So That’s What It Feels Like

I had started writing a post on recent events and how things never really are a problem until they become your problem. As I reread it, it seemed like something that a desperate person would plead right before they snap and become a madman — which promptly afterwards, everyone becomes a critic and tries to weaponize your actions.

So, to avoid looking too much like a crazy person (which I’m sure is already too late), I decided to take a different approach and tie it in with something that has marvelously happened in my life.

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As you, reader, have probably read in my previous rantings and bemoaning diatribes, I’ve been in a lot of money woes, specifically with credit cards. A lot of stupid decisions brought me to that Sisyphian pit of darkness, and at my worst, I did put a lot of blame on my upbringing, my environment, my government, and many other things.

However, I never really directed the blame at myself.

And then I finally did. And then I got really sad that I would never dig myself out.

The problem was that my focus was solely on the largeness of my hole of financial mess. At first glance of anything massive, and you’re probably inclined to think, “Wow, that’s so big. How am I ever going to [insert verb] that?”

As someone who goes from very in his head to very in his feelings, it was hard to convince myself that I would still be alive when I’m out of this predicament, if at all. Yet, like many journeys, it does have to start with that first step.

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I actually learned about the Baby Steps back around 2011, but it never really stuck. I was always fluctuating in my income, but never in my lifestyle. And like food, it has to be a lifelong habit. It can’t be a diet because you’ll crash.

I didn’t stick to the Baby Steps completely. (Sorry, Dave Ramsey. I’m weak.) However, I took the basic principles, finally set my mind to it, and cut some stairs into that big old financial pit, slowly gaining some ground. And it sucked — like eating broccoli.

But I stuck to it. And then the pandemic hit. But I didn’t change my lifestyle (except for the extra couch surfing while watching all my shows). And then I got a job. And then I got another one that paid way more. And I stuck to the process.

And sure enough, after 14.5 years since I got my first credit card, I paid the last outstanding balance, canceled all the balance transfer accounts I accumulated over the years, and cut those credit cards into pieces.

Disclaimer: I still use credit cards for the points, but I never carry a balance anymore.

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I’ve heard of people going hysterical and losing their minds when they’re debt-free, but for me, I didn’t really feel anything. Partially because I still have a massive student loan debt to conquer, but it wasn’t a huge wash of emotion like when I finished my last final in undergrad.

It was more like I had just woken up to another day. For a moment, I thought — now what?

And it was sobering because I think aside from understanding grace and knowing that I’m loved, nothing will ever be as pain-relief-inducing. Compared to knowing God and accepting Jesus, nothing for me will seem like reaching the summit of some grand peak (not peek), but more so like, “Great. What’s next?”

And perhaps, maybe that’s the way to take most things in life, with adequate consideration and commiseration, of course. If you get caught up in every single thing as a life-threatening situation or a coke-filled escapade, then it takes the meaningfulness out of things.

As a friend of mine often quotes his cinematography professor, if every shot is a close-up, then nothing is.

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I guess I do want to feel a certain way with how things are going, and I’m subtly being that I should feel that way on social media, or else I’m not on the correct side. And then I’m being told that if I feel this way, then I must feel that way about this other thing.

Which is probably the dumbest logically fallacy that I see Americans swing on the regular. Like if something is not green, then is it yellow? No, you fucking Neanderthal — it’s just not green.

I do have the feelings that everyone else probably has, and I empathize wholeheartedly. In fact, I really do want to voice my opinion to a whole bunch of strangers to raise some heads about things.

I also kind of want to celebrate that I’m free of credit card debt, but not like have a spending spree and live lavishly. (By my current standards, Taco Bell would be a considerable haul.)

Yet, I believe that once you feel a certain way, a genuine, perhaps practical “then what” should follow. Words and emotions are free to dole out, but taking action is anything but cheap. It’s going to require some form of work or sacrifice to see some change.

I once heard that living is the best form of revenge, but I’d like to take that notion to the next step:

The best form of activism you can do is simply love one another.

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YTD Student Loan Debt: $171,115.90
YTD Personal Loan Debt: $0

Truth Takes Tact

I debated on writing this month, mostly cause I was lazy. Stepping on the scale to see my weight balloon to a new personal best probably didn’t give me a lot of encouragement either.

