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- [00:00]
Dr. Laurie Santos
This is Dr. Laurie Santos from the Happiness Lab.
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Jen
Many people have questions about how to.
- [00:05]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Improve levels of happiness.
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Jen
Living a healthy lifestyle is one sure way of increasing happiness, and a good.
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Dr. Laurie Santos
Place to start is with your oral health.
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Jen
Just a few small changes to your oral care routine, such as changing your.
- [00:16]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Toothpaste to Colgate Total, can lead to beneficial changes in your oral health.
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Jen
Colgate Total helps stop oral health problems.
- [00:24]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Like gingivitis and cavities before they start, because preventing oral health problems is a.
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Jen
Lot easier than treating them. Be dentist ready and get colgate total@shop.colgate.com total the holidays are here at the Home Depot, so let's get to decorating. Find your perfect tree in our huge assortment of shapes, sizes and styles like the easy to assemble Jackson Noble fir with pre lit branches perfect for styling with all your favorite ornaments or the flocked Starry Light Frasier fir with over 1900 pre lit memory wire branches that keep their shape so it's ready right out of the box. Find the perfect tree now at the Home Depot and enjoy free delivery on most holiday decor subject to availability. See homedepot.com delivery for details. It's better over here. After investing billions to light up our network, T Mobile is America's largest 5G network. Plus right now you can switch keep your phone and we'll pay it off up to $800. See how you can save on every plan vs Verizon and at&t@t mobile.com KeepAndSwitch up to four lines via virtual prepaid card. Allow 15 days qualifying on unlock device credit service ported 90 plus days with device ineligible carrier and timely redemption required. Card has no cash access and expires in six months. Hey, it's Alicia. When people tell me, wow, you have such beautiful skin, for a second I say, who are you talking to? Because I never did. Key Soul Care is a holistic beauty and skincare line I created working with a leading dermatologist. I'm so proud of these product offerings because they're all about caring for the whole self inside and out. Nourish your skin. Nurture your soul. Try clinically proven Skincare from Alicia Keys with 25% off your first purchase at keyssoulcare.com using code GLOW on air.
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Dr. Laurie Santos
Holiday magic is in the air and.
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Jill
DSW's got all the shoes to make your season extra merry. Believe you've got parties to attend and lists to check twice. So DSW is taking care of the details like gifts to make their eyes all aglow. Styles that bring joy to your world brands everyone wants, like Ugg, Nike, Birkenstock and more and deals to make your budget bright. Find the perfect shoes for you and yours at a DSW store near you or dsw.com Episode454 how to say no to Impulse Purchases welcome to the Frugal.
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Jen
Friends podcast, where you'll learn to save money, embrace simplicity and live richer life. Here are your hosts, Jen and Jill.
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Jill
Welcome to Frugal Friends Podcast. My name is Jen.
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Dr. Laurie Santos
My name is Jill and today we.
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Jill
Are taking a slight departure from our normal format, where we cover the Internet's most not reliable but most obvious answers to our questions about spending money in personal finance. And we are sharing our own opinions, which may not be podcast most accurate, but it is the most in your face. Just like Google, it's the most readily available answers to questions you may or may not have had There are times.
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Dr. Laurie Santos
Where we think we have the best things to say on any given topic, like this one. Impulse purchases. We talk about it a ton in our upcoming book, Buy what you love without going broke. And we've talked about it a ton on the podcast, so we feel as though it's time to do our own dedicated episode about saying no to impulse purchases. But first, this episode is brought to you by easy yeses. Like when someone offers you a free hot dog, or to clean your floors, or a lifetime supply of gum. There are just some things in life that we can respond to with an instant emphatic yes. Like ordering our book buy what you love without going broke. The title is a banger. The content is fire. The authors are slightly unhinged but completely trustworthy. So when we tell you to stop what you're doing and pre order buy what you love without going broke at Buy what you love book. Com we know it's an easy yes. You won't regret this decision come January, when you're ready to set yourself up for financial success in 2025 and you've got this puppy in your hands again. Buy what you love book.com yes.
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Jill
Don't wait. Do it now. Do it now before the holidays get you feeling discouraged.
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Dr. Laurie Santos
And before you hear all of our tips about how to say no to impulse spending, make this impulse purchase and then say no to the rest.
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Jill
So true. The book will help you say no to so many impulse purchases. It will literally pay for itself. I think it will also help you save money on some huge expenses. And it will pay for itself ten, maybe a thousand times over. It's only $25, so it's very likely some of the tips in here could save you money a thousand times over. I'm not lying. I'm not overinflating it. I really do believe that. So buywhatyoulovebook.com and impulse spending let's get down to it. We asked you guys about it in the Friend Letter that is our three time weekly newsletter where we share freebies and saving tips and even excerpts from the book, excerpts about values based spending. And we asked you when are you most likely to impulse by late night, on the phone, in person, at the store, when you're with other people, when you're stressed, other. And y'all had some interesting answers. But you it was a very evenly space between all of these options when I'm stressed or excited edged out slightly. But like really everyone struggles with impulse spending for a different reason. I would say even the people if I was taking the poll, which I didn't because I would skew it. My one answer. If I took the poll I could answer all of these. So I'm sure we're definitely going to cover all four of these options. But only six people chose other and we don't know what any of those responses are.
