When I was about twenty years old, I was walking near the edge of a rough part of Des Moines, Iowa and I saw something that’s stuck with me ever since.

There was a young boy there, about six years old, and he was climbing out of a dumpster behind an apartment building. He was dressed in a dirty tank top and shorts and was barefooted. In his hand, he had a wadded-up fast food bag. When he hit the ground, he ran around to the far side of the dumpster, opened up the bag, and pulled out a handful of french fries, which he stuffed in his mouth as though he were starving.

I have never in my life felt so compelled to help someone out, but I didn’t know what to do. I looked around and spied a McDonald’s about a block away and so I walked over near the child and said hello to him. He looked scared and started to run away.

I told him loudly that I wanted to buy him some food. He stopped and looked back at me for a minute. I told him that I was going to go down to the McDonalds down the street and buy him some food and that I would come back and leave it by the dumpster. He could come and get it if he wanted.

I decided to do it this way because I figured the kid wouldn’t follow me there and I also didn’t want to create the appearance that I was abducting him. He seemed to understand the arrangement, so I walked down to an ATM, withdrew $20, went to McDonalds, bought about $15 worth of food (thinking he could perhaps share some with his mother or any siblings or friends he might have), and put the change from my twenty dollar bill in the bag – four ones and some coins.

I came back to the dumpster and the boy was gone – which I kind of expected. I put the bag on the ground by the dumpster, looked around, and walked away. I watched for a little while, but I never saw the boy come back. I ended up just leaving the food there in hopes that the boy would eventually come back and find it, but to this day I don’t know if he did or not. I like to think that he came back, found the bag, took it to his mother and his little sister, and they were able to at least get some calories in their system to sustain them for a little while.

This experience has stuck with me for more than a decade now. I’ve seen some situations where desperate need was quite obvious, but never again has anything stuck with me quite like that barefooted boy squatting on the ground beside the dumpster eating rotten french fries.

There are so many situations that we come across in our lives where people could be helped out with just a little help at the right moment. I’ve seen a single mother (with two kids beside her) offering to sell the wedding ring on her finger outside of a grocery store. I know an elderly couple who have been very close to having their electricity cut off this winter. A close friend told me about a food pantry that simply ran out of food and had to turn people away at the door recently.

Lately, I’ve started carrying more cash in my wallet than I ever have before. Each week, I put a couple twenty dollar bills in the back pocket of my wallet and rarely do I spend them. Instead, I just let this cash accumulate over time until I find a reason to spend it.

I call this my “giving pocket,” and it’s already begun to make a difference in how I see these kinds of situations.

It’s pretty simple. All I do is keep cash in that pocket and wait until the right moment comes. Inevitably, every few months, I come across a situation where someone is in desperate need – and instead of feeling helpless in the moment, I give them what they need to help with the problem.

I’ve written so often on this site about how I’ve been able to pull myself back from the financial brink and put myself and my family in a better financial place. Today, we’re stable and safe – but there are so many people who don’t share that safety and security, through no fault of their own.

The giving pocket allows me to seize the moment when I see someone that really needs help, and my financial success gives me the ability to keep the giving pocket full.

Perhaps, just once, I’ll be there at the right time to help someone who really needs it – and that one moment of human compassion and help will put them on a better path in life. If I can do that, then the giving pocket is worth far more than what I will have ever put in it.

Let’s face it: talking about money can be very, very difficult. I’m speaking from experience here: when my wife and I first started addressing our financial situation, it was extremely challenging to talk about money. We’d look at our financial state, see that we weren’t where we wanted to be, and would seek someone or something to blame – and rarely would that blame be directed toward ourselves. Of course, that was when we actually even managed to make it to the discussion table at all.

Luckily, we managed to overcome this tendency over time. What brought about this change, though? How were we able to go from avoiding money talks (and being confrontational when the topic came up) to being able to rationally, calmly, and happily discuss things today?

I made up a list of ten distinct things that worked for us in terms of making conversations about money work in our relationship. Some of these might seem overly simple – others might seem like they won’t possibly work. Don’t overlook them, though. Give these tactics a try, preferably in combination, if you’re having difficulty talking to your partner about money.

