If you’re a college student, you’re more than likely broke all the time. Your credit cards are almost completely maxed out, if you get a paycheck, it all goes to the credit card, then oops! You don’t have anymore money! More credit card swipes! Next thing you know, you’re in this awful cycle of only using your paychecks for your credit card, and the card be used for everything else, and it bites you in the ass when it catches up to you.
You tell your friends, boyfriend, girlfriend, family, anyone who will listen about the stress you have brought onto yourself with your money, and what do they always say? “Just pay it off.” This ALWAYS makes me mad, because it seems like it doesn’t connect in their brains that if I had the money to pay them off, I wouldn’t be in this situation, now would I? “Well, just stop spending money until you have them all paid off.” It’s not that easy to not spend money, man. Ever heard of impulse buying? You know, that disease that plagues the best of us that makes money burn holes in our pockets for things we don’t need and makes us go into credit card debt? THAT thing? Yeah, it’s a pain, and one of the hardest habits to break.
So, what do you do when you’re in this cycle? Well, start by saying “no.” Start small, so say no to going out to eat; you have a meal plan that you’ve already paid for, and I bet you that you have snacks in your dorm. Plus, it’ll save you gas, so you won’t have to spend money on that. Then go a little bit bigger. Say no to some pieces of clothes that you want. If you need them, get them, but if you don’t, then leave it on the rack. Keep getting bigger with the things you say “no” to as you’re getting into the hang of it more, keep putting money to your balance so that it’s going down, and hopefully you won’t have any setbacks that make you have to start from square one again. It’s going to be hard, but as Shia LeBeouf said, “Just DO IT!” Good luck!