Then, in my sometimes-endless scroll on social media, I came across this gem:

Justice is not defined as being fair but it’s defined as what is right. People who are fighting for the homosexual/transgender/LGBT agenda are fighting against God and his word and those who believe that it’s not how God designed mankind. They are asking not for fairness, but to change our definition of right. In essence, they making perversion normal and will make those who believe in the Bible villains. Will we see the church persecuted? I believe it’s coming.

For me, it didn’t register at first because — it’s social media. Anyone who wants to take propaganda, advertisement or soap box moments from Instagram to heart is free to do so, but they should also take it with a grain of salt. I’m only on these platforms to see memes and friends’ family photos.

Then, I came back to it, mostly cause it was starting to gain traction in the comments section, from people that were probably on this person’s side, but weren’t too keen on how this message was particularly delivered. Not much back and forth otherwise, but it was quite clear who was trying to talk whom back from the edge.

All this to say, if I were on the “opposing” side of this post, I would not take kindly to this — if at all.

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If it hasn’t been made clear in this entire journey, then let me re-cement the foundations: I am Christian, specifically Reformed Theology with Presbyterian as the structural basis. I believe in God, Jesus’s sacrifice and a whole lot more that would take a lifetime to unpack.

And that, reader, is what I find so egregiously infuriating with the aforementioned and brief post.

Firstly, justice is defined as fair or impartial in the dictionary, but the justice the original post alludes to is justice in the eyes of God, which is clearly stated but after the fact. Because of the whole bastardization of the English language, we’re left with more people leaning towards a fluid definition of justice, or just more confusion. Kind of like how the word “literally” is no longer literal because of its abuse by the stupid people everywhere. (Like literally.)

Secondly, who was the intended recipient for this post? Other Christians seeming to let tenets slide, or just everyone in general? Such a hot-button topic like this can’t be thrown around like Thanksgiving turkeys, although I don’t see a lot of that happening nowadays either. Being clear about who your audience is, is always paramount. You can’t give a speech about tackling nuclear disarmament during an elementary school recess, although you’d be surprised at how diplomatic children are.

Moving on — to say that they’re changing “our definition” of right is a steep reach. If you haven’t heard, people are quite stubborn. Some emotions go deep (i.e. white nationalism). And yet, God’s definition of right or correctness hasn’t changed, and it shouldn’t have changed for Christians. And if it did change for Christians, well, maybe the moniker should change to something more accurate (like Christian in Name Only).

Which brings me to what this should be the issue: man’s equity with each other. For example, making marijuana legal didn’t change my faith in Christ, nor did it open a gateway of imbibing for me; it just made it not a criminal offense for people that choose to get high with marijuana. Do I think it’s right to take marijuana? Not really (but also, I don’t care). Am I going to guilt trip someone because they do? No, because now we’re comparing specks and planks.

Finally, the Church will always be persecuted until Jesus’s return because it has always been sort of counter-cultural. (Please note the distinction of the Church, the body of believers in Christ, versus the church, a physical place of worship.) To say that the persecution is coming is laughable — welcome to the party, pal. The better question would have been: if you can’t hold true to God’s Word in your own heart despite outside forces working against you, then are you really faithful?

All this to say: it’s one thing to stick to your guns, but then an entirely different thing if you’re shooting without asking questions.

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Honestly, I’m just frustrated that some Christians cannot peaceably exist in society, in that they want to transform society from the outside looking in with holy yelling, reprimand and restriction — and basically being a dick — instead of nurturing it from the inside out. And it’s not just solely this issue, but every issue contradictory to Christian faith.

A great example is abortion. I am Christian, and I believe that every life is sacred. However, I am also a man, and I personally believe that if I, along with the rest of my gender, try to pass laws concerning and restricting activities specific of another gender that in NO WAY involves me other than my reproductive DNA just happened to be involved, then I should probably shut the fuck up. I’m not the one carrying the baby in my body for however long it may or may not take, and I sure as hell am not having it explode out of my lower abdomen orifice or have it cut out of my abdomen.

My problem isn’t with the root content of the original post. (Sorry, people, but I’ve hopefully made it very clear over the years.) My problem is that the person who posted that did so in a way without any tact. And if you need a definition:

tact | tact | ˈtakt | n.
a keen sense of what to do or say
in order to maintain good relations with others or avoid offense;
sensitive mental or aesthetic perception
ex. Without tact, you’re about as subtle as a loud, smelly fart.

