Hot take: budgeting apps make you worse with money

I downloaded YNAB three years ago in Austin and tracked every single dollar for six months straight. All it did was make me paranoid about spending $4 on coffee while I still blew $500 on a bad plumbing part order. The real hard part of adulting isn't tracking money, it's having the guts to say no to yourself in the moment. Anyone else feel like these apps just give us a false sense of control?

2 comments

2 Comments

johnflores1mo ago

Man I used to be all about tracking every penny like it was gonna save my soul. But honestly you're right, it just made me feel guilty about small stuff while I kept making the same dumb big decisions. The real skill is just learning to pump the brakes when your wallet's screaming no.

xena3731mo agoTop Commenter

Yeah that's the part that gets you, isn't it? The small stuff feels like it matters but the big stuff is where the real damage happens. Good on you for figuring that out though, it's not easy to just walk away from that kind of tracking obsession.