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Dr. Laurie Santos
Did they not elaborate?
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Jill
No. But so many people like it's not just in store, sometimes it's online. Some people do it with other people, some people do more alone. It just runs the gamut. So we're going to cover all of it today because we cover all of it in our book and this is just going to be a fun little teaser. We also have other episodes about impulse shopping to queue up after this. We've got episode 408, what happens when you stop impulse shopping and then episode 351, impulse buying, what it is and how to stop. So those episodes we do cover some articles on the Internet and we have some spicy takes. You might be interested in queuing them up after this.
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Dr. Laurie Santos
So we want to go through again something that we talk about in the book. Buy what you love without going broke is the top five reasons that we impulse buy. And we want to rattle those off to you all today in this podcast episode. But also pair that with ways that we can choose differently. So wherever you find yourself in kind of questionnaire or as we talk about these reasons that we impulse by identifying which ones you're impulse buying kind of kryptonite, which one are you most drawn to and what can you do as a result? I love something that you've said Jen, quite a bit in the past just to start the episode off is we all do it. And our friend letter poll proves that we all impulse by maybe some of us more than others, but it happens to all of us. And I think it's important to recognize that there is a reason behind our impulse buying and there's a reason that it's not easy to just stop. Even though we might not feel great about the purchase afterward, or there might be some guilt attached to it, or we wish that we could put money towards these other goals that we have, but instead we find ourselves just one click, buying or filling our cart with more than what was on our shopping list. And I think to recognize that it's not because, oh, we're so weak or we're too easily influenced. There's a whole lot going on behind the scenes when it comes to marketing and advertising that is playing into the ways that our brains are wired, how we think about things, our cognitive biases, which we'll get a little bit more into that as we go along. But it's worth noting at the top of this episode that there's nothing wrong with you if impulse buy. It's very normal. We probably will not be able to stop impulse buying altogether. But the more we can equip ourselves with the knowledge and information around why it happens, the ways in which we're prone to impulse buy, the better able we are to interrupt it, choose something differently, and feel a lot more confident about the ways that we're managing our money.
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Jill
Exactly. So the first type, the first root cause of impulse spending that we talk about in the book is one that I think is kind of. I think it is the ultimate way that a lot of us impulse spend and understanding this one actually helps us with all the other ones. And it's habit spending. Because so often I have found that even in talking about impulse spending and talking about overconsumption day after day after day, I still fall prey to. I will go to Starbucks and do a drive through, like, treat for my son, and then maybe just do another treat next week. And then maybe the next week, maybe I do one with him and maybe I do just one with me. And it slowly kind of spirals from this special thing I was doing with my son to a habit of ending up in the drive through. And so mine is usually coffee, but like, it could be anything. It could be escaping to Target or, you know, anytime there's a sale, like there's. There's so many things. And we'll talk about these routes of impulse spending, but ultimately, if we first understand Habits and habit spending, then we can better understand how each of these other routes evolve. And so a lot of you have heard of the habit loop. We have talked about it so much on this podcast and we love, there's two, I think two main kind of theories in the habit loop. So cue craving, response, reward is the typical one. But then you could also just cue, cue craving reward. And so we, it doesn't matter which one you look at. Honestly, I think if you just look at the queue, we, we know the craving, the response and the reward because we're talking about spending. I think we just have to look at the queue. So don't make it super complicated. That's where the 90 day transaction inventory comes in. And when you put all of your past transactions out on the table on the spreadsheet, wherever you have it, and you're looking for patterns, you're looking for, the cues are specifically what you are looking for. So if you are making a lot of coffee purchases at a certain time of day, like on your way to work, that could be location, it could be preceding event, leaving your house, it could be time of day, morning. You'll find that usually these purchases won't just have one trigger, won't have just one cue, but you need to identify at least one cue for each of the patterns so that you can start to say, okay, the pattern is I leave my house to go to work and I stop at Starbucks on the way. I obviously cannot change the location because that would involve changing either my house or my work. Can't touch that. I can't change the time of day because I go or the preceding event. So I, you know what can I, I can't change the time of day, but I can change the preceding event, which is I can, I can make coffee at home and take it with me. So a lot of the times we will say like, I can't change because I can't change where I work, I can't change where I live, I can't change the time of day. But there's usually one trigger of the many that can be interrupted. I know that was a long ramble, I'm so sorry.
