50 Regaining control of your finances

by

8 May 2026

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Table of Contents

This article will serve as a base line on regaining control of your finances.

The article assumes the point of view of a private individual, it may be relevant for corporate parties: We do not assume that all situations are identical so tweaks and interpretations are required anyhow.

Regaining control of your finances

The first step after realising that your spending is becoming problematic is fully face your problem and acknowledge that it is rarely too late*.

How to start

Below steps are in a suggested order, feel free to shake things up as needed.

Grab your schedule and reserve an entire afternoon.
Take your budget and expand it into a cash outflow schedule for at least the current and next full month. Cash inflow may be added afterwards, though not required at this stage.
If there are genuinely important, non essential, expenses in your near future; do them now so you can start fresh. Otherwise you risk getting in another spending cycle later.
For avid gamers, including those who play physical games where any money is involved: You must include how much this costs you in total, over the past year. Remember that micro transaction add up to macro, plus this type of cash outflow is fully discretionary.

Follow up

Reserve an hour, every single month, preferably just before your monthly income arrives, to schedule how you are going to spend your salary. This includes fixed expenses and how much should go towards savings. Do not leave out any spending, you are only fooling yourself. During these sessions set the goal away from regaining control of your finances, to staying in control.
Every few weeks, review your spending for the past period. This is where your personal preference and situation really come in, these intervals should be based on personal need.
Try to make a list of situations in which you are tempted to spend. This could also be when you are around specific people, which might be challenging to see separately from the situation you find yourself in when near them (at work lunchbreak with that one colleague, for instance). For your correspondent boredom plays a big factor and people whom he considers unconstructive influences (cutting contact is not always possible, due to work or family factors). Simply seeking a distraction by browsing on your phone, can result in temptation.

Long term plan

Here is where we see what happens after some time has passed. The goal is to accept our errors and move on towards a more prosperous future.

Warning signs

A typical contemporary bad sign is using forms of credit, for not really essential spending. Or finding yourself needing credit for essential purchases. A golden rule/big red warning sign is that you are actively spending money that is not in your bank account. Wishing for more liquid resources, for no other reason than a needless shopping spree could be an indicator of your personal slippery slope.

If you find yourself rationalising discretionary purchases, realise what is happening and stop it.

Signs that you are doing fine

You can go several weeks without spending any money, apart from fixed expenses and necessities such as groceries.
Sources of optional spending are being avoided. Such as a web shop that you buy things from that you do not really need. You are now no longer checking that shop, at all.
There are multiple months worth of fixed expenses in your primary bank account, plus you have a second savings account with some money stashed as genuine savings.

Congratulations you have reached the goal; regaining control of your finances, with great success.