Growing up, I remember riding my bicycle in the driveway with my brother and sisters. I had a pink Huffy bike with a white basket in the front and pink streamers coming off the sides of the handlebars. It was every little girl’s dream! Our house was up on a hill with a long, steep driveway.
I remember scribbling notes and pretending to write in cursive when I was a little girl, before I even really knew what cursive was. I would do this every day, and it would give me a sense of accomplishment. I loved folding up my piece of paper and putting it in the white basket on my pink bicycle. I would ride around for a bit, then take the piece of paper out and read the directions that I had scribbled on it. I started doing this at the age of five and continued to do it until I could actually write in cursive.
You may be saying to yourself, “Cute story, but what does it have to do with being a Spender?” Because of this journey I’ve taken, I realized that I am a person who likes to have things mapped out. I like to know where I am going, and I don’t like getting or being lost. I really hate getting lost, and not just in the physical sense, but also in the sense of not having a plan in my life. I am still like that little girl writing out make-believe directions for a journey on a pink bicycle.
My favorite subjects in school were math and science, because they had a definite answer. I like to know with 100 percent certainty that I am either right or wrong. As far back as I can remember, I’ve been an all-or-nothing person. I give it 100 percent or I just don’t do it. If I don’t think I can be the best, I forget about it and move on to the next thing.
This is a good character trait when it comes to losing jobs or getting my feelings hurt, because I don’t think much about it and just move on. It also helped me develop a fearless attitude about life. I want to live life, not just sit passively and let life go by. I tend to be impulsive, because I don’t want to take the time to think things through.
Being an all-or-nothing person becomes a bad thing when it comes to doing something that I don’t enjoy (like dishes or laundry). It also is incredibly bad when it comes to finances.
For years when I was spending money and getting us into tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of debt, I was in the nothing phase of my attitude toward money. I had no map in my bike basket, I had no goals, no determination, no idea what I was doing.
You might be in the same spot in your life, or have the same type of personality. If you don’t, you probably know someone who does.
Sit down and think about where you want your money to go tomorrow, next year, ten years from now. Be inspired, give it your all, and work hard toward achieving those goals.
I’ve used the Spender’s recovery road map that I’ve laid out for you in this book for years. As shown by my credit card experiment, if I try to take a detour or go outside of my fence, I get in trouble. I like to stay within my fence, my safe place, and I can be happy and healthy there.
A Recovering Spender is someone who once caused a lot of financial strain in her family, but managed to learn more about herself. It is someone who has become very aware of her strengths and weaknesses, and of the boundaries needed to keep her in recovery.
It is someone who wants a better future for her family. A Spender in recovery is someone who cares more about others than she does about herself. It is someone who is passionate, kind, and loving. It is someone who wants to make a difference in the world.
A Recovering Spender learns to think creatively and loves financial challenges.
One of my favorite stories from my recovery journey is when we finally saved up enough money to afford new windows for our old home. They were going to cost around $8,000 and we were going to pay for them in cash at Lowe’s. I had this crazy idea that we could buy gift cards from our local grocery store to earn gas points. I figured that if we purchased $8,000 in Lowe’s gift cards from that store, we would earn six free tanks of gas. That would put an extra $240 back into our budget.
I went to my local grocery store to purchase the Lowe’s gift cards, and unfortunately they only had a few of the larger increments left. I ended up buying eighty-three gift cards that day, mostly in $25 increments. It took me over an hour to cash out at the grocery store; each and every card had to be activated, and we hit a line limit on the cash register. It took so long that the manager took over and closed that checkout lane. I was THAT lady!
I came home with a grocery bag full of gift cards and handed them to Mark. He was confused about why, but after I explained it to him, he thanked me. He took that grocery bag full of gift cards to Lowe’s and paid for our $8,000 windows. He also crashed the cash register a few times, and it took him forty-five minutes to check out. He said that he felt like we were that crazy family, but we had gotten pretty used to being that way. We were so dedicated to staying on budget that we didn’t mind doing things like this. We had brand-new windows in our old home, and were $240 richer just by taking an extra hour and forty-five minutes to do things a little bit differently.
In fact, just this morning I paid for my kids’ school lunches with $4 in nickels. I know the school office was probably annoyed, but I wanted to use up the coins from my kitchen coin jar. We have a saying in our house that the money jar is just like finding free money. We stick forgotten or leftover change in it daily, and use it for random expenses.
