Day 101

We have a firm foothold in the triple digits now! I'm so excited to be over 100 days into my personal renovation program. I'm learning lots about taking care of myself; better than I ever have. I'd love to tell you that I learned all of this when I was a kid from my parents, but alas I cannot. Bless their hearts, I know they were doing the best they could, but this is what happens when selfish people have children. They were always very concerned about making money. This was, of course, done in the name of 'taking care of the kids,' but what they failed to realize is that while they were making money, they were leaving behind children who were floundering in the world with few answers to life questions and unimaginable dangers. I thank God that at least they provided something of a foundation of faith, which I know has helped me more than anything in this life. You probably don't want to hear it, but this is my blog and I can say whatever I want. I know I don't deserve anything from God, but I'm thankful to know that He will never leave me alone. I may have to learn some things the hard way...I am a stupid human being, after all. But I'm not alone as I go through any of life's trials. This is comforting to me.

So, today was a very busy research and solve problems kind of day. I just love days like this, but it would have been nice to have been a bit more successful. Here is what I looked like today trying to fix everything:

Just working away in the office looking to heaven for the answers...I didn't always have any! Dang!! My foundation and lipstick looked great today!!

It's hard to realize sometimes that you just cannot fix everything. I want to, but some things have to be resolved by the people involved. Yes, I'm one of those people who wants to fix all of my friends problems. I'm not malicious about it, really I'm not. I just want to help. Sometimes, I can't. There are things that people have to do on their own. Plus, my methods are not always painless. What I've learned is that some life problems are likely to happen to me again if I don't have enough pain while fixing them. So, I've learned to put myself through lots of discomfort when resolving some issues that could come up again. That way, I'm less likely to allow the issue to happen the second time around. For instance, finances. Yes, I've had my share of financial difficulties in my life. Some of those difficulties I created myself (spend, spend, spend...) and some where thrust upon me (i.e. massive cut in pay to the tune of 66% for me and 50% for my husband all at once during the Savings and Loan collapse in the late 1980s in Texas). This required that both he and I be on the same page to make it through the financial crunch. We decided that we could make it if we cut out ALL unnecessary expenses. We were lucky that at the time we didn't have any loans except our mortgage, but the payment was huge (to us, anyway). So, we set a budget and were relentless to stay on it. We not only created the regular kind of budget where we set amounts in categories that we had to stay under, we also did a little thing I liked to call Zero Based Budgeting. This was my effort at making the whole experience into a game (if you stick around long you'll find that I'm all about the 'game' of everything). Anyway, the way it works is like this: You set up your categories and you set the spend amounts to zero. Then, you work to see how close to zero you can be at the end of the month. Obviously, groceries, utilities and mortgage are always going to have money spent, but every month where I beat the previous month I won the game! Now, I didn't get to reward myself with anything special, it was, at the time, enough for me to know that I had won. But the big win was I had extra money to pay down the principle of the mortgage. Little by little, even with that terrible time in our financial life, we were able to pay the mortgage off...8 years early! So, please don't try to tell me that you can't do it; live on less and have a GREAT life. I've been there and done that and I look back on that time as GREAT, because I learned just what we're made of. I'm no weak, limp, lily-livered, human being. I may be stupid about some things, but I can hoist up my bootstraps just as good as anybody and have a great life. Here are some of the things we did back in the day to keep ourselves going:

1. Used the public library to satisfy my need to go somewhere and pick up something new and bring it home. I checked out  books, videos and magazines and always had something new to entertain us.
2. Cut off the cable TV. We didn't have internet back then, but we have had computers since 1981, so we just played games that we owned already and enjoyed the computers. Sometimes we'd find games at the Half Price Book Store for a song (if we had an extra dollar) and that was great!
3. Ate all meals at home. There were only two of us back then and I was able to feed us for $50 a week! That was my budget and yes, I tried to get as close to zero as I could.
4. If something broke we fixed it ourselves with whatever we could come up with as a solution. We repaired the refrigerator at least once (with Vaseline...who knew!) and the dishwasher 3 times by ourselves.
5. We worked really hard to stay well. Take good care of things like teeth and such and try to not need the doctor as much as possible. It's real easy to think you don't have control over health, but you do. Yes, if we needed a doctor, we'd go, but we worked hard to stay healthy, too.
6. Initiated the 3 question solution. What is the 3 question solution, I hear you asking? Well, if we thought we needed something I would ask us these three questions before we proceeded with the purchase:
1. This thing that we think we need, will our lives be in jeopardy or will there be bloodshed if we don't have it? (If the answer is No, then stop right here...you don't really 'NEED' this thing! If the answer is Yes, then proceed to the next question.)
2. This thing that we think we need, can we make it ourselves? (If the answer is Yes, stop here and make the dang thing!! If the answer is No, then proceed to the next question.)
3. This thing that we think we need, can we borrow it from someone and then give it back after we clean it and make it nice for them? (If the answer is Yes, then borrow the thing and stop right here! If the answer is No, then shop for the best alternative and buy the dang thing and be happy because you REALLY need it.)
7. Communicated with each other. We talked through everything. Even the difficult things I didn't want to talk about; we talked through all of them. It was not always easy, but I always felt better when we just talked about whatever was going on. We were truly in the same boat, paddling in the same direction and caring for each other. That doesn't mean he was always happy with me or that I was always wild about him. But what do you think marriage is, anyway?

Okay, there is probably more that we did during those days, but I never let myself look at my situation and be sad. I saw it as my chance to see what I was made of. We didn't have much; there weren't any vacations; fancy anything or extras, but we had each other and our self respect. One of the most important things I learned back then is that my house, car, clothes, shoes, appearance nor anything else about me has a thing to prove in this life. I'm not racing with anyone and I don't look to other people around me for my values. Ultimately I make this life as easy or hard for myself as I like. I choose; life isn't just happening to me. What about you?

So that's my soapbox for today. Hey! Who tightened my rubber band today, anyway? Who knows!! Well, my work is done here for today. I'm off to enjoy some 'me' time before bed. Until tomorrow when I'll likely step onto some other grandstand, sweet dreams, Sweeties!!