Gò0dNews

Gò0dNews on Money Matters
Another Year Older . . . Any Wiser
W
ith the turn of another new year, we
reflect on the past year and remember
our regrets of where we fell short on last
year’s New Year’s resolutions. This is a sobering
exercise, typically ending in the self-assessment,
“What happened” After all, we were committed to
those goals (sort of, for a while anyway), but there
were some resolutions that we never achieved. So
we are reminded of that maxim which says jeeringly,
“The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”
Since one of the top New Year’s resolutions is
to save more money and get out of debt, one might
do well to remember another famous maxim: “The
definition of insanity is to keep doing the same
things you’ve done in the past and expect to get a
different result.” If you were one of the millions of
Americans whose goal was to make better financial
decisions, how did that work out for you An honest
and candid self-assessment may be in order at
this point.
• Did you really save more money last year If
so, how Couponing Putting money into a
savings account or toward your retirement
savings or kids’ college funds
• Did you make substantial and
deliberate progress toward
paying off
by Andrew Lee
debt Did you really pay down the principal
balances of loans, or did you merely make
the regular monthly interest payments
• Did your income increase at all last year If
not, why not Might you earn more income
by temporarily taking a second job or by selling
items in a yard sale or online
• Have you gotten on a written budget yet, and
are you really trying to make financial decisions
about purchases based on this written
monthly budget (or did this goal get listed
again for your 2015 resolutions)
• Were you able to give charitably to all the
worthy causes you wanted If not, why not
Even if we did set and meet some of our New
Year’s resolutions, it’s natural for us to feel discouraged
about where we fell short or missed the
desired goal. But if we can learn from our past
mistakes and correct them, we have hope for a better
future.
Here is an example of a financial mistake I
made when I was a young bachelor. After signing
a three-year lease on a flashy sports car, I entered
the third year of the lease and realized that I would
certainly exceed the allowable mileage on the car,
which meant I would have to pay thousands of
dollars in extra fees. During this time, courtship
was quite a challenge considering I had to park
my flashy sports car most of the time
and ask Esmerelda, “Can you pick me
up so I can take you on a date” Lucky
for me, she was a good sport, but it
was definitely a teachable moment for
both of us, and we’ve never leased a
car since.
Learning from our mistakes is one
of the great gifts with which God has
blessed us.
10 // January 2015
Dr. Andrew Lee is associate
professor of English at Lee
University. He also serves as a
coordinator for Dave Ramsey’s
Financial Peace University. He
and his wife Esmerelda have
three children.