- [13:41]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Or the route that you take to work. And I know a huge pushback on this too is, oh, cutting out coffee is not going to make a huge difference in my finances. And we don't disagree. I think it's just an easy example of something that could be habit spending. But it also is, you know, what could seven to ten dollars a day mean to other financial goals? Or other things that you would want to purchase. So I still think it's worth looking at. But also recognize that habit spending can happen, even apart from a coffee example, but recognizing whether or not it's something that's happening just out of it's just what you're accustomed to doing versus intentional choices that are being made. The second most common reason that we impulse buy is shopping as an activity. This one for me is one of my kryptonites. Personally. I grew up going to the mall on the weekends for fun when I'm together with friends or my mom just going to a store window shopping, as we often call it. But we were always going into the stores and walking around and usually buying something, Allowing the shelves and the racks to inform us on what we want to spend our money on that day. Not really going in with a list. It's just something to do that afternoon or that weekend. And so I think what can happen here in shifting, if this is your circumstances, if you're finding yourself just at the store but no list in hand, no real reason to be there, you just don't know what else to do, it's worthwhile to list out what could be some alternative activities, because with any of these that we're talking about, the way to say no to impulse purchases is not simply to stop and say no. It's to find replacements. It's to find alternatives. We have to give ourselves something else to do, a way to value whatever needs are going on for us and not just deprive ourselves. So I'm not saying don't go shopping, just stay at home instead. It could be. Are there people that you could get together with? Could you pick up a new hobby? Could you do something that's been on your to do list for a while and go shopping when you have a list? Right. Eventually we do spend money, and we can spend it intentionally, but it doesn't have to be the thing that is how we're entertaining ourselves and buying things that we don't actually need, we weren't planning to purchase and doesn't really make us feel great after we've bought it.
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Jill
Yeah. And shopping as an activity becomes habit. And one of the big things about that we talk about in frugality is cultivating creativity. And without borders, without, like, limits, you don't have any incentive to be creative with how you spend your time, how you spend your money. And when you give yourself these, you know, these barriers, you can get creative. So there are so many activities, you won't like them all Right. They're not all for you, but you don't know the ones that are for you until you try a lot that are not for you. So getting creative with your activities, how you spend time with friends is an integral part of frugality and values based spending. Next. This was the number one thing people said they impulse bought for is stress shopping. But we actually think that it's just emotional shopping. It's every emotion so sad, happy, celebratory lamenting. Like we will shop for every perceivable emotion. It's just the primary one that we shop for is when we're stressed. And I feel that so intensely. I will, I will, I will try to get off of social media because I will stress scroll and then social media will make me stressed. So I'll get off of it and then where do I go? I, for some reason I will open up Amazon and I'll stress scroll Amazon after my child screams about me turning off Minecraft for the 368th day in a row. So like, yeah, it's just a mindless way to dissociate and regain control over situations that I feel like I have very little control over. And so the combat to that would be just having a list of alternatives to feel, to do when I feel different emotions. And so addressing, not even needing to address the emotion head on, but to address that coping mechanism head on is to just create a healthier coping mechanism. So and the key to this is having different sizes of activities of coping mechanisms. So when I'm scrolling Amazon in my bed and I'm stressed, the solution is not to get up and go for a run though exercise and meditation are super helpful in relieving stress. I would not get up and go for a run at that time. I might try meditating more often than not. I'm going to like recheck myself and be like, okay, I have to stop scrolling. I'm going to turn on a phone game and my go to is solitaire. So I'll do that. But in a perfect world the most ideal solutions are either exercise or meditation. And I should probably meditate more. If you are stronger than I am, that is what I would recommend to you. And if you're like me, I would say pick up solitaire. It's the only child's like favorite phone game. If my, if my trigger is going to target when I'm stressed, then that's kind of like a medium sized so that in that case maybe trying a walk or going outside in nature, something that's Going to give you a dopamine rush similar to shopping, but in a different way for a different price. And then there's bigger things like shopping as an activity. If we're stressed and we're calling the girls and like, let's go out on the town, I'm feeling stressed. I just want to buy drinks. Creating a different big coping mechanism to where you're gathering the girls. And we're, we're walking, we're just, we're going for a walk or we're doing something. So having those different sizes, again, a lot of trial and error to see what's going to work for you. But that's an important distinction to have when you're trying to combat the stress shopping.
- [21:22]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Another type of list that you could have is identifying what you what might work for you when feeling different emotions. So literally having a written out list of when I'm happy, what do I want to be engaging in when I'm sad, what are some things that I can do to care for myself. Just listing out common emotions you felt within the last week and activities that you could do that are free when you're feeling that way. And this is something that you can absolutely use the Internet to help you come up with a list. And like Jen mentioned earlier, not all of them are going to work for you. Some of them you'll try on for size and they don't fit, you can throw that one out. But eventually refining this list of here's what I can do when I'm feeling this way. And then that way we can know we are meeting the need. We're addressing the emotion with something that's actually going to work rather than slapping a purchase onto something and it usually doesn't actually fulfill whatever it is that, that we're looking for.
