As I mentioned a couple weeks back, Kristen and I were pleased with ourselves for being prepared for "Big Money Day" on September 15th.
At the same time, that also means that times are pretty tight for us as we’ve just paid a massive amount of bills. In fact, this causes a little anxiety and a little "ahhhh!" every time I think about it. For whatever reason, even though that saved money was for this purpose now that it is gone makes me feel in a panic. (Even when there is nothing to really worry about, we’re fine!)
Let me just articulate a couple of temptations I face when things get tight. Maybe it will be helpful to others who live on a salaried income… it’s not like I can just work a little overtime like in the old days. We simply have to budget our way back to "comfort."
- Stop doing healthy things like going on dates with Kristen.
- Get lazy (lazier than normal, that is) on home projects.
- Change our giving habits to the church and other charitable giving.
- Spend money in other areas of my life where I have spending abilities. (Church, YMX)
- Buy something completely unbudgeted, above what we can afford or have planned on, on a credit card.
These are all pitfalls I fight when times are a little "thin" in the bank account. Here’s the thing… we live on a budgeted income. Not very many people can sit down in January and know exactly how many pennies of income they will bring home in 2007… but salaried people can. This actually makes budgeting simple and yet a lot of ministry friends struggle to budget the high’s and low’s of the year into their spending mentalities.
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