Be willing to admit your faults and mistakes. During the conversation, your partner will likely point out mistakes that you’ve made along the way. Be open to this – don’t get defensive. Be willing to admit that you’ve done wrong in the past and also be willing to look for good solutions to these problems that work for both of you.

Pair any accusations with admissions of your own faults. One good way to defuse a situation that might dissolve into accusations and counter-accusations is to pair any statements you might make about your partner’s behavior with statements about your own mistakes. You might point out that your husband spends too much on his golf trips, but at the same time admit that you spend too much on home decorations.

Identify some things you’re willing to sacrifice before you sit down. During any money talk, you’ll likely have to be willing to commit to making some personal changes. This can be hard, especially if it’s simply foisted on you out of nowhere. Instead, all participants should spend some time before the conversation thinking about some changes they would be willing to personally make to achieve success.

Establish a “no yelling” rule. No one involved in the conversation is allowed to raise their voice, period. If you feel an emotional wave coming on, simply ask to stop for a bit and do something to calm yourself down. Likely, when you feel an emotional surge, it’s a good thing, because you’re getting close to a truth that needs to be laid bare and actually discussed.

Open the books completely. Don’t hide anything. You cannot come up with a great solution that you’re both committed to if things remain hidden. Pull out all of the bills, even the ones you’ve tried to hide from your partner, and allow your complete financial state to be an open book for both of you.

Don’t swallow the whole bite at once. Quite often, when couples sit down and begin to address their financial issues together, they find that the rabbit hole goes much deeper than they thought. Instead of trying to address everything at once, break it up into pieces. Focus on optimizing your spending during one conversation, then coming up with a debt repayment plan together during another talk, then tackle retirement planning later. If you’ve clearly hit a stalemate in a talk, back off for a while with just a pledge that you’ll both think about the problem and talk about it again later. Remember, it doesn’t all have to be done at once.

Talk about goals FIRST. Before you start digging into details, you should make it clear what you both want out of the conversation – and also what you both want in the long term from your situation. Establish the purpose of your conversation as clearly as you can so you have something to work toward. At the same time, talk about where you want to go in the future as a couple. Do this before you do anything else – not only is it a great way to open in a positive fashion, but it also gives you a nice framework for the rest of your talk.

Be realistic. You aren’t going to make diamonds out of coal. You’re also not going to make truly radical changes in your life, particularly if your partner’s not deeply committed to the change. Instead, look for smaller steps you can make to achieve the goals you want. Don’t expect to change everything in one conversation – if you do, you’re likely wasting your time. Focus on a handful of realistic, smaller things that you can do to head in the right direction. Then, if those work, have further discussions and add more changes to the mix.

Share your thoughts asynchronously. You may find that a face-to-face talk simply isn’t helping you get past a particular stumbling block. If that’s the case, try using email or another written form to help you work through the situation. Each of you should simply write down your thoughts on the situation and give them to each other, then respond to those thoughts, then respond to those responses, until you’ve reached some conclusions. This can be easily done over email. While you lose the face-to-face advantages here, you do gain the ability to carefully and calmly gather and organize your thoughts and share them in a way where the conversation can be followed later.

Develop very specific, clear, and tangible tasks for you both to follow. If you both commit to spending less, find ways to make that reduced spending specific and tangible. Agree that you’ll both live with a $100 allowance for “free spending” this month, for example. If you’ve decided to set up retirement plans together, you should both be charged with getting the information needed from your respective places of employment. If you’re trying to dig out of debt, you should both commit to tossing your credit cards. A one-sided sacrifice or one-sided task is a sure recipe for resentment – you should both be involved in the solution.

Good luck!

When I was in high school, I went through a period where I was obsessed with building a thorough family tree. I tried to thoroughly document my ancestors as many generations back as possible, adding as much detail to them as I could.

On my mother’s side, I was able to dig back several generations, particularly in one lineage. I was able to discover ancestors that had been dairy farmers in rural Wisconsin in the 1800s and I was able to fill out names and birth dates at least dating back six generations in a few places.

On my father’s side, the digging was very difficult once you started looking at my grandparents. I relied on some hand-scratched notes from my paternal grandmother to figure out some information about my great grandparents, but I essentially have no information prior to that.