- [22:26]
Jen
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- [26:47]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Reason that many of us impulse shop is social influence. This is both the people around us, our community, our friends, our neighbors, as well as the people that we follow online. So there's a lot of opportunity for impulse purchasing when it comes to who it is that we follow, who it is that we hang out with. When we see other people having something or recommending something or seemingly making their lives better or more efficient or giving us a sense of if we had that thing, maybe we would fit in, there'd be belonging, community happening as a result. It can really influence us to want to buy that thing again. From following people online and getting to know someone's personality, what, what it is that they're doing, and trusting their recommendations of skincare products, kitchen appliances, I mean, people are selling clothing, people are selling everything online. And so when we feel like we are connecting with someone on Instagram or Facebook and they're talking about what it is that they recommend, we are more likely to want that item. Because there's this cognitive bias of social proof that I like them, I trust them, they seem to like this thing. It's working for them. I want to try it out. Maybe it'll work for me. And those thoughts aren't even necessarily happening in the way that I'm saying them out loud. We sometimes don't even know all that goes into our purchase. We don't realize that it's because we trust them. We like them. We think it'll solve our desire for belonging and self fulfillment. Our brains just cut to if I get yes, I want that thing, I'm going to one click buy it. And that's the impulsiveness of it or we're at a friend's house and they've got the latest type of appliance, rug, even cleaning products. My goodness. And now I think I have to do that. If I buy that, then maybe my house will be clean. If I buy that, maybe my home will look as aesthetic as this place. Who knows what it is that might be connecting with you, but the people that we're around play a massive role. And so there's not much we can do about this because we desire belonging and community, and that's a very good thing. So we don't want to cut out people, but being aware of the ways in which the people we're around are influencing us. And this can be as simple as creating a pause before our purchases. So whether that's just asking ourselves a few simple questions of what is behind me wanting to buy this thing, what problem that I'm experiencing, do I think that this will solve for me? Can help in identifying, is this actually something that I want to do? Some other things that I found helpful is creating a list of the things that I want to purchase. So if I do see somebody selling something on Instagram, or a friend just got something, or a neighbor's got a new gadget, I'll write it down. Because it's good to value the need that is arising, the desire that's arising, and put that energy somewhere. But it doesn't mean that we need to use our energy by buying the thing. We can put space in between it, create a list, I keep it in my notes app on my phone, of, here's something that I want to purchase, Want to buy this, want to, want to get this. So then when it comes time to maybe I am out at the store or I'm running errands, I can look at that list and identify, is this something that I still want? Have I lived life without it long enough that I'm actually okay without it? The initial desire for it has gone, and I'm okay without purchasing this. Can I make this myself? Can I fix the problem with things that I already have? Can I buy this second hand? These are kind of the questions that I run through before I'll end up purchasing something new. And finally, I would recommend, at least when it comes to who we're following online, that could use a little bit of an inventory and potentially an overhaul. If you're noticing that there's particular people that you're following on social media who are leading you to your most common impulse buys, maybe stop following them for a little bit or Hide their profile. Find people to follow that are going to encourage you towards your goals. I think social media is a lovely tool if we can curate it for ourselves in a way that's going to be helpful for us. So following people who are going to get as excited about cooking at home or hosting in our home on a budget or hanging out with friends. Free ideas. All of these accounts exist and we can be following these people that are supporting and encouraging us towards our goals rather than depleting our energy, our emotions, our finances.
- [32:07]
Jill
Yeah, the cleaning thing was so personally attacking to me because I have definitely in my disdain for cleaning. I hate cleaning and so I am looking always for things to make it easier, but the only thing that makes it easier is doing it more frequently in shorter spurts. And so it's a habit change. That's the root cause of my disdain for it. And I'm trying to buy the solution to a problem whose solution is not purchasable or whose best solution is not purchased. It is a. It's a sorry, not a sorry excuse, but it is a lesser excuse for the true solution. So it's. Yeah, yeah.
- [32:59]
Dr. Laurie Santos
We'll procrast to spend. We'll spend on the cleaning products because we think that's what's gonna make our house clean. We'll spend on all the exercise gear and equipment because we think that's what's gonna get us to be exercising. We'll spend on the journals so that we can start gratitude journaling when in reality we already have these things at our disposal. We already have at least soap and water and a rag at home. We already have clothes we can wear to exercise, an old ratty tennis shoes if need be. We already have paper and pen or even something digital that we can be journaling with. But instead we'll go and buy the things thinking that purchasing the item is going to get us closer to that goal when really taking the steps towards that goal is what we need to be doing first.
- [33:50]
Jill
Yeah, it's hard to hear that sometimes.
- [33:53]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Yes, I'm saying it to myself too.
