A thing I don't miss *at all*:

Seeing an ad for an "excellent balance-transfer credit card" and wondering, for at least a moment, whether I should look into it.

I think it would help to talk to a therapist

I'm in a bit of a quandary, though. For solo work, I'd want to see therapist #4, and the initial work this time will certainly be solo. But I could see it shifting to couple work before long, and that would mean #5, and trying to transition between them isn't the right approach.

But neither thing is likely to happen unless things get much worse, seeing as I just got chewed into last night for buying my first new pair of glasses in three years. "I have four doctor bills to pay," I was told (none of which are mine). I don't resent her health care needs, but I feel like I've been treading water.

Meanwhile, it is good for me to remember that I am not without recourse. I have some resources from my previous times in therapy that it might serve me well to revisit. Let me not overlook doing what I can just because it isn't what I think is the ideal course.

Sleep interruptions

I always hate waking up in the middle of the night alone. But I especially hate it when things are crazy busy at work. I get up to wake mrs. tg from in front of the television, use the bathroom while I'm up, and when I get back into bed the gears are cranking too much to let me sleep.

Bourbon, do your stuff.

Latest proposal should go out tomorrow, and my 70+ page process should go into review tomorrow, too, right on schedule and on budget.

I think I'm going to take on some freelance technical writing/editing work, for extra income. Or start looking for another job in a few months, with a salary increase instead of a parallel move.

It was *so* nice to have the money

Just sunk 4 bills into my car. Exhaust leak repaired, tie rod end replaced, tires for front, alignment, oil change.

Had the money to pay for it.

Now need to replenish the emergency fund. But an unexpected refund from our homeowners insurance, following an adjustment based on a review last month, covered half of it.

Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 5

This phase, and this step, include a section on arriving to a decision. I am fascinated to find that even though we are not undertaking these exercises together, my bride and I have both agreed that we need to take advantage of a program that the parish is offering this spring. So we shall be enrolling in Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University program, which I am hopeful will help get us more on the same page concerning our financial goals and priorities in the context of our faith.

In a related insight that is very clearly not the sort of decision that the step calls for, I felt challenged by Jesus today. The retreat material makes clear that this decision involves a choice that isn't between good and evil, between righteousness and sin, but is rather more about determining what good path the Lord would have us walk.  But that of course requires us to first choose righteousness. I had a sense during and after Mass of him asking me if I really think that the challenges and temptations that I deal with are greater than the ones he faced. Thoughts return to me that I've encountered over the course of the past months, including the idea that we are only tempted as far as we resist. In a sense, once we yield the temptation is reduced in intensity. Further, the same Holy Spirit who strengthened Jesus against his temptations indwells us, as well, so we have the same source of strength that Jesus had to answer our temptations with the truth of who we are in God.

Conforming (phase 2), Three Types of Attitude in Scriptural Case Studies (step14), session 1

This step will use a scriptural example of each of the three attitudes elucidated in the previous step (which I included in my final session as I found it most revelatory to consider the three attitudes together). In this step I expect it will make more sense to reflect on each scriptural example separately. Again, I will not be limiting myself to financial considerations here, though I can see that this area is also due some attention.

The First Type:

And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, "Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?"

And Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: `Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.'" 

And he said to him, "Teacher, all these I have observed from my youth." 

And Jesus looking upon him loved him, and said to him, "You lack one thing; go, sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me." 

At that saying his countenance fell, and he went away sorrowful; for he had great possessions.  - Mk 10, 17-22

Each of these examples is certain to imperfectly mesh with the three illustrations from the last step/session. This man represents the first type because he knows, because Jesus has told him, that he should give away his wealth.  In the previous step, the first couple did not consider whether it was truly God's will for them to give away their wealth; they simply assumed that they should based on their own understanding. (This is how this scriptural example departs from the first type in the parable.) However, the underlying result is the same: the man goes away and appears unwilling to follow through on what Jesus has told him to do, just as the first couple failed to allow their belief that they should give away their wealth to actually spur them into action, to truly change them.

We need to be careful how we decide what we believe God is telling us to do. That was a key part of the Three Types discussion from the previous step.  The biggest obstacle to our truly seeking God's will is that we are afraid that God will tell us to do what we do not want to do. Sometimes he does! At other times, he merely reminds us that what he wants for us is more trustworthy than what we want for ourselves. This is true in our finances, our relationships . . . in every part of our lives, really.

For instance, I can't help but wonder: did our decision last night to retake control of our laundry situation today - when we really didn't have the cash on hand yet to do it - interfere with a way that God wanted to provide for our needs, or perhaps for someone else's?

I see the people around me choosing to do whatever it takes to get their needs met, without consideration of whether that choice contradicts God's clearly-revealed plan for our lives.

Am I doing any differently?

I know that I'm trying to.

Weakened

I suppose we'll find out here shortly what the ramifications are for my wife's broken tooth. I'm glad she isn't in much pain from it; it seems to have pretty much just broken off from structural weakness due to a cavity/filling. She didn't particularly bite down on it; she was just eating her lunch, happened to be chewing on the other side of her mouth, actually, when she felt something foreign and hard. It looks like she lost about half of the crown of the tooth, with the filling still attached to the part that broke off.

I think we're only going to be on the hook for 20% of this work, but depending on what they have to do it could be 50%. But there is no question about needing to have it fixed.

Taking poor care of myself

It's such a challenge to make my own health the priority it should be. I am overdue for a physical and for two specialist visits: one to my nephrologist, who I haven't seen in five years, and one to the urologist I was supposed to visit a year after my kidney stone incident. My scalp is acting up again, too, and I'm out of my prescription shampoo.

But every time I turn around our HSA is empty again. I'm going to have to put more money in it, but then, I expect to have to do that anyway next year just to cover the increased deductible I'm dreading. I suppose I may be buying trouble ahead of its time, but the bad news from today makes it time to think about this even if it isn't time to reach conclusions.