A Christian’s faith — both its strength and validity — is found personally through Jesus Christ and not by outside forces. If a law concerning gay marriage is making your faith look like a Richter scale falling down a flight of stairs, then you really are a terrible Christian — and that’s okay. Most of us are.

But it does not give you any justification to be an obnoxious, unloving and ungracious human being to others.

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There are countless times when I wanted to speak truth to someone, but due to the blessed curse of a gift in 눈치/reading the room, I opt out — because sometimes, the truth won’t set this person free in that moment. Rather, it’ll cut deeply and cause defensiveness, and they’ll only blame you for holding the knife. They might come around later, but you shouldn’t bank on it.

And other times, I just spit the truth (or more likely biting commentary) cause I’m tired of dealing with the bullshit.

But in all of this, as a pastor friend pointed out, the factor that’s missing is grace. You can define it as courtesy or goodwill, and you’d be correct. If you look deeper, it means to show kindness, generosity and favor despite a person’s disposition, despite their creed or belief, despite their sin. And we all have sin. (We ain’t Jesus.)

And it’s not a one-or-the-other scenario. Truth and grace must work in tandem. And I’ll let Kevin DeYoung say it much better than I ever can:

[Grace people] accept us for who we are, but they never help us become who we should be… [Truth people] inspire us with their courage, but turn us off with their intimidation… Jesus came from the Father full of grace and truth.

Kevin DeYoung, “Full of Grace and Truth“

That whole post is worth the read, because not only is it also short, but it does loads more in terms of tact than the person that started this whole rambling did with that inane blurb.

It’s easy to sling a bunch of information and compact it into really catchy stuff just to grab attention. (Case in point: my title for this post.) But it’s a real act of faith to produce the synergy of truth and grace, to not only show the depth of your faith, but the result of it as well.

And honestly, if you want to reach people, you’re going to have to do it like Jesus did — by forming relationships and teaching (not talking down to people), one person at a time.

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YTD Student Loan Debt: $171,115.90
YTD Personal Loan Debt: $9,000.00

Why

If you’ve ever endeavored at writing a letter, story, or manifesto, there’s always some sort of reasoning or passion behind it. So, you open up a blank page on track to write down your thoughts, and then everything suddenly comes to a standstill because nothing is being written.

I had this particular conversation with a friend weeks ago (but it feels like months ago) on the writing process. He fancies himself a writer, but like most, he says that his writing is no good and often worries if his readers will respond correctly. With my years of unpublished knowledge, I told him to sack up and just write, because each second spent worrying about what readers will think, is one second that words aren’t being produced on the page.

Of course, he came back at me with the side-arguments and stipulations of being in his position and the ramifications that’ll befall him if he says the wrong thing. It all sounded legitimate — as in legitimate whining. (To be fair, he is a pastor.) It didn’t change the fact that if he didn’t write, he’d have nothing written. And if you don’t have anything written, did you have anything of value to offer?

I mean that rhetorically, for while although most stories have been told, it’s always the angle, the viewpoint that matters more than the content. The unsaid ah-ha moment that rings like a chime through the zeitgeist. Unless what you wrote sucks — then you should probably reconsider even picking up the pen.

And then, weeks (or months) later, I hit a snag.

I’m part of two different writers’ groups where we workshop our ideas and give notes. The last few sessions for each, however, I came up empty-handed because I didn’t revise anything I had written, nor had I written anything new worth sharing. I sat there like most philosophers and façade Christians, just critiquing and analyzing — never implementing.

I confided in one of the writers that I had sort of lost the drive to create anything for my medium because in the grand scheme of things, it didn’t seem that important in comparison to the business and networking aspects. However, what I wanted to say was what’s the point? We all end up in the ground anyways, whether in a box or in a ditch, and whatever legacy left behind usually ends up being ground down and blown into the annals of history.

So she asked me this: why do you want to write, and why for film and TV?

When I initially thought about it, there really was no good reason. I didn’t like working in an office, I had no translatable technical skills, and I hated how systematic everything in corporate was. For all intents and purposes, I should’ve been a construction worker.

Essentially, I just hated people and the rat race that we live in and perpetuate. Naturally, it probably would’ve been easier to just kill myself when I realized that, but I’m also pragmatic, and I wanted to see how things would play out. I’m also a chicken. And I’m sure Jesus wouldn’t want me desecrating myself in that way.

