Where do you find strength?
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| Mon, 09-08-2008 - 9:50am |
I'm having a real problem with putting extra money towards credit card payments. We have some extra (around $2000) that we've saved from bonuses, birthday presents, etc. that we've always said we'd spend on a vacation or something fun for the family (DH and the boys want an ATV). Now I'm thinking that we should put all that towards our cc debt (around $38K), but I just can't bring myself to do it.
Also, I sell real estate part time and have about $13,000 in commissions coming up in the next couple of months. That's enough to completely wipe out one of our credit cards, but thinking of all the other things we could do with such a huge amount is really hard to think about! I know I SHOULD pay off the cc, but the other part of me says "get the ATV!" "go on vacation!"
Where do you find the strength to resist?

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Would it help you at all to think about how many future vacations and fun things you would miss out on by extending the time that you have to pay interest on $38K of debt? If you used your commissions to bring your debt down to $25-26K, you'd be paying so much less in interest you would be soooo much closer to being able to pay cash for your next vacation...and I bet you'd enjoy it more.
I hope that helps. I find strength here.
I personally think of all the great things I can do ONCE the CC is paid off. I like to think of myself as a slave to the CC companies until I am debt free (that and listening to girl power music can really make me gung-ho on paying things off!!!). I have also found a lot of great activities that are low cost that I can do with my friends and that keeps me motivated (and they are generally good for my health, hiking in with the dogs, walking down by the river,
Bex -
In our case, it's because this is the second time around for us. We dug ourselves completely out of debt 4.5 years ago, but we never changed our lifestyle. We always made justifications for whatever we purchased, "Oh, this would make things easier" "I always said I wanted this" "We deserve this". As a result, we got ourselves back into a WAY bigger hole than we were in the first time around.
We were at the point where we were routinely dipping into the overdraft protection on our checking account in order to cover the mortgage. Usually, it was just by like $100 or $200. But there was one month where DH went to get $40 out of the ATM and was denied because the overdraft was maxxed out. We knew if we didn't change our attitude and lifestyle dramatically, we would eventually be at risk of losing our house. That changed our attitude about our lifestyle in a heartbeat. We don't need to buy the kids brand new clothes at Gymboree. We don't need to go on vacation. But we need a house. I don't have to find strength to resist anyore. The debt feels like a heavy weight and I want it gone as quickly as possible. DH & I both had a very sobering wake-up call. It's unfortunate that it came to that, but at least we're turning it around now.
I hope you can dig yourselves out before you get a wake-up call like that. It helps to focus on what you need and not what you want or what you think you deserve. Good luck.
You want to know how you find strength you find it in your mind. Getting out of debt is a mind set. Is it important to you have your debt down to a manageable amount or not? You know what the housing market is and you know that the 13,000.00 is not going fall in your lap to many times until the market gets a lot better.
So why you should ask yourself is it so hard to take that 13,000 and put it on your debt. As far as the 2,000 goes maybe make that your efund. And leave it alone.
There are some people that think it is not a big thing to go out and buy a 50,000 to me that would be unthinkable because I do not want that much debt hanging over my head. It bothers me to the point of going nuts the 22,000 worth of debt I have
Terror is what motivates me.
I think it is almost harder to pull the trigger on great big payments like that vs. making lots of extra little payments.
The strength I got to wipe out over $100,000 in secured and unsecured debt came from the realization that I had failed my family by accumulating debt to begin with. When I started my debt journey with no house, old cars, and a whopping amount of debt, I felt that I had failed in my role of steward of the family finances. No ifs, ands, or buts. MY fault, MY job to recover from it.
Getting out of debt involved making a career change, working harder, turning over all responsibility for the kids to my wonderful SAH DH so I could focus on making money and reducing our debt, and a host of other activities. When you are working that hard in pursuit of a goal, it is really easy to say no. You accomplish one thing, and it reinforces your desire to do the next. I started out doing one small thing after another, and each "right next thing" set me up to do more of those "right next things."
The results of saying no in the short term to "wants" and saying yes to the things that would get us where we really need to be: we paid off all that debt; I have a career that is far more challenging & satisfying, and pays 4x what I used to make; my kids now can go to private school, to camp, and to Europe, things we never could afford before; we own cars that are not extravagant but are very safe and meet our needs; we own our home (not outright - we still have a 30yr fixed rate mortgage) which also is not extravagant but meets our needs; we just took a family vacation to Europe for 10 days, which we'd planned for years; and we will be able to pay for my 16yo's college education outright, which in turn will make it easier to pay for the other two.
I'm not saying any of this to brag - this didn't happen overnight, but over four years, and it involved my husband's participation as much as mine. I got strength from knowing that I made the right choices for my family this time around. I didn't purposely make bad choices before, I just didn't think enough about them. My goal in getting out of debt was to not just get out of it but set us up so that we'd never be in debt again.
Kelly
IT sounds like you have been working a while on accumulating that $2,000!! And maybe wobbling on the fence a lot over what to do with the money!!
So true, so true! Trying to do a complete "debt diet" at once, without allowing for slipups and some fun, is too hard to maintain over time - sometimes too hard to maintain for a week!
To the OP (I keep wanting to call you Lisa, but your nickname says you're not Lisa! LOL) - I went back and reread your introduction, and that helped put your question into perspective. When there are lots of little "leaks" and no clear sense of where the money goes, month in and month out, it's hard to figure out where to begin. Tracking your expenses over a series of months (I did it for about 2 years) helps you refine where the problems are and what you need to do to stop getting further into debt, just for starters. None of us got into debt overnight, and we aren't going to get out of it overnight either.
That first step - not getting further into debt by cutting back on "silly stuff" - is often shocking enough. The strength to do that (for me) came from realizing the TRUE cost of a "silly" habit, like picking up breakfast on the way to work every day. For example, a breakfast sandwich & 12oz coffee from the bagel shop is $2.80. $2.80 x 4 days a week = $11.20/week. $11.20/week x 50 weeks a year = $560/year. $560 divided by .60 (I'm in the 40% tax bracket) means I have to make $933 in pretax income just to pay for a breakfast sandwich a few times a week! If my income is $100,000 before taxes, is a silly breakfast sandwich worth spending 1% of my entire year's income? I don't think so!!!
Now, if I let myself have a breakfast sandwich as a *treat* once a week, rather than as a regular habit, then I'm only spending $140/year and I only have to earn $233/year. And maybe it's worth doing that so I don't feel deprived - and I'm rewarding myself rather than just spending money as a matter of course.
It's really all about being reasonable with yourself - making tradeoffs in pursuit of the overall goal, rewarding yourself for good behavior rather than thinking you deserve what you want in the moment, and taking it one step at a time.
Kelly
You can't live without excitement and fun in your life. It will make you resentful. So, my advice would be: Don't buy an ATV (this is likely something they will lose interest in after awhile and will be hard to sell in this economy). If you want to do something fun as a family, do it. But, there's no need to spend thousands doing it. You could easily spend a small amount and still have an enjoyable day or even weekend with your family.
It's ok to treat yourself, but remember to be reasonable with what you do. Put a large chunk of the money towards your debt, but save a little out to have fun. Then you'll have quieted your conscious AND lived a little. :o)
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