Motivating Through the Snowball

Motivating Through the Snowball

By Keith Bunn Jr.

April 8, 2012

There is a reason why Dave Ramsey tells us all that in Baby Step 2: Paying off your debts, you list your debts and pay them off smallest to largest and don’t worry about what the interest rates are. The reason is because personal finance is 80% behavior and for you and I to get those quick little wins by paying off some of our debts, seeing some progress, we get more motivated. But once we start getting into the bigger debts and our momentum starts to slow down because it will naturally take longer to pay those off, we can easily lose our motivation and fall off our debt free wagon. If this is you, we know what you’re going through. It has happened to us many times. So here are a few things we have learned on how to keep that motivation going strong…

1.    Make sure you are allocating some frivolous spending money in your budget for each of you. Let’s just face it, you are going to spend some money on whatever, you might as well budget for it.

2.    Give yourselves some quick wins again, some goals. When you pay off some of your debts, reward yourselves. Buy a DVD or maybe even go out to the movies for example. Break your debts up into groups and then reward yourselves after each group is paid off. Just make sure you budget for it and use cash.

3.    Number three is kind of a continuation from number two, and that is, when you start getting into the REALLY BIG dollar amounts in your Debt Snowball, break those up into smaller pieces. For example: if you owed $20,000, break that up into 5 smaller pieces of $4000, or 4 pieces of $5000, anyway you what to break it down, after each piece is paid off, reward yourselves.

Keeping a list of your debts on the refrigerator at home, by your desk or in your locker at work and crossing each one off as you pay them off is another way to stay motivated.

These are just a few things you can do. Be creative! Remember, the overall goal is becoming and staying DEBT FREE!!!

 As with all my blog posts, and social media posts, I welcome any comments, questions, and feedback on the topics I write about. It is the only way you and I will learn more about ourselves and each other, so ask away!

Checkout my website, or follow me on Facebook, Twitter & Linkedin for additional money ideas and facts.

www.cavusfinancialcoaching.com , http://www.facebook.com/pages/Cavus-Financial-Coaching/120347681380181 , https://twitter.com/#!/Cavuscoaching , and http://www.linkedin.com/pub/keith-bunn-jr/47/555/145