Today is the final part of letting you all know where I’m at in each area, so as we know we likely have a similar starting point in which to work toward whole health.
I’ll start with relationships. I’m talking about relationships outside of the family circle, those things called friends. I’m not a terribly social human being, I’m not usually the first to strike up a conversation and I kind of like having my kids as an excuse to leave a conversation – or a distraction to keep me from looking lonely. I have a couple of good friends, but I can honestly say I don’t place as much priority on maintaining them well as I’d like. I have 3 or 4 good friends in Arizona, but phone calls are few and far between, if at all, and really, they’re more ‘Facebook Friendships’ now that I’ve moved. I also have a friend in Canada, and we do a girls weekend once a year – she will be visiting me this winter sometime! Otherwise, our relationship is relegated to BlackBerry Messenger. When I do find a good friend, I do think that I AM a good friend, offering help in times of need and investing in the things that are important to them (going to the candles and bags and cooking supplies parties type of investment). Since I’ve been in Georgia, we had a car break down, and since my husband needs my car to get to and from work, I really don’t get out much, so we haven’t had the chance to try to meet people and go to library story hours and such. That’s not to say I haven’t tried otherwise – my daughter made a friend and started hanging out with her, so I invited her mom to breakfast and we’ve begun to spend time together on occasion. I don’t foresee any options of getting out in the near future to make more friends, so going to library story hour and chatting up another mom isn’t an option as a baby step at this time. I don’t even know what to do as a baby step in this area, but I do know that maintaining relationships outside of the family unit is important to whole health, so I’ve got to come up with something! Suggestions will be considered until I come up with something!
I could title the finances section “My Kids Have More Money Saved Than Me”, because it’s true, they do. They do because when we started paid chores, I made them create a goal, and 50% of their earnings each week have to go into their savings jar until they reach the goal. If they decide to put more than 50% in, they aren’t allowed to take it out. The reason I made this rule is because we’ve tried paid chores in the past and they would spend all of their money on junk toys and candy, and then be disappointed that they didn’t have enough to buy something that they would have rather had. I’m hoping to instill the value of saving, as well as some consumer consciousness in their spongy little brains. Back to my own financial health – we are FAR from rich (no rich-white-girl privilege talk on this blog!) My husband works full time and is the sole provider for our family of 6, which includes a 13 year old boy. I know there’s only one direction our food budget is heading!! My present way of budgeting is to pay all the bills when we get paid, and whatever is left over is what’s available for food, gasoline, and any extras we may need. We still live paycheck to paycheck. We rent our home but would like to buy eventually, and preferably a place with some land (so I can have a big vegetable garden, of course!) We do have some credit card debt that we built up over the move, which we’re now working on paying off. We do generally live by the ‘don’t buy what you can’t pay for’ rule, as we’ve struggled through creditor phone calls before in the past and learned our lesson. Up until this summer, we had been debt free since 2009. It bothers me very much to owe anyone anything, so I work quickly to get things paid off. What isn’t paid off on these cards before tax season, will be paid off with our tax returns. About 10 days ago I started logging and tracking all of our expenses on an Xcel spreadsheet in the hopes that I’ll get a good idea of where we’re spending our money and ways that we can save instead. My baby step in this area will be to continue logging our expenses and to go over them each week to see where we could be saving. I will also open a savings account and start contributing something to it each paycheck.
That concludes my synopsis of where I’m starting in each area. A quick review of the baby steps in each area: Spirit – continue with the short Bible study I’m reading (10 minutes a day). Mind – continue reading the books I got at the library for at least 10 minutes a day. Family – spend at least the first immediate 10 minutes with my husband when he gets home. Body – continue with logging food, yoga for 10 minutes, and choose water over coffee after the first cup or two. Relationships – still need to spend some time brain storming on this one! Finances – Open a savings account and put SOMETHING in it each paycheck.
How about all of you? Have you done a mental inventory of where you’re at and decided on a baby step in each area to work on?
Baby Steps to Whole Health 
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