A. What is your "real" hourly wage?
The book asks you what your definition of money is. People put a lot of power behind this piece of paper, the round piece of metal sitting in my hand, the electronic number that gets transferred through cyberspace with the swipe of a credit card. In short, it is a tool that is used as a means of exchange. It is not good or evil. However, how we use it can have positive or negative consequences. The authors state: "Money is something we choose to trade our life energy for."
Life energy is the time you have available before you kick-the-bucket. We exchange that time for money in the form of work: in order to pay the bills, buy things that we enjoy, to pay for a future trip, or whatever it is you are trying to afford. Every hour that you work for money is one hour that you are not: reading a good book, singing a song, playing soccer, gardening, doing anything that fulfills you (unless of course you enjoy your work). How do you currently spend your life energy? How are you going to spend the life energy you have remaining?
What is your "real" hourly wage? This is NOT the money you get paid per an hour of work that you put in. example: $15 per an hour x 40 hours worked per a week.
The "real" hourly wage takes into account the amount of time that you use to beautify yourself in the morning, the cost of your wardrobe or uniform that you need specifically for work, medical costs and time off related to the stress of work or illnesses you get from other coworkers, the amount of time you take to get to and from your place of employment, the cost of vacations that you take so that you can recharge, and the cost of lunches among other things. When I tallied this in May 2003 I was surprised at my true wage. My hourly wage prior to this calculation was $17.25, and afterward I found out that it was actually $7.02. A copy of my information is below.
Figure 2-1: My real hourly wage
Was it worth it for me to trade 85.75 hours of my life energy to earn $7.02/hour? I continued with this book because it was not. I wanted to find out where all of the money that I traded my time for was going, and how I could improve my situation.
B. Record ALL the money that comes in and goes out of your life.
This might sound worse than it actually is. I carried around a notebook full of college ruled paper everywhere I went. If I found money on the ground, I stuck it in my pocket and recorded it in my book. When I went to the vending machine at work and bought a packet of candy, I wrote the transaction down. The idea of tracking every penny might seem intimidating to you, but it is important. If you cheat once, whose to say you will not cheat again on you paperwork. What do you gain by cheating yourself?
I used a big notebook, because I wanted a big reminder in front of me to keep me moving forward on my goals. The book mentions different methods people used to record their information. Some saved all the receipts at the end of the day and recorded the information on their computers, and some had small notebooks that fit in a purse or wallet. The great thing about this book is that it encourages you to follow this path your own way. So as long as you do it, it does not matter the tools you use: computer, paper, fabric, etc. It is your path.
Figure 2-2: Tracking my money
Next, step 3: Analyzing the data you have collected.
Note: Step 3 is a big one. It took me a little time to put it together, but it was well worth it. Basically, I found out how I was spending my life energy, through the items that I bought.
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