I’ve been struggling with how I want to write this so please bear with me.
It’s a pretty well known fact that we’ve been struggling financially all year but really badly the past month. Lumberjack season tends to create short pay weeks multiple weeks in a row towards the end. We’re usually very used to it. Unfortunately, right in the middle of those, the truck broke and the car broke…and now the van isn’t sounding wonderful. Not to mention I’m still using a borrowed laptop. It really hit me hard.
So of course I did what almost all other people do when bad things happen.
I made a Facebook status.
Most my friends understood that I just needed to vent for a minute because things just all hit at once and at a hard time as it was the week of our competition. One person decided to be rather rude and tell me what I needed to do and to stop complaining (but they used a much ruder word than that).
One part stood out to me. This person has said this before too.
“You will always be in debt no matter what you do. Debt is a part of life.”
This bothered me. Because it isn’t true. I really feel like this statement is why so many people are in debt. They think it is normal. It is why so many people are struggling to live beyond their means. They think that it is normal.
It isn’t. Repeat after me. Debt isn’t normal.
I am not 100% anti-debt. I think a mortgage is okay (as long as you can afford the monthly payments). I am okay with some student loans. Like anything else, you need to think it through and make the wise decision. Which means, not going to a school you can’t afford and not buying a house that is too much house for you.
However, that doesn’t mean you need to be in debt for the rest of your life. Nor does it mean that you need to keep adding to your debt.
We will one day be out of debt. I work hard to pay extra on our loans every month. It’s called determination. And making wise choices with what you have. Stretching the budget every way possible to have extra to put towards our debt is one way I do it. It the rate I am doing it, we will be out of debt minus the house in about 10-12 years. I’m hoping to get their faster but we will be out.
We will not always be in debt.
Leave a Reply