Timothy Yordy

Something I haven’t really touched on so far in this ongoing blog journey of mine is the topic of money management. Every day you hear news reports about America’s growing debt and people being tens of thousands of dollars in debt to credit card companies and not being able to pay their mortgage and now expecting the government to help them out. The majority of the people that fall into the categories that I just mentioned obviously have no concept of managing their money and spending within their means. To achieve independence from the rat race and independence from relying on others to do everything for you, you must take care of your money. You must know where its coming from and where its going. Make a balanced budget and stick to it. Utilize the budget to explore areas of excess spending that can be trimmed back or areas to potentially make some extra money.

At my previous job my boss, who made two to three times what I was and his wife brought in a good deal of money too, was always complaining about money issues and not being gable to pay the bills. Between the two of them they were both bringing in more than 100k! There’s no excuse for this kind of poor fiscal planning. I’ve seen so many examples of people who make a great deal more than I do but have nothing to show for it simply because of their spending habits.

If you find yourself in this kind of situation then read these next few lines very carefully. You can change course. You can turn your fortunes around but you have to be willing to do the work that gets you financially fit again. The best advice I can give you is to go buy a copy of The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. The book will impart wisdom to you that you may be lacking and help you find a way to get back on your feet.

Okay we are bad gardeners, I admit it. But we can change really we can. This year we are trying the concept of Lasagna Gardening. Wherein you lay wet cardboard down over the area you are planning to use for your garden and then you cover that in layers of organic material such as compost and other things. This in turn smothers all the grass and weeds underneath and leaves you with a rich medium to plant in on top. That’s the idea anyway. We’ll see how it works.

This year we are planting a lot more variety than previous years. All part of my pursuit of self-sufficiency.

An area that I’ve been looking at more and more lately is the idea of self-sufficiency. Before global trade became so readily available, nations were forced to be self-sufficient. Now everything is outsourced to someone else. America depends on terrorist nations for oil and communist nations for food and goods. And look at the messes it makes?

The same concept applies to individuals and families. If you depend on other people for all of your goods and services then you are at the mercy of whatever the market conditions are. I don’t plan on being able to be entirely self-sufficient but getting away from being TOTALLY dependent is a good goal to have I think.

Something that we are getting into is growing our own fruits and vegetables as much as possible. And from that making our own jellies and preserves. This past year we made enough jelly to not have to buy any for a year. We did have to buy some of the fruit from local growers though because our own production hasnt matured enough yet. I say if it tastes better, is better for you, and is cheaper, why not do it? If you have kids it can also be a great thing to teach them agricultural principles.

Another way I’ve been pushing a little more towards self-sufficiency is doing minor car repairs. I’ve done some minor stuff in the last year or so that didn’t take very long to do and cost a lot less than taking my car to a mechanic.The flip side to this issue is how much of your time is all this taking up? And could that time be better put to use elsewhere? These are questions that the individual needs to answer for themselves. Timothy Ferriss, the author of The 4 Hour Work Week, advocates outsourcing everything to better free up your time. And this idea does have some merit but if you can do more for yourself at less cost than having people do things for you then you don’t need as much income to support yourself.

Take for example someone who is making $40,000 a year working 50 hours a week for some big corporation. Now what if that person took a job making $30,000 a year at 40 hours a week but spent ten hours a week doing things for himself that he previously paid someone else to do? It could be growing some food yourself, walking your own dog instead of paying someone, your own home and car repairs, or any number of things that you pay someone else to do because you simply don’t have the time. I submit to you that taking care of your own life instead of expecting someone else to take care of it for you is much more fulfilling than working yourself to death in order to make millions for someone else.

Many people in the American workforce are feeling frustrated and angry about having to work harder and harder for less money (less buying power as time goes by) while rich in the country only get richer while doing less to obtain that wealth.

Lowlifes have taken this situation as an opportunity to scam people out of money over the internet with Work at Home scams. They promise huge money for almost no work while you sit in front of your computer. When someone falls into these traps the scammers then either deliver nothing to the victim or something completely different than what was being advertised.

I too am someone who has felt the temptation to look into these “opportunities” that seem too good to be true but I know that they are all lies and people just looking to steal my money. I’ve searched deep into the internet looking for a legitimate work at home opportunity that actually pays something and so far I’ve come up empty handed.

Stay clear of these things at all cost. The newest trick is to make multiple websites that are supposedly reviewing a work at home opportunity and saying how great it was compared to all the other ones.

Someday I would like to work from home, but these crooks aren’t the path to that goal.