While I’ve still been working 55 hours and six days a week this Summer, it’s certainly been a lot easier than the 15 hours days I was working when school was in session.  I have at several points this Summer, especially while enjoying a previously forgotten delight called free time, marveled at how I was able to pull off working so much during the school year.  I kept eying the end of August, thinking, “how can I do this again?”

But then several weeks ago, I was talking to one of my coworkers, who’s been in a similar situation, and he and I were trying to explain to another of our coworkers that you just do it.  You really don’t know what you’re capable of until you push yourself to the limits. Not to continue to force Nike slogan-like motivational statements on you, but there’s no secret except to just do it.  And that made me feel better, because I know that I’ve done it before and I can do it again.  That simple thought has taken away most of my anxiety about the end of Summer and the start of Fall.

Adding to my motivation is that the finish line finally seems so close.  There has been a lot of time between the exhilarating start and the fantastic end.  Months and months of just plugging along.  But now the end is only four months away and I can smell it, feel it, taste it.  Getting there is, to me, worth whatever it takes and I’ve been working on making all the preparations necessary to start the final sprint.  Most important has been to get my mind in the right place.

I was certain of success from the beginning. I guess because getting out of debt is really so simple.  There’s never been a point where I didn’t know what to do or I was confused by someone else or I could possibly convince myself that not getting out was the better option.  It took me a long time to get my mind in the right place, but then it was and I’ve had complete focus ever since, which stands in contrast to the rest of my full-of-distraction life.

Getting out of debt has been my biggest priority this year and it has demanded a lot of my attention and nearly all of my time.  I’m looking forward to my money being my own more than anything, but I’m also looking forward to having this burden off my back.  I think about money all the time and not having enough of it/expenses coming up/not making my debt goals are a constant source of stress for me, often even when I don’t realize it.  I’m making a lot of money and yet I always feel broke.  I’m tired of that.

So, watch me as I go is I guess what I’m saying.  I’m going to do everything I can to be out of debt by the end of the year.  I want to start 2011 differently.

Related posts:

1. The Job Front
2. As Time Passes
3. It’s Going to Happen This Year

This time last year, I hit rock bottom in my financial life.  School was just starting, I was sick, my car had a flat tire, and I didn’t have any money or available credit.  I was almost at a point where not asking for help was no longer an option.  But, I was stubborn, so I walked everywhere in 100 degree heat and dragged myself to the grocery store to buy the least expensive medication I could find.  Then I waited out the next week until it was finally pay day.

You can float along a very long time without feeling your debt.  This was the first time I’d really felt it.  The first time it was so limiting that I couldn’t go about my normal life.  The first time I had to strategize how I would eat for the next week with only the food I already had in my apartment.

It was scary and I was very aware that if one more thing went wrong, I was done.  Worst case scenario, I guess I would have had to call my parents and ask for money, which is a million miles from ending up in a box on the sidewalk, but in my mind, it was just about that bad.

I made it to pay day.  By then I was no longer sick, but I got my car fixed and bought some groceries and said to myself, “Wow, that was a close call.”  You’d think I would have been scared into action, but I wasn’t.  I’m sure I made some kind of an effort to at least avoid being blindsided like that again, but as soon as there was money in my bank account I continued on as I had before.  Things didn’t click for another two months.

Things could hardly be more different this year.  I have $12,000 less credit card debt, money in my accounts, and plenty of available credit. Most importantly, I’m not ignoring a huge problem in my life.  But, I don’t always feel the difference.  I guess because I have my get out of debt game face on.  I feel broke all of the time and I still stress about unexpected expenses constantly.

The truth, whether I choose to accept it or not, is that I am in a much better place and while I’m hoping for clear weather until I reach shore, I’m now capable of weathering a pretty huge storm.  It would take a lot more than a flat tire and acid reflux to take me down now.

