You see, Steve is a big proponent of the Paleo Diet. The essence of the Paleo Diet is simple: eat stuff that’s pretty much always been around. Meat and vegetables? Great! Pringles and Doritos? Not so much. If it can’t be found in nature, it shouldn’t be eaten. He has coached at least dozens of people to their health and fitness goals, and he says real results happen when they fully commit to the Paleo Diet.

I’m interested, but disappointed. I like Pringles. I like Doritos. I like ice cream. While I know they are not healthy, I enjoy having them as snacks. My wife is the same way with certain foods. Tell her she can’t have noodles this week and you’ll need to duck before her fist hits you in the face. So, while we try to keep processed foods to a minimum around here, we do enjoy eating them from time to time.

I brought this idea up to Steve, and he recommended that we go for the Paleo Diet at, like, 90% effort. When he goes out to a bar with friends, he’s fine with grabbing a few slices of pizza. As long as he doesn’t gorge himself to the point where he derails his diet, he knows that he’ll be fine.

After reviewing some of his posts on his site, he believes that even trying will get results. After all, even if you accomplish 20% of your ultimate goal, that’s still a heckuva lot more than you would have gotten if you didn’t try at all. It’s an interesting concept, and one I want to explore further. So let’s go after something we’ve never tried before, but temper our fears in the process.

• You’ll get closer to your goal. Want to run 5 miles? Cool. But when you go out and run 1 mile, you don’t get discouraged. After all, that’s one more mile that you ran, as opposed to sitting on the couch. Changing your diet? Even if you change it every other day, that’s 50% closer to a full-on, healthy diet.
• You’ll build momentum when you see results. All it takes is noticing something different about yourself or your life, and you might just be tempted to keep going.
• It will let you try something out for a while, without fear. It can be scary to implement change. So don’t worry too much about it. Instead, try it out. Tell yourself it’s temporary. If the goal is good, you’ll be able to test the waters before going at it with full force.

So let’s set up a plan:

• Pick a goal. Any goal. Ideally, pick something you’ve always wanted to do, but never tried because you thought it was too difficult. Don’t be afraid to challenge yourself. That’s why we’re only going halfway.
• Set up a specific plan. If you plan to do something temporarily, it’s easy to let that goal be engulfed by the day-to-day crap. If you say, “I’m going to eat healthier three days a week,” you’re going to slack off even more. Instead, commit to a specific type of diet, or commit to cutting out certain snack foods. Write it down somewhere so that you remember it. And put a deadline on it.
• Enjoy your “off days”, but keep it under control. If you are dieting or exercising, enjoy your off days by eating guilt-free, but keep some boundaries. The goal of the off day is to allow yourself to enjoy your temptations – not unravel all the work you are putting in on the other days.
• Cut yourself some slack. It’s going to be tough, but focus on the deadline. Make sure you are committing to it. When you know it’s not forever, you psychologically give yourself a break.
• Pay attention to the results. See if you lose weight. Watch your bank account. How do you feel today? How are you sleeping? How is your mood? Whatever your goal is, recognize and celebrate the results.
• If it works, jack it up! Often, you’ll see the little results and you will be motivated to crank it up farther. You’ll change your diet completely and only have one off day, or something. You will start associating good thoughts with doing those things, which will go a long way in keeping you on track.
• It it doesn’t work, cut it loose. When Dave Ramsey tells people to pay off their credit cards and cut them up, he tends to receive a lot of vocal opposition to the idea. On his radio show, he tells them something simple: “Try it for a couple of months. If you find that you really hate it and need to go back to your old lifestyle, you can always get another credit card and start using it again.” In other words, he knows it will improve their lives if they just give it a chance to see for themselves. And he’s right: more often than not, you can always fall back into old habits if you want to quit.

Give yourself a chance to succeed. Instead of looking at the big picture, focus all your energy on just getting started. You run a marathon one step at a time. You eat an elephant one bite at a time. Step-by-step, you’ll start to see the results you were afraid to pursue.

Wait, why is this a small goal? Paying off debts is a huge mountain to start climbing. You’re right – and I didn’t tell you to pay off all of your debts (you should, but that’s not a small goal). I’m telling you to start with paying off one credit card. Too much debt is carried around in this country, and you may be adding to it, so let’s get going.

