I was driving home from the grocery store several days ago, going through the numbers in my head to figure out if I could still make my January goal.  I do this all the time and I get very stressed about whether I can make my goal or not.  The goals are not easy; they don’t leave any room for error.

This one time, though, I guess because the answer was that I couldn’t make my goal, it occurred to me how silly it is to stress myself out about a goal I made for myself and that no one else even knows about (the specific number, I mean) and that is a serious stretch (so I am likely to fail and even if I do, I still will have put a lot of money toward my debt).

I’m not usually good at following rules I’ve set for myself, but I just really want to be out of debt and the thought of getting complacent in this makes me very anxious.

The thing about spending money is that you can’t go cold turkey.  I still have to eat and I need a roof over my head!  Sometimes it’s hard for me to draw the line between being reasonable and giving myself too much slack.  There are many ways to approach getting out of debt and I took a page out of Dave Ramsey’s book and am doing it with gazelle-like intensity.

This is the way I want to do it, but I can’t say that the stress isn’t really stress.  It is stress, but the adrenaline-fueled kind and not the dread-filled kind.  One way I stress myself out is by keeping very little in my checking account at a time (it’s over draft protected with my savings account, which has $300 in it).  Often I’m trying to get through a week on $50, which I can do since I don’t have to get gas regularly and aside from bills, groceries are my only big expense.  It’s a game to see if I can do it.

I think the whole thing occurred to be suddenly as silly because I was in this mindset that I am poor and this is all the money I have in the world right now. That’s ridiculous in a sense, because I’m actually bringing in quite a bit of money–enough to put hundreds of dollars toward my debt every month.  But, it’s completely true in another sense, because, of course, I am in debt!  I have available credit, but not money that isn’t owed to someone else.

I can see myself starting to think of money differently.  Most importantly, I’m breaking the habit of looking at available credit as available funds.  And the challenge is fun.

No related posts.

I have mixed feelings about Dave Ramsey.  He can be very abrasive and I don’t agree with his politics.  But, listening to him is what finally set my mind straight about my debt.  For the first time I realized that I am responsible for the situation I’m in and it is possible for me to get out of it.  That last part is so important and has changed my life already.  Just listening to his program keeps me motivated to keep going.

1. The Debt Snow Ball. I love this method.  It’s given me direction and a clear goal. I’ve been spinning my wheels, paying on everything at once and never feeling like I’m getting anywhere.  Dave is clear that the strength of this method is the motivation it gives you to keep going.  You pay the smaller debts first, so that you’re encouraged to keep going .  I can’t wait until I can finally pay off my first card.
2. Stop whining and take responsibility for your debt. While I sometimes find Dave too abrasive, especially toward the people who don’t agree with him, I appreciate that he doesn’t let people get away with feeling sorry for themselves and wallowing.  When we do that, we give too many concessions.  We got ourselves into debt and we’re going to buck up and get ourselves out.  It’s about personal responsibility.
3. “If You Will Live Like No One Else, Later You Can Live Like No One Else.” Debt is the American way, so it’s pretty easy to justify your way of life because that’s what everyone is doing.  But, if you’re willing to sacrifice, save, and scrimp like no one else, then you can have financial freedom and live without the limitations of debt that everyone else has.  You can be free.
4. Budget Every Dollar. My problem with budgets was that I would always make them for the expenses I had to pay and then leave whatever was left unbudgeted.  So, as long as I had my bills paid, I thought I was good.  I would spend whatever was left instead of putting it toward my debt.  When you budget every dollar, you spend it all intentionally.  There’s never that point at the end of the month where you wonder what happened to all of your money.
5. Gazelle-like Intensity. What’s really cool about the people who become debt free under Dave Ramsey’s influence is that they do it really quickly.  Most people pay off all of their debt (except the mortgage) in less than 18 months.  And we’re talking about a lot of debt.  You basically do whatever you can to get everything paid off as quickly as possible.  Oftentimes that means living very cheaply and taking on an extra job; the point is that you don’t have to do it forever.
6. You can do this. This is the biggest gift Dave has given me.  He’s given me hope that I can get out of debt.  I don’t have to let it define my life forever.  There really is another way.  He doesn’t hide the fact that it’s going to be hard.  You’ll have to work as much as you can and get by on as little as you can, but you’ll do it.

Dave is pretty clear that nothing he says is all that original.  It’s the simplest of financial advice, but we have to hear it over and over again in order for it to sink in.  If you’re going to get out of debt, then you have to be in it for the long haul and Dave’s show, even though the advice is always the same, keeps me on the path.

If you’re new to the world of personal finance, check out Dave’s website and looks for his podcast (the first hour of his radio show) on iTunes.

Related posts:

1. What advice can you give to someone who wants to start taking control of her debt?
2. A Pretty Big Set Back

I’m a planner, so I have always made budgets.  I even thought I was pretty good at it.  As it turns out, I’m not very good at it at all.  I’ve got three major problems with budgets:

1. Making them is a hell of a lot easier than following them.
2. Unexpected expenses always come up, which makes planning ahead very difficult.
3. I budget only for my expenses and leave the rest of the money unaccounted for, which means it always mysteriously vanishes by the end of the month, while new makeup fills my drawers.

None of these are reasons not to budget–they are just complications along the way.

Making a budget won’t change your behavior, but it does make changing your behavior a lot easier.  Budgeting has made me very aware of the ways I spend my money.  It’s a lot harder to justify some of my spending when I force myself to look at the numbers.  For instance, I love pizza and a good pizza costs me about $20.  At one point, I would have one a week.  It was my only meal out for the week, but even in that case, I could not justify spending $80 a month on pizza.  It didn’t seem that bad until I looked at the monthly total.  When you pay attention to where your money is going, it’s a lot more difficult to waste it.

It’s frustrating to me as such a planner that I cannot plan for everything.  Things always come up throughout the month and when you’re running a tight budget, one unexpected expense can completely derail you.  That makes it pretty easy for me to give up or figure there’s no point in planning anyway.  I’ve been dealing with this by spending a lot of time budgeting.  It’s not something I do once a month, but rather at least once a week.  I’ve been spending a lot of time planning out my finances, which is working for me right now.  I hope it will soon get easier and require less time.

Dave Ramsey says you need to plan for every dollar, whether you’re spending it or putting it toward savings.  Where I’ve been failing in budgeting is only accounting for my necessary expenses–the bills that are due.  That leaves the rest of my money to sit still or be spent without a plan.  Because it’s not accounted for, it often gets spent on things I don’t need.  I’ve found this pretty difficult, because it’s hard for me to figure out exactly what my income and expenses will be ahead of time.  What I’m doing is making a goal of putting an extra $800 toward my debt every month.  With that extra goal in place–the extra line on my budget–there isn’t a lot of wiggle room, which means I have to stick to the rest of the budget and can’t eat out or buy small things mindlessly.

I’ve been doing this for a few weeks now and it’s very powerful.  There is no longer this mystery in mind about how much money I have and where it’s going.   As a result, I am in a place to do a lot more than pay minimum balances; I’m on my way to paying off the first card.

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1. The Cost of Getting Healthy