10
Your Most Powerful Tool
You cannot tailor-make your situations in life, but you can tailor-make your attitude to fit those situations.
Zig Ziglar, See You at the Top
Attitude, the way you respond to life and its circumstances, is more important than anything. It is more important than the past, than struggle or success, than education or experience. It is more important than how much money you have, how much you owe, what you would like to do, or where you would like to go.
While I have not seen them in person, I’ve seen pictures of the cables leading to the top of Half Dome in Yosemite National Park. Family and friends who have completed the climb tell me the final ascent up the sheer granite surface of that majestic landmass is by far the most challenging. The cables are there to make sure climbers reach the top safely and with a modicum of ease. However, I understand the term ease is terribly relative.
Once you begin the last leg of the journey and finally see the cables, you stand there, tilt your head to the sky, view the final hundred yards or so that lead to the top, and experience terror like you’ve never known. You realize you have no choice but to finish the trip.
At that moment, you are more thankful than you could ever imagine for the cables that will help you pull yourself to the top—not only to a spectacular view but also to the feeling of accomplishment the likes of which you cannot begin to fathom from your current vantage point.
We need to erect cables in our lives so that when we face the difficult climbs on the journey—and they will come, you can count on it—the cables we need to make it to the top will be there waiting to help us overcome our fears and self-defeating attitudes.
How to Overcome Quitting Points
All of us have faced quitting points in our lives—those times or situations that become so overwhelming or challenging that we simply quit. No matter what you call them—brick walls, insurmountable obstacles, complete surprises, or financial crises—if you don’t erect cables ahead of time, you most likely will continue to give in to defeat.
Be Prepared
You can erect cables for your financial circumstances by memorizing a list of the reasons you will not give in to debt. If you drill them so deeply into your mind that you could repeat them in your sleep, you will be able to hang on to them when you feel weak and vulnerable. Here are some examples:
· I don’t choose debt because it makes assumptions about the future.
· It is wrong for me to spend money I do not have.
· There is always a way out; I will not stop until I find it.
· When I step out in faith, I unleash God’s power in my life.
· I trust even when I do not understand.
· I do the right thing even when I don’t feel like it.
· This credit card company doesn’t really care about me the way this glitzy brochure indicates; they are looking for a new sucker.
Crash Through
Another way you can erect cables is by identifying your unique quitting points and then figuring out how to crash through them. What past circumstances and situations caused you to throw in the towel and turn to credit as the easy way out? Perhaps it was Christmas or vacation or your fickle feelings of dissatisfaction when you saw what others had that you wanted.
Once you identify your quitting points, you can prepare to deal with them. You have to do this ahead of time, not at the moment you come face-to-face with the overwhelming desire to quit. People who set out to climb Half Dome are notified before they leave camp whether or not the cables are up for the summer season. Experienced hikers would never set out on that seventeen-mile trek without the assurance that the cables are in place and ready to go. Long before they need them, those hikers are already counting on the cables to be there when the going gets tough.
It takes practice to crash through your quitting points. Let’s say you identify the holidays as a time when you are likely to give in to credit. Year after year, even though you say it will never happen again, you end up shopping with your credit cards, promising yet again that “this will be the last time ever.” It’s July or August and you’ve still not paid the bills from last year even though the gifts have been long forgotten and the season is but a foggy memory. The load of debt has become a pile of resentment and something you’d rather not think about. Now is the time to practice crashing through that quitting point, because next Christmas will be here before you know it.
Make a commitment way ahead of time as to how much cash you will spend and promise that you will not go over that amount. Spring or summer—when the holidays are not breathing down your neck and robbing you of your good sense—is the time to practice crashing through that quitting point. Anticipate, prepare, shop early. There are dozens of things you can do to get in shape for that particular quitting point.
Perhaps your quitting point (or that of someone you love) comes in monthly cycles—if you know what I mean. You have three weeks of every month to practice crashing through the difficult time you know is on its way. Anticipate those feelings of defeat and sadness. Practice rejecting attitudes of defeat and purposely replacing them with appropriate thoughts and behaviors. Know exactly what you will do even when you don’t feel like it, when every emotion in you suggests that a trip to the mall—credit card in tow—will make you feel better. Gather all the determination you have to crash through the quitting point. Each time you do, it will get easier to do it the next time. Soon it will become a habit on which you rely, and then you will begin to experience tremendous progress.
