Feeling Like An Impulse Buyer

This doesn't have anything to do with this post but I wanted to unearth this picture in light of Valentine's week. :) Austin and I at the Jane Austen Yule Ball in Rexburg, December 2012.

I've never considered myself an impulse buyer but this week I've felt like one. I don't know even know how to explain it, it's like one minute I'm learning about an online class that is calling my name, and the next thing you know, I'm buying that class plus a few other "essential" things.

Backing up a little bit: I rarely go shopping for clothes or other fun and exciting things like shoes, jewelry, apps, movies, etc. I only do my big grocery shopping trips 2x a month and on the other weeks I just stick to buying produce, mainly fruit for the week. So buying things for "fun" is not really in my radar or budget area even though I think it would be great to do.

On the other side of things, we are those rare couples who are not swimming in debt and actually have money to spend. I realize that all of this money could be gone in a flash for some outlandish thing or could be saved to use in the future, but where is the balance in buying things now and waiting till later? The obvious answer would be to have a budget for these kind of fun expenditures but budgets and me have not been working out lately. Maybe people can give me things they've used that has helped? I've tried so many apps, online resources, and they all work for about two months. Read: I don't think I'm using it correctly so I'm not making it work for me and thus I try something else.

I have the hardest time staying on a budget but maybe the problem is my mindset so I really shouldn't be having any excuses!

Back to this week: I listened to this podcast on perfectionism with Jennifer Finlayson-Fife and it really resonated with me. Fife is an LDS Sex Therapist and I've listened to her on other podcasts and just love what she has to say about the topic of sexuality with the lens of Mormon culture. In this podcast she was talking about the art of desire and how she has a class on it online that helps women. I looked it up and thought, yep I need this (for a lot of different reasons and maybe I can explain on another post).

The class was originally $145 but they were having a 15% Valentine's Day sale so I just had to get it, you know? ;) This was really out of my nature to just jump onto something like this but I was thinking that something like this is worth investing my time and money into. I really love learning and learning about a wide variety of topics (I think that's why I love books so much) and I knew that this was going to be something that I would want to educate myself about. It's the type of knowledge that I want to carry with me throughout my life.

I just started one of her classes (there's four in this course) and I LOVE it. So much so that I think we're going to buy all her classes. Is that crazy??

Now the other things that I bought was piano music-3 pieces of music for $10. It's really not that expensive and I don't remember the last time I bought music but it was kind of out of the blue...sort of. My pull to take lessons again has been on my mind for a few months (which is another expense to take in). Is it worth it? Well I guess the practicing and enjoyment will eventually pay off when I can finally play these pieces, right? :) That's my hope. And developing skills/talents is something I want to invest in, especially with music.

And then the other thing I bought with no real value besides entertainment (no judgement) was the 4th season of When Calls the Heart which starts back up this Sunday. I really can't believe I'm still following this show about 3 years but here we are. I obviously can't get enough of Hallmark cheesiness to let it go. And it doesn't help that I just introduced it to a friend and she got sucked in so now I just have to watch it so we can talk about it. :)  Was it worth it? Well by golly if J&E don't get engaged, I'm boycotting the show! Ha!

Maybe this whole post is just an indication of where I want to invest my time and money...not sure if it's a good indication or not. The hard thing is trying to determine what's important now and what can wait till later.

This just shows that all of these things are more important in my mind than still not bothering to get a microwave which after 4 years, we still do not have. Call me crazy but whatever.

What are your thoughts? Am I the only one who does this kind of thing? What things have worked for you with money and budgets and stuff?