Financial Organization Is My Destination

Two years ago, every other Friday morning was joy and pain for me. I could not wait for my paycheck so I could purchase any necessities and toiletries for myself. That was the joy part. The pain part was when I quickly came to the realization that I had a long list of credit card bills to pay for first. (School tuition and books weren’t going to pay for themselves!) Once I started going through the long list of bills, there was barely any money left over for me to survive on for the next two weeks. After I calculated how much money I would have to pay towards my bills, I cried inside.

I hated the feeling of working tirelessly for two weeks, only for all my hard-earned money to go to someone else’s pocket. As I would pay each bill, I thought it was an excellent idea to not only pay more than the minimum payment due, but to double or even triple the minimum payment. In theory, this is an excellent idea, but this was not something practical for someone like me who could not really afford to do this. My paycheck at the time was not meant to stretch as far as my imagination wanted it to. Nor was it a practical salary to live off.

After I overpaid my bills in order to cover the interest charge on the credit cards (and also the desire to see a significant decrease in my balances), I was broke again and feeling crummy on a Friday payday. 

At least I bought my lunch instead of bringing in home cooked food or leftovers to work as I did every day of the week. In the end, “treating” myself to lunch left a bad taste in my mouth.

In order to avoid running up my credit card balances even more, I would end up transferring money from my savings account to my checking account. I was in a serious bind. My paycheck would go straight to bills and then my savings account suffered too. My bills had a tight grip on my throat. 

This really took a toll on my wellbeing. My life became the game of the hungry hippo. In this case, each hungry hippo represented a different bill and the balls represented my money, joy, peace, sanity and strength, just to name a few. At this rate, I was never going to win this game. I accepted this as my new life. 

I became obsessed with constantly checking my credit card accounts throughout the day and overanalyzing the current balance, due date, which cards to pay for this pay period and how much of the payment would actually go towards the principal. The more I ran the numbers in my head the more stressed and overwhelmed I became. There was no end in sight. 

Each thought was a drop of water that quickly accumulated into a deep sea of thoughts that pushed me way out to the dark and lonely cold rough waters. It was as if I purposely went out for a swim without a life jacket, knowing that I cannot swim. Once my thoughts died down, I washed back up on shore with remnants of thoughts of wanting to go back out to sea. I do not know why I was torturing myself. This mindset became the only way I knew how to think of my financial situation. I felt hopeless and sorry for myself.

Side note: Obeah has many different meanings and spelling, but in this instance my mother who is Jamaican would jokingly ask me if “Yuh owe Obeah Man money, why yuh cyann sleep?” whenever I was going through something I thought I couldn’t handle. I recommend looking up Obeah online for further detail.

Every evening when the sun went down, it was time to get into bed with Obeah Man, only to be wide-awake the whole time. No sweet dreams for me. He would be lying right next to me constantly running the numbers by me so I would not forget my debt. When I woke up from a restless night, he was laying on his right side with his head resting comfortably in his right hand while smiling at me, ready to run through the numbers again.

Obeah Man would laugh as he took each hour of sleep from me. I allowed him to steal my precious time stressing and obsessing over my credit card bills and wondering how I would get them all paid off. With all that time spent staying up every night, I still did not pay off Obeah Man.

I might as well be sitting at a desk with a Banker’s lamp glowing in my face, trying to figure out the perfect solution but the sun always came up too soon. The glowing green light from the lamp in my face would be the reflection of how sick to my stomach I felt. 

One day, I finally broke down and let my mum know the kind of demons I was fighting daily. I finally asked for her help instead of pretending that everything was okay. She lovingly donated funds to help tackle my debt. I also finally took her advice on using an excel sheet, like the one she created to track my monthly expenses. 

Starting the conversation was the best thing I could have done instead of suffering in silence. Initially, I did not ask for help because I wanted to be able to say that I saved myself. That I did it all on my own without reaching for a lifeline. It is such a silly way to think. 

The excel sheet helped me to budget my spending. After a few months of organizing my finances, I decided it was time to consolidate my debt. To this day I am so glad I did. Instead of paying different amounts to each credit card bill, now I only have to pay one monthly payment. It has helped to free up my money and free up my mind. I can already see a significant difference in my debt. It’s become more manageable. My credit score has increased significantly and I’m able to save money now. 

In the excel sheet I break down my monthly spending into different categories—bills, expenses, dining out, clothes, etc. Seeing every payment and purchase in one document eases my mind. I can see clearly each month where I need to cut out certain spending or when I need to budget for something that may be coming up like a vacation.  

This transition was definitely a struggle in the beginning when I was trying to undo habits of feeling anxious or having negative thoughts about my financial situation. The first three to six months I would still freak out and wonder if I had enough money to pay my bills and have enough money left over to last me for the next two weeks. But I knew all I had to do was look back on my excel sheet and see the calculations already done for me (using excel formulas) and see that I did in fact have enough money and I was in control of my finances. 

One of the main habits I cut out was overpaying bills when I noticed I had extra money. When I stopped myself from overpaying, it came in handy for when an unexpected expense would pop up (i.e. car maintenance).

I never want to get back to that place of drowning in debt. Financial organization is my destination. 

I choose not to live a life of paying bills. I want to enjoy life and make the best of it.

Disclaimer: This piece is simply to express my financial experience. I am not recommending any financial advice.