Buying things adds up. I felt like the past year (especially right after Christmas) my wife and I had spent a lot of money on things that we just didn’t need or weren’t sure if we needed. It seemed like we were making good money, but we were barely making it to the end of the month keeping the checking account in the positive and getting all of our stuff paid for.
We decided to intentionally limit our spending, not because we desperately needed to (we were able to afford pretty much everything we bought), but because we wanted to practice restraint over the spending that was “wants” and not “needs”.
we wanted to practice restraint over the spending that was “wants” and not “needs”.
Reasons Why We Chose “No Clothes for a Month”
There were several reasons why not spending money on clothes for a month was something we chose as a couple.
🧨 Reason 1: Madelyn (my wife) and I both felt the impact of the decision. While there weren’t a lot of clothes I really wanted or needed, not being able to buy any of them impacted me just as much as it impacted her. It was also something we both could mutually agree to.
⚠️ Reason 2: Clothes weren’t a “need”. Sure, it’s easy to say “I need this outfit for a wedding” or “I need this outfit for work”, but need is the wrong word. We already had plenty of clothes, and merely were getting sick of the ones we had.
👕 Reason 3: There wasn’t necessarily anything wrong with the clothes that we had, but it seemed to me that the clothes we WERE previously buying weren’t the clothes that actually filled in the gaps of our wardrobe. I wanted to use a month's break to determine what clothes I actually wanted to finish up my wardrobe. (my end goal is to avoid buying clothes for a year - article coming soon).
🥶 Reason 4: We are spending the month of January re-evaluating the things we are spending our money on. Clothes aren’t the only item; there are subscriptions, food, groceries, etc. We also worked on these, but putting an “artificial” freeze on buying clothes helps us take a step back and realize what is most important in our lives.
Did this help?
It’s the end of the month. And I can say that we made it! It was hard sometimes not buying just a little something, but we were able to work together and not spend any money on clothes. This helped us better understand our budget, the clothes we ACTUALLY want to complete our wardrobes, and how to be better stewards. And who knows? Maybe we will do this again sometime…
That’s it! I hope you found this helpful. If you have questions about how to save money, send me an email at info@malachicorliss.com.
Check out my other articles!
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Seeya tomorrow,
Malachi Corliss