• It’s the worst kind of debt to have. You could make the argument that student loans are a “good” kind of debt because of the job benefits you allegedly are receiving from your college education. That’s fine. You might say that mortgages are “good” debts to have because of the value of your home. That’s cool, too. But no one can look me in the eye and tell me that credit card debt is good to have around. It is high-interest and it is one of the most difficult things to pay off. In the meantime, it destroys your credit rating and they can toy around with your money all they want while socking you with fees every chance they can. It’s toxic – let’s get rid of it.
• It can slow down the “bleeding”. Frustrated with high debt balances? That’s pretty common. One of the most annoying parts of carrying a lot of debt is the “bleeding” – where you feel like you are going one step forward and two steps back. It’s the idea that you have so much trouble climbing out of debt because the interest gets piled on every month and it feels like you can’t get ahead. Paying off even one credit card starts to slow that bleeding down.
• It should improve your credit rating. If you care about your credit score or whatever, then paying off a credit card will reduce your debt-to-income ratio, and your score will improve.
• It gives you a handle on your finances. The worst part of carrying debt is the feeling that you have no control. This is very common and it can be incredibly frustrating and disheartening. Getting a credit card paid off gives you a sliver of control, which helps you build confidence in yourself and your financial future. Heck, it might even motivate you to start paying off other debts, too!

So how do we do it? Even if you are struggling with debt, you can start paying off a credit card:

• Stop using it. This is the most important step. For you to get out of debt, you have to stop borrowing money. Set up a system to pay close attention to your finances and adjust your lifestyle accordingly. The bleeding will never stop if you use the card right after making a payment on it.
• Choose which card you want to pay off first. There are two schools of thought on this (if you carry more than one credit card): paying the lowest balance first or paying off the one with the highest interest rate first. I’m a big supporter of the “debt snowball”, which means you start with the lowest balance first. This isn’t about saving a few bucks on interest, but about building some momentum and confidence in yourself.
• If you can, transfer your high-interest balances to lower-interest ones. You may not be able to get another credit card, but if you get an offer for a 0% introductory rate, you might want to jump on it. Those rates are usually good for six months or a year, and transferring a balance to it can help you catch up before interest starts being added.
• Sock every available penny at it. Don’t have any available pennies? Grab a side job. Jump on Elance and start selling your services for a few bucks. There are hundreds of different ways you can earn an extra income, and you do have the ability to do it. Downsize your lifestyle a little bit – don’t go out to eat so often. Send that money towards the card. Be vigilant about that balance! I waited tables on the side for six months and paid off a credit card a few years ago. It’s a great feeling to enjoy the fruits of your labor!
• Sell something. Go through your basement and find extra stuff that you aren’t using. Stop with being so sentimental. You might have things worth selling, so toss them on Craigslist and get going.
• Get rid of the card when you are done. I know myself. I know my temptations. When I get a credit card, no matter how much trouble I know it will cause, I wind up just charging stuff to it because I can. It’s a trap, and that’s why credit card companies stay in business. Cut it up. Stop using it. The end.

Do you have any favorite tips for paying off a credit card? Ever done it before? Share in the comments!

It’s amazing to me sometimes how crippling fear of change can be. You start at an early age: when you do something different from the other kids, they make fun of you (well, they did to me, at least). If all the kids get average grades and you get better grades, they target you. If they are all average at sports and you are terrible at them, they laugh at you. If they all watch a certain show on TV and you don’t, you are an outcast. When that happened to me as a child, I started pulling back on everything and spent a good number of years refusing to be myself out of embarrassment.

Three years ago, I was preparing to move out of my brother’s basement. I had been living with his family in a makeshift apartment and it had reached the point where we were all ready for me to move out. I found a place to move in to and I set about the wonderful task of trying to find stuff for the apartment (i.e., kitchen utensils, various small appliances, and so on). I found myself at Best Buy wandering through the TV section, of all places, and I saw a “sale”: a Dynex 32″ HDTV for $499.

Televisions like these wind up a lot cheaper nowadays, but it was a pretty good deal at the time. Despite having a decent sized TV already, I started thinking about why I should get this thing:

• Well, this whole digital switch is going to happen and my TV will be obsolete anyway, right? I’ll NEED a new TV!
• It’ll be a great long-term investment in my entertainment. When all else fails, at least I’ll have a nice TV in HD!
• I’ll be working from home someday, I’ll want a nice TV to watch when I take breaks!

Oh yeah, and I didn’t have any money. So I whipped out the ol’ credit card and swiped it. And there it was: my glorious, 32″ widescreen HDTV.

Things were great. I was very happy with the quality of this TV, and I went out and charged an XBox 360 to it. I set up a nice HD-DVR through my computer hooked up to it, and life was good. I enjoyed Packer games in HD, The Office in HD, and anything else I wanted. I was working from home and life was grand. Easily, this TV was the best thing I had bought in years.

Then things went south.

