[This is the first of a series in which I try to make this blog more personal. Because it's mine, damn it, and I owe it to you guys and myself not to sound like everyone else.]
[Also, I didn't think writer's block existed until now. Shows how much I know.]
I’ve been staring at the screen for close to twenty minutes trying to figure out how to begin a post on money. Personal finance, for you Ramit-minded readers. I was trying this awesome technique where you deal with your writing issues by writing them in a separate document, and I was writing more in the separate document than I was on the original post.
See, in my family, we don’t talk about money. We never have. I never knew how much our house cost. I never knew what my parents paid for utilities, let alone their salaries. One time when I was about eight, I asked my dad point-blank how much money he had. “Enough,” he answered curtly, and changed the subject.
And of course, no one ever talked to me about credit cards.
In high school, when I got a job, my mum encouraged me to save my money, but didn’t show me how—or why. I worked through most of college, sometimes two and three jobs, but it never occurred to me to keep track of where my money went, or to keep much of it around.
And then there was the credit card. In short, what started as a joint credit account with my dad became completely my responsibility…out of nowhere, and at the worst possible time. So I’m still working on paying that off. And somewhere along the way, I had an emergency…and another one…and another one…and I made the mistake of going deeper into debt instead of working with what I had.
Yes, you heard that correctly. I’m in debt.
No, it’s not that bad. It’s way, way less than it was a year ago. It’s about a tenth of what some good friends of mine owe in school loans. But it’s still something. And it’s weighing on me. Making me worry. Awhile back, I started playing with these online calculators, and when I saw how much money I was losing in interest by paying my purchases off every month, I about burst into tears. My money issues have a huge emotional component, I guess.
Since then, my finances have consumed my thoughts. How much can I pay off this week? If I work ten more hours this week, or get two more freelance gigs, how much sooner is the credit card going to be done and completely out of my life? How much do I have to earn in order to finish paying it all off by my next birthday?
It’s so bad, in fact, that I’ve had a really hard time writing about anything but finance. Have I ever shown you guys how I work on my blog? Each of the article drafts I’m working on at any given time are saved on a Sticky on my desktop. At present, I have about 175 Stickies with article notes in various stages of un-editedness. (Yes, I know this is a really inefficient way to work. I’m working on coming up with a better system.) And in the past couple of months, I’ve clicked here and there on various near-finished blog posts and found myself unable…to write…anything…about the things that I really do love: fashion, New York, productive work habits, and making yourself happy.
Seriously. It’s disturbing. And it’s a big part of the reason why you guys haven’t heard much from me lately on any of the topics I usually write about—because I’m too busy doing debt math in my head to actually write much of anything interesting.
Thoughts? Criticisms? Things left unsaid?
Related posts:
Sounds like you’ve got under control either way, but you shouldn’t stress out as much as you seem to be.
Relax, take an easy. Pert equations say this will all come to pass.
Jeremy—you rock. Thanks for listening. And for being my go-to tech person. :-D
Hi Amanda Lee, thanks for visiting my blog. I too relate to the money thing and how my parents never talked to me about it growing up. Luckily I have a job that allowed to pay off any student debt and buying a house, although putting my in debt for a LONG time, is actually helping me out in others way (first time home buyers perks).
You can do it Amanda Lee!
Hey Amanda. Way to go for writing this.
I think more of us are in debt than we would like to admit. Its cool when someone just says “yeah…Im drowning in credit card debt.” Most people that are getting in trouble with their cards are still in the dangerous stage where they pay the minimums every month but are still using it irresponsibly. Thats what I was doing for years and it felt under control. Ive since cut my cards up and dont want to see any more of my income going to toward interest to some sleazy bank. We are pretty damn exceptional for 20-somethings and that money needs to go to cool shit like travel, next-level clothes and snobby food.
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NewLife—aw, thanks for stopping by here too! Thanks for your support. :-D
Jesse—I’m so glad people are reacting kindly to this; I was a bit apprehensive about posting it. I’m glad you’re doing the same thing I am with debt…after all, the sooner weget past it, the sooner we can use it to buy snobby food [among other things]. I like snobby food. I need more of it in my life. :-D
[...] given my Situation, I’ve had to do a lot of learning about the best ways to manage money. One of the web’s [...]