Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.

Good morning, this is Laura.

Welcome to the Before Breakfast Podcast.

Today's tip is about what not to track.

While measuring various dimensions of your life can be useful,

it is good to know yourself.

If tracking some aspect of your life is going to make you feel guilty

or trigger unhealthy behaviors, then you might be better off setting broad safeguards,

and then not worrying about the particulars.

Long time before breakfast listeners know that I have been tracking my time for a long time,

it will be eight years this spring.

Yes, I know how I have spent every half hour for the past eight years of my life.

Some people hearing that might think that is a wee bit obsessive,

but there are certainly folks who have tracked their spending pretty religiously for years.

There are folks who have tracked all their workouts,

and people who are trying to eat more healthfully, who have tracked their food intake for a long time too.

I do track my workouts, but I don't track those other categories.

Sometimes people are surprised to hear that I don't track spending closely,

because money and time are closely related.

But I have certain obsessive frugal tendencies that I know will kick in

if I start monitoring and recording every detail of household spending.

I will start feeling bad that we didn't buy the generic laundry detergent,

...