Carnival of Personal Finance is up-version #233- Two hundred thirty three-I wonder what that means in Dog Years?
Please visit “A Gai Shan Life’s” site linked above and review the posts chosen. For those of you who don’t know, a Carnival is a compilation of posts on a certain subject, reviewed and posted in one place for the ultimate in convenience for all.
Please check it out-great tips to help with that tendency to overspend during the holidays.
One of the chapters in my soon to be released book, The Millionaire Nurse discusses the importance of giving. No one becomes a successful nurse/person without much help along the way. This may be an accident of birth-having loving parents. Or is it a special mentor/teacher/friend who showed you the way, when you were close to giving up? Giving money or our time in service to others is a way of paying back for all the blessings we have received.
Free Money Finance has a great blog post today about givers. The premise is that those who give are happier, and as a result tend to become wealthier. The post is based on an article written by an economist at BYU studying the act of giving.
I placed my chapter on giving at the end of my book. After reading these discussions, maybe I should have put that chapter at the beginning. There are a lot of stories out there about those whose giving continued even during times when it would be easy to say “maybe next month”.
One of the nurses in my practice was just discussing the other day-how, in her experience, every time she thought there was no way she could make that tithe check not bounce-the money just seemed to always be there. God works in mysterious ways, but He does work.
So let us all remember, don’t wait until you are successful to give. Even those of us who have little money can give a little of our time to help others. Ring the Salvation Army bell, be a big brother or big sister. Help out at a soup kitchen, or go by the nursing home and visit the elderly as another nurse friend of mine does.
As the above posts discusses, it may not just make you feel richer, and happier; you may truly be better at building your own wealth if you learn to give sooner, rather than later.
Please let us know your stories on giving-how it makes you feel and whether you feel happier as a result.
Remember the song, The Twelve Days of Christmas, listing all the things “my true love gave to me”. I thought in honor of the season, I would give Twelve Ways to not becoming a Millionaire Nurse.
So here goes:
Yes I gave you a baker’s dozen just to see if you were paying attention. Which to me is the number one thing that will help most folks manage their money-just pay it a little attention-give it some love as the saying goes. Make it a priority in your life to learn about and understand how money works, how savings grow over time in an interest bearing account. Learn what your money mistakes are and make a plan to deal with it.
And if you need Emergency Money Resuscitation, check out my free ebook. I will also send you my free mini-course on personal finance.
Please let me hear from you about your most common problems involved in managing your money-I want to help, and the way to getting better is to admit the problem, so please make a comment or ask a question.
I have also posted this question-” What are your most common money mistakes ?” over at Cash Commons-check out those answers too.
I am going to spend Thanksgiving with my children-for the second year in a row. It is kind of nice to just show up-(with the turkey of course)- no I don’t mean my wife, I mean the birds I smoked. I will also be spending time with my son’s fiance’s parents for the first time. Knowing their daughter, I know we will get along well and have a great time.
In one of the chapters in my soon to be released book, The Millionaire Nurse, I spend a great deal of time on quality of life issues. Money and money problems, of course, is a common cause of family stress, and divorce.
But many families quality of life does not suffer because of money, as much as lack of focus. Life is so hectic with both parents working, sports activities, dance, music for the kids. All of the family tied to their phones and televisions-texting, facebooking, googleing, yahooing, tweeting-they spend little or no time face to face with no outside distractions.
So, during the next month between now and Christmas, plan to spend one evening a week with your family with the following restrictions:
Now, I don’t want to hear excuses-”I work nights!” ” We can’t eat without the tv on.” “I don’t know how to cook.” “My husband won’t participate.” ” I am single, and have no friends.”
We are always able to accomplish that which we feel is important. So rearrange your schedule, make a new friend, show the kids who is in charge, and I know that you know how to make your husband do what you want, now don’t you…..
I can guarantee, that your holiday season this year will be more meaningful, and remembered by each member of the family as the “Best Holiday Season Ever”.
So from my home and family to yours, Have a Great Thanksgiving.
And if you try my seven step method to a great holiday season, let us know how it goes. Would love to hear and to share with others how your life and the life of your family was changed as I know it will be.
Unsolicited credit card offers: When you go to the mailbox, looking for that letter from a loved one-(do you remember letters?). Or maybe you are looking for a favorite magazine or newspaper (do you remember newspapers?). I know when I check my box I am unfortunately receiving many unsolicited credit card offers-probably 1-2 per day.
The credit card companies get credit information from the credit bureaus, and if you meet their financial criteria-they send you an offer. Now before the recent recession and the bursting of the credit bubble, we all heard stories of credit card offers addressed to children, dogs, and dead people. Whether they have now decreased the offers from the credit card companies with the currently decreased credit availability, or just sending more to less people now, who knows.
If you would like to stop receiving those offers then I can help. You can go to this website for opting out of credit card offers. Fill in the necessary identifying information, and voila, no more credit card offers filling your mailbox. If you would rather make a phone call then try 1-888-5-optout.
What other advantages to stopping those annoying credit card offers?
Now if the only mail you get is credit card offers and you will miss the full mailbox, let me know and I will send you a few catalogs that are also filling my mailbox. Maybe I will write another post on getting off catalog lists-but since most of those are my wife’s, maybe I better leave that one alone.
Now if you need “Emergency Money Resuscitation” go my website linked here, and get a free ebook. This will also result in getting a free short course on financial management-did I mention free.
Please let me know if you have any credit card offer stories to tell.
Danielle, aka The Frugal Lawyer, blogged this week, a mea culpa of sorts, about purchasing a new car. She had hinted at her indiscretion earlier in the week, but finally confessed. I have come to enjoy her writing while participating at Cash Commons, a new question and answer site about money problems.
Far be it from me to pick a fight with an attorney, as an Ob-Gyn I am genetically afraid of lawyers….
But, so far, the comments on her post have been all congratulatory in nature, and as she is a self-confessed recovering spend-thrift, I think I would lose points in the personal finance blogosphere, yes maybe even a little bit hypocritical, to let her get completely away with buying a new car.
So for all The Millionaire Nurse wannabe’s here is my list of reasons why buying used is better, when buying transportation:
So, before anyone points out my personal hypocrisy, in the spirit of true confession, I will admit that I own, (or the banks own) several investment lots on the Gulf coast, that I purchased at the height of the real-estate boom, that have now dropped significantly in value, and though I am paying them off as quickly as possible, I do admit that I made a big mistake in not purchasing them with cash or not at all.
The Frugal Lawyer also makes me a little jealous when she describes the personal pleasure she gets from driving her “new green machine” (my words not hers). When I climb in my 10-year-old paid for truck that gets 16 miles to the gallon, I am thinking about what I am going to do that day-not how I am saving the planet.
But maybe that is because I am over 50, and male, so I just don’t get that emotional attachment she has with her new vehicle, with my truck. So far the truck doesn’t seem to mind my emotional detachment, but maybe I am just not listening…
So, do I want Danielle to feel guilty every day she gets in her new car? No, just like I am trying to quit beating myself up for trying to be a real-estate baron. We just need to continue to learn more about our relationship with our money, and try hard to be a good example in the future to those we are trying to help on their path to financial freedom. Which is, I think, both of our goals in blogging about personal finance.
