I have worked with a practice consultant for about 8 years. She has had a huge influence on
me as well as my practices. In fact, if it weren’t for her, I’d probably still have only one location
in Cherokee Village. Through her prodding, I now own (well, actually Iberia Bank owns them) 5
offices. They are located in Cherokee Village, Piggott, North LIttle Rock, Melbourne, and
Salem. Seeing patients and doing administrative tasks has been a daunting endeavor, but
rewarding in many ways. I truly have great staffs and doctors at each location. So you may be
wondering, how does this tie in to a financial blog?
Well let me just tell you! If you know Sharon, you know that one of her greatest passions is
talking. She tells me all the time how lucky it is that she gets paid well to do what she loves.
When she starts on something, you will probably hear about it at least 3 times. A little over 2
years ago, she began talking about “living like no one else, so later you can live and give like no
one else.” After about the 4th time saying this, I had to get the whole story. She went on to tell
me about how she and her husband Carl were taking a Dave Ramsey class and how it was
helping them to get their financial lives in order. After she mentioned the word “budget” I tuned
out knowing that I didn’t want to put in the effort to do a budget on a regular basis. Who in their
right mind would do that? Not long after this Sharon gave me the tragic news that Carl had
passed away. His death impacted me profoundly in different areas, but none more than in the
financial area. Not long after his passing, Sharon came to me and told me how relieved she
was that she and Carl had committed together to get their financial lives in order and that this
was one less thing she had to worry about. Because of their planning, she was confident that
she could carry on with her finances. That struck home with me.
If you know us, you know that Brenda and I have lived fairly frugal lives. We have had many
great experiences in life, but our lives would never be classified as extravagant. We have had
several new cars in the past, but paid the bank on time each month, and the cars ranged from a
Ford tempo to Honda Odyssey to Toyota Prius. We even had a Chevy pick-up, so you can see
we don’t discriminate based on make/model. We had several credit cards, one that gave airline
miles, and a U-promise card that gave money for college. We were never concerned because
we always paid the balance off each month. As a business owner, I had the ability to take some
money from the business if needed, but always tried to keep this to a minimum. When I began
expanding the offices, this safety net was no longer available as all funds in the business were
needed for the business. Besides this, I had to put our paid off house up as collateral so I again
had a house payment. About this time, my kids were both in college and that was stretching our
finances about as far as they could go. But still, I thought we had it covered. After talking with
Sharon, I decided to offer Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University to people in our office and
at church. I had hoped that it would be great for them since I, of course, had everything under
control. We had 7 people and their spouses sign up. I got the material, went to the first class
and inserted the disc into the computer. The first class went well. So far so good. Everyone
was happy. Then came disc 2 and the “b” word. Dave said I had to do a budget. Going
through my mind was why me? I’m ok with my finances as they are. But in the back of my
mind, I could still see the declining balance in my bank account. Besides, I was the coordinator.
I had to do it to not be a hypocrite. So I sat down with my wife and started the budget. How
hard could it be? Up until this time, I had allowed my wife to handle all of the home finances.
There were times I’d get frustrated when she would tell me we needed more money. When I
ran that first budget, I almost cried. I don’t know how she was able to keep us going with the
thin margins that we had between bills and income. Thanks to Sharon, I was now aware of how
financially ignorant I had been. The rest of the series went on to make me abhor debt and its
consequences. So much so that my business goals changed from acquiring business to
becoming cash flow positive and hopefully soon, debt free in all my offices.
So why write about this? 1 Thess 4:13 begins “but I would not have you ignorant”. I was
ignorant and probably on a path to financial trouble. I was fortunate enough to have Sharon as
a consultant who was able to show me, the eye doctor, how blind I was to financial risks. I hope
to be able to help others. I recently hosted my second Dave Ramsey class this January hoping
to appeal to the people doing their new year’s resolutions. 8 people showed up, 5 finished the
course. I KNOW there are more people in this area that NEED to hear this message. I will
likely be hosting the program later on this year. Hopefully I will be able to reach people through
this blog that will take the chance to change their financial lives just as I was given the chance to
do.