The sky in the UK this month has been a permanent, unyielding shade of damp wool. It’s that specific February grey that feels less like a season and more like a personal affront to anyone trying to maintain a positive outlook. Inside the house, the battle for floor space continues with a quiet intensity. The clothes horse is currently a Mount Everest of tiny socks, sleepsuits, and bibs, leaving roughly four square inches for my own adult-sized laundry to contemplate the impossibility of drying in this humidity. Despite the relentless rain and the humidity-induced indoor drying marathons, there is a steady hum of progress under the surface. February has been a month of “scraping through”—not in a desperate way, but in that satisfying, fingernails-on-the-ledge way that tells you you’re actually getting somewhere.
The February Logbook: Chasing the 25% Mark
Let’s lead with the numbers, because in the Slow Burn world, the figures are the heartbeat of the journey. They don’t always race, and they certainly don’t always do what you want them to do, but they always count. This month, the numbers told a story of quiet discipline and a few happy accidents that have left me feeling more optimistic than I have in a long time.
| Category | Amount |
| Opening Balance | £22,795 |
| Investment Deposit | £920 |
| Growth | +£785 |
| Closing Balance | £24,500 |
Looking at that closing balance this morning brought a genuine surge of glee. You know that specific feeling when you’ve wanted something for seven long years? Maybe it’s a piece of furniture, a career shift, or just a sense of financial air-supply. When you finally get your hands on it, there’s an internal “YAY” that vibrates through your bones. That is me right now. I am a mere scrape away from being 25% of the way to the first £100k. A quarter of the way up the mountain. The summit is still hidden in the February clouds, but I can finally see the path behind me, and for the first time, the distance travelled feels significant.
The £920 deposit was a bit of a mystery at first glance. I have my automatic £450 going out like clockwork—the “set and forget” soul of my entire strategy. But as I tallied the accounts, I realised I had £200 left over from January’s budget that hadn’t been deployed, plus an extra £170 that seemed to have been “found” through a lack of mindless spending. When you stop leaking cash at the local shop for things you don’t actually need, it’s amazing how the “extra” money starts to congregate in your current account like it’s waiting for instructions. It turns out that not buying a daily chocolate bar is a very effective way to accidentally fund your future.
The Sweet Truth: Betting Against Our Own Vices
The big lifestyle shift this month wasn’t actually a planned strategic move. It started because my partner saw a coworker who looked, quite frankly, “fab.” This coworker had been off the sugar for nine weeks, and the physical transformation was enough to spark a competitive fire in our household. Usually, my partner embarks on these health quests solo, but this time, I felt a nudge to join in. There’s something about a shared struggle that feels less like a chore and more like a team sport, especially when the weather is this miserable and you need a project to keep your mind off the damp.
Being a money nerd, I couldn’t just let it be a health challenge; I had to level it up with a financial incentive. We created the Korea Holiday Fund. The rules are simple and brutally honest: if you have sugar or “junk food,” you pay a £10 penalty into the pot. It’s a “mistake tax,” and the proceeds are going toward a trip to Korea in two or three years. We don’t monitor each other like hawks—there’s no “biscuit police” patrolling the kitchen—but we’ve simply stopped bringing the junk home. If it’s not in the cupboard at 9:00 PM when the cravings hit, it doesn’t exist. This pact has turned our kitchen into a sanctuary from our former, more impulsive selves.
Currently, the scoreboard stands at a £10 “mistake” for me and £30 for my partner. We just chuck the money into a dedicated savings account whenever we slip up. It’s a strange feeling, being happy that we are funding a holiday while simultaneously being annoyed that we lacked the discipline to keep the tenner. But as an act of mutual support, it’s been brilliant. We are looking after each other’s health by proxy, ensuring that the “convenience” of a sugary snack is now outweighed by the literal cost of the penalty.
Breaking the 15-Minute Tesco Loop
I used to have a very specific, very expensive habit: The “Tesco Run.” It’s only a short walk—15 minutes there and back—but it was my go-to response for boredom, stress, or a mid-afternoon slump. I’d walk out for “just one thing” and come back with a bag of processed sugar and £7 less in my wallet. Over a month, those “short walks” become a marathon of wasted capital and empty calories. This month, I’ve had to confront those cravings head-on, and I’ve replaced the Tesco loop with the Vanilla Matcha Ritual.
