Prices jump, bills creep, and your chest does that small electric jolt when the direct debit pings. You want relief, but not a life that’s all spreadsheets and self-denial. You want to feel okay again without paying for it with your joy.
I’m in the supermarket queue watching a man calculate dinner on his fingers. Yellow stickers, a quiet sigh, a bottle back on the shelf. The contactless beep in front of us is too loud. My phone lights up: rent due, council tax reminder, a group chat planning a birthday that’s somehow £50 before drinks. The air smells of bread, and anxiety. On the pavement, a teenager hands his mum a loyalty card like it’s a little shield. Outside, someone laughs at a dog in a tiny coat. Life isn’t pausing for inflation; it’s just getting more expensive to live it. The answer isn’t to stop living.
Name the spiral, shrink the problem
Cost-of-living anxiety isn’t only about money. It’s about uncertainty, vigilance, and the feeling you’re one bill from chaos. The brain hates unpredictability and starts scanning for threats. You hear it in your head: what if the boiler breaks, what if the rent rises, what if I can’t say yes to Friday nights anymore.
Sam, 29, tried cold showers for a month to save on energy, then skipped his best friend’s dinner to “be good”. He saved a few pounds and felt worse. He told me his world narrowed to receipts and guilt. Across the UK, survey after survey has shown a majority of adults reporting higher living costs, with many cutting treats, leisure and even heating to cope. The maths matters. The mood does, too.
Here’s why the spiral bites: scarcity shrinks attention. Your brain zooms on price tags and loses peripheral vision for joy, creativity, even problem-solving. That leads to all-or-nothing choices that don’t stick. The way out is to make the problem smaller in time and scope. Swap year-long budgets for weekly check-ins. Separate survival money from joy money. Create a tiny, protected pocket where pleasure isn’t up for review. Your nervous system can calm down before your bills go down.
A calm money system you’ll actually keep
Try the three-bucket week. Bucket 1: Musts (rent, bills, food basics). Bucket 2: Joy (fun, treats, small luxuries). Bucket 3: Buffer (unexpected bits, savings sliver). Move money every Friday morning. Ten minutes, one cup of tea. If it helps, nickname the joy account in your banking app so it feels real. Let it be £8 one week and £30 the next; it’s protection, not a performance. Let’s be honest: no one really does that every day.
Common traps? Cutting joy to zero, then binge-spending when you’re sad and tired. Treating tracking like punishment. Thinking you need six apps and a colour code. You don’t. Keep five go-to pleasures on a “spending menu” and rotate them: a pastry, a matinee, a library haul with fancy coffee, a train to a new park, a charity shop trawl. You don’t need a spreadsheet to breathe. Add “friction” to impulse buys you regret: delete saved cards, put a 24-hour pause on anything over £25, walk once round the block before checkout.
Protect your attention as much as your account. Doomscrolling price rises is a tax on your mood. Replace 10 minutes of scrolling with a “money date” that has a ritual: same song, same drink, same chair. Lightly check the three buckets, then close the tabs and do something nice on purpose. Consistency beats intensity in money and in mental health.
“I stopped trying to win the month and started winning the week,” a nurse told me. “That’s when I felt human again.”
- Make a five-item spending menu and pin it to your notes app.
- Move joy money first, not last.
- Add one stopgap: packed lunch twice a week or a travelcard tweak.
- Use a 24-hour rule for anything over £25.
- Do one “money date” each Friday with a small reward.
How to keep enjoying your life when everything costs more
We’ve all had that moment when you turn down plans because your bank balance feels personal. Move from “no” to “different”. Swap dinner for a walk-and-chips, theatre for rush tickets, pub for a living room quiz with one good bottle split three ways. If your joy is movement, volunteer as a marshal at a local race and run the course the next day for free. If it’s novelty, try “micro-travel”: pick a bus route you’ve never ridden and get off at three stops to explore.
Use the “joy-per-pound” test. List five things that genuinely restore you and rank them by how you feel afterwards, not how Instagram-friendly they look. You’ll spot that £6 flowers on a Monday might beat a £40 Saturday you barely remember. Protect the high-return cheap wins like you would a houseplant. Water them, schedule them, talk about them. It’s not small to be deliberate about pleasure. It’s generous.
Rework the social script. Tell friends you’re doing a “radically reasonable month” and suggest a shared list of free or low-cost plans. Most people are relieved when someone says it out loud. Rotate hosts, rotate recipes, rotate routes. Share subscriptions. Start a swaps night: clothes, books, kitchen kit. Your circle is part money plan, part emotional first aid.
There’s a trick to keeping the future from eating the present: time-box your worry. Set a 15-minute slot to face the numbers, then a 15-minute slot to plan joy. Treat both as appointments. In the gaps, live. Build one “rest anchor” into each day that doesn’t cost anything: a specific bench, a specific playlist, a shower in the dark with one candle. When prices rise, make your rituals cheaper, not rarer. That way life still feels like yours, not just a spreadsheet you happen to live inside.
| Point clé | Détail | Intérêt pour le lecteur |
|---|---|---|
| Shrink the time horizon | Weekly three-bucket check-ins replace overwhelming monthly budgets | Less stress, more control, easier to maintain |
| Protect a joy pocket | Ring-fence small, consistent fun money and a five-item spending menu | Stops binge/ban cycles and keeps morale up |
| Add friction to leaks | 24-hour rule, remove saved cards, one lap before checkout | Cuts regret buys without feeling deprived |
FAQ :
- How much “joy money” is okay when things are tight?Start absurdly small: £5–£15 a week. The point is the habit and the signal to your brain, not the size. Grow it when you can.
- What if an emergency wipes out my buffer?Rebuild by default: skim £5–£20 each week into the buffer before anything else. Treat it like standing order self-respect.
- Is it better to track every penny or just the big stuff?Track categories, not pennies. Musts, Joy, Buffer. Spotlight one leak at a time. That’s enough to change behaviour.
- How do I talk to friends about lower-cost plans?Offer options, not apologies. “I’m doing a sensible month—fancy a park picnic or £7 cinema night?” People appreciate the lead.
- What’s one thing I can do today?Create your five-item spending menu and set a 10-minute Friday “money date”. Put it in your calendar before life crowds it out.