I reached a point where I didn’t know where the next dollar was coming from. I had weeks where I struggled through a $10 grocery budget. I had an angry landlord who had to sit while I couldn’t pay the energy bills (and we’re talking winters in Wisconsin). I was prioritizing bills (“Let’s see, if I pay my credit card, I can let my electric bill lapse for a week, they won’t turn it off…”).

Some days I would sit and look at my TV. I’d start thinking about how much it was worth, with sadness knowing that it was worth much less now than when I had bought it anyway. Besides that, the interest had piled up on that purchase, so I have been paying hundreds more for this thing.

After all of that, the nice television offered no comfort. You might think it will – like, once you have it, you’ll enjoy it, even if you’re broke. But you don’t. As much of a TV nut as I am, I couldn’t take solace in having a nice TV when bills weren’t getting paid.

True comfort lies in security and accomplishments. Comfort comes from having a plan. That plan may not work out all the time, and sometimes it may blow up in your face. But you need to approach life with a plan – not with stuff. Stuff can be fun in the short-term, and even in the long-term. I still enjoy my nice HDTV. But before I turn it on, I sit down and make sure that I have the more important parts in my life taken care of.

Don’t pump money into a TV, or a car, or a house as a means of security or a nice feeling inside you. That nice feeling needs to be generated by activity. It can’t be bought.

Look at the cute li’l sunshine! Awwww….

As I type this, it’s Monday morning, and the beautiful sunlight is streaming through my tiny window. It’s the only taste of sunshine I’ll get today without sitting in a car driving to work at my windowless cubicle. I like to think of moments like this as motivation to keep plugging away at the business. It’ll get there…

Here are some of my favorite stuff from around the Web this past week:

Gettin’ crap done

Yes, the little-mentioned “GCD” techniques. I’m always about looking at different ways to approach my workweek.

• 8 Small Habits That Make My Daily Life Simpler, Easier, and More Effective [The Positivity Blog] – The beauty of tips like these is that they don’t require a complete overhaul of your life. I already took time this morning to declutter some stuff (#4), wrote down my goals for the week (#5), and I spent my Saturday morning doing my week’s worth of grocery shopping (#2). Boom.
• on economy [mnmlist] – When you see the word “economy”, you immediately think of government spending. That’s the curse of being an American. Economy actually refers to how effectively you make the most of stuff – and it goes beyond money. Leo shares a few simple words that encourage economy in every part of your life.
• 9 Simple Tips for Getting Rid of a Bad Habit [The Positivity Blog] – Yup, another one from TPB. Destroy your bad habits by involving others, focusing on one at a time, and letting yourself feel a little bit of pain (news flash: pain is okay sometimes!).
• The Hard Truths About Building Your Own Success [Dumb Little Man] – The beauty of following blogs is that, every once in a while, you’ll come across a great post that will totally hit home with your current situation. This one was mine.

Make your body happy, and make your mind happy

What’s life without happiness? Answer: a big ball of suck. Take care of your health and your happiness with these articles:

• How to Be Kinder: 11 Fine Tips [The Positivity Blog] – TPB is just knocking it out of the park this week, folks. If you don’t think you need to be kinder, chances are you need to. Part of being happy is sharing in the joy of others. Life ain’t just about you, my friend. Follow these tips to be a more pleasant person to be around.
• 7 Superpowers You Act Like You Have But Don’t (And How That Messes You Up) [Dumb Little Man] – After re-reading this one, it may be my favorite of the week. Everybody pretends they have these, but you just don’t think about it. Mind control? Precognition? Time travel? I’m guilty of these. What a creative article!
• Getting By Is Worse Than Failing [Location Independent Professionals] – I do a lot of guest posting at this particular blog, and it is geared towards entrepreneurs, but this is great advice for everybody. Taking those risks and falling down a few times is infinitely more beneficial to you than just “getting by”.
• 7 Life Changing Lessons Learned From Walt Disney [Dumb Little Man] – Want to ensure that I’m going to read your article? Put “Walt Disney” in the title. The guy had an incredible attitude about life and business.

