretty much living paycheck to paycheck and not worrying about going over budget (I say this as if I had a real budget) because I had an emergency fund set aside to cover any overages.
Except that’s not what an emergency fund is for.
So I did a lot of research, read a lot of blogs, and decided that I needed a plan. I needed to budget. I needed to know what I was spending my money on. I needed to prepare for the future.
I decided to create a blog not only to make myself accountable to others but also to share the knowledge that I gained along the way. I’ve learned so much from my fellow bloggers, and I hope that my readers can find something useful in what I have to share as well.
I’m the opposite, I never go to the grocery store when I’m hungry because I make bad food decisions, and buy too much junk. Plus I’m unbearably irritable when I’m hungry, so it’s better for everyone involved if I avoid getting to the point of hunger to begin with!
Yeah – hitting the grocery store when I’m hungry always results in spending way too much at the very least. I can sometimes avoid getting junk but will buy quite a bit more than I need just because I am hungry.
The other trap that I have to keep an eye out for is shopping with kids; that tends to drive the bill up as well.
If I can go shopping after a meal with no kids I tend to shop better.
Hi Megan,
I’m emailing you in regards to a followup email I sent you a month ago in response to a partnership, have you had a chance to think about it?
If you have any questions or would more information, please advise me and we can go from there.
Kind Regards,
Andrew Knight