Well, that was a bust

Who trusted me with all this cash?

‘So.. what exactly is your plan here?’

This question, tame as far as TikTok inquiries go, was left on a video I posted in early November announcing my manic money experiment du jour: attempting to go cash only for an entire month. My reasoning was simple: I’m anxious about carrying cash. I don’t like to spend it. So I thought maybe, when stripped of other options, I just.. wouldn’t spend.

I thought wrong.

For better or worse, my usual strategy is to not have a strategy. But, unlike the first money challenge I’d attempted back in July (no restaurants or shopping for a month) the boundaries here were less clear. Would I take out a certain amount of cash each week? Would I divide the cash up by category & stop spending on that thing when I ran out the cash in the envelope? A practice I would later find out is referred to as…. stuffing?

It appeared I would, in fact, need to make a plan. 

In a twist no one (anyone) could have seen coming, my demise came the day I did just that. Hours after I marched defiantly into my local Chase bank, took out what was left of my budget for groceries, booze and restaurants that month and split the money accordingly into three envelopes, I went to dinner and a friend’s birthday party. The next morning, I woke up with one ripped envelope and $20:

@realgirlproject0 regrets, 0 dollars left in my booze budget for the month 😬🫣🫠💰💵💸 #debtfreejourney #debtfree #debttok #debtpayoff #cashenvelopes #cashenvelopesystem #moneytok

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Overspending, overindulging and overwhelming hangover aside, I learned something that day. Cash can get you out of a restaurant faster, give you a small thrill when you have exact change (just me?) and generally come in handy.

But if you just, I don’t know, started budgeting for the first time in July, throwing in another variable is like deciding to run a marathon on a whim despite having no experience running long distance. Too soon.

On the contrary, there are aspects of a cash-free life I find undeniably convenient. Actually just one. Paying for the subway with my watch (something I really appreciated when, as part of the experiment I tried to a refill a Metrocard only to realize it had expired and I had to buy a new one). But the consequences — like potentially worsening inequality for people without access to a bank account or the elderly, for example — give me pause even as I glide right through the turnstile with ease.

In any event, this month I'm going back to plain old budgeting, using my debit card and tracking my purchases on Tiller, which you can check out here (I am in their referral program now!) & learn more about here:

@realgirlprojectanswering a few questions about holy grail budgeting tool #tiller. Let me know if you have any other Qs below! #budgeting #budget #debtfreejourney #debtfreecommunity #debttok #budgettips

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Using debit feels, at the very least, cash adjacent. Being able to see how much I am spending and categorizing each transaction just works better to understand what you’re spending on and where you can make adjustments, while still avoiding high interest rates and reducing the potential to spend money you don’t have, in my opinion.

I *did* manage to pay off another $1,000 chunk of my credit card debt in the process, so that’s a win. That brings us down to $14,000, party people!

Not every experiment is going to succeed (a message for myself more than it is for you honestly) and there is freedom in realizing something — like going cash only or literally anything else — is not for you.

Here’s to a very merry debit December.

Love,

Jamie AF