New year, new you?
New year, new me. How many times have you seen that on your Facebook feed in the last 2 weeks or people sharing motivational quotes about how this year is going to be different?
It may feel like the time to completely reinvent yourself but if you feel like you need to make a change you are probably not that far away from where you want to be. Only 9% of people manage to stick to the resolution they were inspired to make for the turn of the year*.
So what can you do to make your resolution stick? And what are some of the most popular changes* people want to make and how they be achieved cheaply and in some cases even save money!
- Lose weight / healthier eating
Surely everyone wants to be a bit fitter and healthier? It’s only natural after the biggest blowout of the year at Christmas that you feel a bit disgusted with yourself (or maybe that’s just me). This one is easy if you have a bit of willpower: cut out the junk food and afternoon snacks.
Eating junk food is also an expensive habit, for me it’s a weekly occurrence. I have planned a cheap sandwich lunch out in my head but been tempted by something more expensive and substantial so many times. Why not make yourself a meal plan? If you can keep telling yourself about the benefits in your head, it can be quite easy to say no to junk food, and possibly benefit both your waist line and bank balance.
- Life / self improvements
Speaking Italian, playing the piano competently and being able to solo like Eric Clapton are all things I still cannot do. These are things I told myself I would do at the turn of years. If like me you want to learn a new skill, there are so many ways you can now do this thanks to websites like YouTube and Vimeo.
There are hundreds of thousands of how to videos to help you get started and, best of all, they’re all free to view!
- Financial decisions
Spending £5 to £10 on a whim every couple of days may not seem like a lot but it can add up especially when you think of other uses for that money.
We can all save a bit of money each month on things we probably don’t need but I am not here to tell you to not buy that coffee each day, or that takeaway at the weekend, because we all need a treat every now and again.
At Scottish Friendly we can however help you to invest a little money for the future and help you build up a cash sum. You can find out more about Investment ISAs and put a little money away from £10 a month at https://www.scottishfriendly.co.uk/isas
Keep in mind the value of investments can go down as well as up so you could get back less than you’ve invested.
- Quit smoking
Now I can’t imagine this one will apply to everyone and it doesn’t apply to me but there are so many benefits to giving up smoking from the health aspects to the financial. If you smoke 5 cigarettes a day for a year then giving up could save you a whopping £548* over the same period of time. Think about the things you could do with this money, which brings us nicely onto number 5:
- Do more exciting things
Live a little. You know that thing that you have always wanted to do? Just go and do it. Everyone has a different definition of exciting things, maybe it’s that part of the world you have always wanted to see or maybe you want to go and see more live shows. There are always some great deals to be found if you search in the right places. Why not check out deal or cashback websites.
Last year I wanted to go on more walks, so I visited a few places around Scotland and saw some of the spectacular views on offer. This was a great way to spend a day, free (after traveling costs) and very exciting.
- http://www.statisticbrain.com/new-years-resolution-statistics/
- http://www.nhs.uk/Tools/Documents/Smoking%20calculator.html