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Archive for January, 2010

Talked to Vicki Robin of YMOYL

January 12th, 2010 at 04:00 pm

Your Money or Your Life (YMOYL) is the book that changed my life when I first read it back in about 1992. Even though I never followed completely through the program, I did several of the "9 steps," and just reading the book helped me move from being "mindless" about money to "mindful." It also started me on a path to become educated about personal finances, which has lead to my currently in-progress career change.

Along the way from academic psychologist to financial professional, I developed two courses, "Simplicity and Sustainability" and "Money and Happiness." These were academic courses oriented to college undergraduates with no particular financial expertise and involved reading, discussing, and writing about a series of books written for intelligent laypeople. Several of the authors whose books I read myself along the way are featured in a tele-seminar series organized by Vicky Robin herself. The first introductory class was last night, and I actually got to thank Vicky personally for her work, though I didn't get to elaborate on what a difference it made in my life. She's having a second introductory tele-class tonight and the series starts "for real" next Monday. You can read more about it here:

Text is http://yourmoneyoryourlife.info/?page_id=1815&preview=true and Link is
http://yourmoneyoryourlife.info/?page_id=1815&preview=true, and the link if you want to attend tonight's intro is here:
Text is http://myaccount.maestroconference.com/conference/register/QD3OK1FPXKFZOOQI and Link is
http://myaccount.maestroconference.com/conference/register/Q...

The intro class is free, and if tonight is like last night, she'll discuss YMOYL--which even as someone who has read the book 3 or 4 times, I found useful. The speaker series does charge, however. Since I'm currently unemployed, I'm debating whether to attend myself or not--especially since I think I'll be taking a class at the local college, and much as I could easily spend all the money I don't spend on Henry on education, one does have to make choices. She says she's currently planning to repeat the series a second time, so possibly I'll wait until the repeat. But it was a real honor just to be able to thank the person who co-authored the book that changed my life.