Related posts:

1. It’s Going to Happen This Year

This is a strange post to write, but I keep trying to fit this information into other places and it’s not working.  Still, I want it to be known.  While it is entirely possible that I will change my mind, I anticipate that this blog will end soon after I’m out of debt (early 2011).

I’m sure there are plenty of posts I could write after that point, but this blog is really about my story of getting into and out of debt.  While I’m trying to make the point that money is important and making smart decisions with your money is important, I’ve always thought of this blog as more of a story than a place to get financial advice.  I mean, I have plenty of advice on how to get out of debt, but it’s hardly more complicated than making up your mind to do it.

Post-debt life interests me very much.  I am actually eager to be responsible with my money and make decisions about what to do with it.  The only real decision I’ve made in this journey was the first one; the answer to every question since has been, “do whatever you have to do to get out of debt.”  The story has been about getting my mind in the right place to keep running this marathon.

I have savings to build and a Ph.D.’s worth of student loans to tackle.  But, I don’t want to live the life of a personal finance blogger, accounting publicly for every financial decision I make.  I don’t feel like I need that kind of accountability.  The story that interests me most will be over and if it needs an epilogue or several, I have a personal blog where I can write whatever I want.

I like the idea of an end, though I won’t force it if I still have a lot left to say.  For now, I’m still running and still telling the story.

Related posts:

1. Losing Weight and Debt at the Same Time
2. From Dave Ramsey

I was at work a couple weeks ago when I pulled up the Mint app on my iPhone and saw that, according to Mint, I was no longer in debt, but actually had a net worth of $54.  Considering my net worth usually has a negative sign in front of it and also lights up in the color red, this was pretty exciting to me.

But, unless I fell asleep the night before and woke up in January, I knew it wasn’t right.  I saw the problem right away; it was reporting my Capital One Visa with a $0 balance when it should have shown something around $9,000.  Normally when Mint is having trouble accessing the right information in an account, it will tell you, but this time it looked quite certain that there was no balance on the card.

In the time it took me to pull up my account on the Capital One website and see that my debt was exactly where I thought it was, my mind cycled through some fantasy scenarios.  They were all ridiculous and they all went along the lines of, what if somehow my debt was wiped clean whether by a fairy, my Dad, or Capital One? What if today, I was out of debt?

Now, I’m sure I could get used to the idea, but my first reaction was, No.  It’s just that this has been such an important experience for me and I want to see it to the end.  I want to earn it.  If someone were to rescue me now, it would take away from that.  This fight is mine and I’m winning it.

I advocate getting out of debt the hard way, not only because I think it’s the kind of experience that can change your life, but because it’s also the most effective way.  I’ve read a lot of stories about people borrowing money, transferring balances in circles, and looking for an easy way out (like I did for years).  Sometimes they make progress, but usually they just push their debt around. Some actually get out of debt, but then go straight back into it, because they haven’t learned anything.  Do the smart thing, by all means, but remember that the smart thing is the one that keeps you out of debt for life.

I’ve said before that my life was changed the minute I decided to get out of debt, and it’s true that my thinking about money was instantly transformed, but I’m still learning something through all of these months of hard work, and I’m not done yet.

Related posts:

1. Life After Debt

The thing is that I really don’t know who reads this blog. People will sometimes tell me they read it and I am always surprised.

As I was writing my posts for this week, I started wondering if there was any part of this story I’d left out or anything I’d said that left people with more questions than answers.  A big part of this whole process was going public with my debt, the point of which was to admit to myself that it was a problem, and I can’t think of any part of it I’m not willing to talk about.

So, I guess this is one of those posts where I ask you to ask me questions.  Here in the comments, by email, or click here if you want to ask anonymously (that will take you to tumblr, but I’ll answer here).

Anything about how I got into debt, how I’m getting out, student loans, paying for grad school, working too much, why I still have an expensive cell phone, or whatever.  And don’t worry about being nosy, because I’ve already put all of this information out there and I don’t mind talking about it.

