Avoidance is Expensive

How we manage our spending, and drop the guilt.

Ripping Off the Spending Bandaid

My Amex used to burn a hole in my pocket.

I moved to Mexico City in 2016 and immediately set out to know the cocktail and culinary scene. I was living the high life going to the hottest new restaurants three times a week, hitting speakeasys and wine bars, all while decked out in new clothing. As I mentioned this in a recent piece…I was groomed and out on the town!
(single women… read this piece)

The lifestyle creep caught up to me very quickly when I was abruptly laid off in March 2020. With no job and $25k in credit card debt, I freaked tf out.

This sheer panic led me to finally do what I had been putting off…I had to get acquainted with my spending.

WTF was I even buying?

I sat down in my makeshift home office and did a caffeine-fueled deep dive into a year of Amex data, labeling every transaction with custom tags of the data I wanted to see (Chico, Amazon, Groceries, Takeout, Restaurants). I tagged thousands of transactions over a few hour sessions and was able to see a year of spending at a glance.

Sitting down and naming where my money went was the beginning of a completely different relationship with spending…
It didn’t just give me clarity. It gave me agency.

A few insights: