Can’t break the cycle of debt?

If you’ve been trying to shake off your debt for a while now but with limited success then it is possible that more radical action is needed. Once you are caught in the debt cycle it can be incredibly difficult to get out of it.

I have been caught in a debt cycle for a number of years now. I’ve come to a few conclusions based on my experiences and these are backed up by the experiences of my friends and from what I’ve read on the internet.

The desire to consume ‘Stuff’ never really goes away. You may tame the urge to spend for a while – maybe even a couple of years but deep down the urge to spend is still lurking and waiting for its chance to get you back into the debt cycle.

Strangely as you approach your goal of getting rid of your debt the pressure and hate of debt seems to take a back seat. You have slain the dragon that is your debt. It no longer holds any fear for you so maybe just maybe it would be okay if you charged just one small item on to your credit card. It’s okay because you have your debt under control right? Nothing to worry about you will pay it off next month.

This situation is a lot more common than you would think. Once you have got your existing debt down to an acceptable level you grow in confidence about your ability to manage further debt. Before long you are back in serious debt. I’ve seen this happen over and over again. No one ever seems to get off the debt treadmill 100% and stay off it forever.

Luckily there are a few key changes to your lifestyle that you can make to break this cycle for good. The bad news is that these changes are hard to do.

The idea behind these changes is that you are no longer in harms way so to speak. The aim of making these changes is to reduce the influences that were causing you to overspend and consume in the first place. By making these changes you are in effect trying to shut out consumer life.

Change one – Change who your friends are

I did say this was hard. The logic behind this is that if your current set of friends have been enabling you to indulge in spending then simply cut them out. You want a set of friends that will support you and understand what you are going through. You don’t want to be around people who are constantly spending or talking about spending as it will put you under pressure to spend. This is not where you want to be.

Change two – Go on a media diet

I have discussed this at length in the following post, Media diet – useful in slimming down your debt? In this post I discuss the merits of reducing your exposure to the influences of advertisers by cutting down on your media exposure. One thing I learnt having tried to do this myself is just how difficult it can be to achieve.

Change three – Pick something big you really want and save hard for it

As you approach the point of debt freedom you are approaching the hardest part of your journey. The end is in sight but your fear of your debt will most likely have diminished and the temptation to shop and spend will be huge. It is at this point that you need to give yourself a new, hard to achieve financial goal.

The goal could be something like saving for a big holiday or saving for a new car. The thing is the goal has to motivate you and no matter what you have to commit yourself to SAVING for that goal. Buying that goal on credit will be considered cheating. You must save for it.

By having a big savings goal you are taking the focus off your fast approaching debt freedom. It gives purpose to the money that you were using to pay down your debt and in turn it should limit your desire to take on more debt.

How easy are these changes to make?

Not easy at all. But don’t let that put you off. Paying down your debt is not easy but you’re on your way to doing that. The changes outlined above are necessary if you want to make it out of debt and stay out of debt and ultimately break the cycle of debt.

Even just making one of the changes outlined above should give you enough momentum to stay out of debt but if you could combine all three together then you can break the debt cycle for good.

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