I am now okay with doing things a little bit differently in order to save a little extra money. I have come a long way from the embarrassment of using coupons and the dread of asking my cashier to take a few things off my grocery bill because I had gone over budget. My goal is being debt-free for the rest of my life, and if I have to do embarrassing things to get there, I am fine with that.
How did everything change? I was inspired. I was 100 percent on board with getting out of debt and curbing my spending addiction. Spending money wasn’t important to me anymore. I decided to start spending as a reflection of my value system. I started to care where my money went. I started to plan and created a road map like I did when I was five years old. Yes, I did miss all the “stuff,” but I realized that my money was better invested in what I valued.
There is a misconception that the hardest part of starting something new is just to get started. I argue that the beginning is actually the easiest part, because there is excitement and eagerness to make it work this time. In reality, the hardest part of any goal is right in the middle, when you mess up (for the millionth time) and have to figure out how to get back in the saddle.
Think about when you first set your budget. You’re excited and hopeful that this is the time that it will stick and you will finally stay debt-free. Then you realize you’ve bounced a check, which caused an overdraft fee, and now you can’t pay your credit card minimum, so you get a late fee on that. Your hard work all starts to unravel right before your eyes, and suddenly you are stuck. Pulling yourself out of that is the hardest part. Waking up that next day and starting over again is the hardest part. If you let the guilt control you, you would probably hop right off and never get started again.
If you were to see a picture of what success looks like, it would look like the letter U. You start off at the left-hand side at the top of the U and you are so excited and hopeful. As the journey goes on, you see some success, but the excitement is wearing off and you suddenly find yourself in the pit. That is the hard part, the part where you want to give up but know that if you keep on going you can achieve your goal. The key is to realize that you are in the pit and the only direction to go is up, to the other side of the U. You start to have success again, and you feel hope. Suddenly, you find yourself on the upper right-hand side of the U, and you’ve done it!
Success comes in steps, it isn’t just a one-time thing. You don’t just wake up and become a successful budgeter after being a Chronic Spender for years. It takes time and practice and messing up. It takes hard work, and dedication, and consistency. But once you come up out of that pit, you have a feeling of valor, satisfaction, and accomplishment. Don’t rob yourself of that feeling by staying in the pit. Many other people get stuck in the pit, but I don’t want you to be one of them.
I recently moved my two-year-old daughter out of her crib and into a toddler bed (called a “big girl bed” in our home). The strange thing is that despite being in the same room, with the same surroundings, she is suddenly terrified of her bedroom. Those boundaries of the crib railings made her feel safe and secure. When they were removed, her sense of security was altered and suddenly she was scared. Despite her continuing to ask to have her crib back, we kept her in her bed but moved it into her sisters’ room. She hasn’t cried since, because she has safety in knowing that her sisters will take care of her.
Since I’ve been budgeting for such a long time, I’ve gotten used to the fence around me. If I accidentally miss a budget night one month I feel scared and exposed—just like my daughter was scared when her boundaries were removed. Those securities are a part of my life now, and I don’t ever want to take them for granted again.
You may be wondering what my life looks like now.
As of this writing of this book we still live in the same 1,800-square-foot house we bought when we moved out of the town house. It is tight with four kids, but in nine years we should have our mortgage paid off in full and have zero debt.
We have two minivans, one of them we bought with cash after negotiating with a car dealer.
Mark and I work full-time together from home on our business. We share online courses and meal plans on my website, laurengreutman.com. Once a month, I travel to New York City to go on some sort of TV show, whether it be the Today show, Dr. Oz, or Fox News. We pay ourselves $6,000 per month from the business as our income and still live very frugally. I still cut coupons and meal plan. I shop at thrift stores for our clothes, and every once in a while splurge on a new dress for a TV segment. Life is crazy running a business while having four small children, but I feel like I am doing exactly what God has called me to do, which is use my weaknesses to teach others. To teach you how you, too, can become a Recovering Spender.
If you want more help staying within your fence, come and join me in the Financial Renovation Community. We would love to have you a part of it!
Being a Recovering Spender doesn’t mean that you will always be stressed and broke. Actually, the reverse is true. The main things you need to remember to stay in recovery are to believe in yourself, set those boundaries, and stay inside the fence! If you stay within your fence, you will be safe! Go outside of the fence and you may get run over by your desires, lack of self-control, and all the wants in life. Trust me, inside the fence is much safer. Within the fence your life will be so much more enjoyable.
Welcome to this side of recovery, where you can live a happy, fulfilled, and debt-free life. It is much better on this side of the fence.