Related posts:

1. This Blog Will See An End

I got a big surprise the other day.

For those who don’t know, I work at a library full time.  That’s the job that pays my bills and gives me health insurance and paid time off.  But, I also have a part time job working for a research center on campus.  That’s the job that allows me to network with people in my academic field and it’s helping me get out of debt a little faster, but there are no benefits and no paid time off and the wage is, well, pretty typical of grad school jobs and not all that much more than I made in high school.

That’s all just back story.  The point is that Monday I got a pretty big raise at the part time job.  Like, a 14% raise.  Together with the tiny, tiny raise I’m getting from the library, I’ll be taking home about an extra $120 every month. That’s pretty significant to my budget.

I’m a little bit torn with what to do with that extra money.  My budget is figured out down to the last dollar, which is pretty easy when you commit yourself to not spending anything.  I mean, there isn’t much to account for.  I only have bills for car insurance, cell phone, and rent.  I spend very little on gas.  Groceries are my one fluctuating expense, but I try to keep the total at about $250 a month.  Normally I would just redo my payment schedule to account for this extra money, but I’m hesitating.

I keep things pretty lean.  I have very little savings, I keep almost nothing in my checking account, and I put everything I possibly can toward my debt.  I don’t want to admit it, but sometimes I’m almost reckless about it.  It is still my goal to be out of debt by the end of the year even if I have to open a lemonade stand on New Year’s Eve to do it.  But, maybe this money would better serve me going to savings (I could always throw it at the debt later) or or or [gulp] maybe it would better be spent.  Like on better maintaining my car.

I also thought about just pretending it isn’t there, because things come up every month and I make exceptions for things like drinks and pizza and nail polish once in a while, so in truth I often fall about $100 of my stretch goal, which just means readjusting my chart every few months.  This wouldn’t mean changing my spending; it would just mean more easily reaching my goal each month.

But, this post has become an exercise in figuring out what I want to do, because by the end of it, I’ve decided to readjust my goals to account for at least an extra $100 every month.  I have less than six months left, so I might as well go all out.

No related posts.

It’s pretty awesome to be down to one card even if I don’t feel like I’ve made much progress since.  It’s always been quite depressing to think that even when I make it to the last card, I’ll still have $10,000 to go, but now I’m taking it down.  It feels pretty awesome actually.  I know I always say I don’t feel like I’m making any progress, becuase that is how I feel most of the time, but when I put up these posts and then look back even just to the previous month, I do see that I’m making progress.

This last month has been quite expensive in terms of fun things to spend money on, like a $13 ticket to Eclipse and $180 at VidCon ($80 ticket I purchased in January; $100 spent on food and parking), and now I’m planning a trip home, which will cost me some money in lost wages at my part-time job. But, it’s all worth it.  I think I could easily be spending more money on all of these things by slipping into that mode where I think, “well, I’m already spending money here, so why not just buy whatever I want?”

This has been just like every other goal I’ve pursued where I set the standard at perfection and I am disappointed that I can’t achieve it, but just doing pretty well most of the time makes for progress.

If the picture looks a little different to you, it’s because I canceled the Bank of America Visa and removed it from the list.

Related posts:

1. The Debt As it Stands (8/17/10)
2. The Debt As It Stands (3/15/10)
3. The Debt As It Stands (2/13/10)

I’ve said several times here and on my personal blog that deciding to get out of debt was about growing up for me.  I’m sure there are many mature adults who are in debt, but I was in denial about my debt. I was still waiting for someone or something to come make it all better.  So, deciding to get out was first about facing my problems and, second, about taking responsibility for them myself.

I’m realizing now that it is also about independence.  Now, I have been living independently.  If I wasn’t, then I never would have accumulated this debt.  But, I had never faced the fact that I was failing at living independently.  If I needed any proof of that fact, I think the credit card balance of $20,000 should have done it.

