How We Budget A Healthy Lifestyle
I consider myself extremely lucky that I grew up with parents that taught me a lot about money. I remember being in high school and my mom dragging me along to Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University at our local church, and saving, investing, and budgeting being something that was regularly incorporated into conversation. As an adult, I can see how that foundation really paved the way for decisions I have made and goals I have set for my family.
With how common financial stress and struggles are, I realize that few people have had that same upbringing. And I think it is such an important part of the conversation when talking about holistic health. Not only does money often play a role in the health habits you have access to, but the foods you are able to purchase, your lifestyle stress levels, and potential stress in your relationship if you have a partner that does not share the same financial goals and practices you do.
That is why I am really passionate about sharing tips that can help to increase education and resources on making a holistically healthy lifestyle more attainable!
With that.. these last few months have been spennndddy in our household. We have had some planned expenses that we were prepared for, but quite a few unexpected expenses pop up as well. I am so thankful that we are in a position where we have savings to cover these unexpected costs, but with expecting a new baby in just a couple of months and me planning to cut back on work once he arrives, my husband and I felt really motivated to buckle down on our budget these next few months and cut out any and all unnecessary spending.
We overall keep a pretty tight budget, so I thought it may be helpful to see how we prioritize our health and wellness while still working towards our financial goals!
How We Budget For Health
Because health and holistic wellness is a priority for our family, we intentionally choose to spend more in areas that support that and to forego extras to acommodate that. This means we spend more on groceries and eat out far less often. We choose to do more family activities that are free or budget-friendly than spend a lot of money on entertainment. Here is a list of 10 ways to support our health, while still maintaining a budget!
Meal Plan
Do you have a ton of random things in the back of your pantry or bottom of your freezer? A couple times of year (or whenever I find myself not being diligent about meal prepping), I find myself with random odds and ends stacking up. I try to intentionally use these items and not have a big back-store of foods and I find that it helps to stretch the time in between needing to grocery shop.
I also find that I end up with a lot less food waste because I am not forgetting about things and letting them expire.
At the beginning of each week I look through out fridge, freezer and pantry and see what I can pull together with things we already have on hand! Then, I write out our shopping list with anything additional we may need. I find that this helps us save money on groceries, and also have more of a plan going into cooking dinners for the week!
Grocery Shop in Bulk
Counter to what I just said about not storing up tons of food… we do find it budget-friendly to purchase certain things in bulk at costco. We also purchase a lot of our produce here because we can find it much higher quality than other local stores. But with that said, I try not to “stock up” on things and only purchase what we are going to use in the immediate future.
(you can check out my blog post on our pro-metabolic costco shopping list!)
Home Gym
While this can be more of an upfront cost, we consider it an investment and a means to save money long-term in gym memberships and fees. Especially in a season of life where we have young kids at home, it can be harder to get out of the house to workout. My husband and I have found it is much easier and attainable to set aside time during the day when we workout without leaving the house. These are some of our favorite items in our home gym:
adjustable weight set: we loove these! They can go between 12 and 66 pounds which means my husband and I can both use them for what we need, without having a huge rack of varied dumbell weights
stationary bike: I found a stationary bike on facebook marketplace and love having a means for low-impact cardio. I’ll often hop on this as we are watching a show or as a warm up for other exercises. There are tons of free workout videos on youtube that I will follow along with when I want something a little more structured and higher intensity
yoga mat: I love this non-toxic yoga mat for stretching, meditating, and floor exercises. It is super portable and travel-friendly and was the same one I packed with me when I did a yoga teacher training course in india in 2017!
Exercise bands: one of the most versatile pieces of workout equipment you can have! I love adding bands to squats for additional glute engagement, using them for mobility work, and using them to rehab core strength after pregnancy! You can also get heavier duty ones to help support your body weight during pull-ups and gradually gain strength to do them unassisted.
