Checking In: Did You Do Your Holiday Spending and Purchasing Review?

If you were following the Postconsumers holiday tip guide, A Very Postconsumer Holiday, then you know that one of the methods we recommended was to ensure that, after the holiday was over, you reviewed how well you’d stuck to your holiday purchasing plan as well as your budget. Well, it’s nearly the end of January and it’s time to do just that! In case you don’t have your Postconsumer holiday guide handy, we’re here to remind you of what you should be checking in on!

Firstly, evaluate your budget. Did you go under or go over? If you overspent, where did you guess wrong about how much you would need to spend? Or what habits did you have (such as last-minute shopping) that caused the budget to go out of control? Make notes about what worked and what didn’t with your budget so that you know what adjustments you need to make in the future – to both your budget and your behavior.

Next, review the specifics of your Satisfaction Action Plan. We’ll talk about the big picture later, but for now, how many of the things that you said would bring you holiday satisfaction and activities that you identified to bring you that fulfillment were you really able to enjoy and enact? Where did you succeed, and where did you come up short? Did you allow yourself to fall into patterns of “getting busy” and losing sight of what you had originally said would make you happy? Was that “busy” time worth it to you in the end? What changes would you need to make in order to balance out the “busy” with the “happy”?

Now, just take a minute to reflect on the big picture. How happy were you this holiday season, and what could you have done to make yourself and those around you happier? In the end, it’s not about how much or how little you bought, it’s about whether you found the satisfaction of the holiday.

If your entire family or you and a group of friends were working on a Postconsumer holiday, then take the time to talk about what you learned. Share things that were hard and things that you would want to keep doing all year long because they succeeded so well.

So how did you do with your holiday postconsumer plan? Like us on Facebook and let us know!