Buying stuff and selling stuff

In other words, the art of personal finance:

• Going Up? [The Simple Dollar] – Ah, the age-old argument of “good debt” versus “bad debt”. This is a great article that quickly summarizes the good and the bad (hint: pretty much anything on a credit card is bad debt, and a house isn’t always good debt, but it can be). This article also shows a startling difference between what you want and what you need.
• 8 Life Landmines That Will Blow Up Your Financial Plans [LiveCheap] – We all know disaster will strike us at some point. This article aims to make us aware of these moments, react to them, and proactively live life to prevent these things from happening (or lessening their blow).
• 10 Things You Should Never Pay For [LiveCheap] – It actually kind of scares me how many people pay for this stuff.
• 7 Ways My Clunker Is Smarter Than a Hybrid [Wise Bread] – News flash: hybrids are “better” cars because marketing campaigns are designed to convince you of that fact. Save your cash.
• Fifteen Great Websites That Saved Me Money in 2010 [The Simple Dollar] – Some of these are obvious (Craigslist), but some not so much (Yard Sale Treasure Map). And I’m heading over to PaperbackSwap today to sign up.
• ClickFiller Finds the Best Possible Amazon Filler to Net You Free Shipping [Lifehacker] – I am a huge fan of Amazon, and their free shipping for most orders over $25 is just the icing on the cake. If your order is close, use this tool to put it over the top.
• Four Atypical Things to Do Before You Consider Buying a House [The Simple Dollar] – Figure out why you’re buying a house is a great tip. A better tip is to save like clockwork for two years to get you used to a mortgage. My favorite tip is to start fixing stuff – because you’ll have to.

“Feed me, Seymour!”

Little Shop of Horrors? Anyone?

• 10 Cheap Shortcuts to Making Cooking Oh-So-Much Easier [Cheap Healthy Good] – It amuses me that people think cooking is a lot of work.
• How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love Seasonal Produce [Cheap Healthy Good] – Since I started buying from a CSA, I’m learning the value of buying seasonal. There are some great tips here.

Nerdy Stuff

Because that’s why this site exists:

• 8 Reasons To Use Google Chrome As Your Primary Browser [Dumb Little Man] – I wrote a while back about my painless switch from Firefox to Chrome, and I still stand by this browser as the one to beat.
• Five Ways to Make Productive Use of Foursquare (and Not Be Annoying) [Lifehacker] – I know a handful of people that are using Foursquare. It’s an intriguing tool, but it’s too easy to be annoying with it.

There you go! Have any links you liked from this week? Share ‘em, or send them to me for next week’s Pile!

The above is in honor of the Milwaukee Brewers, who just set a franchise record as I type this for the biggest margin of victory in a shutout win over the Pirates, 20-0. Way to go, fellas! We’ve got a lot of ground to cover today, so let’s just get started:

Family Life

Ironically, even though I don’t have kids, I’m fascinated by articles written by parents about how they raise their kids. Here are a couple I saw (plus a marriage one, too):

• Why You Want a Debt-Free Marriage [Simple Marriage] – This is a nice article that tries to help you avoid the problems that come from money issues in your marriage. Amanda and I won’t be debt-free, but we’ll be working our tails off to get there as quickly as possible.
• What Children Can Teach Their Parents [Stepcase Lifehack] – On the flip side of the usual take on parenting, here’s what the older folks can learn from their rugrats.
• Parenting: 6 Myths You Should Know About [Stepcase Lifehack] – My favorite: “#6. Letting your child struggle or get upset is bad parenting.” Too many people think this is truth.

Put a smiiiiile on your faaaaace…

Happiness seems elusive for so many. Check out these great tips:

• Stuff won’t make you happy, experiences will [Unclutterer] – It shocks me how many people don’t realize this. Even if you consciously understand this, do you subconsciously believe it?
• why i won’t be buying an ipad [mnmlist] – This isn’t an anti-Apple article. It’s a common-sense article.
• The Boy and the Sundae [Becoming Minimalist] – This is a really sweet story that teaches a good lesson about giving back to others.

Nerdy Stuff

Time for something a little more technical – but no less practical!

• Ditch Desktop Apps for Webapps, Free Up RAM, and Enjoy the Best of Both Worlds [Lifehacker] – Most of us have a constant internet connection now, and you can do most computing within a web browser without noticing a difference, except your computer will run better. That’s why I use Google Docs, Gmail, Picasa, Google Reader, and Pandora, among other apps.
• Windows Media Player 12 Streams Your Media Library Over The Internet [Lifehacker] – Say what you want about Microsoft, but they continue to just swing for the fences trying to improve their software for our benefits. I won’t say they’re doing fantastic or anything (I still haven’t tried Windows 7, and it is expensive), but WMP12 lets you connect your music and videos to any computer using the same software that everybody has on their Windows computer. That’s pretty cool.
• Why I’m Returning My Apple iPad [Social Times] – Writer Nick O’Neill puts forth the idea that the iPad is not revolutionary and that Apple has missed the boat here. Besides that, he reiterates like everybody else the same thing: we don’t need it.

Make some changes!

