My Life on a Spreadsheet

Just a few weeks ago the conversation of how I mapped my life out on a spreadsheet came up. Since people think this is humorous I've decided to share with you all. J-dawg and I have separate ways of entertaining our obsession with rules, numbers, dates, and timelines but we are very similar in how we view them. I for one put everything, right down to my “life-plan”, in a spreadsheet.

Just last semester I was finally able to put a name to our craziness, Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder. Before you judge, read below, you might just fall into that category as well. You might know these people better as the perfectionists, workaholics, and stubborn (that would be me) individuals in your life.

A pervasive pattern of preoccupation with orderliness, perfectionism, and mental and interpersonal control, at the expense of flexibility, openness, and efficiency, beginning in early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by four (or more) of the following:

1. is preoccupied with details, rules, lists, order, organization, or schedules to the extent that the major point of the activity is lost

2. shows perfectionism that interferes with task completion (e.g., is unable to complete a project because his or her own overly strict standards are not met)

3. is excessively devoted to work and productivity to the exclusion of leisure activities and friendships (not accounted for by obvious economic necessity)

4. is over conscientious, scrupulous, and inflexible about matters of morality, ethics, or values (not accounted for by cultural or religious identification)

5. is unable to discard worn-out or worthless objects even when they have no sentimental value

6. is reluctant to delegate tasks or to work with others unless they submit to exactly his or her way of doing things

7. adopts a miserly spending style toward both self and others; money is viewed as something to be hoarded for future catastrophes

8. shows rigidity and stubbornness
(www.brainphysics.com/oc-personality.php)

I bet some of you just went, “oh gosh that describes me”. Yep see told you, I think more people than not have a little OCPD. There are plenty of people in the world that NEED to have it. You know who I am talking about, just take a look around your office. Perhaps you don’t see those people yet because they are never on time.

Getting back to the point, while J-dawg doesn’t share my love for spreadsheets he is very meticulous about his money. I think that man could live on $5 for a month and not go hungry. Me on the other hand, I like a good shopping spree at Kohl’s once in awhile as long as my bills are paid. :)

While I think it’s pretty standard to create a budget in a spreadsheet, I like to take it one step further and list scenarios. For example, right now I have a spreadsheet with our past budget, our current budget, our budget if we were to find a house and not yet have ours sold, our budget with a new mortgage payment after having ours sold, our budget with all extra expenses paid off, our budget if we stay in the house and refinance, our future budget with student loans, and last but not least our budget with a baby in the future. I also have a baby budget savings plan for when that day comes. :) Just as I had the down payment savings plan and the wedding savings plan previously. All in a spreadsheet full of fun formulas that let me manipulate all of my data by changing just one expense. Like I said, I don’t think this is too crazy, I know several people who review their budget on a daily basis and keep it in a spreadsheet.

I’ll even go as far as to say, planning our wedding in a spreadsheet was somewhat normal as well. After all, I did hear that some family/friends of ours did precisely the same thing. You know who you are and I thank you for making me feel “normal”. I had everything in that spreadsheet, our budget, our actual costs, comparisons of venues, decorations, dresses, food, travel, etc. I had every name, address, and RSVP in a spreadsheet as well. This came in handy for thank you cards both for the wedding and for showers. Now I use that same list to send out Christmas cards. Not too crazy right?

Well then I came home to my poor unsuspecting husband with my life-plan spreadsheet. Looking back I probably should have done this a lot sooner, perhaps I wouldn’t still be in school. You live and you learn though right? Included in this life-plan were the dates (by month and year) and our ages at these different points in our lives. I included the dates of both our graduations, followed by when we would begin professional school, the exact month we would become pregnant with our first child (because that’s soooo predictable right?), the date we would have the baby, when we would finish professional school, how old our kid(s) would be, when they would start school, approximately how much money we would be making, and when we would be finished with all of the above. So if you officially think I am a nut case, it’s fair, I can admit it was a little on the “she-might-have-just-lost-her-mind” side. At least that is what J-dawg was thinking. He promptly made me trash the list.

So now I keep my obsessive planning to a minimum with my old school color coded planner (red for bills, green for school, blue for appointments). Each semester I also keep a log of my homework assignments, grades, the grade I need on each assignment to get an A, due dates, times, and final grade. This I might mention has come in handy 3 times when my professors calculated the wrong grade at the end of the semester. I’m that student the professors hate, always questioning their grading.

So looking back, maybe it was a little overboard but that is just the way I am. I like to have a plan for everything. I know things change and plans don’t always go as planned but hey I try. Needless to say the “plan” I ever so painstakingly mapped out for us has already changed since we’ve been married. I’d say for the better. Now I just have a rough draft of the plan in my head. No more life-plan spreadsheets maybe I’ll just try to wing it…..yeah right.