Performed "Plastectomy" as Dave Says….
Today, I performed a “plastectomy”. That’s Dave Ramsey’s term for cutting up all your credit cards. Now, all I have left are debit cards for my personal and business checking accounts. Mine were no longer usable anyway, but I still had them locked in a safe, I guess to prevent identity theft or just to keep them out of site. I’m a pack-rat, so there’s no telling why I keep anything. But, it makes for a good garage sale - coming up soon!
After I cut them up I put all the pieces into a pint Ball jar. It’s half full!
It’s too bad the amount of money needed to pay the balances won’t fit in a pint Ball jar. It probably wouldn’t fit in a case of pint canning jars…. 
Anyway, as soon as I get a lid for the jar, I’m putting it on my desk to remind me of where credit cards belong, and in what form - in pieces in a jar. Better yet, never even printed in the first place. I must have a lid around somewhere. I hardly ever throw anything out.
This is really hard for me because I’m 46 and I’ve never been in this position before. I’ve been poor, but not poor and broke. Before I was laid off from my chemistry job at the end of 2003, I was never in debt except for my home mortgage, and $10,000 in student loans that I paid off a few years after I graduated from college. I saved money and lived on less than I made. I accumulated all this available credit over the years when I didn’t need it. A little here, a little there, increased credit line here, another there. Then I got desperate, and desperate led to stupid, and I went way into debt that I had no hope of paying back at the time.
Depression will do that to you, too. You’re in a bad position and you don’t see it objectively. All you can feel is overwhelmed and not know what to do, who to consult, where to go for help. So you go into denial and maybe when you come out, everything will be better. That’s the definition of insanity. Continuing to repeat the same thing over and over again expecting a different result.
I was beginning to come out of that period of depression and I kept hearing Dave on the radio on my way home after tutoring every weeknight. The show is on from 7-10 p.m. central here. I kept listening, and that guy was making sense! Finally, someone who made sense! So, I visited his website and then I went down to Barnes & Noble and bought his book - probably with a credit card. I read it a couple of times, and then I joined the MyTMMO website and received a copy of both the book and the workbook. I gave one of the books to a friend who needed the same advice I did, and then I read through the workbook. Then I started working on my first budget. I’ve been going uphill slowly ever since. By slowly, I mean at a snail’s pace. But at least I stopped digging myself into a deeper hole and I am making my way out of that hole.
It’s also great to stretch and flex my creative muscles when it comes to finding ways to earn extra money. The more ways I make extra money, the more ways I seem to run across or think of to make extra money. I’ve scoured the MyTMMO forums for ideas, and the library. I read “555 Ways to Earn Extra Money” by Jay Conrad Levinson. It’s dated. It was first published in 1981 and updated in 1992, but it still holds a treasure of ideas and gets you thinking of ideas that apply now where some of his material is out of date.
Because of all the information I’ve run across, I’ve learned the most important lesson of my life, or at least of this decade — you don’t have to depend on a single source of income to make a good living and you don’t have to put all your earning eggs in one basket. When I lost my job in 2003, I lost my sole source of income, benefits, even my identity in some ways. Now I have a business, a part-time job for another company, and a few very part-time endeavors that also bring in a decent amount of cash. I’m still implementing ideas, and more money comes with each idea. Sometimes a lot, and sometimes a little, but it all adds up. I also never get bored. When I’m not working on one thing, I’m working on something else.
Although this period of my life has been hard; and still is hard and will be hard for quite some time; it’s worth it. I’ve learned some valuable lessons, and I’ve done things and succeeded where I never thought I could. I’ve learned I can do a lot more than I think I can. All I have to do is put my mind and my effort to it, and I can probably make it work.
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