Thought for today:
For some of us, it was pure torture to say “no” to our creditors. To risk a bad credit score was a death sentence, we thought. How dark it was before the dawn!
Our compulsion was a symptom of our fear and pride. What reasonable person would spend hundreds of dollars on bounced checks, or throw away thousands on unsecured loan interest payments? This debt thing had us beat, alright.
A member shares:
“No one forced me to go into debt. I did it to myself, for supposedly ‘good’ reasons at the time. The truth is that I mindlessly spent on what I thought was important. That insane twist of mind allowed me to get this deep in debt. I was ashamed of my debts. I had to admit I had messed things up.
“All my other problems came into perspective once I admitted that I was different from “normal” people. They could debt without going overboard, and I could not. That was the first step to help set me free!
“Knowing that I was different allowed me to look at life differently. Of course I was different from others – I am a compulsive debtor. When I stopped fighting that idea, I could have patience and insight about my life situation.”
Putting first things first helps:
For some of us who had hit bottom with this disease, the only chance we had at a sane life was to oppose our depraved thinking and force ourselves to put our needs first. That meant declaring a temporary moratorium with our debts. It meant re-learning how to care for ourselves. Our physical, emotional and spiritual recovery had to go ahead of our creditors’ needs if we were to survive the long haul.
Ask:
Am I grateful that I found a life-preserver in staying solvent one day at a time?
Meditation for Today:
Our self-esteem is strengthened by doing esteem-able things, much more than by acquiring things.
Affirmation for Today:
“I will live within my means, yet my means will not define me.”
Recommended Reading:
See our Fourth Step Template which helps us to take a fearless moral inventory.
Some members, with the help of their Pressure Relief Group, take a moratorium from debt payments in order to get their spending under control. See this Debt Moratorium sample letter to creditors for one example.
If you are new to this blog, check out our overview of the program of recovery from compulsive debting. If you like this post, please click one of the like/share buttons on the site. If you would like to receive daily “Thoughts for today”, enter your email and a username in the subscription form at the top of this page. Some links on this page bring you to other sites. Clicking a book title or image brings you to information about purchasing it. If you buy something it will help support this blog with a small commission – which does not add to your cost!
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