- [33:56]
Jill
Yeah, so we're going to move on because I don't want to hear it. So the last one that I actually love talking about, one of the biggest reasons, and this one's coming up with the holidays, is the thrill of the hunt. We love hunting. And this comes from somebody who does not love camping. I don't love thrifting, like hunting for things that I can, you know, But I, I still feel a rush when I get a good deal on Something, especially if it was something I was going to buy anyways. And that feeling is capitalized on by companies because they want to give you a deal on something you are going to buy in the hopes of bringing you in because it is very likely you'll add something to your cart that you weren't going to buy, but you will because it's on sale. That is the goal of sales, not to get you a deal. But we love the thrill of the hunt and so how do we fulfill that? Especially if you're like me and I don't love other hunts. So how do you fulfill that without spending unnecessarily? So hunt something different. The most Dangerous game goals. I really wanted to put that in book spoiler. It did not make that line, did not make the in the book. But I really wanted to talk about hunting the most dangerous game anyways. Goals. I think a lot of the thrill that I can get now is hunting some kind of goal and not big goals, but maybe smaller goals and focusing on those. So like I for the last six weeks I've been tracking my eating and that's been a goal of mine is to be more intentional with tracking what I eat and making little changes to kind of make healthier choices. So I haven't eaten out like at all in the last six weeks except when we've been out of town. But when we have been home, we have eaten in like every night. It's been, it's been insane for me because I don't love cooking, I hate dishes and I'm always looking for an excuse to get out like and eat. And it's just been like mind blowing to me with this little like chase that I've been doing to like track and stay on track has been doing for other things financially for me.
- [36:43]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Yeah. The thrill of the hunt remains for me. Absolutely. And I think that's one of those things. We don't have to entirely weed out this desire to hunt for a good deal. I think that's part of the benefit of this particular propensity is there can be a lot more research that goes into your purchases and potentially a lot more thought around it. So we can certainly leverage this to our benefit in looking for the best deal, the best way that you can solve for this issue or problem that you're having without spending a ton of money. So I think that this one can, can work in our favor. But also recognizing that there are other things that we can replace here. Like you mentioned the new goal. Yeah. Reading a book, trying out A new hobby. I think there's so many things that we can do that fit into that thing that many of us have where we want to dig, we want to search, we want to problem solve, and it doesn't have to mean that we're buying something we didn't intend to. To.
- [37:54]
Jill
Yeah. And it sounds so silly, like, try another hobby. Do this. Like, but it is so effective. And just trying until you get something that fits is it increases your creativity and it makes you feel so good, it'll increase your confidence. And so we talk about that stuff and like, some other things in the book that are peripheral to these five, like cognitive biases. And so again, you'll have to check out the book@buywhatyoulovebook.com to get the rest of it.
- [38:32]
Dr. Laurie Santos
And the thing that has been most helpful for me, speaking of the peripheral stuff, is the marketing tactics. I think when we were researching for that and writing about that, it was so illuminating and really helped to equip me with knowledge and awareness to be more mindful and intentional when I'm spending. Where now I can identify. Oh, this marketing tactic is at play here. I can be a little bit more judicious about the ways that I'm thinking about how I want to spend my money and knowledgeable about what's happening. What are the ways that they're trying to utilize my cognitive biases, which can be really great and helpful in some scenarios against me in this situation to make me spend money that I didn't want to. So another peripheral topic that I think is so, so helpful if you want to be equipped even more on this type of thing? How to say no to impulse purchases. Again, buy what you love. Book. Com. But you know what makes us equipped every single episode with just the best tips and randomness.
- [39:40]
Jill
And you don't have to wait for this.
- [39:44]
Dr. Laurie Santos
The bill of the week.
- [39:56]
Jen
That's right. It's time for the best minute of your entire week. Maybe a baby was born and his name is William. Maybe you paid off your mortgage. Maybe your car died and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore. Duck Bills. Buffalo Bills.
- [40:12]
Jill
Bill Clinton.
- [40:13]
Jen
This is the bill of the week.
- [40:16]
Jill
Hi, Jen and Jill. This is friendletter writer Kim, and I'm.
- [40:20]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Recording my bill of the week about the Renaissance Fair.
- [40:23]
Jill
My partner wanted to go because he's.
- [40:25]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Never gone before for his birthday. And while we were there, we got engaged and I wanted you guys to know. Thanks. Have a great weekend.
- [40:36]
Jill
We are both clearly finding out about this at the same time I saw Chill's face. Congratulations, Kim.
- [40:45]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Yay, Kim.
- [40:46]
Jill
Yay.
- [40:50]
Dr. Laurie Santos
We make our own sound effects over here.
- [40:52]
Jill
I don't know what sound effects are at the Renaissance Fair or I would do them, but. Click, clink. Sword fighting. It's swords clinking together in celebration.