Whether it’s in yourself or in the world, we can all agree that a little change would be nice once in a while:

• From the Greats: 6 Tactics to Increase Your Class and Charm [Dumb Little Man] – The old days weren’t perfect, and I wouldn’t want to bring all of it back (sexism, racism, etc.), but people – especially men – carried themselves differently back then. They had respect for themselves, and that’s something we can agree needs to come back.
• Why Rejection Letters are Great [Write to Done] – Yeah, this is about business and writing, but it could easily be called “Why Rejection Is Great”. In other words, rejection puts you one step closer to success.
• the only thing you can change [mnmlist] – Putting big life changes in perspective. If you feel like you’re in over your head, read this one.
• 6 Proven Ways to Make New Habits Stick [Stepcase Lifehack] – Want to go to the gym? Get up earlier? Eat healthier? Start here.
• How to Lose Weight: 6 of My Own Favorite Tips [The Positivity Blog] – Hint: it’s really not that complicated.
• 9 Great Ways to Be Exceptionally Boring [Stepcase Lifehack, again] – This blog really showed me this last week why I kept it in my Google Reader feeds. This is a quick article showing you the habits that make you a bore (and somebody nobody wants to really be around).
• 34 Little Ways to Share With the World [Zen Habits] – The beauty of today’s internet is that anyone can make big changes with small actions. Here are 34 of them.
• Give Up [Rock Your Day] – Stop expecting things to go well all the time. Life doesn’t owe you jack. Then you’ll see some awesome things happen.
• 42 Practical Ways To Improve Yourself [Stepcase Lifehack] – I’m a sucker for any post with the word “practical” in the title, but this one is a great summation of different ways you can make yourself a better person. Pick one that intrigues you and give it a shot!

Money, money, money, money, moneeyyyyyyy…

No list is complete without some money tips. Here are my favorites from the last two weeks:

• Is It Possible to Manage Credit Cards Well? [Christian Personal Finance] – No. No it isn’t. I got ripped to shreds on Facebook the other day for posting a similar anti-credit card article. Makes me sad.
• 10 Ways To Simplify Your Life [Christian Personal Finance] – Here are some great ways to cut out the clutter in your life and make yourself a little money in the process.
• Why Do You Buy? [The Simple Dollar] – This is a remarkable trick: the next time you go to buy something, ask yourself “Why?” five times, just like a little kid. I bet you will wind up saving a little more money.
• 5 Tips For Going Out to Eat on a Budget [Christian Personal Finance] – I am a big proponent of cooking for yourself, but it’s nice to go out to eat once in a while. But don’t blow the bank account when you do by following these tips.
• How To Buy a $5,000 Car [MoneyTalksNews] – We are a nation full of people that pay too much for their cars. Talk about reliability all you want, but you buy the newer car for the flash. Otherwise, we’d all be driving Toyota Corollas or something. If you want to avoid the car payment trap, you need to buy a good used car. This is a great guide.
• Seven Reasons To Care About The Tiny Things (And Seven Tiny Things To Care About) [The Simple Dollar] – Chances are, the tiny things are more controllable than the large things. And they add up.

"Hey, Mom! I got a credit card so that I can build credit. This is going to be a smart move towards my future – a good credit score will mean a nice mortgage and better loan rates!"

"Son, take the credit card and lock it up. Don’t carry it around with you. Only use it for emergencies."

"Aw, I won’t use it. What am I going to buy for $1,000, anyway?"

Then I go bowling and I’m out of cash. "I’ll just put thirteen bucks on the card, who’s that gonna hurt?" Flash forward 5 years: I racked up about $3,000 in credit card debt, got a second job to pay it off, and now I sit with another $8,000 in credit card debt after that.

No matter what I’ve done over the last five years, I’ve constantly succumbed to the lure of the credit card. The problem is, when I see that I have $200 "available" on my card, my mind instantly thinks of stuff I can buy for $200. The first key in getting out of debt is to understand that this is not "available" money; every dollar you put on a credit card is money you have to pay back or creditors will start hunting you down.

In my case, both of my cards, on separate occasions, sent me letters saying they were going to triple my interest rates if I didn’t stop using the card and close it down. Not being able to afford the interest and the payments that were going to come along with them, I had no choice but to close them down. If I used my card even once, they would retroactively charge me for the higher interest rate and I would be screwed.

Each time this happened, I took my cards out of their well-worn spots in my wallet, grabbed a scissors, and split them in half. I keep the pieces in a filing cabinet to remind myself of the pain that these cards have caused me.

