The other day, I was browsing one of the fine blogs listed on the right of this page, and they mentioned Dave Ramsey and how his Book had a huge impact on their financial habits.  Don’t worry, this isn’t a blog about Dave Ramsey.  That post has been written a thousand times by a thousand other people.  I have never read Dave Ramsey’s book, but after seeing it mentioned in yet another post, I decided that I should probably go ahead and read this book and see what it was all about.

So, we reached the point where “Jefferson Wants a Book!”  Immediately, old habits began to creep back.  My first stop was Amazon.com, which is probably my favorite store in the world, because they have everything.  They were charging $16.38 for the “Total Money Makeover,” which seemed a little steep.  While I haven’t read Ramsey’s book, I am pretty sure that a portion of it will be dedicated to controlling your spending.  My own “total money makeover” was not going to include buying really expensive books. The Kindle version was a little cheaper at $9.17, but still more expensive than any other Kindle book that I have ever purchased.  I then remembered that you can usually get books for dirt cheap at eBay’s half.com website.  Lucky for me, they were selling the Ramsey book, brand spanking new, for $4.00 +$3.99 shipping.  I immediately got excited, and quickly added the book to my shopping cart.

Right as I was about to finalize my order, the little debt birdie on my shoulder began to chirp at me, “Jefferson, you can get books for free at the library, ya know?  Why would you buy this?”

Oh yeah.  I knew that.  I *could* get the book at the library.  So, why was my first instinct to spend money unnecessarily?  Why is this so ingrained in my brain?  When my mind decides that it wants something, it starts a snowball effect (no Ramsey pun intended, I swear) where I seem to suspend rational thought until the purchase has been made.

This voice of reason (the little debt birdie) that saved me is a new creation, created by the same efforts that have also spawned this website.  It is a combination of mindfulness and accountability, and it is clearing the way towards financial sanity.  It is replacing my old patterns of unnecessary spending with new patterns, but it isn’t easy.  Believe it or not, I battle habit creep every single day.

Michelle talked yesterday about her struggles with shopping withdrawal, but my cravings are a bit different.  If I have to stop at a gas station on the way to work, I have to restrain myself every single time from going inside to get coffee and a snack.  I know very well that I can get free coffee at work if I just wait 15 minutes.  To make matters worse, I also have to drive past a McDonald’s each morning, and their coffee is really delicious these days! (Yeah, I like coffee).

Old habits die hard.  For a good portion of last year, I would entertain myself during down time at work by visiting slickdeals.net.  For those of you that don’t know, Slickdeals is a lovely site where folks post about the amazing deals they’ve found at various stores. Mindlessly reading through the forums on slickdeals is a very dangerous hobby when you are trying to save money.

Slickdeals via Jeff: “Somebody is selling a 1TB External Hard Drive for $50!!!”
Debt Birdie: “But you already have an external hard drive. You don’t need this.”

Before Debt Birdie was around, you could see how this could cause problems.  I probably spent a thousand dollars last year on Slickdeals items that I wouldn’t have bought had I not seen the deal.  Yeah, all of these items were being sold for a “great price,” but it isn’t really a deal if I wasn’t planning on buying the item in the first place.  I should note that I still heart Slickdeals, and I do think it can be a major tool in trying to save money, but instead of browsing the site, you should just search for something that you need to buy.  If you need a new waffle maker, just search for “waffle maker” and see what deals are out there in waffle maker land.

I am not perfect and this a work in progress.  I have stopped to got coffee once or twice this year, and I do occasionally catch myself browsing the Slickdeals forums from time to time.  A big part of developing new habits and getting spending under control is avoiding the triggers that cause spending in the first place.  If you can successfully do that, you can keep habit creep under control.

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This post was originally published in Feb 2012.