- [41:02]
Dr. Laurie Santos
That too. Oh, Kim. How exciting. Yeah. So Kim is one of our writers for the friend letter, which we mentioned at the top of the episode is where we all, we send out freebies and savings tips, how to spend more mindfully and in values based alignment and even excerpts from the book. And Kim helps us to write those every week. We give three free friend letter emails a week. And Kim is an awesome one. She's got the same kind of wit and style that we do and lots of fun memes in these friend letters. And it's where we poll you, where we talk about the polls in these episodes. So if you want to get that friend letter. Frugalfriendspodcast.com But Kim is just a valued part of our team and we knew that you were getting serious in this relationship, but my goodness is. This is so very exciting. Congratulations. What a great bill. If you all want to submit your bill, if it has to do with a Renaissance fair or getting engaged or getting married or having a baby or just out here living a single life.
- [42:17]
Jill
If you want to propose as a bill of the week, please, that would be a dream. That's my dream. Somebody's proposing to someone as they're on the bill of the week.
- [42:29]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Yeah. So frugal friends podcast.combill to leave your bill.
- [42:35]
Jen
Hey, it's Alicia. When people tell me, wow, you have such beautiful skin, for a second, I say, who are you talking to? Because I never did. Keys Soul Care is a holistic beauty and skincare line I created working with a leading dermatologist. I'm so proud of these products offering because they're all about caring for the whole self inside and out. Nourish your skin, nurture your soul. Try clinically proven Skincare from Alicia Keys. With 25 off your first purchase at keyssoulcare.com using code GLOW on air, Ma can get chaotic between due diligence, integration, and everything in between. It's easy to feel like you're drowning in the details. I'm Key San Patel, host of M and A Science, the weekly podcast that cuts through the confusion. Every week, I sit down with M and A pros who faced it all. The challenges, curveballs and lessons learned the hard way. No buzzwords, no theories, just real actionable advice from people in the trenches. From keeping deals on track to managing integrations without losing your sanity, each episode is straight up practical insight. What works, what doesn't, and how to simplify your own MA process. Wherever you are in the deal cycle, want to close the next deal with confidence? Tune in to MA science. No fluff, just real talk about what it takes to close deals. Listen on your favorite podcast app. Here's to the deal. Introducing Signals, the next generation of platforms for investors designed to elevate your trading strategy by giving access to insights used by Wall street pros to dominate the market. Signals uses its proprietary data of $70 billion in consumer spend across North America to spot market trends before they make the headlines. We bring you the alternative data that drives decisions at top hedge funds, allowing you to carve your own edge in the stock market. Join the insider circle who are already transforming their investment strategies. Visit joinsignals.com to start your free 14 day trial. No hidden fees, no gimmicks, just pure, actionable insights. End your reliance on outdated information with signals. Invest like a pro, make informed decisions swiftly and stay ahead of the curve. Uncover tomorrow's market moves with today's real time data. Visit joinsignals.com today gifting is hard, but here's a Give the gift of connection from US Cellular. Not sure what that means? Here's a slightly more specific can choose four free phones and get four lines for $90 a month from US Cellular. Your family wants new phones? How do we know? They told us. The good news is that compared to wrapping presents, you're great at getting hints. So take the hint and get them four free phones and four lines for $90 a month. US Cellular built for us. For many of us, the holiday season means more travel, more shopping, more time online, and more of your personal information in more places you can't control. It only takes one innocent mistake, even if it's not your mistake, to expose you to identity theft. Not to worry. LifeLock monitors hundreds of millions of data points every second and alerts you to threats you could miss by yourself. Even if you keep an eye on your bank and credit card statements. If your identity is stolen, your own US Based restoration specialist will fix it, guaranteed. The last thing you want to do this holiday season is face drained accounts, fraudulent loans or other financial losses from identity theft all alone. Gift yourself the peace of mind that comes with LifeLock and spend more time doing more of the holiday things you love. Visit lifelock.com iheart and save up to 40% your first year. That's 40% off@lifelock.com iheart LifeLock for the threats you can't control.
- [46:47]
Dr. Laurie Santos
And now it's time for the lightning round.
- [46:54]
Jill
All right. How do you extend grace to yourself after making an impulse purchase?
- [47:00]
Dr. Laurie Santos
This is a question from Goldie.
- [47:01]
Jill
Deep one. Jill, can you go first from this one? I really want to hear your answer.
- [47:06]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Mine is kind of tongue in cheek, but it's accurate. Not saying it's the best response or that everyone should do this, but if I make an impulse purchase and I don't feel good about it, I just return it. That's just the truth of it. So I don't know if that's exactly extending grace to myself, but it does bring me relief if I'm like, you know what, I don't know why I bought this. I don't like it, I don't want it. I don't want to go back to the store. But that's what's going to happen. I mean, maybe not the same exact day, but I'll just throw it back in the car with the receipt and it gets returned. If it's a purchase from a thrift store. Were you about to.
- [47:50]
Jill
Yeah. What if it can't be returned? It can't be returned or food or something.
