Financial Peace University
Joe and I have the awesome opportunity to attend Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University for the next couple of months. Joe is finally seeing some nice commissions with The Leaders Institute and for the first time in forever, we are actually one paycheck ahead in life! Scary. This financial class has come at just the right time. Our first class went great. Eric and Kelly Rogers are facilitating the class here in Hamilton at a Liber Book Store. We watch an hour DVD and then discuss. I absolutely loved the DVD portion of the class. Dave Ramsey is hilarious and talks about money in a way that is easy and simple to understand. The discussion part of the class I don't like as much. Let me explain.
For those of you who know me well, you are aware that talking about money makes me want to literally throw up! So you can imagine how thrilled I am to have not only Joe and I talk about money but other class members too. I could feel the dry-heaving about to begin as soon as other people started talking. The fact that our car had broke down only one hour before the class had probably, somewhat contributed to my anxiety. (Thankfully a day later...with a new batterry...we are up and rolling again.) I love all the people in our class and am so thankful to the Rogers for facilitating this experience but it's going to be a real struggle for my anxiety levels. Maybe I should just bail out after the DVD portion and have Joe fill me in on what I missed! We'll see how it goes.
Now for the positive! Dave Ramsey said something in the first lesson that really calmed me down about our financial situation. He said, "Acquiring wealth is a MARATHON not a SPRINT!" That simple phrase has given me perspective and hope for our financial lack of well being. Watching Joe get ready for his marathon last summer, I was impressed with his dedication and determination. Changing money habits will require this too. Only this time, we are a partnership helping each other. As Dave Ramsey talked about doing a "Quickie Budget" for starters, Joe leaned over and whispered..."We need to do that Allie." to which I kindly whispered back..."I already do...every month."
I take care of all the bills each month. Joe brings in the money and I take care of the financial end of things. This is a system we agreed on early in our marriage and for the most part, it has worked quite well. However, there are some things I would love to discuss with my hubby that now will come to the forefront. We have been credit card free for a couple of years now but we continue to pay off our monstrous debt incurred years ago. We still pay on student loans and we obviously we have a house payment and car payment. We live paycheck to paycheck and wonder how we will get our kids through college!
I am confident that these classes are going to give us the tools and resources to get on track. Our first homework assignment was to set up an Emergency Fund...aka: Savings Account of $1000 to begin. Thankfully, we have that kind of money right now and we hurried to the bank to set it up. I am happy to say that for the first time since before we were married... we have a savings account! Yay! I cannot tell you how much peace of mind this has brought to both of us. The goal now is not to touch it! Why did we never do this before? Oh yeah...we had no money. This simple act of learning to save money rather than spend money is one I hope to now pass down to my kids. I've seen the numbers and finally understand that compound interest = Money Explosion! Of course, not all this will happen overnight because it is a marathon not a sprint. But I am happy to report our "marathon" training has finally begun!
I would encourage all family members to enroll in a Financial Peace University near you! I'm super excited to learn more about how to manage our finances better and will share a little of what I learn each week.
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