#146 You Deserve a Break from $tress

Welcoming you back with our Money Edition.

Normally, we like our wallets like our Thanksgiving turkeys: fat and stuffed to the brim. But today’s Making Cents goes in a different direction.

Let’s get right to it so you can see what I’m talking about…

The Cost of These OTF Highlights? $0

• Making Cents of Holiday Spending💰️

• Hustle Hub: Litter Boxes, Answer Inflation, and 3 Start-Your-Own Business Books💰️📈🚀 

• A Holiday Season Did You Know 💰️

MAKING CENTS💰️ 

Enjoy the Holiday Spending. YOU Deserve It.

Making Cents is my favorite OTF content section to write because it forces me to learn more about money. I never really had that opportunity when I was younger because my family didn’t have a lot of it. There wasn’t anyone to really guide me along financially.

A lot of what I’ve learned - what I share with you every month - focuses on investments, savings, hacks, side hustles, etc. How to keep and grow more money to achieve wealth.

And that’s important.

But it’s also important to think about how we control our emotions and frame our spending.

With the holiday season upon us, I’m excited! I could and maybe should be stressed — I just spent a lot on a wedding and honeymoon, and boom: here come more expenses. Gifts, flights, events, parties…my wallet could use a break…

But I’m not too stressed. I’m looking forward to it. Crushing wings on a football Sunday, downing an adult beverage or two at a family gathering, just enjoying time with friends and family after one hell of a year - count me IN!

So my approach to this holiday season? Instead of running from the spending, I’m leaning into it.

Hear me out:

I work so damn hard day after day, week after week, month after month. I bet you do, too. What do we work so hard for? Money, sure, but what’s the point of having that money? Is it really about buying an iPhone 37 Pro only a year after the 36 came out?

No, it’s about enjoying life with friends and family. And that’s what the holidays are all about.

So I’m not stressing about all the money I’m giving to WaWa’s and American Airlines over the next couple of months. I’m not looking at my bank account like, “Damn, this is all going to be expensive - I should cut back.” I’m going to frame it differently. I’m going to tell myself, This is what you work so hard for. Enjoy it. You deserve it.

Quick Clarifications

1. I don’t even think this should just be a holiday mindset. You work hard. You’ve got your priorities in order. If you want that $15 lunch out instead of bringing leftovers, rip it!
   

2. “Priorities in order” is the key idea there. I’m not advocating careless spending just because you can, and I’m not saying you should spoil yourself or give in to your impulses all the time. But the holidays in particular are about loved ones and making memories, so this is the one time of year when you don’t wanna nickel-and-dime yourself.

I’m not gonna go crazy. I won’t spend what I can’t afford. But I also refuse to miss out on good times with loved ones just to save a few bucks.

I’m gonna spend, and when I do, I’m sure as hell gonna enjoy it.

How Do You Typically View Holiday Spending?

Click your vote and see what others are saying!

HUSTLE HUB 📈

YOUR SUCCESS:

Be a Great Interviewer - The secret to crushing your next job interview? Avoid “answer inflation.”

THEIR SUCCESS:

Be Inspired - 760K in Year 1. Bought for at least half a billion within five years. Obviously, we’re talking about…a litter box company?!?

YOUR SUCCESS:

Be Well-Read - Forbes recently put out an article entitled “3 Books to Help You Start a Business After a Layoff” (unnecessarily negative title, but okay). In case it’s behind a paywall, here are the three recommendations:

1. The Corporation in the 21st Century by John Kay

2. The Art of Principled Entrepreneurship by Andreas Widmer

3. The Let Them Theory by Mel Robbins

DID YOU KNOW… 💸 

• Americans spend over $5.6 billion on Thanksgiving groceries each year!

• Nearly 30% of all annual charitable donations are made between Thanksgiving and the end of the year.

• Over the five-day period from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday in 2024, about 197 million U.S. shoppers took part and the average spend per shopper was $235.

Source: Adobe Analytics, National Philanthropic Trust, American Farm Bureau Federation, Reuters

Before You Go!

Thank you again for joining us for another edition of OTF!

We will see you next Tuesday!

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