How did I survive? I wasn’t making enough to cover my bills. I figured I’d starve, since I wouldn’t be able to put groceries on my credit cards anymore. Here’s what happened:

1. I prioritized my spending. This, for me, meant getting on a budget, but suddenly, I started working on the Four Walls. I had to make sure I understood where my money needed to go, first and foremost.
2. I made some sacrifices. I thought I wasn’t spending on myself, but sure enough, I found little bits and pieces throughout my typical month where I was wasting money. Reigning in this spending allowed me to cover the usual bills that I was using my credit card to pay for.
3. The bleeding stopped. It may not be much, but now I can see some progress made on my accounts. Each card has a few hundred dollars “available", and without the cards, I have no desire to use that "money".
4. I slapped together an emergency fund. To pay for the little emergencies that come my way, I now have some money in the bank to pay for them, should they occur.
5. I went out less. This doesn’t mean my life is somehow less fun. It just means that I’m being responsible with the money I do have, and I make it count when I go out and pay for stuff with cash. I find other ways to bond with my friends, besides going to the bar and opening a tab on the card.

In short, I feel liberated. In the short-term, yeah: things suck a little. But I don’t feel chained to these cards anymore. Cut the cards and cut your chains. Think you "need" them? Think again. Your financial situation is not unique, and other people are dealing with it better than you are. Suck it up and cut ‘em up!

[Note: I was planning to do a podcast today, but I felt this article might have a wider reach if written out. I have a feeling more people would rather read this than listen to my nasally voice for 20 minutes on the issue.]

There are lots of political and personal reasons why I’m not a fan of the Health Care Reform that’s being signed today (and why are we taking this advice from a group of people that hasn’t balanced a checkbook in 50 years?), but the biggest, farthest-reaching one is this: it fixes the wrong problem.

Yeah, health care costs are expensive. It can be difficult getting health insurance. I get that. But why is it so difficult getting health insurance for some people? Because we’re sick all the stinking time. The second we get the sniffles, we pop a pill. I know several people who work in different departments of health care (hi, honey!), and I know for a fact that there are thousands of people who go to the doctor the second they start feeling like crap. They clog up our emergency rooms and flood our doctor’s offices to hear that they have a cold, or those chest pains are just a little acid reflux (guilty of that one).

And the other group are just sick all the time – cancer, heart disease, etc. Is this a by-product of global warming (excuse me, “global climate change”)? Is it because vaccinations are making us sick? Nope – it’s because we don’t make our health a priority and a responsibility in this country. I think those that compare our health care system with those of other countries don’t factor in that many of those countries just flat-out take better care of themselves.

The people supporting this whole reform are assuming a few things about the American public:

• Everybody that doesn’t have health insurance is a victim.
• They’ve just been going about their lives like normal and suddenly get sick.
• They can’t afford health insurance.
• They all work really hard.

These are faulty. Americans, generally speaking, are the laziest bunch of people on the planet. Our priorities are out of whack, and we need to fix them. These are the real problems with the health of our nation:

We blame the system

Are you fat? Oops, I mean, “overweight”? Must be a genetic thing. Or it must be because you just can’t lose any weight. Or it must be because all the skinny people can lose weight like nothing. That’s okay, we have gastric bypass surgeries and things like that. We can shrink your stomach to the size of a peanut and force you to eat less. It may not work, but that’s okay – you can just blame the ineffective surgery. It has nothing to do with the fact that you eat garbage and sit on your can all day.

Hey, if you’re sick all the time, it must be because everybody keeps spreading stuff. It must be that crazy virus that’s sweeping the nation. It must be because you can’t afford medication. It can’t be because you don’t properly fuel your body and your immune system is shot as a result.

We do stupid things

I know it’s obnoxious to write this in all caps, but I’m going to do it anyway: HOW CAN THERE POSSIBLY BE ANYBODY UNDER THE AGE OF FIFTY WITH A CIGARETTE IN THEIR MOUTH?!?!? Is this some big, government secret that nobody’s heard? Smoking destroys your body. There are ZERO health benefits to smoking. I don’t care if it feels good. What in God’s name are we doing? Have you not seen or talked to somebody dying of emphysema or lung cancer because of smoking?

I know that smoking is one of the most addictive activities in the world. And if you’re over 50, chances are you started doing it at a time when nobody knew what was going on with smoking. But if you’re young enough to know better, you have got to be kidding me. It boggles my mind. You’re going to have the nerve to act surprised when the doctor tells you your lungs are shot when you’re 40 years old.

Also stupid things: drinking until your liver pickles, driving without a seat belt on, combining those two activities, etc.

We don’t prioritize health insurance spending

One of the most common examples proponents of the Health Care Reform have are the mother that gets fired from her job, loses her health insurance, and then gets cancer. I would have to assume that this example is by far in the minority.

