This personal finance educator says budgeting is ‘toxic’ — try ‘intuitive’ spending instead

If you're trying to stay on top of your spending, you might have logged your finances in a spreadsheet, tracked every dollar, and created a strict spending plan, but one expert says budgeting like this can be "toxic."

Dana Miranda, a certified personal finance educator, is the author of "You Don't Need a Budget," a book that looks to liberate readers from the prevailing approach of managing their money.

"Budget culture is our dominant approach to money that relies on restriction, shame, and greed," Miranda told CNBC Make It in an interview, likening it to diet culture.

"Research shows in budgeting, and we see the same thing with a much broader body of research in dieting, that that kind of restriction doesn't work," she said.

"People tend to fail at sticking to those rules, and so you are inevitably going to feel like a failure. You're going to feel that shame because you're not reaching those sorts of arbitrary goals that are being set."

Not everyone agrees, and many financial planners say creating a budget is the single best thing you can do to improve your finances.

However, Miranda cited a 2018 study by researchers at the University of Minnesota who found little evidence that budgeting helps achieve long-term financial goals, adding that it can also increase anxiety.

Sheida Isabel Elmi, meanwhile, a research program manager at the Aspen Institute Financial Security Program, told CNBC Select that budgeting can be especially challenging for low and middle-income families. This is because they're more likely to have volatile incomes and lower wages which can't be easily managed by a strict, prescriptive budget.

According to Miranda, the toxicity of budgeting stems from a capitalistic culture geared toward making more money and