Well this is technically the first week that my full throttle, no nonsense, intensified, steroid injected budget from hell is in the works. Last week was sort of a warm up, before I went to cash only. I didn't spend as much as I normally do. I ate peanut butter and jelly for lunch everyday and began the grudging process of warming up a tv dinner, taking it out of the microwave to stir and then warming it up again. I have to admit right now this is hard to do. I feel like it takes 20 minutes just to cook a snack. I will get used to this though. No one ever said this budget would be easy.
I am noticing that this budget is beginning to change the way I think. For starters I'm beginning to think about each and every purchase. Going to a weekly spending limit while retiring the safety net of your debit card enlightens a person to exactly how much money he wasted on things he simply did not need.
I'm not delirious enough to believe that everyone is chomping at the bit to read these updates on my budget. My reason for posting my budget progress is to show the world that it can be done. I used to sit and stew for hours about how little I perceived my net worth to be, but now I realize that was just the response of a lazy martyr. God created us with a spark of His very own creativity, and creativity is usually birthed out of an uncomfortable situation. The boundaries of this budget are unlocking a creativity in my spending I never knew I had. I owe it to myself and God, not to stall out everytime I feel bogged down with my weekly expenses, but to instead creatively draw an exit to my situation.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
chicago cubs
Every now and again I can be completely oblivious to my own wretchedness. If I was to totally disarm myself I would admit to you that this happens a lot more than I care to describe. It embarrasses me. It totally nullifies this great idea I always bring up to myself; this idea that says I'm ok. I'm a good person. Whenever I am confronted on an issue, or find myself doing something I promised myself I'd never do I am forced to look at who I really am in a mirror that doesn't flatter (James 1:22-24).
I so badly wish I could rid myself of my wretchedness. I've tried over and over again but there doesn't seem to be an existing remedy. I feel like the Chicago Cubs starting over a hundred new seasons without ever winning the World Series. Of course at the beginning of the season I have high hopes that this will be the year, but somewhere in the not-to-far back of my mind I know this this is just a pipe dream.
Even Paul had these inner demons that pioneered a constant irritation to his spirit. In Romans 7 he transparently confesses that he doesn't fit the profile of a superstar pastor in the limelight of the public eye. In this intimate letter to the church in Rome, Paul spills his conflicted emotions onto its pages by admitting that the very things he wants to do he doesn't do. And to make things worse, he can't even manage to commit to not doing the things that he doesn't want to do. In another letter he finds solace in the fact that without, what he describes as, his thorn in the flesh he would become bigoted and most likely not even need God. So I guess you could say that the thorn itself was the remedy he had been searching for.
I guess what I've been so thankful for lately (and which eventually sparked this blog) is not that I can now compare myself to Paul and not feel so bad about my own wretchedness. That is not the intention of that scripture. But instead I can pursue Paul's repented response. I don't ever want to get to a place where I look into the mirror of the Word of God and see the most undesirable parts of my life, and, in turn, walk away from it completely forgetting who I really am, like James warns. Instead I desire to have my heart replicate the heart of God by breaking the moment I discover my wretchedness. I know that I can never be perfect, without any trace of sin here in this life, but I do want this to tear me apart inside. I believe an outlook like this makes the heart that much more anxious to repent and the ears that much more tuned into what God is speaking.
One day I will be with my creator and I will no longer have to struggle with my wretchedness. And one day the Cubs will win the World Series.
I so badly wish I could rid myself of my wretchedness. I've tried over and over again but there doesn't seem to be an existing remedy. I feel like the Chicago Cubs starting over a hundred new seasons without ever winning the World Series. Of course at the beginning of the season I have high hopes that this will be the year, but somewhere in the not-to-far back of my mind I know this this is just a pipe dream.
Even Paul had these inner demons that pioneered a constant irritation to his spirit. In Romans 7 he transparently confesses that he doesn't fit the profile of a superstar pastor in the limelight of the public eye. In this intimate letter to the church in Rome, Paul spills his conflicted emotions onto its pages by admitting that the very things he wants to do he doesn't do. And to make things worse, he can't even manage to commit to not doing the things that he doesn't want to do. In another letter he finds solace in the fact that without, what he describes as, his thorn in the flesh he would become bigoted and most likely not even need God. So I guess you could say that the thorn itself was the remedy he had been searching for.
I guess what I've been so thankful for lately (and which eventually sparked this blog) is not that I can now compare myself to Paul and not feel so bad about my own wretchedness. That is not the intention of that scripture. But instead I can pursue Paul's repented response. I don't ever want to get to a place where I look into the mirror of the Word of God and see the most undesirable parts of my life, and, in turn, walk away from it completely forgetting who I really am, like James warns. Instead I desire to have my heart replicate the heart of God by breaking the moment I discover my wretchedness. I know that I can never be perfect, without any trace of sin here in this life, but I do want this to tear me apart inside. I believe an outlook like this makes the heart that much more anxious to repent and the ears that much more tuned into what God is speaking.
One day I will be with my creator and I will no longer have to struggle with my wretchedness. And one day the Cubs will win the World Series.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
the budget from hell: death to convenience
I am 25 years old. Apparently I was supposed to graduate into the arena of an adult a few years back. I would imagine that you never quite feel like a "grown-up" until you have one of your own nuclear families (Dad, mom, 3 kids, the cat, the dog, and the white picket fence). However...even though I don't really see myself as old as I saw my dad when he was this age, I am stepping deeper today into the land of maturity. I settled it today. I am going on a budget.
Now before you think of me as some ignorant kid who has never had the motor skills necessary to plan and form a monthly spending limit, let me make it clear that I've been down this road many times. I know what it is like to have to watch your friends at work eat beautiful Chinese take-out, as you try and rock a Tyson T.V. dinner whispering to yourself "this is delicious, this is delicious." I know what it is like having to say no to going to see a movie on opening night opting to see it at the dollar theatre two months later instead. I know what the simple budget entails, and for reasons unknown I treated them all like dieting. They worked for about a month, but I then fell into the same bad spending habits.
This budget is going to be a lot more intense though. I am locking away my debit card and spending only cash now. This is going to pose a problem for my convenience. No longer am I going to be able to eat out every night. Once my cash is gone for that week, my cash is gone. I will continue to update how this is working and effecting my financial life through this blog.
I am nervous about this. It's going to suck. I'm sure it's going to suck. But my plan is save a ton of money to one day do the things I dream of doing. In the words of Dave Ramsey: "I've got to live like no one else, so I can one day live like no one else."
Now before you think of me as some ignorant kid who has never had the motor skills necessary to plan and form a monthly spending limit, let me make it clear that I've been down this road many times. I know what it is like to have to watch your friends at work eat beautiful Chinese take-out, as you try and rock a Tyson T.V. dinner whispering to yourself "this is delicious, this is delicious." I know what it is like having to say no to going to see a movie on opening night opting to see it at the dollar theatre two months later instead. I know what the simple budget entails, and for reasons unknown I treated them all like dieting. They worked for about a month, but I then fell into the same bad spending habits.
This budget is going to be a lot more intense though. I am locking away my debit card and spending only cash now. This is going to pose a problem for my convenience. No longer am I going to be able to eat out every night. Once my cash is gone for that week, my cash is gone. I will continue to update how this is working and effecting my financial life through this blog.
I am nervous about this. It's going to suck. I'm sure it's going to suck. But my plan is save a ton of money to one day do the things I dream of doing. In the words of Dave Ramsey: "I've got to live like no one else, so I can one day live like no one else."
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