What’s amazing to me is that these people are essentially lost to the mists of time, even though they have descendants today who are actively looking for them. These people, in the end, left no mark on the world aside from passing on their genes and their values to their children.

Until very recently, I was essentially heading for the same result. Until I started The Simple Dollar, my name had only appeared on a small handful of largely uncited scientific papers which very few people will ever read. I have a number of handwritten letters floating around out there, but many of those have likely found their way to trash cans over the years.

In the last year, I’ve been lucky to see quite a bit of my writing in print, and there are literally thousands of copies of 365 Ways to Live Cheap floating around out there in print. I’ve been lucky enough to be able to write things that have impacted thousands of lives, and at least a few things I’ve written will stick around for a while.

Yet, in the end, my mark on the world will be painted over by time as well.

What can I do with my life that will leave more of a mark on the world than just another name on someone’s family tree in a hundred years?

The most obvious thing is to take care of my children and give them every tool and every opportunity I can to allow them to succeed in life. In this case, obviously, it would not be my own mark on the world, but I will have been the person most responsible (along with my wife) for shaping someone who did something great.

This calls me to be a good parent. When I’m being a bit facetious, I describe good parenting as “love and grammar,” but that’s a big part of it. My job is to show my children love, but also teach them the basics of, well, life. At their young age, it’s simple lessons – how to be polite, how to use the bathroom. As they grow, I’ll push how they think and how they express those thoughts to others.

After that, my best opportunity to make a mark on the world is through my writing. By some stroke of luck, The Simple Dollar has given me an opening – an opportunity to share my writing with a large audience.

This calls me to push myself to be a good writer. Sure, I post a lot of articles for free on The Simple Dollar, but that’s just part of what I write. I write some freelance articles. I’ve written a book and started writing a second one. I’ve written some unpublished fiction, too, and on top of that I also journal extensively and also try out some writing exercises from time to time. I’m a big believer in the “fifty pounds of pottery makes you a better potter” theory, so I write. And read. And write. And edit. And write some more. Eventually, I hope to be able to write things – hopefully, a lot of things – that transcend my life and last for a very long time.

My other avenue for leaving behind a mark is sharing what gifts I have in a public forum. For me, that means being involved in volunteerism, particularly in starting such projects and managing them for the long term.

This calls me to dig into opportunities in the community – and create my own. I’ve already started doing this by participating in a number of community organizations and activities, and I have a few ideas for initiatives that I want to start in the future.

In the end, I’m left with some pretty big things to focus on: my family, my writing, and my civic-minded projects.

Whenever I devote significant time or significant money to things that aren’t in line with these areas, I think back to all of those names I’ve written down in my family tree. Those forgotten ancestors of mine had dreams as well, but those dreams were lost in the mists of time.

Today, every day, I have a choice. I can make the easy choice – but that choice will lead me to be just another name on someone’s family tree. Or I can make the hard choice – focus on being a good parent, work hard on my writing and my community activities, and maybe, just maybe, leave something more behind than just my genes.

In a few weeks, the book club reading of The Intelligent Investor, which I post each Friday morning, will be finished. Some of you will celebrate this, others will lament it (I’ve received a lot of comments on both sides of the coin).

Regardless, I am aware that the Reader Mailbag is perhaps the most popular feature on the site. I receive more correspondence about the mailbag than pretty much anything else I post.

So, what I’m considering is replacing the book club entry on Friday mornings with a second Reader Mailbag each week. What do you guys think?

How to Build Confidence and Destroy Fear Confidence is a key part of personal finance success. Without confidence, it becomes much, much harder to stand up and make real changes in your life and in your investments. After all, it’s much easier to just go along with the flow – and that often means spending more than you should. (@ get rich slowly)

7 Great Ways To Track Your Progress Towards Your Goals I’ve been fanatic about journaling since I was pretty young and that’s how I track things like this. In fact, I have considered posting the entire journal online before under a sheen of anonymity – I have daily entries (most of them over 1,000 words) dating back to 1991. (@ dumb little man)

