Most financial professionals want to budget out the enjoyment in life.

Skip the latte.
Buy beater cars.
Don’t buy luxury goods.

While you should be aware of where you are allocating your money, being responsible with your finances does not mean that you cannot spend money, more money than might be recommended, on thing or experiences that are meaningful to you.

Let me amend that…not just meaningful to you, but ALIGNED with your Authentic Life.

There is no “right” answer for where you allocate your money. Your values determine your “right” answer, what aligns with your Authentic Life, and ultimately the amount of money you earn. No one, not even the brightest financial professional, can tell you what you should and shouldn’t spend your money on.

Do not mistake this as permission to spend frivolously on the things that align with your Authentic Life. You still need to be responsible, save, invest, have proper insurance, etc. But if you like cars or nice clothes, and you've worked on an aligned budget to make sure you can cover all the essential things, then go ahead and get a nice car or buy that expensive hoodie.

Yes, we can argue that material possessions like a car or a hoodie aren’t important in life. The care is going to depreciate and get old. The hoodie will eventually wear out, get a stain, or go out of style. So spending less on those material things and saving the money or spending it on experiences is not necessarily bad advice–it makes total sense. Just not for you because, if you are truly living your Authentic Life and have an understanding of your values and what aligns with your Authentc Life, you understand the tradeoffs and are acting in alignment with what is right for you, not a financial textbook.

Again, it’s important to remember not to put your Self in financial strain just because it’s aligned–if it is putting you and your family in a financial strain, then it really isn’t aligned with your Authentic Life.

Before you revisit your budget, take some time to think about what values do you want to see carried out with your finances, what material possessions and experiences align with your Authentic Life, and what categories are you currently allocated your money to that do not.

Build out an aligned budget by starting with categories first:

• Non-negotiables like housing, food, insurance, and an emergency fund.
• Long-term planning, like investing (be careful of overplanning for 40 years out)
• Aligned spending

Once you have these categories outlined, you can begin allocating your money to them to arrive at an aligned spending plan.

To give an example of some of the aligned spending for our family, here are a few categories we spend more on than a financial professional might recommend (and yes, I am a financial professional):

• Food (we try to buy higher-quality food, which is typically more expensive)
• Transportation (we spend a lot of time transporting the boys to all of the activities, and I appreciate having a car that I enjoy being in)
• Fitness
• Fashion (I don’t spend a crazy amount of money on clothes, but I do like to express my Self through clothes, so my closet has more than what is needed to survive)
• Youth sports
• Supporting small businesses and friends (it is important to me to spend money supporting people who are pursuing their Authentic Lives, even if sometimes I don’t need or even want what they are offering–the ability to support is important to me)

If I went on a financial fixer-upper show, there is plenty to critique with my finances. I’m sure the show's host would chastise me for spending money on things that “don’t matter”. But the truth is, our spending aligns with our values and our Authentic Life as a family. In total, we are not living beyond our means. We are saving and investing. We are adequately insured.

Yes, we could have more in our investment accounts. We could have more money sitting in savings. We could have a bigger house. But these don’t align with our Authentic Life as a family–we could have those, but we don’t need those.

One final thought…

If you are beginning your financial journey or rebuilding your financial life, you can still practice aligning your spending with your income. As you increase your income over time, continue to view your spending from a place of alignment.

You don’t have to have or make a lot of money to spend in an aligned way–the amount you have to spend on the non-essentials will vary, but anyone can do the practice, no matter income or net worth.

And I believe, aligned spending is one way to help increase the amount of money you have to spend–it shows The Universe that you are a good steward of money, which energetically shifts more flow to you.

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See you tomorrow and keep pursuing,

JC