For most of my life, I never really knew where my money went in detail. I just think “oh i use my money with X amount to this and that”. Sure thing I knew about my big spending.
I remember buying a phone, a new keyboard, game, or subscription. But if someone asked me how much i spend for food last month or how much do u spend to grab a coffee here and there, I literally don’t have any idea. I could only guess the amount.
Three years ago, I decided to stop guessing.
Since then, I’ve started to record almost every expense I’ve made. It wasn’t because I want to be obsessed with budgeting or saving a huge amount of money. I simply just curious where all of my money goes. I wanted to see if the numbers were roughly the same as what I remember.
For the first 3-5 month, the tracker data didn’t seem particularly useful. I just seeing a growing amount of money and transaction. But as more time had passed, the data start to become meaningful. They painted a picture of my spending habits that I had never been able to see before.
The biggest surprise wasn’t how much I spent. It was how wrong my assumptions were.
I always thought I had a pretty good memory of where my money went. It turns out I wasn’t remembering my spending, I only remembered the expense that are expensive, exciting or unusual ones. Everything else blend into the background, even though those ordinary expenses made the most of my monthly spending.
Looking at the data made me realize that many of those purchases weren’t necessary. It wasn’t the expensive purchases that bothered me. It was the small, thoughtless and impulsive spending that never felt important in the moment but added up over time.
What if all of that money had gone into my savings instead?
Tracking my finances didn’t magically make me wealthier.
It didn’t stop me from buying things I wanted, and it certainly didn’t eliminate impulse purchases overnight.
What it did give me was awareness. It replaced assumptions with facts, guesses with answers, and memories with data.
Looking back, that’s probably the most valuable thing the tracker has ever given me.