Intro
April: You’re listening to the Money Dad Podcast — practical financial and business conversations from a dad who knows money. I’m April Adams, and please welcome my dad, the Money Dad, Robert Adams.

Robert: Hey, April. It’s great to be back with you and hopefully help folks a little more with their money.

Recap: Where We’ve Been So Far

April: Our episodes have been building on each other. In the first one, we talked about tracking what you spend — just recording everything so you know where your money is going.

In the second episode, we talked about setting up a budget so you can allocate your money and see where you are.

But sometimes, when you finally put it all on paper, it creates a real “oh crap” moment. You realize, I don’t have enough money to cover my expenses. I’m spiraling.

How do we stop this spiral?

Seeing the Spiral for What It Is

Robert: The answer is simple… but getting there is hard.

If you’ll use the “old man spreadsheet,” it will show you very quickly where the spiral is happening. That spreadsheet is on our website, TheMoneyDadPodcast.com.

I’ve had couples come over to the house. We list everything in the budget spreadsheet — every expense, all income — and the whole sheet is full of red numbers. Negative, negative, negative.

And the first thing that happens?

• The husband points at the wife: “I told you not to spend money on this!”

• The wife points back: “Well, I told you not to spend money on that!”

That’s when I want to say: Go back and listen to Episode 2.

You cannot use the budget to beat each other up.
You have to be smart for once and look at it as a tool, not a weapon.

The first step is admitting where you are, seeing the truth, and then deciding what has to change if you want to be successful.

We talked in Episode 2 about how fighting over money can lead to divorce. It’s not “maybe.” It will if you let it continue. And if you think things are bad now, just wait until lawyers get involved. They get paid either way.

I once knew a couple in North Carolina who had money. They went through a nasty divorce; both wanted to “win.” Their lawyer told me, “I tried to get them to stop, but they wanted to keep fighting. So all I could do was keep taking their money.”

When it was all over, they were divorced — and broke.

That’s what happens when you weaponize money instead of using it as a tool.

Leaving Pride at the Door

Nobody wants to admit they’re wrong. Nobody wants to confess their faults. But when you’re staring at that spreadsheet full of red, you have to be honest:

“I didn’t realize how bad this was… but now I see it.”

And like I said before:
What’s behind you doesn’t matter. It’s what’s in front of you that counts.

Turn the clock to zero. Start a brand-new day.

Say to each other:

“I love you more than I love money. We’re going to stay together. We both messed up in different ways. Let’s fix it and move forward.”

Some things have to die for the spiral to stop:

• Pride

• Ego

• Some of your wants and desires (at least for now)

Bury them deep.

How to Start Stopping the Spiral

When you look at your written budget, everything is staring back at you. This is where wants, needs, and desires come into play.

Work backwards:

1. Start with desires.
   These are the “extra” things you’ve been funding with money that should have gone to electricity, groceries, etc.

   • Wipe out the desires.

   • See where that puts you.

2. Then go after wants.
   If cutting desires isn’t enough, remove all the wants for now.

   • Wipe out the wants.

   • Look again.

3. If you’ve cut desires and wants and you’re still in the red, then you’ve reached a hard truth:

   • Someone may need a second job.

   • Someone may need to ask for a raise or change jobs.

   • You may need to sell some things.

We’ve talked about boats and hobbies. There’s nothing wrong with those when you can afford them. But if you can’t pay your bills, you can’t afford to be out on the lake entertaining people.

If you have a boat, accessories, toys, or other “extras,” you may need to sell them:

• To get rid of the payments

• To generate cash

• To bring the budget out of the red

That doesn’t mean you’ll never have a boat again.
It just means you can’t have one right now.

Once you’re out of the red and back in control, you can start adding some wants back in.

But you must get to a place where:

There is no red in that third column.
Everything has to be black.

If it’s not, you’re not going to make it.

Real Consequences of Ignoring the Spiral

I’ve been helping someone manage their money who always told me, “I have enough to pay my bills.” But once we put everything in the spreadsheet, there was no way they could make it.

They kept borrowing from friends and family, trying to plug holes, but it didn’t work. Their house still went into foreclosure. They almost didn’t have anywhere to live.

Regardless of how emotional it feels, you have to:

• Put on your big boy or big girl pants

• Make the tough decisions

• Accept that your old habits got you here

You have to ask yourself:

“What do I need to do to contribute to fixing this?”

Not: “What does my spouse need to do?”
First: “What do I need to do?”

A Word to Single Listeners

April: You’ve been talking to married couples a lot, but I don’t want to neglect our single audience. When you’re single, you don’t have another person to lean on financially. No “family nights” are built-in. A lot of your social life is going out with friends — and that usually costs money.

How do you handle that tension between wanting community and trying not to blow your budget?

Robert: I’ll answer with a little humor first. The Eagles had a song called “Get Over It.” If you haven’t heard it, go listen to it a couple of times.

We’ve talked about emotions, pride, and ego. In Episode 1, I talked about being the “weekend drunk” — buying drinks and breakfast for everyone. Everybody loved hanging out with me… because it was free.

But I was the one suffering, not them.

