so when do you leave?

I've been preparing for this since before I began this blog. The blog itself is almost two years old now. I realize that I've been vague in setting a hard date, but have had good reason for it. Life happens, and you have to learn to be fluid when dealing with what it throws at you. I'm going to detail the history of my soft dates and why things were pushed back. I hope this will be of help to those of you who might be struggling with what to do.

March 2011

The main reason for this was there were rumors flying all over the company that contractors would be cut loose at the end of this month. I was expecting to be one of them since they failed to hire me in 2010. My morale was pretty low but they still kept me on as a contractor at least. Nothing wrong with collecting a check for as long as they kept me. I would be able transition to unemployment benefits when they cut me loose as well. I was ready to go physically and mentally then. Financially, not so much. I was over 20k in debt at the time and was counting on the sale of my land to cover that. As I was about to put it on the market I learned that they neglected to tell me that land sales had been stagnant for the last nine months. The sale was a no go and that money wouldn't be there to bail me out of my debt. Had I been able to sell it, I would have pocketed another 20k after taxes. With only unemployment benefits and what little I managed to save; I would stop paying the big bills (truck, trailer, & credit cards). I really didn't care if my personal credit took a major hit either. That's mostly because I took solace in knowing the repo man would have a pretty hard time finding me since I'd be moving from one boondock site/state to another. Instead what happened was that they finally hired me. I was a bit stunned and didn't get around to setting a new date for a while. Basically I went back to the business of paying off the debt. It wasn't until later in the year when I realized my mojo was coming back and that I actually stood a real chance of becoming debt free. This was the goal. Sort of.

Oct 2012

I had set this date in Sept 2011 because I signed a new lease and that's when it would be up. With my mojo back I was really taking names and kicking butt now. On top of that four out of the six bills would be paid off by this time. I was really itching to just get out there so this was the date! Or so I thought. It wasn't until a few months ago when talking with a good friend (whose full timing) suggested that I stay the course and finish paying off all of my debt. I'm so very close to it and it would be a shame if I wasn't able to pay it off because I left too soon. I thought about it some and realized that she is absolutely right and making the sacrifice to do that now means I will have one less thing to worry about when I'm out there. The plan was to sign another lease for another seven or eight months, and then part ways finally. Things turned out a little differently, but good nonetheless. 

Both times I had it in my power to leave despite what was going on. For me, the decision to stay put worked in my favor in more ways than I had considered. For one I learned that being able to pay off all my debt turned out to be more important than I'd thought originally. Looking back I realized that I had almost made a decision based on emotion rather than logic. I guess it was hard not to given where I was. I think things would have turned out for the worst had I given in to what I was feeling and left prematurely. Glad it didn't!