So after I got over the existential hurdle of the question, I realized that I just really like writing. Like visual arts and music, it’s a true creative medium, with only your imagination and vocabulary posing as limitations. An easy pick for a kid that didn’t have any friendships that lasted longer than three to five years. (I eventually did make life-long friends. Really, I did.)

But why film and TV? Curveball.

I actually had to think harder about that one. I recalled the reason why I left Seattle in the first place, but not so much why I pursued film — why I did. It’s not an industry that you dip your toe in and assume you can swim. It’s also not somewhere you can give your list of demands or dreams and expect them to be met.

If I’m to be honest, it’s where crazy people go to take advantage of others, trounce over those that are weaker, speak ill of one another, and eventually die. I’ve seen more ugliness in five years than I should see in a lifetime, and most of it wasn’t even directed at me. Watching friends I’ve made in the industry get pummeled by other people talking out of their asses, is truly one of the few things that makes my blood boil.

And when I calmed down, the only answer I could come up with is two-fold: nothing better to do, and no better challenge.

That’s really all it is.

If 2020 has show me anything, whatever tower you thought you’d erect to make your monumental claim is ultimately built on sand. Any relationship built on under false pretenses or incorrect assumptions collapses faster than a Kevin Spacey TV series. Of course, I say this all while drinking bourbon in the middle of the bonfire that is the pandemic because a part of me feels like I’m ready to go.

But what 2020 also has shown me is that anything you deem remotely worthwhile, still needs a bit of elbow grease. And elbow grease comes from exercise, from constant trying and failing, from getting back up and taking one in the nut-sack. You have to move to be alive, and you have to jump in order to reach.

And sometimes, you just gotta be crazy — but in a good way.

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YTD Student Loan Debt: $171,115.90
YTD Personal Loan Debt: $13,000.00

The Moral High Ground

It’s been a minute! (A phrase one of my Korean friends learned recently.) With everything, there should be good breaks smattered in between things to adequately separate the fun from the relaxation. Or the absolutely soul-crushing from the wallowing despair.

In my break time away from this blog, I binged a lot of shows. Avatar: The Last Airbender, Legend of Korra, Teen Titans, Young Justice, Harley Quinn, Rick & Morty… Yes, I have a bias towards animation because I believe the stories are vetted up and down so much before they even pass to the animators, that they’re usually good. Except The Killing Joke.

However, I always found myself tuning on one show in the background while I ate my meals, did my home workouts, or just to put myself to sleep cause the current events revolving around politics and media are a cesspool that would allure any sane person into shoving their head into a garbage disposal.

Like Binging with Babish, it’s been The West Wing.

That’s how he gives you those silky, smooth aural pleasures.

I recently saw a post from someone that suggested that President Bartlett was probably friends with Jeffrey Epstein. The thread devolved a little further with another person saying that The West Wing is a fantasy. Only one of those statements are remotely correct, but I take issue with both.

I took that very depressing and insulting social media waste to heart because as much as this Aaron Sorkin wet dream is fantasy, it is something to which people inside and outside of politics should aspire. Until you actually are in the bureaucratic nightmare that is the American political system, every statement about it is conjecture and hearsay. And bullshit. (Here I am talking about politics as well…)

Like most of Sorkin’s soapbox material, it’s all about pushing people to be better than what the lowest denominator is trying to drag the rest of us down to be. It’s about rising above the mire and lead others to a moral high ground. There’s no indication that it’ll be easy or that it’ll be a a war with an actual end, but it’s about fighting the good fight that fights for the good of all.

I already talked about Leo and how he’s pretty much my favorite character, but when it comes this idea of leading others to a better moral future, I hone in on two that characterize the wrong and right way to do it.

Toby

Toby Ziegler is probably the most unappealing, abrasive character in the entire series. Stubbornness personified, he’d probably tell the doctor operating on him that he’s doing things wrong mid-operation. If he wasn’t Jewish, he’d probably be a typical Bostonian.

Still funnier than most.

Despite his bitter pill personality, he stands for a lot of what I stand for. Actually, aside from the male pattern baldness, political career, and religion, I think of myself as a moral mirror of Toby: idealist, advocate for grammatical correctness, Socratic-level moral practitioner. An ancient philosopher’s ideal politician.

Toby is so gung-ho about moral absolutism that he often gets into hot water. He doesn’t compromise, so a lot of times, he gets into shouting matches with very important people, reminiscent of my own shouting matches (usually with myself).

