The Home Owners Association fees at my friend’s condo went way way up and she and her husband could no longer afford to live there. She knew she needed to sell, sooner rather than later, but she absolutely refused to consider a listing price less than $X00K. The reason: $X00K is what she believed she would need to buy a new house in cash, in a new neighborhood where she liked the school district, that had at least 3 bedrooms and that was less then 5 miles from her office. Mind you, my friend doesn’t actually have kids yet, but she and her husband were thinking about it. Also, her company was considering relocation; they would know in about a year if the offices would move.  Finally, because of some old credit issues, she was pretty sure she wouldn’t qualify for a loan, though she didn’t actually call any lenders to ask. Her realtor wanted her to be flexible, to let him price based on other recent sales in the neighborhood and to be open to whatever offer came-in, but she refused.

As I’m listening to my friend tell me all this, I am thinking, ” she is crazy!”; she has a real problem right now, she can’t afford her house, and is letting a set of arbitrary conditions, about a future possible scenario, get in the way of her solving her current issue. I tried to point-out that there were really a lot of unknowns in her ‘new house scenario’; what with the not actually having a new property in mind yet, not having kids yet, that schools are constantly changing, credit worthiness changes over time and based on lenders, the fact that housing markets go up and down, the option of renting for a while versus buying, job moving, etc. But she held firm — in her imagination, $X00k was the number she needed to sell this house for to keep her future housing options open. That amount would cover the most expensive option she might want, in the most expensive neighborhood she might want, so it was safe. It was what she needed.

• I know that it is possible I can prepare and then have what I need
• I know that it is possible that I don’t prepare and I then don’t have what I need
• I have spent time accumulating evidence that it is possible I  prepare and still don’t have what I need (like clothes for funerals and gala and interviews) and I am starting to believe
• But for years I have taken for granted a basic ‘fact’ — If I don’t prepare there is no chance in hell that I will be ok, that I will have what I need.

This is my control monster, rearing its hydra head in a fun new way. But just the other night I walked down to a new restaurant in my hood for a bite. I was shocked by how packed it was, sorry I didn’t make a reservation, but I went in to ask about a table anyway. The hostess told me I had come at just the right time: It was 9:15 and they consider reservations no show after 15 min, so I got the table for someone who had 9:00 reservations , who had prepared, but didn’t come. Here I was, unprepared but still OK. Its a start, something I am being mindful to notice, to collect evidence on. I need to train myself to understand this quadrant of possibilities, otherwise I will never let go of preparing no matter what the cost.