- [47:56]
Dr. Laurie Santos
I do make sure that I use it. I think that's the best way for me to feel relief and freedom in it is to say, you know what, that's a decision I made. I can learn from it. So I guess there's the grace in it of letting myself off the hook, but logging it so that it can inform future decisions and then using it, whether for myself or if I decide I don't actually want this thing, but I know someone who could benefit from it. That's always a silver lining for me is if it could be of use to somebody else. That's what I do. How about you?
- [48:34]
Jill
For me, I. Something that's very much helped me is the non judgmental questions that we talk about in chapter two is looking at my spending with neutrality because every purchase has a purpose, including and especially impulse purchases. So asking myself non judgmental questions about why I made the impulse purchase and then making a plan to make a better choice or a more values aligned choice in the future. And that's kind of something I'm doing with this with tracking my food for the past six weeks has been because I was eating out more than I liked and I was not making it. I was buying something that should have lasted me all week and like eating it in two days. Sort of thing to the point where like, Travis would get mad because we were like trying to split something and then I just couldn't help myself. And I would eat all of it and leave nothing for him. And it would be two days. Right. And so he didn't even have time. And so like now. So this has been my solution to that. And yeah, just making a plan and looking at it non judgmentally.
- [49:55]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Yeah, that's good.
- [49:57]
Jill
Yeah. So I hope this episode helped you to think about some of your impulse spending, to think honestly about impulse spending in a more holistic way, that there are multiple root causes to it and multiple solutions. And in our book we even propose an exercise you can do to more quickly round out these solutions and come up with them. So highly recommend. Buy what you love book. Com thank you for listening. We love reading your kind reviews, especially this one from Maya in the Sun. It happens to be five stars. I love these girls. Practical, relevant, and a little weird. This podcast is not only full of practical tips and tricks to save money, but full of fun and weirdness too. Listening to Jen and Jill is like sitting in your back patio on a perfect summer afternoon, drinking a margarita with your best girls and talking money. They're so purely themselves and it makes them so relatable. The topics are almost always relevant to me as a woman in her early 30s with no kids, but there's something for everyone. This show is really a breath of fresh air amid all the stuffy or bro, dude personal finance podcasts that are out there. Jen and Jill are girls, girls, and I love it.
- [51:17]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Oh, Maya, we are in the fun.
- [51:20]
Jill
With you drinking, Margaret.
- [51:23]
Dr. Laurie Santos
I'm feeling that. I wish that's where we were right now. Summer afternoon, drinking a marg, talking money, being relatable.
- [51:31]
Jill
This is perfect, Maya.
- [51:32]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Thank you. It is funny. Eric said, I think your listeners know you better than you think that they do. Because I'm like, you know, the podcast is just part of me. It's like, no, you really are just yourself. I think they know you and get you and your style, just who you are, a whole lot more than you are.
- [51:54]
Jill
Well, I got an email literally the other day from a listener who sent me a picture of her water bottle. And she's like, I thought about your new shirt that you just got that says support local libraries. And so she got a sticker from her local library. I think it said like, I love the Wisconsin Library or Wisconsin Library loves me or something. It was right under a Frugal Friends sticker. Yeah. And I was like, you Know me. I'm a one issue voter and that's my issue. It's libraries.
- [52:25]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Oh, wow. Well, thank you so much, Maya. We feel like you get us and we're glad that you feel as though we get you and we love that review. And if you all are listening and you haven't left us a review yet, and you do think that you know us more than we realize you know us, please leave us a review telling us that we'd love to hear how many of you are out there just getting us.
- [52:50]
Jill
Just leave a review with something really, like, oddly specific about one of us that you think is oddly specific and really, really weird.
- [53:02]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Oh, that'd be fun.
- [53:03]
Jill
Love it. Yeah.
- [53:05]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Thanks, everyone. See you next time.
- [53:06]
Jill
See you next time. Frugal Friends is produced by Eric sir.
- [53:23]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Speaking of people understanding us, I so we just had an awful hurricane here. By the time this comes out, we will be weeks post hurricane Helene. But Jen and I are both in the Tampa Bay area and it's been really, really, really rough. Thankfully, we are okay. And as far as the people that we're connected with, our communities, our neighborhoods devastated but moving through it. And I was out in the immediate wake of this at Home Depot getting supplies and helping people clean out their flooded homes. And I walk out and they were offering free hot dogs. This guy just yelled out, you want a free hot dog? And I've never heard someone yell that to me before. My initial reaction was like, oh, I don't know if I want to buy a hot dog. And then the free settled in. I'm like, yes, immediate tests, automatic. Yes, free hot dog. Then I'm like, oh, man, the Frugal Friends community would love to know this. And also we had a lot of people checking in, like, how are you doing? So I'm like, this is a great way to update everybody that we are okay and good things are still happening in the midst of tragedy. So anyways, I posted about that on our stories and we had somebody respond like, oh, my gosh, I knew you loved hot dogs so much. I can't believe you're holding two in one hand. I don't know why that impressed them. It's very easy to hold two hot dogs in one hand.