Watch Your Attitude
We have the freedom to choose our attitude in any given circumstance. We can alter our lives and avoid quitting by changing our attitudes. That is an amazing concept and one that should fill you with confidence and joy.
When it comes to debt-proofing your life, I believe 10 percent is about the money you have and 90 percent is about your attitude toward it. How else could I possibly explain the amazing financial feats of people like Vikki and her husband, who not only survived but also thrived during a very difficult financial season. Here’s their story:
After twenty-four years of service, my husband learned his job was in jeopardy. So we sat down and worked out a six-month plan. We lived by it religiously.
First, we took all the money from our regular savings account, which was enough to pay off two credit cards. We took those payments and added them to the next highest balance credit card bill and paid it in full in two months.
We tackled the next largest credit card bill. We increased its monthly payment by the amount we’d been paying toward the other bills each month plus $50 more, which we really didn’t have to spare.
We did not go out to eat, to the movies, or rent videos. We altered our seams and hems to extend the life of our clothes. The adults went on a diet (we needed to shed some pounds along with the debt).
We went through our house and assessed every single belonging. If it hadn’t been used in a year, it became part of our huge garage sale. We made $2,500, which we immediately paid toward the next credit card account.
We called the credit card company and asked them to lower the interest rate. They said no; we said adios. Then they agreed and lowered it to 7.9 percent for six months. Our big payment (plus $50 every month) began to make a huge impact.
On January 29, no more job. We also learned the same day there would be no unemployment benefits or child support from our granddaughter’s parents. Wow. A triple whammy.
We sat down again and went over what was left to pay. At this time, excluding the mortgage, we still owed about $30,000. We were scared but decided we could do it.
We went through the house, garage, and attic again and purged. We had another garage sale. We made another $1,400, which was enough to pay off the last credit card.
The next debts in line were the doctor, dentist, and optician bills. We made arrangements to pay as much as we could on a weekly basis.
To our complete amazement, my husband got an unexpected severance package, so we paid off all our outstanding unsecured debts. We split the remaining amount into three: one-third into the checking account for monthly expenses, one-third into a contingency account, and one-third into savings.
On May l we were completely debt-free except for the house. We even paid past-due property taxes. We rolled the 401(k) account into an IRA. We closed all the credit card accounts (and will never, never have another one, by the way) and had three months’ living expenses in the bank.
I reopened my home business, which generated food money. I used every trick in the book to get our grocery bill at rock bottom.
We made it. We stuck to our plan. We are debt-free, fat-free, and much, much wiser. We are patiently waiting and excited to know what our next employment opportunity will be.
We can learn so many lessons from Vikki’s story, but I believe the most important is about attitude. She and her husband, upon learning that his employment situation was on shaky ground, had a choice. They could fall into a deep funk, or they could see this wake-up call as the opportunity to rise above their circumstances. They could plan a pity party complete with whining, blaming, complaining, and a long list of all the reasons they were doomed, or they could pick themselves up and make a plan for survival. They could quit, or they could keep going.
Out of all the possible reactions, this family chose happiness. Instead of labeling their situation a disaster, they turned their situation into a launching pad, and their positive attitudes became the fuel to ignite a season of financial accomplishment.
Don’t Plan to Quit
When you keep credit cards with a just-in-case attitude, you are planning to quit. I have seen this happen many times. Someone will consolidate all their credit card balances into a new home equity loan (HEL) or put them on a new low-interest credit card, leaving the previous cards with a $0 balance. The problem? They keep those credit cards handy “just in case” or justify the available credit as a cushion if things get tight. As reasonable as that might sound, it is nothing but a sugarcoated plan to quit.
As long as you leave yourself escape routes, you may find it difficult to summon the strength, stamina, and courage to crash through your quitting points. Endurance is counter to our have-it-all-now culture, but it helps us build hope and the courage we need for those times when the situation appears impossible.