The problem is that although he may be right, no one wants to listen to someone that’s just going to chastise and critique. No one wants to be talked down to. No one wants to be told that they’re wrong, especially from a know-it-all.

Then again, flexing your knowledge is pretty gangster:

Matt

Matt Santos is the closest thing to Barack Obama pre-Obama. Young, progressive, hopeful. Just swap out the basketball for football. He’s my ideal candidate, regardless of political affiliation, because he’s not an old person that won’t be around when legislation actually starts to take societal effect.

Even though he had been in politics for a while, Matt considers hanging up his legislative cowl because sadly, politics is a lot more steamrolling than it is compromise. However, at Josh Lyman’s urging, Matt runs for the highest office in America — and he quickly realizes that this isn’t like most political races.

It’s a slaughterhouse, where all of your dirty laundry is plastered and showcased. You’re expected to stick to talking points distributed by your political party and fit into the mould they shove you into. Probably makes a pretty good argument for why people wanted a candidate in 2016 that didn’t care what they said.

I can’t put a photo here for a reference
to the 45th President of the United States
because I will hate myself.

But Matt tries to stand above it. He doesn’t take cheap shots and talks about issues that are probably going to alienate his democratic base like ending teacher tenure. Throughout the campaign up to the DNC, he’s always in contention with his campaign manager. (You’ll find that Josh is always causing trouble for some reason.) All the while, he tries to lead the people towards a better discussion, a better future.

At one point, with basically all of his ad money gone, needing to promote his candidacy, and unable to get a fair debate (let alone an invitation), Matt Santos goes in front of a camera and makes a last stand.

I can’t help but feel a bit romantic about this bad-ass moment. To not only flex your on-camera skills but show that you’re morally above the rest, it makes me hopeful for another candidate, another politician to take a stand against far-end and overall stupidity. And one that’s not a septuagenerian.

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Morality is great on paper, but once you start throwing in people’s emotions and desires, it starts to look like used doo-doo paper. Yet, it doesn’t mean that because it’ll be messy, that we should just go full dirty. It’s a delicate balance of do-or-don’t in respect to earning people’s trust and leading them to something better — to get everyone on the same clean page.

I can’t say that I’ve held the moral high ground very well. There are definitely moments where I really want to slap the taste out of a person’s mouth, and other moments where I just want to quit and let people run the car into a wall. There are even times when I just ask God to put me out of my misery.

But I think all of that — good and bad, highs and lows, progression and setbacks — comes with trying to fight the good fight for the good of all.

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YTD Student Loan Debt: $171,115.90
YTD Personal Loan Debt: $15,000.00

My OCD for whole numbers is very real. What’s also real is that (personal loan) debt freedom is just on the horizon…

Make America Literate Again!

If you’ve been watching any amount of news, you’ve probably heard a lot of inflammatory speech. (By the way, there will be cursing in this post.) With pundits throwing accusations to straight up going over our heads with terminology, it’s a literal slog to try and decipher what’s really going on — which is why I really appreciate outlets like Reuters that tend to just stick to facts and break them down as objectively as possible. Even then, you need more than a third-grade reading level to understand some reports.

And as I was thumbing through my tutoring students’ essays while watching the news, I noticed a common trend throughout media, both professional and social, and our education system. Americans are just plain, old dumb. (Everyone, myself included.) Don’t get me wrong. We can read and write (although debatable), but do we understand what’s being read or written? Look at how many people struggle with filling out a W-4 or a W-9 — or even know the difference between them.

I could go on a spree of how Americans need more financial knowledge, but we need to look at the core of the issue: Americans need to be more literate.

literate | lit·​er·​ate | ˈli-tə-rət | adj.
able to read and write, having knowledge or competence
ex. The President is about as literate as a rock in a pond.

Let me preface by saying that I had a not-normal childhood, where summers were spent reading U.S. history textbooks in exchange for an N-64 and writing summaries on National Geographic articles so that I could go play outside, the bulk of the time which was forced to mowing the lawn. (This was in Tennessee, where land was cheap, so I’ll let you imagine the square footage…)

I should also point out that I come from the bias that knowledge, education, and effective pedagogy is the solution to most problems, if not all. (I’m basically a wannabe philosophy professor. Whodathunkit…)

A lot of my time in tutoring is spent breaking apart the bad habits structured in today’s educational system. If I’ve witnessed anything as a third party, it’s this: we’re turning our futures into mindless drones prepped for careers that they may not want by engineering a system aiming to compete against other countries’ better school systems instead of building towards advancement of economy or society.

