The four financial resolutions you should make to straighten out your family finances in 2023

It is a very good idea to make New Year’s resolutions — the tricky part is sticking to them.

Resolutions help to lift our vision and aim for better things. They lift our spirits because thinking about them and how we will accomplish them is an act of self-care.

When we see them through — for the entire year — the results are often transformative. The more realistic they are, the less stress and anxiety we experience, which is a priceless reward.

The secret to making resolutions stick is to create healthy rituals out of them. Here are four to get you started:

Daily ritual of financial self care

Ostraching is sticking your head in the sand (yes, just like the bird) and not looking at your finances.

We do it because we are scared of what we might potentially uncover. As we push off opening our online banking, or setting up our budget, our mind races and we think basically the worst of our financial situation.

The funny thing about ostraching is that nine times out of 10, when we pull our heads out of the sand and actually look, the financial picture is not nearly as bad as the story we’ve created in our minds.

Set the ritual of checking your online banking daily to see how it looks. Are your accounts in good shape? Do you need to move money around? Is it time to return that gift you bought for someone that never was given? And, while you’re at it, move a small, but meaningful amount of money into your savings account, possibly the value of an expensive latte or takeout you were going to order, but have decided against because it’s not good for your wallet — or waistline.

Facing your finances daily isn’t about becoming obsessed with your progress. It’s just healthy to know what’s going on and to bring awareness to areas that could improved.

Weekly ritual of designing your week ahead

Whether digital or paper, take out your calendar at the beginning of the week and map out your week. Where will you go? Who will you see? Are their key commitments for work or family? Where and how will you fit your wellness in? Now, put a price beside the items that cost money. Do you like what your week looks like? Are you happy with the costs? Would you like to make any changes?

Thinking through how you plan to make your upcoming week awesome, and financially mindful, brings awareness to our spending habits and is an opportunity for us to be intentional about our time and money choices.

Not sold? People who plan their weeks achieve better results at work and are more likely to stay the course with their budgeting. In other words, they make more money and are much better at keeping it.

Monthly ritual of net worth tracking

Gather up a list of all of your assets and liabilities. Assets are things that you own, which grow in value, such as a home, an investment, a savings account, a pension or a business. Liabilities are debts such as a mortgage, car loan, line of credit, a credit card balance or money owed to friends and family. List out the total value of each asset and liability, then subtract the total amount of liabilities from your assets to determine your net worth. Now repeat this each month.

If your net worth is growing — even by a little — every month, it means you’re doing the right activities financially. If it’s shrinking, and caused by something within your control, you will want to take action to correct your budget, maybe your costs have gone up and you haven’t adjusted properly for it, or behaviour, like overspending.

Tracking net worth can be motivational when you stick to this monthly ritual. Within a couple of months of doing this ritual, you’ll be able to set clear goals around specific areas like reducing debts and adding more to your assets.

Annual ritual of updating your financial plan

This implies you have a financial plan to begin with. If you don’t, that’s the takeaway to set one up.

People who take the time to establish a financial plan, and support it with a well crafted budget, end up with between two and three times more money in retirement. The key with financial planning is to keep your plan up-to-date based on life changes, and to review it annually at a minimum.

Ask around to see who in your circle has a great financial planner or money coach, and enlist their services to help you with this financial planning process, and annual review.

These financial rituals are an act of self-love, and let’s face it, we could all use a bit more of that going into 2023.

This article was originally published in The Star. Lesley-Anne Scorgie is a Toronto-based personal finance columnist and a freelance contributing columnist for the Star.