Supplement Strategically
I am a big advocate for supplementing wisely.. which often-times means cutting a lot of them out initially! I believe one of the greatest “supplements” you can provide for your body is a whole food, nutrient-dense diet. Once that foundation is set, there are a few supplements that can be helpful to “fill in the gaps” to your diet. But until you set that foundation, oftentimes your body is not setup to even use them effectively!
But not only does this help prioritize high-quality, bio-available nutrients, it saves you a ton of money! Supplement smarter, not harder! (if you need help with supplementation, reach out to me via my coaching page. I’d love to hop on a free call with you and help give you some holisitic guidance and strategy!)
Thrive Market
I have had a thrive market membership for well over 2 years now and it has saved my family so much money on snacks, pantry staples, and household products! While you do pay for a membership, you are refunded the cost of it should you not save the equivalent! They have also recently added some discounts and freebies with other wellness companies that help to off-set that cost even more. We have so many thrive market favorites but some of our most purchased items are seaweed paper for homemade wraps, low pufa snack items, organic rice, cooked beets, and household cleaners!
If you’re curious and want to try it out, this link will save you 40% off your first order!
Meditation, grounding, and breath work
With every single coaching client I have we talk about stress management techniques because it truly is so crucial to holistic health. You can be eating all the “right foods” and moving your body well and hydrating, but if you are leaving stress unchecked it will catch up to you. And what I love most about implementing stress management is that more often than not, you can make amazing progress with simple, free techniques like meditation, grounding, journaling, and breath work exercises.
Prioritize sleep
Similarly to stress management, if you are not prioritizing stress, your body will not have the time to heal and regenerate. I suggest most people try to be asleep by midnight at they very latest (ideally closer to a 10 pm bedtime)! Whichever bedtime works best for your schedule, try to make it consistent day to day. This will help to regulate your circadian rhythm and over time, you will find yourself falling asleep easier. This is because your body will begin to anticipate bedtime and start releasing hormones to calm your body and prepare it for restful sleep.
Finding affordable ways to enjoy hobbies
I love to read and can easily fly through a good book in a couple of days. One thing that I found myself spending a lot of money on was books and then never reading it again and having them stack up in our office, only to donate them a while later. Instead I started taking advantage of my local library and their resources and truly feel like there is rarely a book I cannot access through that. Then, on the off chance there is a book i cannot find, or maybe one that I would prefer to purchase for future reference I will add it to my wishlist on amazon and purchase when it goes on sale!
Meal (and coffee!) prep
We save soo much money when we intentionally prepare our meals, snacks, and drinks before leaving the house and going to work! $4 for coffee in the morning, and $7 for lunch, and a $3 snack all add up so quickly over the course of the month. Let alone the foods you are buying while out and about are probably not as supportive to your overall health compared to something you could prepare at home with higher quality ingredients. I have lots of blog posts on easy ways to make your coffee more metabolically supportive, or naturally sweetened to help inspire you!
I also think investing in some quality meal containers and a lunch box can help make this more doable. We hardly ever leave the house anymore without this cooler bag filled with balanced snack options!
Simplify
Whether it is your meal plan, or your supplements, or your skincare routine… I encourage you get back to the basics! Rather than add more products and things into your life, try and find a few quality products that you LOVE. Instead of buying a bunch of tops that you only kind of like, save up and invest in ones that you LOVE. You might end up spending a little bit more initially per item, but I gaurantee you will enjoy wearing/using/owning it so much more and you will actually get more use of it… ultimately saving you money in the long run! You can use the same mindset for literally everything in your home.. rather than owning 20 different cleaning products, find a couple that work well and ditch the rest.
Simplifying your life in this way will help you to prioritize what actually matters, save money for the things that truly hold value to you, and help your mental and emotional health as well!
I am a huge believer that wellness does not need to be expensive. There are so many other ways that you can save money while intentionally prioritizing your health and holistic wellness. Check out my page of free resources for my guide to holistic wellness on a budget! I share 100s of ways that you can support your family’s health without breaking the bank!