Debt Free Living: 5 Attitudes You Need to Adopt for Success
Do you want to be debt free?
You lose a lot when you live debt free. You lose things like stress, fights with your spouse and sleepless nights.
You also lose that financial ball and chain you’ve been dragging around.
Debt free living is financial freedom. It is going against the grain in our society to find a better way. I want to assure you, it is truly a better way to live!
Some might think that debt free living is impossible, but I’m living proof that it is not. My wife and I have been debt free except for our mortgage for over 2 years now. We will be completely debt free in the next five.
The 5 Attitudes You Need for Debt Free Living
Getting and staying debt free requires adopting the right attitudes. Once you get your mind right about money then the rest is just mechanics.
Here are the five attitudes I think are most important for debt free living:
1. There is no such thing as good debt
Debt is bad. All debt is bad. There is no such thing as good debt. Have I made myself clear? There will be some people out there that think I’m a simpleton for saying it, but I believe it is true. Why do I think this way? Because debt is risky.
Ron at The Wisdom Journal wrote a little about this in No Such Thing As Good Debt? I think he makes it clear that even what some call “good debt” can quickly turn on you and become “bad debt”. He says it is a matter of perspective. I think debt is always bad because it enables us to purchase things (even good things) when we can’t really afford them.
There are very, very few things worth going into debt over. I might buy a house on a 15-year fixed rate mortgage, but I’d much prefer to pay cash. Sometimes, you don’t have much of a choice like in the instance of a major health issue. Of course, in either of these instances I would just consider the debt a necessary evil until I could pay it off.
2. Financial margin buys me freedom
When you live below your means (i.e. spend less than you make and save the rest), you create financial margin in your life. As Amanda at My Dollar Plan points out, Finding the Value in Money is an important step if you want to stop spending every dime you make.
Saving money and having financial margin provides freedom of choice. It opens up options that wouldn’t otherwise be available to you. This is one of the big reasons that I love living debt free. Amanda shares some specific examples of how this has played out positively in her life. I’d encourage you to read her story.
Bottom line, you must have a purpose that trumps your desire to buy everything you see if you want get and stay debt free.
3. Accumulating wealth is not a bad thing
It seems that wealth has a bad name in America right now. The rich have gotten some bad publicity. Corporate scandals have left Americans feeling like everyone with money is greedy and unscrupulous.
Frugal Dad wrestled with this a bit recently in Wealth, Greed, Envy and Shame. I’ll let you read his thoughts on the subject. I think he offers a very balanced commentary. Once you read the article, you can draw your own conclusions about wealth.
What I will tell you is that once you become debt free, you will start to accumulate some savings or wealth. Therefore, you need to have your head on straight about what wealth means to you. Personally, I kind of like it. 
4. One mistake does not make you a financial failure
On the road to living debt free, you are bound to make a financial mistake or two. This does not make you a failure nor does it mean that you should give up. As Dave Ramsey puts it, “You just paid some stupid tax.”
Learning flexibility is an important part of getting and staying debt free. We are often too hard on ourselves which robs us of our motivation. Brad at Enemy of Debt writes When Your Financial Plan Takes A Detour It Doesn’t Imply Failure. As Brad points out, being debt free actually takes some of the sting out of your mistakes because you have some cushion.
5. I am a grown-up and I make my own money decisions
We have to take personal responsibility for our decisions about money. This is part of maturing into an adult. Living debt free is not the norm. It takes courage to choose to be different even when “different” is clearly better.
Our society pressures us to spend money on things we don’t need or even really want. Jason Price writing for Bible Money Matters tells us to Avoid The Pressure To Spend. I think he did a very nice job bringing clarity to a subject that often goes ignored.
We have to be mature enough to use our heads and not our emotions to guide us in purchasing decisions. The advertisers and marketers of the world are pros. They know exactly how to get us. We must steel ourselves against their efforts.
These Attitudes Will Lead You to Success with Debt Free Living
These five attitudes have served me and my wife very well in becoming and remaining debt free. I hope you’ll also find them very useful. Your attitudes guide your behavior so getting your mind right is more than half the battle. Set yourself free!
What other attitudes are important to debt free living?
Photo by Matti Mattila
This was a good refresher for me. I am on my way to being debt-free (except for my mortgage) and it feels really good to say that. I started down this path only out of necessity, but will stay the course because I choose to.
Oddly enough, there is someone in my life who I used to be envious of. She and her husband have always spent a lot of money, with a beautiful house, new cars, clothes, meals out and lots of extras. (Think hot tub, high-end furniture, personal trainer, decorator, etc.) Recently though, she confessed that they were selling the house and downsizing so that they could pay off debt and save money. Their lifestyle was unsustainable, and they had cashed in all of their savings, 401k accounts, etc. to try to stave off bankruptcy long enough to sell the house.
I’m not envious any more. I made mistakes too, don’t get me wrong. Their situation helped me to (re)gain perspective and to more fully appreciate the difference in my life that refusing additional debt has made.
Taking out student loans when that is the only way to attend college is a bad financial decision? I totally disagree. That IS good debt.
“There is no such thing as good debt”
I have got to agree with that.
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