Single & Struggling - Step 3: Breaking the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle

In this episode of the Pink Money Podcast, Jerry Williams continues the Single & Struggling series by tackling one of the most critical steps in breaking the paycheck-to-paycheck cycle: understanding where your money is actually going.

After organizing bills and prioritizing urgent financial obligations, the next step is deeper analysis. Jerry walks you through how to track your spending, identify financial “pain points,” and take control of your cash flow—without relying on rigid budgeting rules or one-size-fits-all formulas.

From everyday habits like eating out to larger expenses like housing, this episode helps you uncover what’s really holding you back—and how small, intentional changes can start shifting your financial reality.

If you’re feeling stuck, overwhelmed, or unsure where your money disappears each month, this episode offers practical, judgment-free guidance to help you move from awareness to action.

💬 Have a question or comment? Contact Jerry here

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

The following podcast is for entertainment and educational purposes only. Remember to seek competent tax, legal, and investment advice that is unique to your personal situation. Hey everybody, I'm your host, Jerry Williams, and welcome to the Pink Money Podcast, where we look at all things related to money from a queer perspective. And you know, I recently was reading something, and I thought this was really powerful because I think a lot of us have heard this before, but given that we're talking about this single and struggling series, it really hit home with me. And the fact that believe it or not, 60% of people are living paycheck to paycheck. And that's really difficult when you're in that 60%, because that means that there's no room really for anything because all of our money is flying out of our hands and going somewhere. And so we are just trying to make do until we get our next infusion of cash. So when you're in this paycheck by paycheck to paycheck cycle, we have to really take a look and see where our money's going because there's obviously some problems, right? We know that. Otherwise, we wouldn't be living paycheck to paycheck. Now, if you're following along in the single and struggling series that I created, we already took a look at the very beginning where we just dumped everything on the floor. I told you about my garbage bag story. You know, everything was in one sack, and I dumped it out and sorted into piles. And hopefully you've done the same thing. You've gathered all your bills and everything that's been unopened, and you created your little piles, and then you opened everything and started taking a look. Okay. That was kind of the step one. And then the step two was we used a triage system like they do in, I always think about MASH, you know, but any kind of field work or hospital work where in triage you have to stop the bleeding, you know, put a tourniquet on or whatever you got to do. But then you take a look at the worst case situations first, and you prioritize things. And in triage, real triage, they color code it. And I suggested using a color code system. You can you do whatever you want, like red for the most immediate, yellow for urgent, and then blue and then black, black being you know, pretty much everything else, but blue being less urgent than yellow. It's just a simple way, but you can do it any way you want, or not use any colors at all. Doesn't really make any difference. It's just a means for you to organize things and to start prioritizing them so you know where to start. So we've done all that. We did step one, step two, and then step three. You know, we've decided before we paid anybody, before we set any financial goals, before we really have done anything, again, we need to do more analysis. Okay. So this is the means that we use to strategically deploy our money. And we're going to get to some of those things like setting SMART goals and that kind of stuff. But we're not going to do that until we have a real good handle on where we're at. And that's really, really important. So I'm a saver of receipts. You may not be, but it just depends on you. But you need to now go through your spending and identify where your money's going because that's going to give you the clear picture that you need on what's happening with your money. It's your money, you're using it, and you're spending it, but we need to find a way that we can save more and get you out of this paycheck by paycheck cycle. Because although this may be common, this is not normal. Okay. So the normal is not living paycheck to paycheck. Normal is having money to pay for everything and save for everything and having some left over. And if we don't have that, then we need to find where the money's going. Like I've said, my most common things that I've seen in the past are people spending the overspending on eating out and on their cars. But yours could be different, yours could be on housing. Okay, that's a big one these days. But it really just depends. I could sit here and guess all day long, but that doesn't make a difference to you. And so you need to again do the hard work, pull your bank statements or whatever, however you spent your money, and you need to really figure out where it's going. And again, you need to do some sorting as well. And I I hate to keep bringing up chat GPT, but I just find it so useful. I really, really do, because it's so easy to use and it's so friendly, and it's not judgmental, and there's no shame in and talking to it. However, you want to talk to it. It's not gonna, you know, snap back at you when the next thing you turn, you know, you turn around and it's got its back to you. No, it's gonna be very helpful to you, and that's what