You ever heard of the HALT framework above? I didn’t make this phrase up, someone else did. But adhering to this has saved me a lot of money and grief. It helped me identify a lot of the times I spend emotionally.
When you are emotional your brain is literally not lighting up the rational decision making pathways. How often have we said things, done things, bought things that we regret because of our emotions? A good reminder to not spend money or make big decisions when you feel these things.
I have developed a very easy framework called Trigger, Action, Reward, that literally rewires your brainto spend less! I talk about it a lot and I teach it personally to each person I coach, but it can take 4 – 6 months for this to sink in. I have been improving the framework and its effectiveness each year.
Trigger – we all have real emotional, physical, and psychological needs that have to be met. But we may have assigned the wrong reward to these needs over time, leading to compulsive spending, debt accumulation, and no solution to our pains.
Action – Once you have identified and realized you are being triggered, you need a plan in place that MEETS the triggered need, but at a lower cost than before.
Reward – When you have successfully met your trigger with the lower-cost action, you need to reward yourself mentally for having done something to heal yourself while being gentle on your wallet.
See below for an example of how I applied it to my own life – my love of being a foodie and good food.
Trigger: I’m triggered to want to eat out when I either follow a foodie on social media, or when I’m feeling lonely and want to spend quality time with someone
Action : I try to make myself get off social media right away. I try to learn more recipes so that I can satisfy my palate by eating at home. I try to address my loneliness by writing friends to meet up for a breakfast, a dessert, a walk around, instead of an expensive dinner. I maintain a list of good but cheap restaurants that are my usual fallbacks. By doing this, I still get the quality time I need and the good food, without breaking the bank
Reward : I kept a Facebook album of all the recipes I learned and i try to take pictures of me and the friends (and not so much the food) when we hang out so that I have a record of good memories
So go ahead and write some Trigger / Action / Reward sequences for your life today and try to implement them. It may take some time, but I guarantee you over time, this will lead to more money saved!
