Only in my Dreams

I feel like I should mention that over the past month I've actually started to have nightmares about the Stuff Stand-off. It's not like you think - I'm not missing the shopping or anything. Oh no, my nightmares are that the Stand-off is over. Every time in the dream it's the end of the year, but we are exactly where we are financially right at this moment.

Part of what has been so great about this Stand-off is how much money we've saved, and we've really started to get into it. We've got some high hopes for how the rest of the year will pan out, and how much more money we might continue to save. So in my dream I'm all freaked out that we lost this great opportunity, and somehow we got to the end of the year without paying off some of the debt we'd hoped to pay off, and without saving the money we had hoped to save.

What I think is hysterical about this dream is the underlying assumption in my subconscious that as soon as January 1, 2011 hits I will start spending like a maniac. I had to wake up and remind my conscious self that just because the Stand-off will be over, I do NOT have to go back to spending like I did before it started. There's a novel idea: we can actually continue to be more careful and thoughtful about what we buy.

Maybe my subconscious will listen to my conscious self and I'll stop having those dreams. We'll see. In the meantime, I'm going to keep getting used to the idea that while our intentional year off will eventually end, there's a few lessons I might actually want to take with me when it's over!