you need. You really need a helping hand, okay? Because we need to identify these spots, and they can do it quick, because again, we don't have all the time in the world here to sit and analyze and create spreadsheets and everything, okay? We got priorities. And when we're in the red zone, like I mentioned before, you know, if the wolves are knocking at the door, we got to find a way to tackle this, okay? And you really need to marshal all of your dollars and account for all of them before we decide making phone calls and telling people and making promises, I'm gonna pay you and I'm gonna do it by Tuesday. When the reality is you're not gonna come anywhere near that, okay? Because that's not gonna help you one iota. So when we call these people, as I mentioned before too, in the last episode, we are looking for time. Time is really our ally here. It even though the clock is ticking sometimes against us, we we need more time, and we ask for time because you you know, you don't ask, you don't get. So you have to ask for time and time to pay people in a realistic fashion. Okay. So once we've made it through red and now we're into yellow, and we're tackling some of the blue, and that's a good feeling in and of itself, because that means you've made some progress. And we're all about progress here, okay? We're not saying perfection, we're saying progress. So perfection in my mind is really never achieved in almost anything, okay. I don't give you the I don't care if they give you a perfect 10, you know, in the ice skating, okay? There's always someone who does something else like the quad triple LUTs or whatever it is, you know. I'm just saying, you get my point. Anyway, so the whole concept here is we've identified and we prioritized, but we really have to can address these pain points so that we can deploy our dollars in the most strategic fashion. Okay. That sounds so grown up, right? But it is. That is exactly what we're doing. We're saying we are grown-ups, we take control of our money, and we don't let it spend itself on its own. We control how it's being spent. And therein lies what we're actually trying to do, right? We need to get our arms around the money and use it as we see fit. And we have to live within our means. You know, when I was younger and I would hear people say things like that, well, they don't live within their means, they handle their money really well. I heard those words, but it really didn't make any sense to me. I really didn't understand what that meant because no one told me the how and why. I just knew that when people said that, it was sort of a bad thing. And I wondered if I was in that boat, right? Because you never want to see yourself in the sinking boat. You want to see the opposite. And I'm was, and I've always been wondering, you know, back then, how do I how do I figure out if I'm in that boat and what do I do if I'm in it? Well, now we know paycheck by paycheck means we're in the leaky boat, okay? We're in the leaky boat, and now we need to solve our problem. We got to get away from this systematic behavior of living paycheck to paycheck. So if this is a habit that you've developed, like all habits, you need to change this habit. And if it's let's say spending on going out or if it's eating out, you really need to, like any habit, break it by taking a pause. And before you decide that you're gonna go do this, just pause. Take a powerful pause and use it to your benefit. So you don't want to act spontaneously, you don't want to let it get the better of you in terms of that money burning a hole in your pocket. You need to remember what you're trying to do, which is break the cycle, okay? And that is what we have to do. And if let's say you were ready to go pick up the phone and order DoorDash, don't wait at least 10 minutes and let it dissipate, and then think, what else could I do? And I hate to say it, but if we've got ramen, let's eat ramen, okay? We gotta do what we gotta do. So instead of spending$30,$40 on dinner, we could spend 29 cents on dinner. Okay, no shame, no shame there. You're still providing sustenance to yourself, and there will be a day that you could order DoorDash to your heart's content, but we are not there today, okay? Some people are, but we're not. And don't beat yourself up about it because again, we're making progress, and that's what we're after here. So when I think about the ways to do that, you know, there's so many different, I'll call them budgeting guidelines like 60, you know, 30, 20, or you know, all these different ways to allocate your money. I even despise the word budget. I don't even like that word because it doesn't really mean a lot of things to a lot of people. It really doesn't. And there's just a zillion budgeting apps and people giving you advice on how to budget your money, etc. And I just say forget that word budget and don't look at these percentages and let it drive you crazy because it doesn't really tell you anything. Honestly, it doesn't. Because they're just saying, in a general sense, this is how you should use your money, but that's not the reality for us, okay? That is just an easy way for people to say you should use your money like this. And quite frankly, I don't care what they say, okay. We're saying we need to use the money the best way, we need to use our money, okay? And the best way that we can use it is first figuring out our pain points. So backing into our budget, our formula, whatever you want to call it, the deployment of our money, okay, let's use that term. The how we deploy our money is going to be in the best, most strategic fashion, and we're going to figure that out by backing into it. So if you are able, you add up how much I spent to the grocery store. Here's what I'm spending for rent, here's our mortgage, here's what I'm spending on utilities, you know, on and on