There was a time in my life where I would come down on myself hard because I was sick and tired of not being able to live the dream. Whatever that meant back then I can’t tell you but I know today that it means living debt free.
If one of my mates had rich parents I would be jealous about it and wished I was that lucky. There was lots of wishing going on and not much doing. Once I had my first job earning money that’s all it took because I never looked back, only to say I’m sorry for judging you in my own little way.
I wanted all the riches back when I was a boy but as I became older and lived through many financial experiences that super-charged my mindset. I’m finally at a happy place in my life where money doesn’t matter so much. It’s just nice to have and money stress is gone for the most part.
I don’t go to work for the money, I go because I love it.
I also don’t dwell on what I don’t have because now I’ve learned that if I want something I must put the effort in to achieve it. Living debt free may not sound like the top of the chain for someone who has surpassed this goal but this is what makes us happy.
Why stop at living debt free when you can go for millions?
I’m not saying that we don’t want to have millions in the bank but it’s impossible to say what I think and feel about that kind of money until I have it. Most people never make it past go when it comes to setting money goals and dreaming big. It takes time and risk. It always will but you must have resources to back your risk or risk losing it all. That’s lots of risk to take without it.
Sometimes risk can back-fire
Mrs. CBB was at the dentist getting her teeth cleaned when the dental hygienist told her that they need financial help and that she can’t keep up with the size of house they bought. It’s massive with over 3000 sq feet and far too much for someone who works full-time and has 3 kids.
“Someone who owns a house my size should be able to afford a maid, I can’t”, she told my wife. Funny enough that’s not the first time I’ve heard that however it makes me question why they would buy the house in the first place?
When you don’t know what you’re getting yourself into it’s not until you’ve lived it that you understand. This is the same thing when it comes to understanding the success of others. Mrs. CBB has been through the entire budgeting process many times with her but they still don’t use one.
It’s her husband who leaves her stranded to do just about everything as he’s never home and always at work trying to make his business successful. So far there hasn’t been much progress and it has caused plenty of arguments as they invested so much money even taking out a second mortgage on the house.
She has to keep working because she is the bread-winner in the family luckily she loves what she does. What a relief to finally hear someone say that. Although it’s clear that they are in desperate need of financial assistance it is also affecting her almost sexless marriage. She’s exhausted, gaining weight, depressed and just wants to progress up the ladder but feels they are at a stand-still.
Her idea was to sell the huge house and buy something a bit more reasonable in size and with an affordable mortgage. With a house their size the bills are expensive as are the city taxes even though they rent the basem*nt for $1200 a month.
When they bought the house it was the price tag that drew them in but taking risk without back-up cash might hurt them unless they find a way to get the business running year-round with profit. The house needed updating which still hasn’t been done as there is no time and no money to hire contractors. With the extra money they earn from selling the house she hopes to pay down debt with it.
Money takes commitment
All she wants is less financial worry in her life and progress to happen and she knows that if she doesn’t do something about it he won’t. Imagine the weight on her shoulders having to deal with everything without the help of her husband? Mrs. CBB told her that it’s no excuse as I work 2 jobs and still cook, clean, budget and play with our son.
She can’t force him to progress to the next level unless he wants to which leaves her between a wall and hand. This is where relationships get tricky especially when one partner won’t put the effort into success building as they are too focused on failures.
Lucky you living debt free
Before leaving Mrs. CBB blurts out something she doesn’t normally say to anyone, “Boy, am I ever glad we paid off our house 4 years ago” and then she stopped what she was doing and said, “Wow, must be nice to be living debt free so young”. Did your parents give you money for the house?
Um, no.
So you see when someone wants to be where you are they automatically assume what they believe it takes to walk in your shoes. This is not the case especially for Mrs. CBB and I. We were never given any monetary lump sums from our parents, ever.
In fact we both saved from the time we were young because we were ready to progress to the next financial level. We both came from families who struggled with money and living debt free was our goal. There was no, “I want to be a millionaire” it was simply about not owing anyone money ever again. Thankfully it worked out the way we had planned it but it wasn’t an easy road but it also wasn’t a lonely one.
Living debt free at a young age doesn’t mean you have been given more opportunity then the next person. It only means that you haven’t found what works for you and the longer you wait the more time you waste searching. Putting a financial plan in place that gets you from A to Living Debt Free is something only you can conquer.