Stop Whining
When we find ourselves in challenging financial situations with our backs against the wall for any number of reasons, it is easy to default to victim status, which is often the first sign of quitting. Oh, how easy it is to start whining, blaming, and complaining. Although that does nothing but make the matter worse, for some reason resorting to self-pity is, in some sick way, comforting. Unfortunately, that attitude is also self-defeating and destructive.
As long as you see yourself as a victim, things will not change. Your attitude will bring you to your quitting point. You will never fix your problems if you blame others for your circumstances. Whatever your situation, regardless of the details, you are accountable. You are responsible.
You can either give in to your circumstances or rise above them. You can remain in your misery or climb out of that rut and look around. You can reward your whining, blaming, and self-pity with your full attention, or you can completely ignore yourself when you slip into that debilitating mode. You can choose thoughts that support your misery or those that lead you to action and a solution. You can keep living in denial, or you can find the courage to face the truth. You can dig your pit of despair a little deeper, or you can make the commitment to do whatever it takes to turn your financial life around. The choice is yours.
Debt-Proof Your Attitude
The single most significant decision you make on a daily basis is your choice of attitude. It’s the difference between letting life happen to you and making it happen. Debt-proofing your attitude is the difference between letting your financial situation control your life and taking control of your finances.
Every morning when you wake up, you put on your attitude of the day, whether you do it consciously or simply by default to whatever your emotions hand you. Allowing your emotions to dictate your attitudes can be dangerous because emotions are fickle. They cannot be trusted. They will lie to you. That is why you consciously need to choose happiness, contentment, joy, optimism, trust, love, peace, and confidence while rejecting fear, denial, anxiety, pessimism, anger, and resentment.
Happiness is a choice. It has nothing to do with what you have. If you do not choose happiness, more money will just magnify who you already are. If you are bitter, more money will only intensify your bitterness. If you are greedy, more money will only make you even more self-centered and selfish.
If you choose to embrace your situation as an opportunity to experience God’s power in your life, you will choose happiness.
You have to want what you already have or more will never be enough. Purposely choosing to be content is an important ingredient in debt-proofing your life.
Take Control of Your Mind
In the same way you can take control of your actions, you can control your thoughts.
You cannot allow your feelings to guide your actions—particularly your financial decisions—or you will spend your life on an emotional roller coaster. If you make your financial decisions based on what feels good, watch out.
The way to take control of your mind is to choose good thoughts and positive attitudes and banish every thought and behavior that is contrary to them.
When I have difficulty falling asleep, it’s usually because I have overwhelming thoughts racing through my mind. I’ve discovered a way to get rid of them. (Actually, this works well any time of day, not only as a way to get to sleep.) I visualize my thoughts written on a chalkboard. Just as quickly as those thoughts appear on the board, I start erasing.
Typically, I make one or two end-to-end passes on the chalkboard in my mind, and I’m either sound asleep or ready to replace those thoughts with what I know to be right and positive.
File this silly technique away in your anti-debt tool chest and reach for it whenever negative and destructive thinking begins to crowd in or when you are threatened by waves of desire. It really does work well.
Counter Destructive Attitudes
Let’s say your neighbor just came home with a brand-new SUV. You are overwhelmed by feelings of desire and envy. There was a time when you would have begun immediately to find a way to get a new car too. But things are different now. You have a new set of values. You no longer make financial decisions impulsively. The car you have is paid for and meets your family’s current needs. But still those feelings bubble up.
Just as soon as you recognize them, counter them. Replace those destructive attitudes with thoughts of your Freedom Account and the way you are committed to the cash purchase of your next vehicle. Think about not making huge monthly payments, not paying triple insurance premiums, not paying $400 for the annual registration fee, and not forking over $600 for that 50,000-mile tune-up.
A good way to counter negative attitudes is to replace them quickly with positive ones. Here are some examples:
· I never have enough money. I am so thankful for a regular paycheck.
· It’s not my fault. Even though I wasn’t 100 percent to blame, I take full responsibility—I will find a way through!
· This is too difficult. This is challenging!
· I work hard, so I’m entitled to have what I want. I work too hard to let money leak out of my life.
· I want it now! Waiting builds my character.
· Maybe I’ll win the lottery. I’d rather save that $2 (or $10) a week than throw it away on the lottery.