The Paradox of “The Paradox of Thrift” My argument here is that different financial choices merely help different industries. If you spend it, you help retail businesses and consumer product manufacturers. If you save it, you help the banking industry. In the end, I don’t worry about the economy when I make financial choices. (@ consumerism commentary)

Frugal Camping: My Roots in Frugality Reading this, I was reminded of the week long camping trips we used to take when I was a kid. We’d settle in for the long haul and do all kinds of interesting things. (@ frugal dad)

Emotional Bank Accounts This is certainly an interesting way of thinking about relationships with other people. (@ gather little by little)

Several months ago, I wrote an article entitled The Guardianship Question, where I discussed at length the challenges that parents face when making the difficult decision about guardianship in their estate planning. It’s a very challenging thing to think about – who can possibly take care of your children if something unexpected were to happen to you?

I wrote that article during a time when my wife and I were really struggling with that issue ourselves. We’d read quite a bit about how to select a good guardian for your children and were moving through the process of choosing such a guardian and I felt the information we had learned would make for an interesting article. I often do that very thing – if I’m working through an issue and researching it for myself, I’ll write about that issue on The Simple Dollar, because if it’s something I’m working through, there are likely many others who are thinking about that very issue.

To put it simply, my wife and I are still struggling with this issue. In my original guardianship article, I noted a big handful of questions that one should consider when selecting a guardian. We used these very questions to attempt to select guardians, but every choice we considered failed miserably in at least one aspect.

Here were our criteria:

Does the potential guardian share your values?

Do you believe the guardian will raise your child in accordance with those values? Is that potential guardian a good person?

Does that potential guardian have a strong family network around them to help with the burden of having unexpected (and likely traumatized) children?

Will that potential guardian teach your children the basics of success in life?

Does that guardian have the financial security to ensure that your child’s needs are met?

Will that guardian have an expected natural lifespan that will allow them to remain as guardian until your child enters adulthood?

Our choices for guardianship really boiled down to four options:

Option A is a couple without children at home in their mid fifties. They strongly share our values and are closely tied to our extended family.
Option B is a couple in their forties with three children at home, all older than our children. They share our values pretty well and have some ties to our extended family, but they live far away from both sets of grandparents.
Option C is also a couple in their forties with three children at home, all older than our children. They weakly share our values, but have very close ties to our extended family.
Option D is a couple close to our age that’s unable to have children. They very strongly share our values and probably fill me with the most confidence to raise our children well, but there is virtually no tie at all to our extended family.
Option E is a single female younger than us with values that perfectly match what we want and close ties to family. However, her income level is extremely low and her future and life path would be greatly altered by the burden of children. Likely, Option E will grow in likelihood as time goes by and she figures out where her life is going.

So, each option has some strengths and some weaknesses.

During our discussions, I was a strong advocate for options B and D, while my wife was a strong advocate for options A and C. What does that really mean? My wife and I see different criteria as being the most important in selecting a guardian.

This realization has changed our discussion quite a bit. We know what the strengths and weaknesses of each option are – our question then becomes what criteria is the most important to us. Is it most important that we choose a family that matches our values? Is it most important that we choose a family that has a lot of support with our extended family? Is it most important that we choose a young family that will be able to provide parental support until our children fully leave the nest and find their own lives? How important is it that a family is in strong financial shape?

After a lot of discussion, we tentatively put down Option A as our choice on our will, but we’re still discussing the issue and it’s likely that the choice will change at some point. We pick up this discussion on a regular basis and twist it around, but we usually find ourselves just as far away from a real answer as we were when we began.

If guardianship is an issue that is of concern in your life – and if you’re a parent, it should be – now is the time to start thinking about it. From our experience, I recommend starting with the criteria. Do you want your child’s guardians to be young? Must they have a strong income? Do they need to have close ties to your family? What about their values – do they match what they want for your children?

There is no right answer here. Different people will come to different conclusions to these questions. What matters is that you put thought, care, and love into this question and do what you feel is truly best for your children.

Good luck.

A few weeks ago, a nice reader named Nicole introduced me to the concept of a gratitude journal:

Have you ever written about a gratitude journal? It’s something I’ve started doing and it’s really helped me figure out what is important in my life. It’s easy. Each day you just write down the five things you’re thankful for. I do it before bed or sometimes I’ll jot down things during the day.