Did that mother put aside some money for emergencies? Nope, she spent it and racked up her credit card debt on clothes and vacations. Does she have cable TV? Probably. And I wonder what’s in her fridge.

Here’s some full disclosure for you: I had a terrible year, business-wise, last year. I wound up having to go get a part-time job, and eventually a full-time job, to get myself back on my feet financially. My gross business income was $13,000. This is right along the poverty line in America, and I was paying over $600 a month in rent, $200 a month in credit card payments, $400 a month in student loans, and I tend to eat food. But I was able to get health insurance coverage for $60 a month. It wasn’t great coverage, but it was going to take care of me should disaster befall me. You know how much I used to pay for cable? $70 a month. If you have cable TV and no health insurance, you have no excuse in my eyes. Turn off the TV and go take care of yourself.

We sit on our butts

We’ve come to the conclusion that everything we do has to be fun. “I just don’t like exercising.” Well, then don’t complain to me when you’re sick. Exercising helps you lose weight, fights off diabetes and heart disease, and gives you a host of other benefits. I don’t even feel like I need to talk about this one for particularly long. Start going for walks, do some light yoga, run in place, hop on a bike, join some kind of sports team, whatever. Put down the remote and go get your blood moving.

We’re eating crap

I decided before this Health Care Reform thing that I wanted to make this week “Food Week”. I’m currently reading an awesome book by Michael Pollan called In Defense Of Food. In it, he discusses how eating habits in this country have changed over the past 50-75 years, and how disease rates have skyrocketed as a result.

Want an eye-opener? Take a look at the ingredients in that loaf of bread you bought. Water and flour, right? A little yeast? Didn’t expect to see “high fructose corn syrup” in there, didja? We’re going to talk a lot more about food this week, but take some stock in the following questions:

• How often are you going out to eat instead of cooking something?
• How many meals are you making by opening a box and following instructions printed on them?
• When you do go out to eat, where exactly are you eating?
• Compare the time you spend eating your meals and the time you spend eating snacks.
• The World Health Organization says you should only have about 10g of sugar per day. For some reason, in the United States, this number is 25g. A single bag of Skittles (my favorite candy) that you buy at the checkout counter contains 47g. How much sugar do you think is in your diet?

As I said, we’ll discuss food a little more this week, but I want you to really think about what you’re eating – and I’m not talking antioxidants and riboflavin and omega-3s. I’m talking food – vegetables, fruits, unprocessed meats, all that good stuff.

So, I think the problem here is we’re blaming the wrong people. We don’t need to reform the health care system all that much. We need to reform ourselves, and we need to reform our health. Stay tuned – we’ll talk about this more this week.

I’m sitting in my cold apartment, eating yet another lunch of Ramen Noodles. I’m 5 pounds lighter than I probably should be, and my jeans have a big hole in the knee. I climb into my car with one burnt-out headlight and pray the gas will hold out until tomorrow. After seeing how much food I can squeeze out of ten dollars, I return home to hop on the computer and I breathe a sigh of relief.

“Oh good,” I think to myself. “My credit card payment cleared on time.”

Anybody else see what’s wrong with this picture?

This isn’t really that much of an exaggeration, either. Last fall and in the beginning of last winter, this was my life. And you know, it’s actually a portrait of a lot of lives. Today, I’m a couple pounds heavier (it takes a while for me to gain weight – sorry, ladies), my gas tank is full, and my cupboards are far from bare. That’s because the first thing my fiancé and I figured out in our budget was The Four Walls.

Dave Ramsey teaches The Four Walls as the basic needs for living – no matter what, these things need to be covered:

1. Food
2. Shelter
3. Clothing
4. Transportation

Now, you notice he doesn’t say:

1. Going out for steaks
2. A 12-bedroom house with an indoor pool
3. A new wardrobe every other month
4. A $30,000 BMW

Sure, those things are nice, but they’re not basics. For food, you need ingredients for a healthy diet. That means you need to start cooking. Go to Amazon and type in “cooking for beginners” and you’ll get a ton of books that will teach you how to apply heat to food and watch a timer. That’s really all there is to cooking. Heck, my chicken recipe for this week consists of spreading mayo on chicken breast, rolling it in bread crumbs, and putting it in the oven for a little while. And it is some of the tastiest chicken I’ve ever made! Don’t overwhelm yourself at the thought of having to cook. Remember, this is for your health and well-being.

