MBL 7 - Breadwinner Breadwinner, Who's Cooking Dinner?

Happy to be back after a long hiatus, we are discussing the emotional and logistical challenges we are facing after making a serious lifestyle adjustment in the past year.

Two things crystalized for me during this discussion:

• It is incredibly difficult to feel comfortable or entitled to provide input in an area in which you are not actively contributing. While any glimpse into the dregs of the social media world might indicate otherwise, I think for most of us, in our personal lives, when we divvy up responsibility we often also relinquish ownership. For me, going from an equal contributor to our household income to no income has been a challenge in terms of trying to remain an engaged partner in our finances.

• It is not always a clear and linear path to the goal line. While some financial goals are fairly straight forward (e.g. I want to purchase a new bike, so I will save $X per month until I have saved enough to buy it), many are more complex. In retrospect, our goal to tackle all our outstanding debt 5 years ago enabled us to make our big move this past year. All we knew was that reducing our debt reduced our fixed expenses which would increase our financial freedom. We didn’t know it would set us up to be able to give up my income and relocate our family. Getting your financial house in order is always a good idea. It will open possibilities down the road that you might not even see yet.

Thanks for tuning in,

-Sarah