Recently, I read another blogger’s money story – and I always find them pretty fascinating! I mean, it’s a big part of why we blog about what we blog about and our own outlooks on money and life.

Several years ago, I wrote my debt story. I was finishing up paying off $30,00 in student loans and was a little burnt out on the whole process when I first started blogging.

As I read that other blogger’s story, I realized that my debt story is only one chapter in my money story so far! And I thought it was kind of cool that enough time has passed now that I can see that – so if you’re in the middle of your debt chapter, just know, there’s light at the end of the tunnel.

And so, here is my money story.

When I was in junior high, my best friend started making money babysitting and I just about lost my mind because my parents wouldn’t let me do the same. I wasn’t allowed to babysit anyone other than my little brother until high school.

I share that because I wanted a part time job for as far back as I could remember. It would be my own money to do whatever I wanted with. I turned 16, the legal working age in New Jersey, in the middle of the summer and as soon as band camp ended, I got my first part time job working as a cashier at Walgreens.

It was not fun at all.

I worked there about 8 months, stock piling money, until I felt I had enough to not work for a while and quit.

This is kind of the story of my life. I stockpile money and then make big, crazy decisions and leave any security I’ve built up.

By the end of the summer, I needed another job again and started waitressing at a local Italian restaurant owned by an older couple I went to church with.

Turned out, they were kind of insane. The whole family was really. But I worked there all of senior year until I destroyed my knee in a skiing accident – you can’t waitress that well if you can’t walk. When my knee healed, I decided I didn’t really need the money, so I didn’t go back.

College was paid for by my parents and a decent collection of scholarships. My dad was really strict and had a lot of (seemingly) insane ideas and rules and forbid me to work when I went to college. He pointed out that he paid for books, food and laundry, so I was set. My job was to study.

Clearly, dads don’t understand that college also required pizza, trips to the movies and questionable underage liquid substances, but I was also a pretty good kid, so I followed the rules freshman year.

Sophomore year I got offered a student worker position in the theater scene shop (where everything for the shows get made). I was pretty much living there anyway, so why not get paid, right? I actually worked that job for about a year and a half , finally reveling in all the pizza and beer money a college girl could want.

Senior year, I got a job working as a stagehand in the campus performing arts center.

Now, let’s recap. 4 jobs here – cashier, waitress, scene shop worker, stagehand. Where did all that money go?

Beats me. I was a chronic hoarder/spender. I would build up decent sized chunks of savings – in my checking account – and then it would just disappear. The personal finance blogger in me now winces at the thought that if I’d just opened a flipping IRA back then….

But we can’t turn back the clock, can we? So onward…

That’s how my early years with money went. Amass it, dispense it, don’t plan ahead.

And somehow I always got by (something about the grace of God and all that). My senior year of college, I had a super religious moment, flipped a quarter three times and wound up in seminary for the next three years.

I funded this with a little help from my parents, scholarships, substitute teaching, stage managing and a brief but miserable stint as a customer service rep for an insurance company. For those who don’t know, seminary is super cheap – like $1,500 a semester.

My money skills did not get any better here. I was mastering the art of working exactly the minimum that I had to in order to pay all my bills.

This is still a skill that plagues me to this day. If it’s stage managing or blogging, two things I really enjoy doing – I can work 80 hour weeks and be fine with it.

But substitute teaching. Ugh. To this day I figure out the minimum number of days I can sub and still meet my savings goals.

After seminary (and a really bad breakup), I made the first super crazy move of my 20s (well… arguably the 2^nd. I think a lot of folks who knew me found going to seminary to be a little out of left field) and up and moved to San Francisco on a whim.

Hello major money mistake #1. You don’t move across the country into an apartment with $1,250 a month rent without a plan. Or a job.

It was pretty much a miracle that I landed a job that paid my rent within 3 weeks of moving out there – stage managing on a cruise ship.

Now, this was the most money I’d ever made! I had to fork most of it over to pay my portion of the rent in San Francisco and to pay off some credit card debt from the end of seminary, but I just squirreled it away in a checking account again like a demented, interest hatin’ squirrel.

When that number got over $10,000, I thought – I should do something with this! So I applied to school again, this time for a PhD in theater. And got in nowhere. Rejection teaches you awesome things, right?

Not to be deterred in my goal of spending that money, I wound up in England, getting an M.A. in Theatre & Performance Studies.

And this is where I really started to learn about money. I had a $20,000 loan from my grandmother and another much smaller one from Sallie Mae and all my savings were gone.

Nothing will freak you out like watching all your account balances drop lower and lower while living in a foreign country.

It was a crash course in frugality. I went for a lot of walks. I started eating mushrooms most of the time instead of meat. I mastered thrift store shopping, but even only then when I couldn’t just mend whatever had broken.

And in June, when I left England, my debt chapter began.

For the next two and a half years, the majority of every paycheck was turned over to my credit card company, Sallie Mae or my grandmother. I wound up back out on a cruise ship so I could live really cheaply and pay off that debt as quick as possible. When I left the ships, I got on a circus train so I could do the same thing.

And finally, in the Fall of 2013, I mailed off my last check to my grandmother and all my money became my own again.

But what to do then in the new debt free chapter of life? I waffled around a little bit the first year and set a few savings goals. I moved into an apartment for the first time since San Francisco in New York. I used that financial freedom to grow my career, live in a high cost of living area, and work at a high profile theater in the City.

But my wanderlust was too strong and after all those years of not paying fixed costs every month – rent, utilities, etc. – it all just seemed like such a waste to me. Maybe if I’d liked my job more or made more friends in the area, I would’ve stayed, but the call back to the low cost, on the road living was too strong.

So I’m here again. Making a much lower salary than the NYC year, but with next to no cost of living (other than healthcare – thanks federal mandate making me buy something). My savings game is pretty strong. Last year I saved about half of what I made between retirement funds, emergency fund and other savings accounts. This year I’m aiming for a slightly higher number.

My hustle game is pretty strong too. Because I’ve definitely learned that spending less is only part of the equation, earning more is really where it’s at. Don’t get me wrong though – I think spending less is a fantastic place to start! It’s kinda like the pf snowball method– cutting back expenses is something you can sit down and start doing right this second and see results. Earning more is like the pf avalance method – the returns are probably higher, but it might be a little longer before you see some results.

I’m coming up on meeting several of my savings account goals – so I’m excited so see what the next chapter of my money story has in store.

What chapter is your money story on?