WYTI Links: 10.25.07

Thursday links this week:

• How I Live Without Using Credit Cards - My Simple System for Living on a Budget (via No Credit Needed) Thanks to Adam for recommending this worthwhile write-up.
  

• Budgeting is Like Baking Cookies (via ChristianPF) I'm a big fan of analogy/comparison articles. These are some excellent points about budgeting.

• An Annoying Email I Got (via I Will Teach You to Be Rich) The end of this conversation is where this really gets interesting. Finances are no different from faith in this perspective: advice (even Biblical) is of no use unless we are willing to change.

• Where To Stash Your Emergency Cash (via Michelle Singletary, Washington Post)
  

• Inexpensive Ways to Woo Your Wife (via Clever Dude) This is a guest post by Clever Dudette (Clever Dude's wife) about cheap ways to keep the spark lit with your wife. You've still got time this afternoon to implement some of these suggestions :).
  

Quotables: Your Money or Your Life -- Prologue

I am currently reading Joe Dominguez & Vicki Robin's Your Money or Your Life: Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence and reading Trent's (The Simple Dollar) extensive reviews.

As I finish each chapter, I will post some of the quotes I find interesting and helpful. Think of it as letting the authors reviewing the book themselves.

Today, we flip through the Prologue:

• What [most money] books have in common is that they assume that your financial life functions separately from the rest of your life. This book is about putting it all back together. It is about integration, a "whole systems" approach to life (xviii).

• Even though we "won" the Industrial Revolution, the spoils of war are looking more and more spoiled...the old road map for money has us trapped in the very vehicle that was supposed to liberate us from toil (xx).

• FI (financially independent) thinking is about cartography--making your own map, one that accurately depicts the terrain of your life as it actually is today (xxv).

• FI (financially independent) thinking will lead naturally to Financial Intelligence, Financial Integrity and Financial Independence (xxv).

The authors make the point that much of our financial shortcomings today have resulted from using the "old road map"--born from the Industrial Revolution--in a time where a much different map is needed. I think it's a strong and plausible argument.

I also appreciate how their approach is designed for individuality. Too many people (especially the most famous ones) in personal finance try to give virtually the same advice no matter the situation.

WYTI Links: 08.30.2007 (PtP Edition)

I've been at the BJCC in Birmingham all week for Polishing the Pulpit. If you've never attended, you need to seriously look into it for 2008. It should be the last week of August, and they are thinking it will likely be in Sevierville, TN. If you are able to get away for a week or two devoted to a lectureship of some sort, this should be toward the top of your list.

Here are some links to suffice for the week...consider it an "emotional" edition:

• The Emotional Impact of Debt (via One Million and Beyond)

• Personal Finance Isn't Rocket Science, It's Personal Motivation (via SavingAdvice.com)

• Money Mistakes to Avoid: Procrastination (via Money $mart Life) This is huge for me...I'm a big procastina

• It's Okay to Spend Money (via Five Cent Nickel)

• The Weight of Stolen Money (via Money, Matter, and More Musings)

• Considering the Cost of Things I Took For Granted (via I've Paid For This Twice Already...)

• Getting Over the "Taboo" of Generics and Store Brand Names (via The Simple Dollar)
  

"The Total Money Makeover" (Chapter 2)

Continuing the theme of attitudes, Dave Ramsey's 2nd chapter is entitled, "Denial: I'm Not That out of Shape."

For many, this is the major attitude that must be overcome. I know it was for me, before Leah and I got serious about money.

People with this attitude can look at someone in their family or neighborhood who is worse off than they are and say, "See, we've got more stuff than they do." To ask a simple question: why are you worried about stuff???

Many people are leveraged to the hilt! They are paying on a mortgage, 2 cars, 5 or 6 credit cards, student loans and 2 or 3 personal loans. They are, literally, one bad day away from total financial disaster. We need to stop using thoughts like, "I only have $5000 in credit card debt," or "It's student loan debt, so it's not that bad."

We need to learn to see debt as a problem, but a problem that can be overcome. Overcoming debt takes change, though, and change is hard for many people. Quoting page 15 of the book:

Change is painful. Few people have the courage to seek out change. Most people won't change until the pain of where they are exceeds the pain of change.

It is when we look at the person in the mirror and are able to say, "I have a money problem," that we are able to begin attacking that problem.

Look in the mirror...then continue with the book!