I decided to give it a try for a few weeks to see how it went for me. Each day, I simply made a list of the five things I’m thankful for that day. Here’s an example from last Sunday:

1. My daughter’s ornery one-eye-closed grin with chocolate ice cream all over her face.
2. Watching the Daytona 500 with my dad, even though I don’t like NASCAR. We don’t spend much time together and I like it when we do.
3. My son running into the living room, giving me a hug, and running out again giggling.
4. Overhearing my mom telling my dad that she loved him.
5. Reading about 70 pages in a really good book while my kids napped.

I have a collection of about twenty five of these entries now, and many of them read like the above. They usually involve my family, enjoying some quiet time alone, a writing success, or a period of feeling really good (like an after-exercise rush).More importantly, though, virtually none of the items I’ve listed in nearly a month revolve around spending money. The high points of my day usually don’t revolve around any sort of financial exchange at all.

What about the days when I do spend money on something unnecessary? When I reflect back on those events at the end of the day, I rarely think about the spending event. Instead, I’ll often think of some little piece of that event, one that could have been cut out and placed in a less expensive context.

Take my memory that I noted above about my daughter with ice cream on her face. That moment was the result of a visit to Cold Stone Creamery, where we spent quite a bit on ice cream for the six of us (my parents, my wife, my two kids, and myself). Yet, we could have quite easily gone home and eaten much less expensive ice cream and had virtually the same memory. If we wanted some “luxury” ice cream, I could have just made a batch in the ice cream maker during the afternoon, making a stunning batch for just a few nickels on the dollar.

What about that good book? Sure, I could have spent a lot on that book that I was enjoying, but the truth is that the book was essentially free via PaperBackSwap.

What about that entertainment center that my father and I watched the Daytona 500 on? We watched it on our rather old television – no expensive high definition flat panel is needed here. Having a flat panel wouldn’t have changed that moment a bit.

The value here isn’t the stuff, it’s the moment. A moment alone. A moment with my daughter. A moment with my son. A moment with my parents. A moment with my dad.

These moments are the spice of my life, and it doesn’t matter whether I have the latest gadget or if I live in a dump. Either way, I would still enjoy these moments.

So what should I spend my money on? For me, the motivation to spend money revolves around the ability to build a moat around those moments. What can I do with my dollars so that my daughter always has the lightheartedness to bust out one of her big smiles? What can I do with my time that makes my parents’ retirement a little bit easier (calling them and communicating a lot goes a long way there)? What can I do to preserve the health of my marriage over the long haul (and, trust me, buying trinkets might be nice, but it’s no substitute for communication and relationship building)?

In the end, my idea of sound personal finance is about protecting those moments that I’m grateful for. What moments are you thankful for?

A little over a week ago, J.D. at Get Rich Slowly posted an article entitled “What Next?” The Third Stage of Personal Finance, where he discussed the fact that he had dug himself out of his financial hole and was beginning to accumulate wealth. The “problem” here is that it meant that he was having to reconsider many of his goals – for so long, his goals had revolved around straightening out his financial ship and paying off debts, but those goals had been accomplished.

What J.D. discovered, after some introspection, is that he’s reached what he called the “third stage” of personal finance: what’s next? What do you do when your basic financial needs are securely met and you still have a strong income? For him, a big part of it is moving towards a more pastoral lifestyle: working less and spending more time doing things like gardening. For him, more money is not the goal.

I enjoy reading articles like that one because, more than anything, it shows the difference between my life’s situation and the situations that others find themselves in. Much like J.D., over the last few years, I’ve come to a very stable place in my personal finance situation. I no longer worry about paying bills and I earn quite a bit more than I spend. We’ve paid off most of our debts, have a very nice emergency fund, and don’t really sweat the things life throws our way. We bought a house and I’ve moved to a career that I truly love.

And that’s the point where our paths differ.

I have a three year old son and a one year old daughter at home. Rather than filling my evenings with the types of activities I might engage in if I were single or married without children (things like reading more than I do, planning an extensive garden, volunteering at some community groups, and so on), I instead tend to fill my spare hours with things involving my children. I read books to them. I cook supper for them. I play Memory with them. I put them to bed at night. In short, my overarching goal at this stage in my life is to raise my children as well as I possibly can.

