5 Simple Tips on How to Budget When You Hate Budgeting

Let's go through each of my tips and try make budgeting fun!

1. Treat yourself to quiet time to budget

Budgeting takes a lot of focus. So I treat myself to quiet time when I can work on my budget. I treat myself to quiet breakfasts or I treat myself to a mom’s night out once a month and I put it in the budget. I go to a local restaurant, sit down, have a nice, quiet meal, and work on my budget.

2. Gamify your budget

Make budgeting fun by creating games and challenges. For example, if you’re not so great at saving, hang posters all over your walls of things you want to save for and create a game out of it.

Or, save every five-dollar bill that you come across, for something special. Another idea would be to save all your one-dollar bills and all your change into a Disney fund. You’d be surprised how fast everything adds up.  

3. Have a budget buddy

You can bounce ideas off of a budget buddy and a buddy will help you stay focused on your goals. You will feel like you are not alone.

4. Don’t forget to dream

I am talking about having concrete dreams. I understand how you feel if you are negative by the end of the month and you’re wondering how in the world you are supposed to have a dream.

A dream can be something as small as having a nice lunch at the end of the week or a simple hour at the beach. It’s easy to go for years without having a single dream like I did when my kids were very small. You also won’t grow as a person if you don’t have goals and dreams. 

5. Reward yourself

Reward yourself when you have successfully completed the budget that you planned. At the end of the month if you have stayed within a certain percentage range of the budget that you put into place–and no budget will ever be 100 percent perfect–reward yourself.

That’s why we have oops money. At the end of the month if you have money left over in your spending categories, pull that money out of your envelopes and without guilt, put it into your savings challenges for the things you’re saving up for.

If you have money left over in your oops category, do not feel guilty but go buy that small thing that you’ve really had your eye on. Reward yourself with small things to keep you motivated to move forward in your budgeting process.

How to budget when you hate budgeting

I hope these tips will help you learn how to budget when you hate budgeting. Just remember to give yourself grace because your budget could change monthly. That’s just life and it will depend on what season of life you’re in at the moment.

Let me know how you feel about making budgeting fun. What are your favorite games, challenges, and rewards for budgeting? What challenges are you going to take up? Comment below!