$48 per day: Fall Cleanse Preparation

I'm doing a five-day food cleanse followed by a six-week diet with Liz Vequist in an effort to start feeling fit, active and inspired. The cleanse starts on Monday, October 5, 2015.

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Preparations started on Friday, October 2nd when I created a five-day meal plan with three meals and three snacks for each day. From there, I was able to create a shopping list and cooking "to do" list.

I first shopped on Friday, at the hippie grocery store near my home. I spent $55 on the following items:

• Cold pressed flax seed oil
• Organic tamari
• Two types of seaweed 
• Stress relief tea
• Red lentils
• Old fashioned oats
• Sea salt
• Whole mustard seeds
• Black sesame seeds

On Saturday, while at Target with BMG, I found organic, sprouted mung beans for the kitchari recipe I wanted to make on Sunday. That meant I didn't need to go to Whole Foods at the yuppie mall. Score!

On Saturday, I also went to my local conventional grocery store to buy the rest of the supplies I needed. This meant I didn't buy organic. as it was suggested. In this case, I decided the differential in cost combined with my willingness to wash the fruits and veggies well made it an acceptable deviation. At the conventional grocery store, I spent an additional $65 on the following:

• Chopped kale
• Chopped spinach
• Lemons
• Apples
• Grapes
• Carrots
• Cucumbers
• Shallots
• Cilantro
• Acorn squash
• Sugar pumpkin
• Brown basmati rice
• Brown rice
• Decaf coffee
• Chia seeds
• Almond milk

I didn't buy, because we had it already:

• Another acorn squash
• Sweet potatoes
• Parsley (from the garden!)
• Cauliflower (from the garden!)
• Fresh ginger
• Summer squash and zucchini (from the garden!)
• Coconut oil
• Miso paste
• Sunflower seeds, ground flax seeds, ground pumpkin seeds
• Piles and piles of spices (e.g., tumeric, cinnamon, etc.)

It is suggested that one also cleanse one's home and one's mind of clutter before beginning, ostensibly so to allow the mind to focus on the body and healing. So, with the okay from BMG, I cleared our shared office of clutter. This cost me another $122 in supplies, including a cheap DIY bookshelf and cubbies for storing the piles of paper that lived on the floor. 

All told, NOT counting the fees charged by the nutritionist, the cleanse has cost me $242. For five days of activity / That's $48 per day.

Spendy.

Nearly 15 years ago, I went through the Your Money or Your Life program, in order to build a budget that reflects my values and aligns my spending with things and activities that make my heart go pitter pat. As a result of evaluating my spending relative to my values, I stopped spending so much on Starbucks, and added a line item in my budget for "adventures."

There has never been a line item for "my health and well-being."

The cleanse guide suggests identifying up to three things one wants to "mentally detox." I'm going to reframe this from a positive perspective and instead ask myself "What are three things I want to gain emotionally as a result of this experience." And I'll start with understanding if I value my health and well-being enough to budget and spend generously on it.