Your Relationship With Money: What 2025 Taught You

As we enter 2026, or any new year, there’s a familiar temptation to wipe the slate clean and set bold new financial targets. Yet year after year, the statistics tell a sobering story. Approximately one in five individuals (21%) give up in less than a month. According to Columbia University, only about 25% of people remain committed after 30 days. Looking longer term only 8% of people manage to stick to their financial resolution for a full year. The reasons are consistent: motivation fades, life intervenes, and good intentions quietly slip away.

That isn’t because people don’t care about their finances. More often, it’s because we focus too quickly on doing, budgets, targets, rules, without first understanding how we feel about money and what the previous year has actually taught us.

At Money Wise UK, the past 12 months have been about helping people and advisers slow things down, step back, and think differently about money. This first blog for 2026 is deliberately reflective. Before setting new goals, it’s worth pausing and asking: what did 2025 reveal about your relationship with money?

Reflection: Looking Back Before Moving Forward

In Money and Meaning, I talk about a familiar pattern:
“Next month we’ll get back on track.”
Then next month arrives, and something unexpected happens.

Even with the best intentions and the most carefully constructed budget, life has a habit of knocking our plans off course. A car repair, a family expense, a period of stress, or simply tiredness after a long year. What’s striking isn’t that plans change, it’s how rarely we stop to reflect on why they changed and what that tells us about ourselves.

As you reflect on 2025, consider a few simple but powerful questions:

1. What went well financially this year?
   Not just numbers, decisions you feel proud of, moments of restraint, or times you acted with confidence.

2. What didn’t go so well?
   Where did things feel harder than expected? Was it spending, saving, investing, or simply staying organised?

3. Are there any regrets or rash purchases?
   And more importantly—what emotion was driving them at the time?

Alongside these questions, ask yourself something deeper:
Do I feel in control of my money, or controlled by it?

This moment of reflection isn’t about judgement. It’s about awareness. Celebrating wins, learning from mistakes, and recognising patterns is the first step towards taking control, rather than letting money quietly dictate our choices.

Values: The Foundation Beneath the Numbers

Over the summer, my wife and I sat down, on holiday, away from the usual distractions, and talked about our values. After more than 25 years of marriage, it would have been easy to assume we were still aligned.

That conversation reminded me how dangerous assumptions can be.

Thankfully, our values were still closely aligned, but the process itself was the important part. Those values feed directly into how we think about money: what we prioritise, what we’re comfortable spending on, and where we’re happy to say no.

Money decisions rarely exist in isolation. They are expressions of what matters to us, security, freedom, generosity, family, experiences, or peace of mind. When financial stress creeps in, it’s often because spending and saving habits have drifted away from those underlying values.

On the Money Wise UK website, there’s a free values-based exercise designed to help individuals and couples have these conversations. Used properly, it can unlock far more clarity than any spreadsheet.

Goals: From Meaning to Direction

One of the recurring themes in my writing—and in conversations with financial advisers—is the role of goals. Not goals as tick-box targets, but goals grounded in meaning.

Before we ever talk about how much money is needed, we need to understand:

• What we’re working towards

• Why it matters

• Who it affects

This is where good financial planning adds real value. It helps translate values into direction, and direction into practical steps.

As you start 2026, reflecting on:

• what went well,

• what could be improved, and

• how aligned your money feels with your values,

creates a far stronger foundation than rushing straight into new resolutions.

From there, goals become something different. They aren’t punishments for past mistakes or unrealistic promises to “be better.” Instead, they become guides—helping you make calmer, more intentional decisions throughout the year ahead.

A Different Way to Start the Year

So rather than asking, “What should I change in 2026?”, try asking:

• What did 2025 teach me about myself and money?

• What do I want more of—and less of—in the year ahead?

• How can my financial decisions better reflect what matters most to me?

That shift, from resolution to reflection, is often where lasting change really begins.