1 Jul

What, Me Worry? Who Needs a Paycheck Anyway.

Posted by the Dad in Climbing Out.

…find work that fits your passions and natural skills. [...] chuck your TV out the window and fire yourself.

A simple fact: climbing out of debt requires a paycheck.

Yesterday the company I work for laid off 44 people. That’s about 15% of the work force. Five of them were in my department. That hit pretty darned close to home.

We may be living on a plan these days, but I was up last night thinking about those 44 folks and wondering what they were doing. I wonder if they are debt-free with an emergency fund, just climbing out, or lying awake stunned and scared.

Although our emergency fund is small at $1,000, not even enough for one month’s expenses, I am not afraid of getting laid off again. When that went down we were swerving through life with eyes blissfully shut to our financial reality; clinging to Stuff, spending without paying attention, and bouncing from one “emergency” to another. In contrast, we have spent the last five months living fiscally on purpose. Money is spent before it arrives and all we are left with is executing the plan as agreed.

Perhaps that should not give me any comfort when faced with being let go, but it does. We are different people now. Stuff seems a lot less important and I’m far more willing to get rid of it to get out of debt. The house, while home, is still just a house and we’d be willing to sell it too. Don’t get me wrong, we like the place, but we accept the mess we’ve made as well as the responsibility to clean it up.

In No More Mondays Dan Miller says we are all taught a paycheck mentality from the earliest days of school. Follow the rules, color in the lines, don’t make waves and you’ll get a good grade — a paycheck. Miller goes on to encourage us all to find work that fits your passions and natural skills. To chuck your TV out the window and fire yourself. I’m thinking I’ll try to be debt-free first.

Whatever comes I know we are going to make it. If it means selling the house and moving into a two bedroom rental, so be it. I don’t know that another round of layoffs is coming, but I do know that our heads are not in the sand and that what we do will be deliberate and arm-in-arm.

Today, though, I am greatful for the paycheck I have — even if it means a few more Mondays.

the Dad


2 Responses to this post.

  1. Tam's Gravatar

    Posted by Tam on 07/02/09 at 5:02 pm

    Awesome. Just awesome.
    That has been the biggest relief in this process for me so far. Disentangling from the STUFF. Our house will be on the market by the end of summer. Freeing up at least $1000 to send to the debt snowball feels much more important than ‘owning” a home.

    Thanks for the continual inspiration.

  2. T's Gravatar

    Posted by T on 07/02/09 at 6:54 pm

    Great, great blog ~ I’ve enjoyed reading your posts.

    I can’t agree more with you here. My company has been on a roller coaster for months…some days making me wonder when the paycheck will stop. However, being on BS2 on the TMMO plan, I’ve come to a resolution (no matter what the circumstance is that would take away our income) … step by step we let “things” go, hold on tight to each other, and wake up to a new day. We now are on a plan.

    (I’ll admit though – some days it just stinks – I have to come back and read my motto when the roller coaster takes me to the bottom.)

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