· It won’t matter just this once. Even the little things add up.
· If only I had more money, then everything would be okay. More money is not the answer—managing well what I have is the secret to having more.
· If I didn’t have to worry about money I’d be happy. I choose to be happy regardless of my present circumstances.
· I’ll never get out of this mess. I can do all things because God strengthens me.
· They wouldn’t give me the credit if they didn’t think I can handle it. I have the confidence to make my own financial decisions.
Build Your Offense
I’m not much of a sports enthusiast, but I do know that the best defense is a good offense. I can’t think of a better way to describe this matter of debt-proof living. You dare not wait for a surprise attack by some overwhelming desire to go back to your old way of living. You need to build your offense ahead of time so you have it handy as a defense and a prevention.
Slippery places are situations, events, or locations where you could easily trip and fall, financially speaking. For example, you might be at the mall, where you could easily slip into an old habit of shopping mindlessly and running up a lot of debt before you take time to analyze what’s going on.
As you debt-proof your attitude, you need to identify your slippery places and then devise a counterattack—a specific behavior to counteract the potential negative effect on your commitment to debt-proof your life.
I have identified lots of slippery places in my life. I realized early on that there were some behaviors I could eliminate from my life. For others, like going to the grocery store and department stores, I’ve come up with alternatives to my thinking as well as purposeful behaviors that help keep me from falling.
You want an example, don’t you? Okay, I will tell you. I engage in self-talk. I sit myself down and give myself a little talking to. “Do you really need it?” Then I make myself answer honestly. Sometimes it’s yes, but most of the time I have to admit it’s a no, which kinda puts an end to the whole thing.
Mail order catalogs are one of my most slippery places. I can need absolutely nothing, pick up Renovation Hardware’s newest and greatest catalog, and in the time it takes to flip a few pages have about 157 urgent and critical needs. My original antidote for this slippery place was quite gentle. I made a deal that as long as I followed a few new rules, I could “shop” to my heart’s content.
As I went through a catalog, I allowed myself to order anything and everything I wanted. I would fill out the order forms for all the items I just could not live without, including the order numbers, color codes, sizes, prices, shipping and handling, and tax. Once I came up with the total, I would write that amount on the outside of the return envelope, indicating the amount of the check I needed to enclose. I would also write the mailing date—one week in the future. The deal was that I could order whatever I wanted as long as I waited a full seven days and I could pass a simple test: I had to remember everything I ordered without opening and reading the order form.
It makes me laugh to admit that all the times I did this, never once did I carry through. I would either forget about the order altogether and find it months later or fail my test of remembering what in the world I had wanted. Clearly, my joy was in the shopping, not in actually acquiring all that stuff.
Curiously, the exercise was so tedious, the rules so confining, that my catalog problem has all but disappeared. Now I go through my mail next to a recycling bin and toss the catalogs without even a glance.
This technique works for online shopping as well. I can load up an online shopping cart so fast it would make your head spin. I make a note of the total charges, then vow to return in a week to finish the purchase. But I don’t. It almost makes me laugh to think of all the shopping I get out of my system without suffering the financial consequences.
Jump-Start Your Attitude
Getting off to a good start in the morning sets the tone for the whole day. There are lots of ways to select your attitude before one selects you. Read a verse from the book of Psalms or Proverbs first thing in the morning. Ask God to renew your mind. If you have access to the internet, log on to my website at DebtProofLiving.com. I log on every day to share what’s going on in my mind. We can help each other with our attitudes.
Come up with your own unique attitude starters. Make a list so you can refer to them often. Here are some ideas:
· Today I am grateful for . . .
· The small sacrifices I will make today pale in comparison to the more worthy goal ahead.
· Today is the tomorrow I worried about yesterday, and all is well!
· Nothing can happen today that God and I can’t handle together.
Keep an Arsenal of Alternative Activities
I’m the first to admit that spending money is a lot of fun. It feels great to buy all kinds of stuff and pretend that money is no object. It’s particularly enjoyable to spend someone else’s money—the way it feels when you use a credit card instead of cash.
