Editor's note: "Glenn Beck" is on Headline News nightly at 7 and 9 ET.



Glenn Beck says to always question conventional wisdom.



NEW YORK (CNN) -- "The people who survived the Great Depression were the ones who had money to buy when everybody else was selling." -- My grandfather



I learned a lot from my grandfather, but that might have been the greatest lesson he ever taught me. He wasn't just talking about managing money, he was talking about managing life -- and his words have stuck with me since I was a child.



A few years back, I was taking a theology course and the professor recommended only the books whose authors he agreed with. I read those books, but I also asked that professor which books he thought had it completely wrong -- and I read those too. Then I made up my own mind. After all, following the herd is fine until they all run off the side of a cliff together.



Less than a year ago, a recession was the last thing on anyone's mind. In fact, over the summer, as I was questioning the conventional wisdom, I read an article on my television show that quoted a financial expert as saying, "It is the strongest global market that we've seen in the history of measuring these things."



That's when I realized how fast the herd was approaching the cliff.



But with predictions of a recession now more common than Fed rate cuts -- and that's saying something -- maybe now it's time to look at a worst-case scenario. After all, considering all sides of an issue, no matter how extreme they may be, doesn't make you a crazy person; it makes you an educated one.



So to understand what a real meltdown could look like, I turned to Nouriel Roubini, chairman of RGE Monitor and professor of economics at New York University's Stern School of Business. He's also a former adviser to the U.S. Treasury Department.



Professor Roubini recently laid out what he called the "12 steps to financial disaster." Unfortunately, they were really complicated, and I have severe ADD, so I've boiled them down into five phases that even a rodeo clown like me can understand.



I think of these like our military's "DEFCON" -- or defense readiness condition -- scale, except that this countdown could end in the meltdown of your bank account:



• DEFCONOMY FIVE



How you'll know we're here: The housing downturn turns into a free fall, making it the worst collapse in our country's history. That not only triggers massive numbers of foreclosures and lost household wealth, but it also sets off another large wave of bank write-downs.



Odds we get here:  Roubini told me that it's "extremely likely, even unavoidable" that we hit this stage because "the excess supply of new homes in the market is like we've never seen before." Prices, he believes, "need to fall another 10 to 20 percent before that clears."



• DEFCONOMY FOUR



How you'll know we're here: Americans upside-down on their mortgages and unable to pay their home equity loans begin defaulting on other debt, like credit cards, car loans and student loans. In addition, bond insurance companies lose their perfect credit ratings, forcing already troubled banks to write down another $150 billion.



Odds we get here: High. Roubini says that 8 million households are already upside-down on their mortgages and he thinks we could see that number go to between 16 million  and 24 million by the end of 2009. A lot of those people, he believes, will simply walk away from their homes and send their keys back to the bank.



• DEFCONOMY THREE



How you'll know we're here:  Some banks begin to crack under the pressure of continuing write-downs and mounting defaults by consumers. A national or large regional bank finally collapses, triggering hedge fund failures and general chaos on Wall Street, potentially leading to a 1987-style market crash.
What kind of scale was laid out? what did glen say What is the DEFCONOMY scale?
"12 steps to financial disaster." "The people who survived the Great Depression were the ones who had money to buy when everybody else was selling." defense readiness condition
question: What kind of scale was laid out?, answer: "12 steps to financial disaster." | question: what did glen say, answer: "The people who survived the Great Depression were the ones who had money to buy when everybody else was selling." | question: What is the DEFCONOMY scale?, answer: defense readiness condition