Sidebar: Thanks, history of people focusing on the wrong thing about education, including Betsy DeVos. Go fuck yourselves. There aren’t enough God-fucking-dammits to illustrate my frustrations. Basically, we’re raising students to think inside the box that their elders are creating, only to be called upon after graduation to think outside it. How confounding is that?

Let me be fair. My students are literate; they can pronounce words and write somewhat complete sentences. Yet when it comes to essay time, they often simply churn out the worst pieces of argumentation I’ve seen. Reading these essays is like wading through a muddy swamp in a cheap suit, but it is like a triple-stuffed Oreo when I read a rarefied, good essay.

Still not nearly enough filling.

If you look at an ACT Writing Test Scoring Rubric, proctors grade essays on four criteria: ideas and analysis, development and support, organization, and language usage. By far, organization is the easiest: plug and chug or outline and copy. The other three require an entire K-12 education, and I’m expected to repair any mistakes from their entire learning history, both academic and in-home, so that they can write a logically-sound, well-argued essay. God-fucking-dammit.

Clearly, all the parenting and teaching problems come full force in reading an essay (that is, if they turn one in). If anything, I’m disappointed that with all that technology and access to so much information in these students’ hands, the breadth of understanding is limited to dumbass things such as TikTok videos. How am I supposed to fix things when technology has such a deep root?

Better yet, how am I supposed get these kids to argue when they don’t even know how to start an argument or which side to argue, let alone understand the issue? (Granted, what kid actually wants to come to a tutoring center during the summer to learn to debate?) Reasoning and competency take a lot of time to build up, which, from my perspective, aren’t being taught at all in schools or at home.

Don’t even get me started on vocabulary. The required reading material should have advanced a little since my time in high school, not sunken back because parents don’t like George Orwell or Mark Twain. When they don’t read, kids miss out on a plethora of words to describe their world, whether more accurately or colorfully — or both. (Why say “are doing” when you could instead “slash through the pages” or “caress the computer screen”?)

These are all things that I have to cram into a teaching session, which I pray for retention as these students go home to possibly undo everything. Some do return with a better understanding, easily reflected in their marginally better essays. (Vocab still needs work…) Nevertheless, my seemingly never-ending goal is to raise the literacy and understanding in all the students, so that with the wealth of knowledge at hand, the future could look a little more hopeful.

I now understood what had been to me a most perplexing difficulty – to wit, the white man’s power to enslave the black man. It was a grand achievement, and I prized it highly. From that moment, I understood the pathway from slavery to freedom…
The very decided manner with which he spoke, and strove to impress his wife with the evil consequences of giving me instruction, served to convince me that he was deeply sensible of the truths he was uttering. It gave me the best assurance that I might rely with the utmost confidence on the results which, he said, would flow from teaching me to read. What he most dreaded, that I most desired.
Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

At the heart of all my distress from reading terrible essays and even worse public statements, is language. Language is the key to culture, to unlock perspectives outside of your own and discover a bit more history and information. Within that process, you develop insight, understanding, and perhaps empathy that your world is much bigger than your four walls or the four sides of your fence. Language frees you from the jail of your mind.

Did you know that there are words in the Korean language that don’t have an English equivalent? Or maybe that there are words like daijobu and gwenchanha between Japanese and Korean, respectively, that mean relatively the same thing and are used pretty much the same way? Here’s one that blew my mind: German and Korean have similar syntax. All of these revelations, just by learning a language (or two).

My point is that we need to focus on literacy and language as our foundations, and then build appropriately and intensively. We need an increase in this type of learning to really start progress. While it’s certain than face-to-face time and sussing out differences in safe environments is also crucial, if we don’t have language as the basis of accurately communicating what we think and how we feel, how can we become a better society?

If any of this was compelling, please do me a favor and just read a book. Whether it’s one you own or one you can borrow from the library (via digital loans). When you do, give a shoutout to the guy that started the first lending library and really wanted to make America literate — Benjamin Franklin.

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YTD Student Loan Debt: $171,115.90
YTD Personal Loan Debt: $21,640.00

I paid off my auto loan. Hallelujah!