In my artsy/academic/liberal circle, we try to minimize money as an issue, but I can’t think of anything that is more central to living independently.  I’m realizing this more and more all the time.  I mean, my car has to this point and continues to be the biggest What If in my budget–the thing that, at any moment, could cost me hundreds of dollars that I would have no choice but to pay.  A problem with my car could cripple my independence, but the only thing required to alleviate that stress is money.

More than finally being able to afford a few nice things and maybe some travel, knowing that even if something were to happen to my car, I would be able to easily cover it, is exciting to me.  Of course money doesn’t solve every problem, but it does fix cars and a broken car stresses me out and stress hurts the quality of my life.

Related posts:

1. It Wasn’t Any Fun
2. The Stress I Put Myself Under

When my debt was just sitting, I didn’t think that much about the interest I was paying.  At least, not until the point where my cards were so close to their limits that when the interest hit they were in danger of going over limit.  The fee for going over my credit limit ranged from $25-38 on my three cards.  I don’t know how many times I paid overlimit fees, but I know that it was more than once.

Fees are bad, but what about the hundreds of dollars in interest I was paying?  If you notice in my As The Debt Stands posts, the balance on my Capital One Visa has remained almost the same for the last eight months, yet I have been making minimum payments on it this whole time. That’s kind of maddening.

In the early years of my growing my debt, I simply was not making enough money to do anything but make minimum payments.  In the year before I finally started doing something about my debt, though, I was making plenty of money and yet still mostly making only minimum payments.  Sometimes I would make an extra payment of $500 or even $1000, but in the end the interest kept me from getting anywhere.

As I’ve said before, my debt doesn’t make me angry at the people I have borrowed money from.  Their terms were clear from the beginning and I borrowed anyway.  And, I don’t say that from on high and it’s not like saying I have no regrets, where obviously you do have regrets and you’re trying to convince yourself not to.  The anger just simply isn’t there.

What is there is a desire to get out of these relationships where I give more than I ever get.  I want to be free of creditors, so that the money I work really hard to earn is all my own.  When I started this eight months ago, I was paying almost $300 a month in interest.  I knew just off the top of my head how much interest I was paying on each card, but I’d never added it up before.  That’s absolutely ridiculous.  And that money was never mine.  I owed it before I’d even earned it.  Some of the language out there about being a slave to your lenders seems over the top to me, but that’s exactly what it is and maybe the exaggerated language is just what we need to work hard so we can be free.

Related posts:

1. Goodbye WF Visa. Hello Halfway Point.

Last week I did what I’ve been meaning to do since I paid it off six months ago and canceled my Bank of America Visa.  It was a bad card with a high interest rate and a yearly service fee and I always knew I would cancel it, even if closing an account means a short term hit to my credit score.  I don’t think it will do much damage considering it’s my youngest account (I’ve had other accounts and cards much longer).

I felt a certain freedom from it the moment I paid the card off, but I closed the account with satisfaction.  I don’t have ill thoughts toward any of my creditors, but I got the closest with this Bank of America Visa.  It was my fault for ever signing up for a card with such terrible terms, but I actually applied for a better one and when I didn’t qualify for that, they sent me this one instead without asking.  I should have sent it back and said no thanks, but I was desperate for credit then.  It’s true, the creditors have all the power when you’re desperate.

I hadn’t been impressed with Bank of America customer service up to this point, but they made canceling the card a simple process.  Considering I haven’t spent a dime on the card in months and they slashed my credit limit from $2500 to $500, they probably weren’t too sad to see me go.

I actually had the extra satisfaction of cutting up not just one card, but two, because they’d recently sent me a replacement card that I hadn’t yet activated.  I knew this was my only chance to take revenge on the plastic, since I’ll be keeping my other two credit cards open even once I’m out of debt, and it felt good.

Related posts:

1. The Debt As It Stands (4/14/10)
2. Interest
3. Found Money