Dave Ramsey - Kinda Sort Plan

Can you kinda sorta follow some financial guru's advice?

I believe you can. It's called PERSONAL FINANCE for a reason. I believe in a LOT of what Dave Ramsey teaches. I'm so grateful that we took Financial Peace University and that we now have a much clearer financial plan mapped out.  It's not perfect by any means, but it's much better than it was!

In the year 2000, I read the book Getting a Life. In that book they talk about how we trade our life energy (time here on Earth) for money (AKA a job). It was a crazy concept to me and I felt like it was something only odd people did. However, the more I read the book, the more intrigued I became. It asks the question, what would you do for a job if you didn't need to work for money. My immediate response was that I'd quit my job and stay home with my babies. That was totally eye opening for me because I always thought I'd have a job outside the home.

Nine months later we had paid off our truck and our student loans. Shortly after we moved back to Montana I was able to work part time and then quit my high paying job all together. During this period of time we didn't buy very many clothes, we went on very few vacations, didn't go out to eat, didn't spend much on hobbies, etc. With focused intensity my dream came true! Thankfully my husband was and continues to be very supportive of my homemaking dream. I just described the Dave Ramsey plan. It works!

Today things are a lot different. In 2004 we had another dream. A dream so big that many people thought we were insane. 60 people were chosen out of 600 to attend Physician Assistant school in Mesa, AZ. My husband was one of the 60 people. So in August 2005, we sold our house and almost everything in it, gave my car to my Grandpa and drove our 1991 Suburban pulling a 1950's 6X12 Uhaul and moved to Mesa, AZ. It was quite an adventure. I remained a homemaker and my husband was gone from early morning until late at night.

Along with that adventure we acquired a LOT of student loan debt. Sure, we could have done things differently. We could have stayed in Montana, I could have gotten a job, but we chose to follow a God given dream. Our student loans are extended out to 20 and 30 years. Our goal is to pay them off LONG before then! However, we're going to have our own plan. Our kids are getting older and we don't have that much more time with our kids before they get jobs and/or move out of the house (sniff sniff). We refuse to give up camping or going to see our family. We are still focused on paying off debt, but we are going to have an envelope for decorating the house, clothes, gifts, and vacations. We might not put very much in those envelopes, but clearly this needs to be a long term plan that works!

All this to say, don't give up on a financial plan just because you don't agree with one or two things. Make a plan that works for you and your family. If you can have your debts paid off in less than two years then really really focus on that. It'll be gone before you know it. If you have problems using credit cards, then focus on that issue. If it's going to take a million years to pay off your debt (or so it seems) make sure you have short term goals, but a realistic plan!