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Archive for March, 2007

Setting the bar low?

March 25th, 2007 at 06:53 am

It's been a while since I've updated this blog.

I'm a lot busier at work now because its the unlikely situation where both my managers are away on holidays at the same time, leaving me to handle a lot more than I normally do.

Although its stressful, its a good exercise in a way, I'm learning some new things, and at the very least our VP is around when something comes up that I'm unfamiliar with. Eventhough he's in Hong Kong, he's quite accessible still.

Budget-wise, I'm on track and I've learnt some lessons as well.

I made up an excel spreadsheet last year to track how much I can save each month. I started in August 2006.

I've found that on average, I socked away $1,400 per month in 2006, not counting my bonuses. I had set a 2006 target of $1,000 per month, so I'm happy I exceeded it.

To be perfectly frank, I actually cheated in a way, I knew I'd make the target easily. But since its my first time tracking my savings so closely, I wanted to get that positive reinforcement thing going when I exceeded my own expectations.
(Yes, I know this sounds somewhat silly...But I wonder if other people do this too? Set a purposely low bar so that they will succeed?)

Anyway before I meander, because I did "so well" last year, I got a little overly ambitious this year.

I socked away $1,800 in February, which didn't leave me with much to spend. I barely made it to the next month.

Anyway by March I've had to lower it to $1,500. This has left me with abt $700 for all my monthly expenses. Still very do-able.

I'm quite pleased overall, but I've learnt that I shouldn't overdo the saving bit either.

I didn't shop at all for fun stuff in February. (By fun stuff I mean clothes, bags, and shoes.)

But I let myself buy a pair of really lovely pants and a gorgeous necklace this month. I felt I deserved it. Plus after not shopping for so long, it felt sweeter somehow.