We Tried a No-Spend Challenge

03/06/26 - Friday

March 06, 2026

Hey friend,

We spent all of January doing something we haven’t done in a while: a full month no-spend challenge.

And honestly? We both kind of failed. But we learned so much in the process, and we think you will too.

🎧 New Episode: We Tried a No Spend Challenge. Here's How It Went

For the entire month of January, we committed to no spending except for our predetermined exceptions:

Jill's rules: One trip per week to the grocery store for essentials only  
Jen's rules: One grocery trip and one coffee per week

Sounds simple, right? Turns out it was harder than we expected.

💡What We Learned

Jill realized she needed to reexamine her giving habits. Turns out, she was being overly generous in ways that weren't sustainable, and the challenge helped her see that clearly.

Jen discovered she needed to take a hard look at her grocery spending. Also, she somehow spent way more on coffee than anticipated during the challenge. Still not entirely sure how that happened, but here we are.

We both walked away feeling like we "failed" the challenge in some ways, but honestly, that's not the point.

The point is that restricting our spending for a month opened our eyes to patterns we didn't know were there.

Sometimes you need to hit pause on everything to see what really matters and where your money is actually going.

This episode is raw, honest, and full of the kind of insights you only get when you're willing to try something uncomfortable.

And if you want to see our faces as we debrief this whole experience, subscribe to our YouTube channel. More subscribers helps us reach more people with our message of intentional consumption.

💰 While You're Thinking About Money, Don't Forget Your Old 401(k)

Here's something we realized during our no-spend month: when you're hyper-focused on the little daily expenses, it's easy to forget about the big financial moves sitting on your to-do list. Like that old 401(k) from a job you left years ago.

I learned this lesson the expensive way.

When I rolled over my 401(k), I forgot to actually invest the money. It sat in cash for an entire year, and that mistake cost me over $5,000 in potential growth. I WISH I’d known about Capitalize back then.

Capitalize is completely free and walks you through the entire rollover process. They handle the paperwork, make the calls to your old provider, and most importantly, make sure your money actually gets invested properly.

It's invaluable to have someone in your corner guiding you through a process that's intentionally complicated.

If you've been putting off dealing with an old 401(k) because it feels overwhelming, now's the time.

Having more space to think about these bigger financial moves, instead of just obsessing over daily spending, is exactly what challenges like this create room for. **

Thanks for being part of this community and for trying hard things with us, even when they don't go perfectly.

💗
Jen +Jill

P.S. Have you ever tried a no-spend challenge? How did it go? Hit reply and let us know. We'd love to hear your stories.

**Means this is a sponsored or affiliate section. We may earn a small fee or commission when you choose to try one of our sponsor or affiliate partners. But opinions are still 1000% our own.