- [54:57]
Jill
Your hands are so small, Jill. I can't believe you're holding two. This is amazing.
- [55:03]
Dr. Laurie Santos
One for me, one for my husband. I wasn't getting too greedy with it. But yeah, we had people certainly commenting on the hot dog bit, like, yeah, of course, of course. Because you love hot dogs. Like, you guys get Me?
- [55:17]
Jill
Yeah, I don't. So I don't usually. Like, when I tell people I live where I live, I usually say Saint Pete because it's more like easily recognizable. But I actually live in Gulfport, Florida. And Gulfport got a lot of national media coverage around Helene because a lot of it was uncharacteristically devastated. Like, there are some areas that flood frequently and knew they were gonna get flooding. And Gulfport is on the water, but does not typically flood. And so it has been really interesting to be so close. Last year when Ian came, we were pretty far removed from all that devastation. And like today I am a 4 minute drive from where Gulfport basically ends now. Like those roads and those houses were just like decimated.
- [56:21]
Dr. Laurie Santos
It is wild. Cause I've seen, you know, you see stories throughout life of various communities getting hit with a natural disaster and seeing what devastation and need and rebuild efforts happen, how long it takes. But to actually be now living in the community where that's happening and seeing it firsthand, it's a whole other animal.
- [56:47]
Jill
But people are stepping up. I've been, yeah, yeah, North Carolina, you know, and parts of Georgia, Tennessee and Georgia. So, so many people, the needs are so widespread.
- [57:03]
Dr. Laurie Santos
And I know with something like this there can be this absurgence of, oh, how can I help? In the immediate aftermath. And I think what we can forget about is that there are needs that happen one, two, three months out from it. So, yeah, if you're listening, if you're still with us, listening, it's about a month out, probably since the storm. Yeah, efforts are still happening. I think my takeaway from this is best to partner with organizations that are already doing stuff. So whether that's the Red Cross or Samaritan's Purse or local organizations, a lot of businesses and restaurants are doing relief efforts, partnering with other people. So, yeah, good thing to keep in mind.
- [57:52]
Jill
Shout out to Gulfport, Mississippi, who's specifically raising supplies and money for Gulfport, Florida, calling them their little sister or something. I don't know. It was really cute to see. Yeah.
- [58:06]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Whoa. Very cool.
- [58:08]
Jill
So it'sythere are some good organizations that are doing some good work here and help them help us help our communities. Because we love these communities, we love these neighborhoods, our beaches. We want to see them come back and their employees back, residents back. And so please, if you are able to, yeah, we'd love to see our community rise up.
- [58:49]
Dr. Laurie Santos
See ya.
- [58:52]
Jill
This message comes from Greenlight. Ready to start talking to your kids about financial literacy? Meet Greenlight, the debit card and Money app that teaches kids and teens how to earn, save, spend wisely and invest. With your guardrails in place with Greenlight, you can send money to kids instantly, set up chores, automate allowance and keep an eye on your kids spending with real time notifications. Join millions of parents and kids building healthy financial habits together on Greenlight. Sign up for Greenlight today@Greenlight.com iheart hey, come on in. Small Business Saturday is right around the corner and so is that shop you've been meaning to check out on November 30th. Support your local community by shopping small on Smart Business Saturday, founded by American Express. Pick up a new outfit, a handmade gift, some vintage vinyl, maybe even some local tea.
- [59:43]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Thanks so much. See you soon.
- [59:46]
Jill
Shop on small business Saturday, November 30th.
- [59:49]
Dr. Laurie Santos
That's the powerful packing of American Express.
- [59:52]
Jen
Dear Toyota, I need a word with you about your Crown family. I started driving one and suddenly I love traffic. No, really, rush hour is my happy place. Intentional wrong turns feel so right. I could sit in the comfort of my crown forever, basking in its elegance, feeling on top of the world. But you see how this is strange for me, right? Who gets excited about traffic? This is on you, Toyota. And send the captivating Toyota Crown Family.
- [60:20]
Dr. Laurie Santos
Toyota let's go places. There's joy to be had in finding the perfect gifts for the ones You Love, and Saks.com's holiday gift guide can make it easy. Whether it's surprising your hard to shop for sister with a Chloe bracelet bag or gifting your partner a memorable scent from Gucci that matches their personality, Saks.com's handpicked guide can help take the stress out of the holidays, like adding instant cheer to your home with bright decor or giving yourself some comfort by bundling up in a scarf coat from Tatem. Find gifts guaranteed to bring joy to everyone this season@saks.com at Amica Insurance, we.
- [60:55]
Jen
Know it's more than just a car. It's the two door coupe that was there for your first drive, the hatchback that took you cross country and back, and the minivan that tackles the weekly carpool for the cars you couldn't live without. Trust Amica Auto Insurance Amica Empathy is our best policy.