Why Celebrating Small Money Wins Is the Secret to Debt Payoff Momentum | 100

What if the fastest way to pay off debt isn’t cutting more—but celebrating more? In this milestone episode of the Debt Rebel Podcast, Jewlz The Budget Nerd shares a powerful real-life win from the community: a listener who just dropped $15,000 on debt—something she never could’ve imagined doing two years ago.

This episode dives deep into debt reduction strategies and demonstrates why celebrating financial wins, big and small, is the key to building momentum, especially if you’ve lived paycheck to paycheck or felt stuck for years. You'll learn how embracing a no shame finance mindset can help you overcome setbacks and stay motivated.

Discover why debt payoff is a marathon, not a sprint, and how small wins—like sticking to your grocery list or funding an emergency fund—compound over time. Learn why community and encouragement matter more than willpower and how celebrating progress helps you stop relying on credit cards for necessities. Plus, explore what actually keeps families consistent long enough to become debt free.

Jewlz also celebrates this milestone episode and shares the Debt Rebel community’s growing goal of paying off $1 million in debt by 2026. Join us by submitting your own wins so we can celebrate your progress together.

👉 If you’ve ever thought, “This will never work for me,” this episode might change everything.

Resources mentioned:

Submit your debt payoff wins + grab a free guide: ⁠debtrebelpodcast.com⁠

🎉 This episode is your reminder: progress counts—and you’re allowed to be proud of it.

Disclaimer: This podcast is intended for educational and informational purposes only. As a financial coach, I share insights, strategies, and tools to help you make more confident decisions with your money—but personal finance is personal. Your situation, priorities, and goals are unique, and what works for one person may not be the right fit for you.

This content should not be considered financial, legal, or investment advice. I encourage you to seek guidance from a trusted financial professional who can understand your full financial picture and provide personalized recommendations.

Additionally, while we may discuss topics related to stress, habits, and behavior, I am not a licensed medical or mental health professional. Any insights shared are based on personal experience and research and are not intended to diagnose, treat, or replace professional medical or psychological advice. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for support in those areas.

By listening to this podcast, you acknowledge that you are responsible for your own financial and personal decisions.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Hey there, I'm Jules the budget nerd and welcome to the Debt
Rebel show. This is the place where working
families like yours learn how tostop living paycheck to
paycheck. Crush debt.
For good and build a life where money actually works for your
family. In about. 15 minutes, I'll
share. Practical Family.
Budgeting tips, tough love strategies and actionable.

(00:20):
Steps to move toward debt free. Living without the fluff, the
shame or the confusion. And I know a thing or two.
About. This my family and I have
eliminated over $107,000 in consumer debt and that was after
I got my degree in economics. So stay tuned.
This is going to be a great. Episode So grab that coffee your

(00:40):
planner. Whatever you need to make this a
great experience. Maybe a snack if you're like me.
And let's make your money work for your.
Family and my husband have basically live paycheck to
paycheck since we got married and I just never thought it
would be real for me. I'm kind of speechless and I
also feel like a little bit of like gut pain from putting that

(01:02):
much money down. But I know I have plenty in my
emergency savings to get us by. But if you were to ask me like 2
years ago to put that much moneydown, I would have been like,
you're crazy. I would have never done it.
And that was my biggest obstacleI had to overcome was trusting
the process and putting everything towards one thing at
a time instead of trying to do everything at once.

(01:24):
I would not let that go. And once I finally let that go,
I made so much more progress than I've ever made before.
So I just submitted my 15,000 and whatever the heck else and
I'm ready for it to show up on that website because I am just
so proud of it. I'm super proud of it.
So that puts my snowball amount for my student loan to just over

(01:48):
$2000 a month on my student loan, which means in 10 months
I'll pay off that other 20,000 if I don't have any
discretionary other random bits of money that I can put towards
it. But just my snowball alone.
I can get rid of my student loanin 10 months which is insane.
And it's January so that means basically by the end of the year
I will not have a student loan. I'm just blown away.