The difference here, though, is that it’s not a life goal that will sit in line with personal finance freedom. Instead, it’s quite the opposite, actually – the expenses brought on by our children actually keep us from achieving the money success we might otherwise have.

There’s a huge and vital lesson here, I think: personal finance is a tool to reach the goals you want to achieve in life. While it’s great to have a goal of debt freedom (for example), that goal in itself is actually just a precursor for other things.

Why do you want to be free from debt, after all? There are as many reasons as there are people out there, but once you start digging into that question, you quickly realize that the answer to that question points a person towards what really matters in their life – and quite often, that thing that really matters in your life is your mission in life.

Take me, for example. I was inspired by my infant son to start bringing about financial changes in my life. When I think about my life now, I don’t think about being in good financial shape or being debt free. I think about being a good parent and being a writer that reaches people. Good personal finance success just makes those things possible.

Why do you want personal finance success? Spend some time thinking about that question in your own life and you might find that it leads to what you really want to do in life.

Each Monday, The Simple Dollar opens up the reader mailbags and answers ten to twenty simple questions offered up by the readers on personal finance topics and many other things. Got a question? Ask it in the comments. You might also enjoy the archive of earlier reader mailbags.

As usual, we’ll start things off with a few links to older articles that directly answer questions I’ve heard recently.
Investing in Yourself: Mental and Spiritual Health
Is Success a Choice?
The Five Ps: Breaking Down Big Dreams Into Little Steps

And now for some great reader questions!

When shopping for a used car do you think it is better to focus on a younger car with higher mileage or a older car with lower mileage?
- Elizabeth

Older car with lower mileage every single time. The age of the car isn’t really that important – what’s more important is how much wear and tear the car has faced over time.

I’d far rather own a 1970s model car with 20,000 miles on it than a 1990s model car with 80,000 miles on it.

Lost has been crazy so far this season. What’s going to happen next?
- Locke

First, I’m pretty confident now that every significant question ever raised on the show is going to be answered. They’ve been doing this pretty effectively this season so far, even addressing how Danielle got to the island (something I thought would be never mentioned again). I think this will continue. Beyond that, here are three predictions:

+ The time skipping is finished after Locke turned the wheel. Whatever “time” the people on the island are at now is where they’ll stay. I think it’s going to be in the 1980s when the Dharma Initiative is in full swing (which is why the season opened with Daniel working with Dr. Candle).

+ Locke will come back to “life” when his casket reaches the island, but it’ll be a strange sort of “alive,” much like how Christian Shepard is now.

+ This very next episode will feature a plane from Ajira Airlines landing on the island with at least some of the Oceanic Six on it.

I’ve been calculating my networth, and I was wondering. Is there a rule of thumb for guesstimating how much your cars value depreciates each month?
- Mol

I use a really simple formula for doing this. First, I find out what the car was worth when it was new. Then, I take the mileage of the car, subtract it from 125,000, and divide that by 125,000. I then subtract $5,000 from the new car cost and multiply it by the mileage number. If that’s less than $1,000, I mark it up to $1,000.

What does this do? It basically says that the car immediately goes down $5,000 in value when it is bought, then decreases in value steadily until it reaches 125,000 miles.

Here’s an example. Let’s say I have a car that’s worth $25,000 new and has 75,000 miles on it. (125,000 – 75,000) / 125,000 = 0.4. ($25,000 – $5,000) * 0.4 = $8,000. So, I’d figure the car is worth $8,000. It works as a thumbnail, at least.

What is your opinion on engagement rings? I plan on proposing to my gf very soon – I am in my mid 20s, have no debt, a substantial emergency fund and a monthly income (after tax) of over $5,500. Do I really need to spend the 3 months of salary (ie over $16,000!) that most people/websites seem to be recommend??
- Jason

My opinion is that you should talk to the lady you’re going to be engaged to and find out what she wants. Some women LOVE the big ring. Other women would prefer you saved most of that money for a house or another major purchase in your married life.

My wife wanted a very simple ring. She saw no reason at all for anything complex. Another friend of mine is so proud of her ring that she almost obsesses over it. Neither perspective is right, but you need to know what perspective your partner has before making such a huge purchase.

