From my list of 12 Proactive Pursuits posted a few days ago, I am picking youneedabudget.com or ynab as my January Project. It’s a software program you subscribe to for 6.99 a month. I keep putting off doing a real budget, but my daughter got me excited about it so I am doing it! Here is the pricing link:

https://www.youneedabudget.com/pricing/

Let me back up. In 2006, I heard a counselor in our Stake Presidency give a talk at our Adult Stake Meeting on President Hinckley’s talk given in 1998. This is the part that got me, especially when I realized President Hinckley had given it 8 years earlier.

“I wish to speak to you about temporal matters.

As a backdrop for what I wish to say, I read to you a few verses from the 41st chapter of Genesis.

Pharaoh, the ruler of Egypt, dreamed dreams which greatly troubled him. The wise men of his court could not give an interpretation. Joseph was then brought before him: “Pharaoh said unto Joseph, In my dream, behold, I stood upon the bank of the river:

“And, behold, there came up out of the river seven kine, fatfleshed and well favoured; and they fed in a meadow:

“And, behold, seven other kine came up after them, poor and very ill favoured and leanfleshed. …

“And the lean and the ill favoured kine did eat up the first seven fat kine: …

“And I saw in my dream … seven ears came up in one stalk, full and good:

“And, behold, seven ears, withered, thin, and blasted with the east wind, sprung up after them:

“And the thin ears devoured the seven good ears: …

“And Joseph said unto Pharaoh, … God hath shewed Pharaoh what he is about to do.

“The seven good kine are seven years; and the seven good ears are seven years: the dream is one. …

“… What God is about to do he sheweth unto Pharaoh.

“Behold, there come seven years of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt:

“And there shall arise after them seven years of famine;

“… And God will shortly bring it to pass” (Gen. 41:17–20, 22–26, 28–30, 32).

(Look at those lean ones chomp into the fat ones!)

“Now, brethren, I want to make it very clear that I am not prophesying, that I am not predicting years of famine in the future. But I am suggesting that the time has come to get our houses in order.’ ( Eight years later the recession hit.)

“So many of our people are living on the very edge of their incomes. In fact, some are living on borrowings.’

“We have witnessed in recent weeks wide and fearsome swings in the markets of the world. The economy is a fragile thing. A stumble in the economy in Jakarta or Moscow can immediately affect the entire world. It can eventually reach down to each of us as individuals. There is a portent of stormy weather ahead to which we had better give heed.”

And,

“President J. Reuben Clark Jr., in the April 1938 general conference, said from this pulpit: “Once in debt, interest is your companion every minute of the day and night; you cannot shun it or slip away from it; you cannot dismiss it; it yields neither to entreaties, demands, or orders; and whenever you get in its way or cross its course or fail to meet its demands, it crushes you” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1938, 103).”

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1998/10/to-the-boys-and-to-the-men?lang=eng

When I heard this talk 8 years after it had been given, the student was ready.  I was finally paying attention. Those had been “fatfleshed” years from 1998 to 2006 for America, and the timing made me nervous. I was hearing the warning much later than I should have. I kept thinking, “Why haven’t I heard this talk before?” I went through our mortgage, car loans and credit cards,  and I realized we were paying about 2500.00 in interest a month.  Whaaaaaaaaaat? I thought we were very frugal. We had worked for ten years to pay off a 100,000.00 student loan plus 33,000.00 in interest. After hearing that Stake Conference talk in 2006, we started focusing and paying down our debt.

We found Dave Ramsey who told us, “Live like no one else, and later, you can live like no one else.” We believed him. In fact that hooked my husband, because he didn’t see the value in going without unless it led to something great in the future.  We went up Dave’s 7 Steps until now we have what he calls, “financial peace”.

Now to 2016 where I read about You Need A Budget on Mr. Money Mustache’s blog and the founder, Jesse Mecham. I suspected he was a Mormon—Lehi, Utah and 6 kids? It’s a great interview—here is the link:

http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2016/07/28/jesse-ynab-interview/

I never felt the need to use ynab because we used Mint which is free. But there were glitches in Mint and I never got into because I was frustrated by the glitches. I just balanced my checkbook the old-fashioned way with a paper checkbook register. That still wasn’t true budgeting and the truth is:

Life is so much better when you are following a budget.

My daughter Nikki recently started using “You Need A Budget”  and has been raving about it. She has talked one sister into subscribing to it and me. We are currently working on other members of the family. I will post about this Proactive Pursuit throughout all of January. How has your budgeting efforts been?

Disclaimer: I make no money promoting the above products.

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1998/10/to-the-boys-and-to-the-men?lang=eng

http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2016/07/28/jesse-ynab-interview/