Scott Wilder - ish

Dave Ramsey wants me to be 'Gazelle Intense'. In his book he uses the
idea that a gazelle will only be eaten by a cheetah 1 times out of 19
because it has a successful strategy to wear down the cheetah during
the chase. The problem is that I have no point of reference. I have
not seen the Discovery Channel show he's referencing. So this whole
gazelle thing is just kind of abstract and intellectual to me.

 But I do have a reference point of my own that is real and I can call
upon those memories to motivate me. Going to war. As a former Army
guy. I know what it is to prep for war and to be in the "thick of it".
So I'm declaring war on financial slavery. We are going to use
overwhelming force. We are not taking any prisoners. And we will be
victorious.

 So using my new reference point; there are a few important things to remember:

 1. In war there are always casualties. Every spending habit that's not
required needs to die. So that means that every purchase that used to
be considered "play money" (and even some that weren't) now goes under
scrutiny. If it doesn't hold up, it has to go.

 2. In modern warfare, it's not just enough to win the war. You must
also plan for the resulting peace. This is something that has never
gone quite right in the history of warfare (just look at our strained
relations with Iraq, North Korea and Vietnam to name a few). But for
us, it's not just enough to get out of debt. Instead, our fundamental
philosophies about what money is, what it does (more importantly what
it should never do), and how we make the best use of it needs to
change.

 3. Wars are almost always won by the side who "wants it more". Sun Tzu
writes: Now the general who wins a battle makes many calculations in
his temple ere the battle is fought. So while the credit card
companies may have size and strength on their sides; we are prepared
to do whatever is required. We have a plan and we are sticking to it.
If we can't win man to man then we'll fight guerilla style.

 4. Winning the war is all the more precious when you refuse to
relinquish the moral high-ground. Yeah, we could file bankruptcy or
just refuse to pay the creditors until they write off our accounts.
But that would just mean that we accomplish our goal by ignoring
ethics and integrity. So not only are we going to get out of debt. But
we're going to do it with our dignity intact.

 5. To the victor goes the spoils. For the first few years of his life;
our son is going to watch his mommy and daddy pass on new cars and
sexy gadgets over and over in order for nothing more than the ability
to erase numbers off the white board. He is going to process financial
slavery in his own unique way. And we will passing on a legacy of
financial responsibility to our J.J.

 6. War is never pretty. The reality is that other people are going to
see us pass on dinner outs, expensive day trips and multitudes of fund
raisers all in the name of getting debt free. They might even feel as
if we're choosing money over relationship. My hope and prayer is that
they will instead see this as the biggest effort in our lives to have
right relationship with people and with God.

 So put another way, we are crucifying financial debt so that mental,
relational and spiritual freedom might be resurrected.

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