What is your advise when one spouse wants to take control of a huge debt and work at paying it off (by the snowball method) and the other doesn’t agree and has no other plan? We are drowning in debt and my husband will not help me–he just pays the minimum payment and sometimes sends a little extra. We are also in our fifties and I worry about the future.
- Lara

Again, communication is the big key here. You need to sit down with your husband and talk through some things. When do you plan to retire? At what level of lifestyle do you plan to retire?

Don’t worry about the actual debt snowball. Just sit down and figure out what your real shared goals are. Then, go through your financial state and figure out how you’re going to get from here to there. Again, don’t push the snowball. You need to gently – very gently – lead the horse to water here.

Don’t put it in context of money. Put it in context of your big goals and dreams together. Running up the credit card begins to seem silly if you’ve started envisioning things together.

I always seem to overrun when doing errands and hence end up really hungry in town. Aside from taking a packed lunch, what is the best way to eat something for cheap? Our town has supermarkets as well as Subway, McDonalds and the chippie (I’m in England) but getting bread & cheese or meat plus juice works out almost as expensive as just going to Subway and spending £6! I am reluctant to buy just crisps or a chocolate bar for about 50p because they won’t be filling for more than 20 minutes, if that, and have no nutrition at all. Any suggestions?
- princess_peas

Don’t buy crisps and chocolate. Instead, look for foods that are easily transportable, relatively healthy, and provide a sustained nutritional and energy boost. Dried fruit is a good option. Granola bars are another option, as is beef jerky or other, similar dried meats.

What’s nice about things like these is that you only need to eat a little to sustain you, they go well with water, and most of all, they preserve very well in the car or in a pocket until you need them.

I usually keep a few granola bars in my glove compartment for just this purpose, actually.

When figuring your net worth percent change, how can you handle the switch from a negative net worth (or net debt as you say) to a positive net worth?
- Nate

During the period where that transition occurs, you can’t really calculate a worthwhile percentage change in your net worth.

Another approach worth considering is to simply figure the percent changes in your assets and the percent changes in your debts and not worry about the actual percent change in your net worth.

I actually do all three numbers. I find that the change in assets and the change in debts together provide at least as good a picture of one’s personal finance health as the change in net worth.

If you could go back in time and watch any historical event, what would you want to go back and watch?
- Mitch

If you’re looking at all of time, I’d go back to the start of the universe and see what’s there. Where did this all start? Was there a “big bang” or has this universe just always existed?

If you’re looking at just human history, I’d want to go back and observe the last year or so of the life of Jesus, as well as the year or so afterward. I’d like to see what really happened, rather than relying on the retellings of retellings that we rely upon for knowledge of what happened. The events in that area at that time have had an incalculable impact on our world.

How many credit cards do you carry when you leave the house? Given identity theft risks, I’m wondering whether you have a wallet full or not.
- Eliot

Most of the time, I just carry two card, my Citi Driver’s Edge card and my Target Visa card. I also have an Amazon.com Visa, but it stays at home since I only use it for purchasing things off of Amazon.

I do consider having credit cards in your wallet to be an identity theft risk. I often make a conscious effort to keep tabs on my wallet all the time when we’re out and about, just to make sure it hasn’t been lifted, and I carry it in my front pocket whenever I’m somewhere that makes me cautious.

What is your greatest fear?
- Sammy

My greatest fear is not being able to be there for my kids as they grow up. It fills me with more concern than anything else in my life.

I have always had this deep fear that I’m not going to live until I’m very old. I think it started when I was young, when I had a ton of medical problems all throughout my childhood. I believed through most of my late childhood that I probably wouldn’t live to be as old as I am now. Now that I’m thirty, I often am filled with a sense that I’m not going to live or be fully healthy for much longer.

I really have no reason for this. I eat pretty well (especially recently), I’m active and productive enough to do a ton of writing each day, and I’ve always been there for my kids and my wife. But the worry is still there. In fact, it’s been so bad at times that I’ve recorded videos for my kids to watch later in life if they grow up without me.

Got any questions? Ask them in the comments and I’ll use them in future mailbags.