“Have you ever played Roulette?”
My significant other posed this question to me not long ago. At the time I said yes, thinking of one drunken incident on New Year’s Eve long ago (we won’t discuss details). But it occurs to me now, that for years I have been playing Roulette with my finances. Sometimes it’s been a total gamble from month to month and/or week to week, as to how I would get by and which bills would get paid.
Playing the wheel of fate
I would realize that only so much money was available (let’s say $900 for the sake of argument) and there would be a stack of bills overdue (perhaps totaling $1300 just to give it a number). At this point I could randomly draw from the deck and let fate decide which creditors got the cash and which ones got the “check’s in the mail” bluff for another month. And I am ashamed to say that for awhile I did exactly that.
It all adds up, your not buying yourself time your digging the hole deeper
Of course the late fees ($30 here or $45 there) would add up on the unpaid bills. I don’t know why I was clueless to this at the time except that I was living in a constant state of denial. This continued until I had to apply for a loan just to finish covering my monthly living expenses. In hindsight I’m surprised it didn’t happen sooner but its amazing how talented you can get at juggling (even without clown training).
Trying to make it right
Then I realized that I had to stop letting my decisions ride on fate’s spin of the wheel. No more stabs in the dark and hope the bet would end up going my way. I had to sit down with all the bills, prioritize them, organize due dates, and make phone calls on the ones that couldn’t be paid in order to negotiate better terms, perhaps a deferment for the month, or whatever I could manage.
Getting there
It hasn’t always been successful and I still ended up falling into the payday loan trap for awhile. But there is no way to get out of the deep hole of debt unless you start paying your way out, one bill at a time.
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