(02:10):
I don't really know what I'll say.
Thank you Jules for believing inme and always having my back and
encouraging me even when I overspend on gifts and coffee.
OK, debt rebels, we can do this $1,000,000 2020.
Six my stars isn't that amazing.So I am just so excited to be
able to share that huge wane with you because today's episode

(02:32):
is all about celebrations. So this is a pretty big
milestone for the debt rebel show because this episode, Oh my
gosh, I am just so excited for all the things that have
happened throughout this show and the things that are coming
because I plan on keep doing this because you keep listening.
And so I just want to say a veryspecial thank you from my heart

(02:55):
to you because I said I would record this.
I would, you know, create this podcast for one family.
And I know that hundreds more have listened to the show.
And so I want to say thank you for listening.
Thank you for sharing your wins and your stories with me.
It is very encouraging. It is also, I'm just so grateful

(03:16):
that we get to talk about the thing that our culture says
don't talk about. We talk about money here and
budgeting and especially when itcomes to raising families and
parenting and all of the things that go into that.
And so thank you so much, Allison, for sharing your huge
win with us, but also for you'vebeen a, you've been a part of
this since the very beginning. And so thank you for being a

(03:40):
part of the Debt Rebel communityand also for sharing the the
financial wins because so if youare brand new to the show, this
year on the show we have set a goal to pay off $1,000,000 in
debt. And so that number keeps growing
because y'all are just doing amazing things.

(04:01):
So if you haven't entered in theamount of debt that you have
paid off so far this year, then head to debtrebelpodcast.com and
you can see where we are. I do have to update that
manually, so it's not an immediate update, but I do
update it often and so that we can celebrate those wins
together. And so I want to talk about why

(04:22):
it's so important to celebrate the wins, especially in the
journey of paying off debt. And the biggest one is it's the
thing that's going to help create the momentum for you that
you need to just keep going, right?
So it's debt repayment is a yourdebt, you know, debt payoff,
debt elimination, however you want to call it is it's a

(04:42):
marathon game. It is definitely not a Sprint.
And so having these moments where, you know, if you've ever
seen anyone run a marathon, theyhave those water stations here
and here and there. And they are also, you know,
getting, they have those, oh gosh, what are they called?
Like those little, you know, food pouches and the to continue
to sustain their energy so that they can continue on running

(05:03):
26.2 miles, which was always a life goal of mine.
But that one, the one we're going to we're going to put on
the back burner, But that's whatdebt elimination and just
getting to that debt free point is.
And so surrounding yourself withpeople that are going to cheer
you on. That's why when people run
marathons, they are there's people that have support them

(05:25):
along the way. There's the people that have
said, Hey, don't forget to get that Six Mile run in today or,
you know, asking how your, how your training is going.
And that's exactly what we do inside the alliance coaching
membership is just cheer each other on and know that we're all
going the same place together. We're on different stages of
the, of the path. And, but we're, we're doing it

(05:47):
together. And I think that's what makes it
so special. It's not what my husband and I
had on our journey. We were kind of just doing it
ourselves and we are encouragingeach other.
It's it wasn't, it wasn't the same to have someone that wasn't
within our household to cheer uson and say, hey, how's that
going? And so and to when we kind of

(06:08):
felt like we were getting stuck to just pick us up and say, hey,
let's put 1 foot in front of theother.
And so I know Allison has been able to do that and has done
some incredible things for her family through this through this
process. So paying off your car is such a
huge win because when you're driving around with your family,

(06:28):
you knowing that your car is paid off is a very different
feeling than when you're drivingaround a car that you have to
make a payment on every single month.
It's just a different, it's a different feeling.
It's a different level of ownership, but also it's a
different level of pride knowingthat it's something that you set
a goal for your family and you accomplished it.
And so having having a communityof other people cheering you on

(06:50):
is just amazing. So thank you again, Allison, for
sharing your story with us. And I would love to celebrate
you as we kind of go into this next chapter of the podcast.
This is episode 100. So we've covered so many things
you've heard from, you've heard from my husband, you've heard
from some other people that are listeners of the show.