For shelter, find a modest space that you can live in for a while. It may mean having to downgrade a little bit – a smaller space, maybe a place that doesn’t have an on-site gym or pool. Included in there is money to keep the lights and the heat going. This is for the comfort and well-being of you and your family. This could even mean selling your house and renting for a while. It might suck, but it might be necessary if you are struggling to make ends meet. Let’s be realistic about what you can afford. Don’t choose a living space based on emotion.

For clothing, make sure you’re not naked and you’re dressed appropriately for the climate and occasion. Simple stuff.

And for transportation, let’s keep gas in the tank every week and have a modest car that will get you to and from work. Something that runs.

I do listen to Dave Ramsey’s radio show on my Sansa Clip every day, and he gets a lot of calls from hysterical people drowning in debt. To calm them down, he says, “Okay, let’s budget this out – start with the basics” and he walks them through the Four Walls. At the end of it, the person has stopped crying and he says something like, “See? Life seems a little less scary when you know you’re going to eat and keep the lights on, doesn’t it?”

It’s That “Peace of Mind” Thing Again

We learned in grade school what the basics to living were. Yet, somehow, in our Spend-Spend-Spend culture, we’ve gotten away from it and forgotten. All of a sudden, we’re buying crap we don’t need and sacrificing dinners to pay for them. It’s stupid, and I’m just as guilty of it as you are.

When you sit down to put together your budget, take care of those things first. Even if that means you can’t pay a credit card bill right now, you need these things. What good is a decent credit score when you’re eating ham sandwiches in the dark because they turned off your electricity? Life takes on a whole different perspective when the basics are covered. Those are the moments when you think, “You know what? We’re going to be okay.”

And what about that bill that you can’t pay? Well, you may just have to tell them you can’t pay right now. Then you go out and you start working harder to bring in more money. But you have to take care of yourself first. Let the collectors stomp their feet and whine. You need to eat.

I have budgeted $30 a week for groceries for myself. It’s a very liberating feeling to go into the grocery store and have an obligation to myself to spend that $30 every week on food to keep my cupboards full. Having that psychological peace keeps your head on straight when you have to deal with the rest of the garbage of your financial situation. That’s a big key in getting out of it!

So remember: before you pay for anything, put dinner on the table, keep you and your family protected and warm, stay covered up, and get yourself to work and back. Build on that, and you’ve got yourself a solid plan. No amount of debt in the world is worth sacrificing those things from your life.

This is my favorite line in the budget.

Last year, while I struggled financially and professionally, I really didn’t do anything socially. I rarely went out for a drink, I never bought any clothes or anything for myself unless I had to (for example: when my only pair of jeans finally sprouted a hole). As mentioned in the introduction to this series, I rarely took my fiancé out on dates. Sounds pretty miserable, doesn’t it?

I’m not going to tell you to ignore your financial troubles, but you do need to get your mind off of them for the sake of your sanity, right? You need to go see a movie or treat yourself to a new pair of shoes (if you’re into that sort of thing). You need money to blow on stuff. Some people call it “blow money” or “fun money”. We call it “play money”.

Play money is the “no questions asked” line in the budget. It’s the money that my fiancé and I don’t need to explain to each other. As long as we have room in the Play Money budget, we can do whatever we want with it. She can buy more clothes (like she needs them), and I can grab a beer with my Best Man. She can go out to eat with her old friends from high school, and I can buy Bob and Brian albums.

Plus, we can go get a nice dinner together, or spend an off-day at IKEA imagining our future home, or go see a movie. Play money is like a candy bar to a dieter. It’s not something you need in excess, because it will completely derail your diet. But a well-placed candy bar lets you reward yourself for all the hard work you are doing.

It doesn’t have to be a lot, either. My play money is $75 every month. That’s hardly anything that’s going to paint the town red on a regular basis. But I can buy blank DVDs, a good dinner, and a few beers with that money every month.

It Does Two Things, Depending on the Person

To be honest, for my fiancé, it forces her to limit her shopping. She bonds with people over going for pedicures and grabbing a bite to eat and buying a bunch of clothes. And that’s perfectly fine! But now she just has to make sure that day doesn’t turn into $250 out the window. For me, on the other end of the spectrum, it forces me to have a life. I’ve spent a lot of time sitting around by myself because I’ve been broke. Now I can make sure I get together with friends and enjoy my life a little bit.

Ever go out and swipe your card thinking, “I really shouldn’t be doing this…” That type of night really puts a damper on your mood. The Play Money line in your budget liberates you from that by making sure you know exactly how much you can spend. You may have to limit yourself to more low-key activities like buying a case of beer and hanging out with friends at home, but it sure beats sitting at home alone doing nothing or that feeling in your gut when you know you shouldn’t be paying that much while you’re out.