Singles can get caught in the same trap. You feel pressure to:

• Go out as much as your friends

• Spend as much as they do

• Say “yes” every time

But sometimes you just can’t afford to go out three times a week. Maybe you can only go out once.

That doesn’t make you less valuable. It means you’re being realistic.

You have to:

• Be honest with yourself

• Learn to say no

• Build confidence in who you are, not what you spend

You might say:

“Hey, I’ve got other plans tonight, but I can go out with y’all Saturday.”

You don’t have to explain your entire financial situation to everyone. Just stop letting pride and fear of missing out drive your spending.

Contentment & Teaching Your Kids

April: You mentioned contentment before. I think that ties in here. Instead of chasing everything, we work on being content and realistic.

So if we’re feeling pressure to keep up — whether it’s kids wanting Disney, friends wanting big nights out, or even family expectations — we can:

• Reshape how we spend time together

• Suggest lower-cost or free options

• Be honest when we can’t afford something right now

Robert: Exactly. And with kids, there’s another layer.

Your child might come home and say:

“So-and-so is going to Disney World. Are we going too?”

It breaks your heart to say no. But this is a teachable moment.

Instead of saying:

“We just don’t have the money.”

You can say:

“Right now we’re working through some other things as a family. We’re hoping to go one day, but we can’t go this year.”

If all kids ever hear is “we don’t have the money,” they can become obsessed with money later — seeing it as the only path to happiness or identity.

Better to say:

“We’re working toward it. We have goals. We’re in this together.”

Teach them:

• How to earn money

• How to save toward goals

• How to be patient

April: I remember saving for rollerblades as a kid. I kept a notebook, wrote down the price, and tracked every bit of money I earned until I could buy them. That taught me a lot.

Robert: That’s exactly what we want kids to learn early.

Kids, Sports, and the “Travel Ball” Trap

If your child plays sports, especially baseball or softball, here’s a big financial trap:

Everyone thinks their kid is going pro. Travel teams start calling. It feels like, “If we don’t do travel ball, we’ll ruin their chances.”

But I’ll tell you from experience: I only played high school ball. A pro scout came to talk to me because of high school, not travel ball.

If your child is really that good, they don’t have to play travel ball to get noticed.

If you have surplus and want to do travel sports as entertainment, that’s fine. But don’t wreck your finances for it.

I worked with a woman who traveled constantly for softball with her daughter. The daughter was good. She got a scholarship to a smaller college, played one year, and decided she didn’t like it anymore.

That mom had kept track of what they spent on travel. She realized she could have paid for her daughter’s college outright with that money.

So again:

• Check your ego.

• Check your motives.

• Check your budget.

If you can afford it from surplus, great. If not, it’s okay to say no.

Birthdays, Gifts, and Social Pressure

Another trap: kids’ birthday parties.

Your child gets invited to a party, and you feel like you have to bring a big, expensive gift so you don’t look bad in front of other parents.

Don’t fall for that.

You bring the gift you can afford, and be proud of it.
You’re giving to bless the child, not to impress the adults.

Growing Up with Less — and Being Okay

I grew up in a two-bedroom, one-bath house with six people. We didn’t have name-brand stuff. We didn’t take week-long beach trips.

But:

• We always had food to eat.

• We had a roof over our heads.

• We made the most out of what we had.

My dad grew up during the Depression. He’d say:

“You’ll always have something to eat. It may not be what you want, but you’ll eat.”

We’d go on two-day trips, not seven-day vacations. He would say:

“We’re going to make more out of these two days than others do in seven.”

And he was right.

If your kids never had it, they won’t miss it. You don’t have to give them everything to give them a good life.

Cutting Out People Who Only Want Your Money

April: One thing this process does is sort out the people in your life. If someone only wants to be around you when you’re spending money, going out, and doing what they want… that person doesn’t really care about you.

When you set boundaries — financial or otherwise — the people who stick around are the ones who value you, not your wallet.

Robert: Amen. Your character should define who you are, not your possessions.

Long-Term Payoff

I was born in 1957 and didn’t buy my first new car until 1986. Until then, I always drove used cars.

Guess what?

• I still got where I needed to go.

• I got there on time.

• And I didn’t go into debt to impress anybody.

Because your mom and I made tough choices early, did without some things, and stuck to a budget, we were able to:

• Avoid spiraling debt

• Build surplus over time

• Have options later in life

If I wanted to go buy a new car today, I could — but I don’t need to buy one just to buy it.

Things are good now because we did the hard things then.

If we hadn’t, things would look very different.

Wrapping It Up & What’s Next

April: So to recap:

• First, you have to deal with the emotional side: pride, ego, comparison, pressure.

• Then, look at your budget honestly:

  • Cut desires

  • Cut wants

  • Live in needs for a season

• Maybe pick cheaper alternatives for food, entertainment, and streaming. (And check out our budget-friendly recipes at Homesteadin’ In The City — HITC.city — which we’ll link on TheMoneyDadPodcast.com.)

Those small cuts add up over time.

Robert: Your dad might sound tough, but it’s because I know where this can lead if you don’t take it seriously. These are hard choices — but they lead to peace.

April: And that leads us perfectly into our next episode. Next time, we’ll talk about how to start your savings — building an emergency fund and beyond.