Living Debt Free Notions
Some of the crazy things we’ve heard from people we’ve told that we are living debt free convinces me that financial complaining and assumptions go together. Many of these are what we’ve heard in conversation as we have chosen to tell only limited people about our debt freedom.
I think as we get older now that we’re getting comfortable about opening up about living debt free to others. There really is nothing to worry about and if all else fails we have two ways to handle situations, Yes or No. Full-stop.
- His/Her/Their parents probably gave them money
- He/She/ were probably left a huge inheritance
- He/She/They must live like cheapskates on that TV show
- They must have no social life unless it’s online if they even have internet
- He/She/They must be cheating the system, stealing or scamming people for money
- He/She/They would be boring friends to have if they won’t spend money
- He/She/They must be working under the table illegally for cash
- He/She/They must be working in the drugs and sex trade.
- He/She/They must have won the lottery or come into it another way
This is only a fraction of the craziness we’ve both heard over the years. Writing this blog post made me realize how important it is to learn from the success of others and forget trying to second-guess yourself.
Start now don’t procrastinate
Dreams about living debt free for us started when we were young and has never stopped slapping us at the back of the head. When we fall we get back up again and jump the hurdle. Now that we are living debt free we can look back and say that we owe our success by learning from others success.
If you continue to say, “I can’t” , “I won’t”, “He/She won’t” then you will wake up in the same predicament day in and day out. Even the happiest of people who aren’t living debt free know that as long as they find ways to make ends meet and save money they are progressing even if it’s a slower pace then they’d like.
Go ahead and presume what you want but where will that get you? Nowhere because no one cares about what you think. The only person it is damaging is yourself because you’re putting jealousy above your success options.
Moving up the ladder
In order to move up you must get up and do something about it. Instead of looking up at the people who are progressing start climbing the ladder and don’t worry about the life you are leaving behind. You have something better waiting for you. Just believe in yourself.
I know that I’ll never judge someone again that has more than we do because I’d rather want to know how they did it. I’m no longer afraid to talk to strangers about money nor questions others who are successful about their secrets.
I don’t care that they are one step or even two or three steps ahead, all I care about is that I continue to learn about progress. Our goal is to continue living debt free because we’ve learned that money is simply money. Never Enough always Too Much.
Discussion Question: Have you ever thought negative about someone or a family who has money? What kinds of things did you say about them that you would like to take back? I ask this because you might be on that same step in the ladder as they are now and are aware of what you need to do to keep moving up. You may also understand why you said certain things about people who are successful but potentially not true.
Top Finance Post
This week I made my way over to a new personal finance blog called Four Pillar Finance to read a post titled, “The Awareness Ladder” and I’m glad I did. It actually ties in with my post today because without living through something or trying something you won’t know what it’s like until you get there. If you want to make your way up the awareness ladder you must educate yourself in order to move to the next rung. Excellent post.
A week in my life
This week was about appointments, sleep and yard-work and it flew by. Since the weather was raining most of the week I took advantage of fertilizing the lawn. Thankfully I didn’t burn it like I did last year because I was rushing.
All it takes is one embarrassing disaster for me to never do it again. Of course Mrs. CBB was going on and on about making sure I water the grass enough. I knew it was going to rain as I timed it right although I knew it might not.
All is well with the front yard so we can all relax now and have a beer. Right! No, there are now wasps circling the top of the garage that I have to deal with. Looking out the back window the other day I noticed quite a few on the deck. Since our neighbours have had issues with nests over the years I thought there must be another one. I just didn’t think it would be on our house.
Mrs. CBB is terrified of bees, hornets and wasps like most people are so now I’m tasked with finding the problem and solving it. Hopefully it won’t cost me too much money if I have to call someone in but we have a home maintenance budget for a reason.
As you know I’ve been super busy with work-related agendas at the moment and planning our vacation. I have almost no time for much else and even squeezing in a couple of runs every few days is challenging but it’s important so I do it.
Other than that, I cleaned up the back garden of any dead weeds and plants again and it’s starting to come along. I’m hoping once I start renovations again that I can actually finish them this time around. I just found out that a house like ours just sold for over double what we paid for it.
I was in awe when I heard the final purchase price. Scared as well because prices are getting near the $700,000 mark just to buy a decent house. That’s what you get for living in the Greater Toronto Area I suppose.
Exciting!
Until next week… Enjoy every day.
