90 Days to Financial Stability

There are many ways to get out of debt and I will be discussing those in later posts but today I want to talk to you about perhaps the most important factor for getting out of debt. Taking responsibility for your actions. By taking responsibility, I don’t mean that you have to blame yourself. There is no blame here.   What I mean is that you acknowledge the fact that you were the one that got yourself into debt or allowed someone else to. Here’s what I mean.   In 1999, I went from earning minimum wage as a part time sales clerk to making $20,000 a year when the federal government hired me. Six months later, I more than doubled that income when I transferred to another position.    Just before my one-year anniversary, I woke up partially paralyzed on one side of my body. The doctors diagnosed me with multiple sclerosis and within three months, I went on disability and took a 30% cut in pay. The problem was that for that year I spent money as i...

If you look back to Tuesday February 13, 2018, you will see that I am discussing the history of women and money. Today, we continue. Next, we move into ancient Rome. The Romans were more liberal than the Greeks were. This culture allowed women divorce, hold property and inherit. Divorces were easy to get and men had the legal right to retain custody of children. In 565 AD, the Byzantine empire, Justinian laws allowed women to be married without a dowry though there were pre-nuptial gifts which, if a woman cheated on her husband, the man was allowed to divorce her and keep the gifts. He was also entitled to keep the dowry, if there was one, and a third of any property she possessed! Some working women, such as prostitutes and tavern-owners, did not have the right to marry Roman citizens and Roman men could only keep them as concubines. Emperor Justinian’s wife, Empress Theodora – a former actress and wool spinner – left her jobs when the Emperor started to court her. ...

Jill is a divorced woman in her forties. She lives from paycheck to paycheck, trying to make ends meet. There are months she isn’t sure that she’s going to have enough money to meet her obligations and then Jill has to scramble, taking money from one bill to help pay another. She makes a decent income but doesn’t know why she is always broke.   She knows she has to do something so she decides to start a budget.   She makes a list of her income and all her expenses and sticks with the plan. For a little while. Soon though, Jill finds herself slipping back into her old habits and struggling to pay everything. Jill is convinced that she can’t stick to a budget and budgets don’t work. Does that sound familiar? Have you ever gone through something similar? Have you started a budget only to fall off it within months? You aren’t alone, many people do this. There are many reasons this happens. 1.        The budget is too ...

Have you ever heard someone say it is easy to stay out of debt – just spend less than you earn. How does that make you feel? When I hear someone say that, it pisses me off!  First, it sounds arrogant and condescending and secondly, it insinuates that people with large amounts of debt are stupid. Those who have debt, realize that they wouldn’t have any debt if they spent less than they earned.  Well, guess what? Those in debt already know that and telling them to do that does not help the present situation. If you can’t give helpful advice then don’t say anything. There are so many reasons people end up in debt. A health issue is a big one even for those who live in Canada where there is publicly funded health care.  Having a stroke, heart attack or a chronic illness comes with extra costs. What do you if the government or health care plans won’t pay for these extra costs?  You find the money somehow.  The same goes for dental issues. Going to the ...