Let me start with a confession: I always believed that I was good with money. But as it turned out, I was not. At least Gen AI told me so.
No flashy splurges, no risky bets, and enough personal finance blogs under my belt to dodge the usual traps. Yet every month, my salary would come in, briefly pump up my bank balance, and then vanish into thin air.
I blamed inflation. I blamed adulthood. I blamed Swiggy surge pricing. But here’s the thing, deep down, I knew something wasn’t adding up.
So, one night, driven by curiosity and a hint of desperation, I exported six months of my UPI transaction history, that messy log of ₹48 chai stops, ₹313 food orders, ₹799 Amazon buys, and ₹150 auto rides, and fed it to ChatGPT.
What I got back wasn’t just numbers or charts. It was a mirror.
The ghost in the machine knew me better than I knew myself
UPI isn’t just a payment tool. It’s India’s daily money pulse, a raw, unfiltered reflection of how we live, spend, and sometimes splurge.
Dumping this data into ChatGPT was like handing over my financial diary, but with timestamps, vendors, and patterns that revealed more than I expected.
Here’s what it told me:
1. I don’t have a spending problem. I have a decision fatigue problem: I was outsourcing too many small money decisions to my mood. Lunch depended on cravings, groceries only happened when I ran out, and travel was always last-minute Ubers. ChatGPT flagged that my spending spiked during stressful windows, Monday mornings, Friday evenings, and after arguments. My wallet was leaking because I procrastinated emotionally, not because I spent wildly.
2. I turned generosity into self-sabotage: My UPI showed frequent small transfers to friends and colleagues, the cousin who forgot his wallet, the colleague always “short.” What looked like kindness was people-pleasing disguised as payments.
3. My UPI told a story my bank statement never could: Each ₹20 tea stop or midnight Swiggy binge had a hidden context. My bank balance never tracked mood, but UPI did.
The hidden behavioural debt
We all fear financial debt. But what ChatGPT exposed was behavioral debt, the invisible cost of unchecked habits. Impulse convenience was my kryptonite. The ₹55 coffee I could have brewed. The ₹600 cab ride was because I left late. They weren’t big alone, but added up fast.
“Your financial goals are aspirational, but your transaction behaviour is avoidant.”
It’s not about cutting coffee. It’s about rewriting scripts.
This experiment wasn’t a guilt trip. It was a reality check.
ChatGPT connected dots I hadn’t noticed: days I walked in the park, I didn’t spend on food delivery; Sundays I planned meals, my UPI was quieter. I wasn’t overspending, I was under-thinking.
What changed?
I didn’t delete Zomato, Swiggy and Uber. I didn’t uninstall UPI apps. I built a weekly UPI routine. Every Sunday night, I export my UPI data and ask ChatGPT three questions:
- What spending could be avoided?
- What felt worth it?
- Which patterns repeat?
Fifteen minutes a week, but like therapy, with receipts.
Your UPI is a mood diary in disguise
Budgeting isn’t a numbers game. It’s a behaviour game. Your UPI log remembers when you spend out of stress, boredom, or celebration. You don’t need to become a finance expert. You just need to listen. Here’s the real secret: Your UPI statement already knows what’s wrong. You only need to ask the right questions.