and on. Okay, so we've accounted for all of our dollars. And even like I said before, if money is flying out the door, even to your 401k, that is still money being spent. Taxes is still money being spent. Okay. You don't live on your gross income, you live on your net income. And if you're contributing in a pre-tax world of your 401k, that's shaving money off of your gross income. Okay. Not net. Anyway, net is what gets deposited into your bank account, and that's the money that we then spend. It may be, it may be useful for you to put a pause on your 401k. Okay. That that may be an option that you have to exercise, even though it means, let's say, losing an employer match. If it's a temporary situation, okay, we don't want to do that permanently because that's just losing free money. And then time is not your ally when you're not contributing to your retirement. You need to start early, as early as can be. However, like all things, we have to prioritize. And this is where we address those pain points. And we need to get clear. If you've been sitting and looking through things through rose-colored glasses, well, take them off. Okay, because what we're really looking at here is our complete entire financial situation through bright lights. And it may not be as pretty as we kind of thought it was, because if you've been looking at things on the edges, we need to bring that focus in and really narrow down to say, got it, this is what I'm doing, this is where it's going, and I cannot live like this any longer. And imagine, imagine if you're single and struggling, but if you have a child, children, that is compounding your issue, okay? So we then have to add in like child care, all the things that it takes to keep a kid in school, all that gets accounted for. You may be getting some child support, maybe not, or you may be paying child support, either or. All I'm saying is we need to account for these things because that's where our money's going. And so I want to be helpful to you. I'm not wanting to be preachy to you because we don't need that. We need someone to guide us through the steps that it takes to continually move ourselves forward, and we go from our awareness where we are now into action, and that's where we're moving ourselves to, so that we again strategically deploy our money in the best fashion possible. So I think we have our step right now, meaning we've got some more work to do, okay. We've taken care of our red, we had to, okay. That was immediate. We had to take care of the red, we got a little bit of time, right? So we need more money though, and we're gonna get to some of the things that can make you more money, like what I call the Mildred Pierce way to build a better life, okay? And then eventually we're gonna get to the Betty Davis now voyager, now voyager period in our life, and I'll tell you more about that later. So, anyway, we're not there yet, but we're getting there. So every step we're taking is a step that's moving us forward, and that's good on you. So, your homework, if you will, is again figure out where your money's going, address those pain points, and become very familiar with them because with the next step is we're going to address them and we're going to have to make some hard choices to fix them. And it may be ones, again, that you don't want to make, but you have to make. I'll just give you an example. If half of your money is going to rent, that's not sustainable. That is unsustainable. There has to be a way that we can reduce that to a more realistic number, basically about 25%. That's more or less where we need to be, about half of what you're spending. Now, I can automatically hear you say, Well, I live in Austin, Texas. That's not possible. I can tell you, yes, I don't care if you live in Austin, Texas, that is possible. Because they say that it takes about$100,000 to live in Austin, Texas. And I'm using this as an example, it could be anywhere USA, USA. But most people don't earn$100,000. They're earning anywhere from$50,000 to$75,000. So you have to work with what you have, okay? If you can get a better job that pays you$7,500,$100,000, well, then what are you waiting for? Go for it. But most people don't have that luxury of doing that today, getting that job today. It's maybe something that you're working towards as well. Okay. Maybe you're trying to finish your degree. But my point is we're going to work with what we have today. And so if we have those hard choices to make, we're going to have to find a way to reduce that. And that may be bringing a roommate in or some other way to reduce those expenses. Okay. You know better than I do, but you cannot continue to ignore it or just say that's the way it is. That is not the way that it is. Otherwise, we're never going to get ahead. And this paycheck to paycheck cycle is going to break because you're going to break it. We're going to get ahead of this, and then you're going to get into the uncommon, into the normal. So that's where you need to be. So hopefully, I've given you stuff to chew on today. I hope that you take a lot of this to heart. If you're not in these shoes, as I mentioned before, be grateful. And if you know somebody who might benefit from this information, let them listen. I think that it's incredibly important for us to share and to give as much as we can to others. And especially when people don't see it, they just can't see a way forward. And if you're the kind of person that can be a guide, a light, I know that sounds maybe too churchy, but believe me, a lot of people need help in these darkest days of their lives. And you can be a very helpful person to guide them. Okay. So I hope that you are. And I encourage you to do everything you can to improve your life today. Don't wait and keep listening, and we are going to get you there. And I will talk to you next time.