When I was going through particularly challenging times while getting out of debt, I purposely came up with alternative activities that didn’t have such negative consequences, activities I could do instead of shopping whenever that urge came over me, activities that were at least as, if not more, pleasurable. My alternative activity of choice has become—you’re going to laugh—ironing. I am not kidding, and I cannot believe I am actually admitting this.
I have an unusual respect for textiles, and I thoroughly enjoy ironing them. For me, there is something soothing about the sound of a good steam iron gliding over high-quality cotton or linen. I find the activity to be calming and pure joy. I love how ironing offers instant gratification. I enjoy how ugly wrinkles simply disappear under the weight and steam of an iron and with them whatever urge I had to spend my brains out on stuff I probably don’t need and will not likely remember once I unplug the iron and go on about my day. When my old defeating attitudes and destructive thoughts start to crowd my mind and insist that I throw caution to the wind in favor of an all-out shopping binge, I often iron instead. It works for me.
You would do well to come up with your own arsenal of alternative activities so that when you get the urge to go back to your old ways you’ll be able to deal with it quickly, logically, and responsibly.
Choose to See Things in a Different Way
Of all the techniques to debt-proof your attitude, this might be the most difficult but also the most rewarding: choose to see things in a different way. It is difficult because you may have to confront attitudes and beliefs you’ve had all your life.
Some years ago my husband, Harold, and I desperately wanted off the car-leasing treadmill. We’d repaid our unsecured debts, and we wanted to free ourselves from car payments.
We’d been leasing cars, two at a time, for far too many years. But how to stop? Each time a lease ended, we had no money for a down payment on another car. We always owed more than the car was worth (because of over-mileage penalties and the like), so we did what any typical car salesman recommends today. We “rolled over” any remaining balance into new leases on bigger and better cars—models that elevated our minimum standard ever higher. But finally we said, “Enough! No more leases!”
Our plan to get out was drastic. With the cash we had—$4,000—we would buy the best car we could find for that amount, and we would continue saving to buy a second car with cash. In the meantime, we would become a one-car couple. This was possible since we share an office and followed each other to work anyway.
Understand that for more than twenty years we’d always supported two late-model, high-end, leased vehicles. Every marketing campaign’s dream consumer, I had bought into the myth that I was what I drove. Having my own car gave me freedom and spontaneity. But for now, we would share.
The best we could find for the money we had was a 1986 Chevrolet El Camino. At the time it was nine years old—a major step down as far as I was concerned. I consoled myself, however, in the temporary nature of the situation and that it was worth the trade-off: no more car payments!
I tried to hide just how miserable I was. After all, for twenty-two years I had driven my own car. I hadn’t needed to check with anyone or ask permission. Now I had to ask my husband to drop me off or ask to use the car. I hated the feeling of dependence and my loss of freedom. I wanted to control the radio and decide when to get in the fast lane. I wanted to select the parking space. All my little quirks and control issues didn’t have an outlet. Now I had to compromise, but mostly it felt like I had to give in.
After about three months of this miserable arrangement, it came down to this: I could either change my attitude or go stark-raving mad. Choosing the former (mental institutions are expensive), I sat down for a heart-to-heart talk with myself.
I said, Oprah has a driver. She never concerns herself with mundane things like parking spaces, pumping gas, car washes, and oil changes. Her driver takes care of everything. You too have a driver. You no longer have to concern yourself with mundane things like parking spaces, pumping gas, car washes, and oil changes. Your driver takes care of everything. You can talk or sleep; you can listen to music or read. Your driver is always available and makes your transportation needs his top priority. What’s not to love about this?
I then moved to the financial ramifications of not having a car of my own: no car payment, no additional insurance, no annual registration and licensing fees, no biannual smog inspection (California thing), no maintenance and repair on a second car, no worrying about parking tickets for forgetting to move it on street-sweeping days, four less tires to replace, fifty-two less car washes each year. The list got longer and longer, and my conclusion was clear: I am a blessed woman.
My attitude changed in a heartbeat, and it remains that way to this day, by choice. We are still a single-car couple, and I do not want now, nor can I ever imagine wanting, the responsibility or expense of owning a second car. It works for us.
One of the most powerful debt-proofing tools you have at your disposal is your attitude. It can become your best ally or your worst enemy. You hold all the cards. It’s up to you.