Mr.CBB
CBB Published Posts
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Top Post This Week: How Much Should My Grocery Budget Be?
- Should we bother renovating before we sell our home?
- 5 Grocery Store Tips for the Busy Shopper
- Flaky Corned Beef Puffs
Making a difference (MAD) 2017
Welcome to the 2017 Making A Difference series! Join the networking movement of Personal Finance Bloggers around the world.
If you are a personal finance blogger and would like your blog to be featured simply drop me an email. I’m currently booking June/July/August 2017-Limited spots.
Personal Finance Bloggers and Fans: I’m currently recruiting for guest posts on the blog while we go away on holidays. This is your opportunity to get published on CBB. If you have a topic idea and interested please contact me via email. canadianbudgetbinder@yahoo.ca let’s talk.
HeyEveryone!
I’m Sarah and I blog over at ‘Smile & Conquer‘ and I’m so happy to be included inMr.CBB’s ‘MAD’ feature.
I live in Edmonton, Alberta with my boyfriend of 11 years, two dogs and two cats and have been a part of the personal finance blog-o-sphere for a little over a year.
After graduating with an Arts degree in 2008 and no idea what I wanted to do, I took a job in finance and haven’t looked back. My story isn’t one of climbing out from under crushing levels of student debt, shout out to Mom and Dad who helped me through.
I have always enjoyed writing (back to the Arts degree…) so I decided to combine that love with the knowledge I had from my day-job. On Smile & Conquer you will find words of wisdom from my experiences at work, including topics like debt repayment, budgeting and saving for retirement, along with some anecdotes from my life.
Good money habits are learned behaviour but there isn’t enough focus placed on financial education. My hope is that I can share tips to help my readers improve their finances and set themselves up for a secure future without sacrificing too much right now. Feel free to check out my blog, I’d love to get to know some of you!
Sarah
Fan Brag of the Week
Send in your deal or brag of the week to canadianbudgetbinder@yahoo.ca along with a photo and small write-up to be entered into our yearly draw.
Enter as many times as you like. If your brag gets featured you get an extra ballot in the draw.
Hey Everyone!
I have found couponing to have become more and more difficult over the last couple of years.
I think companies started paying more attention to the value of their coupons therefore making it harder to get free items.
I used to get my favourite Secret deodorant free or close to it all the time. Now I often still pay $1 or more.
I have never tried lady speed stick but I’m going to because of this deal ?
Lady Speed Stick reg $3 at Walmart x 8=$24. PM to Giant Tiger $1.97 x 8=$15.76
4 x $2.50 wub2 coupons =$7.81 including tax! $.72 each or $.98 each including tax
Thanks,
Jen 🙂
CBB Words of Wisdom
I Want To Eat This
I’m a huge fan of pineapple so when I found this recipe for Hawaiian Tortellini Salad from The Slow Roasted Italian blog I knew this was a salad I would love. I’ve made tortellini salad many times but it’s the combination of spices, flavours and ingredients that make it unique. I love the Spring and Summer colours in this salad and the juicy pineapple.
DIY Weekly
Over at FloridaCitrus.org they have a pretty cool tutorial about how to DIY a Citronella Candle which we all know could get pricey around the summer months. No need to buy one when you can make them for a fraction of the price.
Create the perfect mood for any occasion with Orange Rosemary Citronella candles. This simple DIY project will make your summer gatherings with family and friends more festive and enjoyable, while keeping unwanted pests at bay.
Search term giggles
Always begin and end your day with a SMILE!- Mr.CBB
Every week I get tens of thousands of people visitCanadian Budget Binderbecause they did a search online and found my blog.
Most times funny, Sometimes serious.
- Wife Spends Too Much On Food- Hey that’s not that bad, it could be worse. If you don’t already have a grocery budget it sounds to me like you need one.
- Dealing with an extreme hoarder money husband– Woah, so where did we pack that luggage again? Hopefully he gets the help he needs.
- Ripped off by Cogeco– Next..
- ATM gave me an extra $40– And you still have it? lol.. Do what’s right.
- Do you have to report extra earnings while on maternity leave?- Think about it.
That’s all the fun for this week, thanks for dropping by and we’ll see you all again next Saturday.
Mr.CBB
Don’t forget to Follow me on Social Media and Subscribe to the blog.
Hey…if you see any mistakes let me know. I’m not an editor just a guy who likes to write and yes I make mistakes.
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