I know it's been a while since I have graced you people with my words. But let me tell you. It's been busy! Okay, thats a lie. I mean, it has been busy but the real explanation is that I haven't had any inspiration to write. I gotta have that feeling of "Oh my gosh! I need to share that with the world!" AKA the 10 people who read this. 😂 I call you guys the OG 10.
The other day, I got the inspiration. It hit me like a ton of bricks. There were two things that just inspired me to write. Not sure if you guys know, but I listen to podcasts often when I clean, and when you are the mom of 6 kids and you have two dogs, who are shedding for summer, living IN the house, cleaning is a constant thing. It never ends. And your girl here probably has some slight OCD or control issues and needs the house to at least feel clean. So it is a constant thing for me. In order to get me motivated to do it, I listen to podcasts. I mostly listen to the Dr. John Delony show and the Ramsey Show because those are the ones that get me motivated in life, period. They mostly think the same way as me and push me to be better and thats what I need. But the other day, Adam had me listen to another podcast and I cannot remember the name of the podcast but it had the woman Abbie Halberstadt, who wrote "M is for Mama." She is a mom of ten (Yikes, and I thought 6 was a lot) and she writes a blog. I figured I would take a listen because I had the book that, once again, I started but never finished. I have at least 10 books on that unfinished list. My ADD or whatever won't let me sit still for a book. Anyways, she was one this podcast and her and the other lady who was talking mention this Bible verse: "
"For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice." James 3:16
Oh my goodness. That was like BAM! That one hit me hard. I have so much jealousy and selfish ambition in me. Thanks to social media, I am always seeing what everyone else is doing and everything they have and I am like, "Dang. I am like way behind." Or "Dang. I don't have any of that." It's real easy to fall into that trap. But here is the thing I have to say to myself every time I start feeling that jealousy creep into my life: "STOP IT!" Sometimes out loud and sometimes in my head. I'm sure people think I am a crazy person, but that's fine. I've embraced my weird.
Adam and I have made a decision in our lives right now that we are so tired of being in debt and having those student loans looming over us. Before we sold our house, it was credit cards, car loans, plus the student loans and we were drowning in sending our hard earned money to lenders. We felt trapped and we were "slave to the lenders." And we have had enough. We were hoping that selling our house was going to be a slam dunk, but it wasn't and that's okay. I don't think our money habits and spending would have changed and maybe that's what God is teaching us in this. We are learning how to live off little, like for real. Because before we had little and were spending like we had big, if you know what I mean.
Yes, it's true, we are Dave Ramsey fans, which is much like saying you do Crossfit , but in the financial world. I'm not super vocal about it just like when I was super into Crossfit. People will get super judgy and that's fine. You can have your opinion as long as you let me have mine. I'm not going to convince you to join my side, especially if you are super passionate about hating the thing. Haha! Anyways, Dave is all about getting out of debt and building wealth and that sounds good to me. That's really our goal in all this getting out of debt. We want to get to the point where we are building our wealth, where we have our house, help kids with college or weddings, save for retirement, and just be able to give, give, give. We desire so much to be able to help others. It's hard to do that when you don't have the margin. And it's going to be hard work but I feel the benefits that will come out of the hard work are so worth it. We want better for our kids. We are hoping that watching us work so hard and even watching us in the struggle will teach them not to do the same in their lives. We don't hide the struggle and we don't hide the awesome times, obviously.
Back to the verse I shared earlier. Because I can get that jealousy over what other people have or I start just worrying about myself like, "gosh, I want that because it will make me feel good." or something to that effect, disorder 100% happens. We have our budget and we have to stick to it but when I want that cheeseburger or I want something else that isn't exactly budgeted for, it all goes haywire and we have to move things around in the budget and it's a mess and it takes away from our main goal. And yes I know, the verse probably is talking about something totally different, but it's just an example in my life. And y'all are probably like, "Dang girl, it's just a budget." Yes, yes it is, but I'm a nerd and I like when my budget categories stay where they need to be and don't go over. 😂 But that's beside the point. I believe I said it in my last post, comparison is the thief of joy.
Rachel Cruise (yes, Dave's daughter, but I just love her) also said it well. She just posted a video yesterday talking about comparison so I'll share it here because it did speak to me: (click the link below)
Comparison - Rachel Cruise
So yeah. That's the jist of what I had to share today. It took me a week to write this because I felt passionate but then it would fizzle and then come back and then fizzle. It's been a wild ride. Ha! I hope this rambling spoke to you in some way or made you think me strange in another way, which is cool. Or most of all, I hope it made sense. I rarely go back and edit because I'll end up erasing all of it. So like the video above, don't compare yourself to others. We are all on our own journey and they all look different and we are all in different places in life. You do you and get er done. As for us, we will be working hard for this next year to find peace and to seek that freedom that will quiet those anxiety alarms in our brains!
I'd like to end with a song that spoke to me during my thinking up of a new post. And goodness, this one made me tear up. Darn songs.
I could write a whole post about this song but I have already rambled enough of my feelings above. I just know that I am thankful to have a husband and works so hard for our family and one day we will have a story to tell our grandkids. All 800 of them. 😂
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