Photo by: enea

(Yes, I was trying to think of a super cheesy post title.)

Over the weekend my wife and I discussed making good choices with some teenagers. I posed the question “How does being ‘good’ affect those around you?”

It was a broad question and I wasn’t getting much response. In these situations I sometimes explore the flip side of a subject to see if it’s a little more obvious.

• What if I spent less time helping around the house and replaced that time playing video games?
• What if I picked up a filthy vocabulary? Would that affect my wife and kids?
• What if I started using our credit card to spend money we really didn’t have?
• What if I spent our paychecks on wants, and ran out of money for the mortgage that month?

It’s easy to take for granted the small simple work we each put in every day for those we love because they’re not as obvious sometimes.

They may be every-day things we do, but they’re still good choices, and the people we care about depend on us to keep doing them.

Think of the quiet “good” you do every day and take a moment to appreciate how it affects your friends and family.

Photo by: Gilles Gonthier

If I learned anything from elementary school, it’s that groundhogs have the cosmic ability to predict how long winter will last depending on their shadow.

This supernatural event only happens on the 2nd of February every year. If the groundhog sees his shadow he goes back down his hole to hide from six more weeks of winter. The universe will have spoken.

We have no ability to change whether winter will last another six weeks or not – that is up to the cosmic groundhog – but you do have the ability to choose to follow a budget for the next six weeks. Try signing up for One Month of Budgeting for some extra help:

If you’re reading this in a reader, you can click through here to see the form.

(Ok, the One Month of Budgeting emails only last for five weeks, but you still get six emails.)

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PS – I was going to include a bunch of mildly obscure references to the movie Groundhog Day, to drive my wife nuts, but I deleted them.

Oh what the heck:

Watch that first step… it’s a doo-hoo-sie! Am I right, or am I right? Right? Right?

Photo by: Md Zaq

On your marks, get set…

My parents hold hostage a VHS tape containing various clips of me as a child. One of those clips is my infamous presentation of “The Tortoise and The Hare,” with popsicle-stick puppets. I think it must have been for school.

We’ve all probably heard the famous moral of that story: Slow and steady wins the race.

I can’t help but think that if Aesop wrote that fable today, he’d highlight the word “steady” and then click Bold and Italicize.

Steady month-after-month budgeting does a couple of things that off-and-on budgeting can’t. It helps you make sure you’re always spending less than you earn – it can only take one awkward month to slip beyond your means. And it gives you current data to review, to help tweak each new budget – so your budgets are always better, and your money is going where you know you need it.

Keep it up, you’ll see steady progress, I promise.

PS – WithinMeans is six months old this week. Thanks for being a part of it!