The holidays are over, your credit cards are maxed out, and yet... there is another of those great travel ticket sales on.

It is so tempting to take just one more trip. You know you really shouldn't not so close to the last one. You just love that `shop 'til you drop' feeling.

Government yesterday released its new budget and maybe it's time for you to take a look at yours. You may only be a household party of one, two or three, but wouldn't you, for once, like to know just exactly where your money is going? The countless lines of ATM withdrawals on a bank statement don't tell much; besides who remembers? DENIAL WILL GET YOU EVERYWHERE You would rather not think about this. That's OK, denial will get you everywhere. In fact, denial works very well for many people. They refuse to think about the future, or so they say, but worry can manifest itself in many other ways, stress, hair loss, constant illness.

Take charge of your financial life! Just for a little while and start now.

Otherwise, when you end up in a situation where you need to make a major life decision, how will you know what to do? MAKE IT A NEW HABIT With the development of any new habit -- and budgeting is just that -- a habit, the standard advice is to start small. Take baby steps, push yourself forward to the next one, and praise yourself for the last one. Starting with some of these money behaviours will provide the springboard you need to dive in! If you are really serious about getting control of your finances, where do you start? Look at your current spending habits. Look through your chequebook, ATM withdrawals (remember what you spent on any of that?) statements, and receipts.

Start gathering information on where and how much money you spend in various categories on a weekly or monthly basis. Some people are incredibly disciplined and write down every single thing they buy every day -- for a whole month. You can really see spending patterns with this diligence.

TAKE BABY STEPS Speaking of baby steps, don't forget the power of compounding. Suppose you are a new parent and you want to ensure a golden retirement for this child later in life, or in terribly tough circumstances, your child has a disability and you worry every day what will happen to this child when you are gone.

As soon as you can after the baby is born, you begin depositing $100 every month into an investment account. You continue to do that until the child's sixth birthday, at which point you stop.

You leave the money in the account and never touch it. Again assuming the 8 percent interest rate, when the child retires at age 65, your investment of $7,200 would have grown to over a million dollars -- $1,107,869 to be exact! Hard to believe, isn't it? Does that relieve a little anxiety? DISPELLING THE MYTHS Myth 1: You have to suffer to use a budget.

Many people never even consider starting a budget because they are afraid they will have to `give up' something. The real truth is, you are following a budget whether or not you have consciously implemented one.

Unfortunately, the `budget' you end up with by doing nothing is almost certainly an endless cycle of reactions, as opposed to a forward thinking and proactive strategy.

A reactive mode contains the double whammy of the anxiety of wondering when the money will run out, and then feeling deprived when it does. A budget will actually reduce your aggravations.

Myth 2: You have to be in debt to budget.

Another popular misconception is that budgets are only for people who are in real financial trouble-individuals who are severely in debt or currently living way beyond their means. The truth is that everyone can benefit from budgeting.

Successful companies, operating solidly in the black and generating millions of dollars in annual revenue, all maintain budgets. Some companies have entire departments, with dozens of employees, whose sole purpose is to run the budgeting process.

These companies don't do all of this because they are in financial trouble or are spending beyond their means. They do it because budgets work.

Myth 3: You have to spend extra hours doing paperwork.

Another common fear is that budgeting will take huge amounts of time. Once you have your budget set up and in place, bill-paying sessions turn into stress free, time-efficient moments.

You've eliminated the month-in and month-out agonising (or arguing) about priorities. You also no longer wonder where the money will come from for the next bill that crosses your desk. All of that negative energy and time will have been turned into a positive routine experience! Enclosed are a sample budget sheet and a pie chart made directly on a spreadsheet. You don't need anything anywhere near as elaborate to get going.

Simple ruled paper and a handheld calculator (or good old-fashioned adding machine will do just fine).

This budget looks quite good, but just one little problem; the balances owed on the credit cards are a total of $8,000 and the cell phone is about to be shut off. If this is you, take charge and get going, you can do it.

TAKE THE STEPS AND DO IT NOW With a carefully constructed budget, you will have an excellent understanding of your monthly income and expenditures. That knowledge will translate directly into how much you can afford for your many personal goals, a home, a new car, or retirement savings.

You can do this! If you can't do it alone, meet with a financial advisor and begin your program. Make the savings a permanent part of your budget. Years from now, you will be so glad you did! *** Martha Harris Myron, CPA, CFP holds a NASD Series 7 licence and is a US tax practitioner. She is also the Programming Chair for the Financial Planning Association of Bermuda.

Questions regarding this article may be sent, via e-mail, to marthamyron ynorthrock.bm