How will you get over ‘Blue Monday’?

The principal key to a sensible financial life is to create an annual budget. I keep a small book in which I note weekly expenditure on all different classes of expense, major and minor – such as food, fuel, energy, subscriptions, miscellaneous (odds and sods) etc etc and use this to establish an annual budget – by month, as some are more expensive than others. I then record against this budget my weekly expenditure to see where I save, or overspend. I can then base the following years budget on reality – if you just try to think of what you spend money on you’ll miss quite a lot.
This not only records expenditure, but helps understand it and points to areas where you can save, if you need to. Cut down on Christmas presents, try a cheaper holiday?
I keep a separate record of income, and compare the two.
At least this way you don’t hide from the truth, even if is unpleasant, and you can try to balance the two before it’s too late.
I wonder when someone will bring out a greetings card – Happy Blue Monday? I’d never heard of it.

I wish everybody on here a Happy Blue Monday and many returns of such days.

I got up this morning with a spring in my step and soon discovered that my energy supplier was reducing the amount of my monthly direct debit by £54 in order to balance my account. This made me happy even though it’s probably because they over-reached themselves with the previous adjustment and have been dipping their hands too deeply into my pocket over the last few months. The energy-saving measures we have been taking over the last year have also started to make a noticeable difference and my thanks go to many contributors to Which? Conversation for their tips and suggestions. Milder weather must have contributed also.

It is interesting that today was also predicted to be the peak holiday booking day of the year. This is not surprising given that all the new brochures are released at the end of December when the heavy advertsing also begins and the travel supplements are published in the newspapers and magazines. It would be a failure of marketing effort on the biggest scale ever if that combination of publicity didn’t generate a higher level of sales as soon as people could return to a normal pattern of behaviour. Anyway, Happy Holidays to one and all as well.