It’s nothing fancy—just high-quality matcha, hot water, and a splash of milk. But it provides that “hit” I was looking for without the subsequent sugar crash that usually follows a chocolate bar. It doesn’t fix the craving 100%, but it helps enough to get me through the hour. Plus, an accidental side effect of this ritual is that I am actually hydrated for the first time in years. Drinking green tea instead of eating a doughnut turns out to be a fairly effective life hack for mental clarity. The act of whisking the tea replaces the mindless act of unwrapping a snack, giving me a moment to breathe rather than just a moment to consume.
The Freezer Defence: Lasagne and Sanity
With no sugar to provide that quick, cheap dopamine, we’ve leaned heavily into the kitchen. Batch cooking has become our ultimate defence mechanism against the “convenience trap” of modern life. We’ve had marathon sessions of making lasagne and aubergine parmigiana, filling the kitchen with the scent of slow-cooked tomatoes and garlic. There is something deeply satisfying about seeing a freezer stocked with home-cooked meals. It’s a gift to your future self—the self that comes home tired, wet from the rain, and tempted by a takeaway app.
My little one has decided that aubergine and tomato sauce is the ultimate culinary achievement. Served with a bit of couscous on the side, it’s the one meal that guarantees a clean plate and a happy toddler. There is a quiet joy in watching them enjoy something we made from scratch, knowing it’s packed with actual nutrients rather than hidden sugars and preservatives. It’s a reminder that minimalism isn’t just about owning fewer things; it’s about choosing better things, whether that’s the stocks in our portfolio or the ingredients in our dinner.
The Physical Seesaw of February
I have to be honest about the toll of this transition. February felt like it was split into two distinct physical phases. Phase one was the “Sugar High” (ironically, while quitting). I felt a burst of clarity and a sense of “I can do anything” energy. Then came phase two, right around the time the challenge really set in and the novelty wore off. The energy slump was real. There were days when the grey weather, the damp laundry, and the lack of a chocolate pick-me-up made me feel like I was wading through treacle.
Quitting a habit isn’t a linear path to glory; it’s a bit of a rollercoaster. But even in the slumps, there’s a quiet satisfaction in knowing that my energy levels are slowly re-stabilising. I’m no longer relying on a temporary glucose spike to get me through a Tuesday afternoon. Instead, I’m building a foundation of steadier energy that matches the steady growth of my investments. It’s a slow burn in every sense of the word—less explosive, perhaps, but much more sustainable in the long run.
Looking Toward the Horizon
We’ve decided that if we hit 50 “mistakes” a month between us, the Korea fund would be overflowing in no time. But the goal, obviously, is to have a very small holiday fund and very high energy levels. As I look toward March, the rain is still falling and the laundry horse is still a permanent fixture in my living room, but the portfolio is sitting at a proud £24,500. I am 24.5% of the way to a goal that once felt like a fever dream, and that gives me more “glee” than any sugar hit ever could.
I’m not sprinting to the finish line, and I’m certainly not “hustling” until I burn out. I’m just walking, one vanilla matcha and one home-cooked lasagne at a time, toward a life that feels a little bit lighter and a lot more intentional. The first 25% is always the hardest because it requires the most change in momentum. Now that the wheels are turning, I’m excited to see what the next quarter of the journey looks like.
Gentle Questions for the Road
As I hang up yet another batch of tiny leggings and watch the raindrops race down the windowpane, I’m struck by how much of this journey is won in the “boring” moments. It’s not the big stock market surges that get us to our goals; it’s the decision to stay home, to cook the aubergine, to whisk the tea, and to keep the “mistake” money for a better day. There is a profound peace in the “middle muddle” once you stop fighting the pace and start enjoying the walk—even if that walk is no longer to the local Tesco for a bar of chocolate.
What about you?
- What “15-minute loop” or convenience habit is currently quietly draining your wallet or your energy?
- If you started a “Mistake Fund” today for a dream holiday, which habit would be funding your flights?
- How does it feel to look back at how far you’ve come, rather than just obsessing over how far you have left to go?