This week in our personal finance class I have the opportunity to teach. Today I sat down and read through and studied the lesson and I loved learning and relearning principles of self reliance. This has been such a fun class and I am grateful to get my spending under control better. Not that it was out of control too much, but I had neglected one of the most basic principles of financial stability and security which is to track where the money is going. This class has helped me get back on track with my tracking and has made me a lot more conscientious about where my money goes.

This weeks lesson is about paying our tithes and offering as well as saving for the future. I do well paying my tithing. I strive to be generous with my other offerings, although, because I wasn’t budgeting very well, I wasn’t doing as well in that area as I could have been. Savings is a whole different story. I like to save money, but it seems like every time we get a little ahead something happens that costs a fair amount of money, like a child wrecking a car or dental or medical needs, etc. Those things cost a fair amount of money usually and cause a large drain on the savings account. However, as we have been committed to paying our tithing, the Lord has always blessed us with the ability to pay those things and not go into debt to do so, so I am immensely grateful for the Lord’s help in that regard.

Going through this class, and especially as I have been working on our own money as we have gone along, I realize that I have been spending more money on wants, particularly things that make my “mom job” easier, like quick meals and eating out too much. And really, it’s not such a huge time saver as we have to travel to get meals if we eat out, and the quick meals that you can buy, still take almost the same amount of time to prepare as a home cooked meal, it’s just more hands off. I also didn’t realize how much money I was spending on snack type foods throughout any given week. There were many other areas that I didn’t realize how much they were costing as well, things that we have grown accustomed to, almost feeling like they are a necessity, but realizing that really, they just cost more money.

So I have been cutting back on what we are spending. I have been adjusting my mindset (again) to see what we are purchasing from the stand point of: Is it a necessity or a nicety? And what has been the result? Peace. I didn’t realize how much stress managing, or not managing, our money was having on my unconscious mind. We have maintained being out of debt, but not by much the last couple of years, and apparently it was wearing on my mind more than I realized. It’s interesting to me how being aware and being intentional about how we spend our money makes a huge difference internally and mentally.

I think that this internal awareness and intentional living has a big impact on our mental state and can also have an impact on our physical bodies given a long enough period of time of internal instability caused by lack of self reliance. There is freedom in self reliance, freedom from obligations to others, freedom to do as we desire, freedom of conscience, freedom from worry, and of course peace. This has been a fun class. The concepts aren’t new, but the reminder is timely. I am grateful for the opportunity to take the class, to teach this week, and to continue to be reminded of the importance of personal and financial self reliance. Most especially I am grateful for peace.