(07:13):
You've also obviously unpacked alot of my story.
And so I have a lot more to say.So thank you for sticking
around. And if you know someone else
that was like, hey, this is thisis a topic that comes up a lot
for them. Or maybe you're just brand new
to the show. It's one of the things that I
say is a key indicator and something that I realized for us

(07:34):
that a change needed to happen was putting groceries on a
credit card. So when we're putting life's
necessities on credit cards, that's usually a a pretty big
red flag that something that something's off.
And so I would love to unpack that more with you.
So I'll put a link in the description.
I'll put a link in the show notes for you.
If that's something that you're like, tell me more about that

(07:56):
because OK, so why is it important to celebrate your wins
along this journey? So the small, it's the small
things, it's celebrating the I went to the store, stuck to my
list things. It is the I stayed within my
plan for my food budget this month.

(08:19):
Or you know what, my family and I, we decided we were going to
have, you know, pizza night oncea week and we'd we did that.
Or maybe it is something a little bit different.
Maybe you said, hey, you know what I finally added into my
budget that I added a line item in there to start saving for my
next vacation. Or maybe it is I finally got

(08:42):
myself logged into my retirementaccount, you know, online access
or something like that. Like all of those things, they
seem they, they don't necessarily seem like the most
life changing things, but they are absolutely the little wins
that compound overtime that are going to get you closer to your
goal. So if we go back to that
marathon analogy, it is one stepcloser to the finish line.

(09:06):
And so today is just about thosecelebrations and making sure
that you're creating that time and that space for yourself to
celebrate the wins along the way.
And as you, you know, pay off a day or if you pay towards a
debt, we want to celebrate that with you.
So the debt rebel podcast com atthe very top there you can put

(09:27):
in, Hey, I paid off this amount this week and we want to
celebrate those things with you.And if you're feeling brave and
you want to share a voice note with me and the listeners of
this show, if you Scroll down a little bit on the website,
you'll be able to do that. And I would love to hear from
you. I'd love to hear the things
about this show that you love. If you have an episode idea, I

(09:50):
am here for it because I have I have a lot of things that I
would love to share, but I also want to share the things that
are going to be of value to you and your family.
Please drop those on thatwebsite.rebelpodcast.com and
we can celebrate together. So again, episode 100, I am so
grateful for every single personthat has listened to this show

(10:14):
that is shared an episode that has left a review that has said,
hey, Oh my gosh. Like the things that the wins
that you've created for your family, those are those are your
wins. Those are the things that you
have done for your family. You've taken information, maybe
you've learned from the show or other places, but you've done
that for your family. And so, so today is a

(10:36):
celebration for you and this show in this community to say
we're doing it. We are changing the narratives
within our homes. We are changing the way that we
talk about our money, the way that we see our money, and
bringing back the joy that we should have when it comes to
spending our money because we'realigning it with what matters
most to ourselves and our families and our futures.

(10:58):
And so today is just one big celebration for you.
Thank you so much for allowing me to occupy some of your mental
energies and your earbuds over the last 100 episodes.
As of this recording, the debt rebel community is at $16,722

(11:18):
paid off. So congratulations, you are
amazing. And this is a race to the finish
line of $1,000,000 for this showin 2026.
I know you can do it. And if you haven't had a chance
to submit your debt payoff amounts, you can go to
debtrebelpodcast.com and it's right across the top there.
You won't be able to miss it. And there is a free guide there

(11:41):
that you can grab to accelerate that even faster if that's
something you want some additional support in.
So I am so grateful for every single person that has
contributed to this community and just, and I'm celebrating
with you. I'm so grateful for every single
person that's been a part of this journey this last 100
episodes. Whether you've listened to 1

(12:03):
episode, and this is whether you've listened this, whether
this is your first episode or ifyou've listened to every single
episode since the very beginning, I am grateful for you
and I'm celebrating with you today.
All right, we will see you in the next episode.