Imagine how you’ll feel when you are free of your debts. Picture yourself writing the check that pays off the last of your debts. Feel the emotions of that action. Believe the picture. You have the power to turn worry on it’s head and change despair to hope. You believed the negative picture of worry because you practiced and practiced. Your mind doesn’t care if the image is positive or negative and will accept your positive beliefs as easily as the negative of worry.
“Stop scaring yourself to death with your own mental pictures” (Maxwell Maltz, MD). Worrying about debt paints vivid mental pictures of failure that can destroy your emotional well being. When you worry, your emotional state suffers because you imagine the worst, your imagination believes you, and you suffer the same emotional turmoil as if the imagined events have actually taken place. They haven’t.
Your attitude and focus are the important first steps for getting out of debt. Thought always precedes action. Don’t you think you’ll feel better emotionally when you turn your attention to the positive things you can do instead of focusing on the lack of money? You might be surprised at how big a difference a positive focus will make in your emotional well-being.
It’s easy to say “don’t worry,” but you need to turn things around. Once you have a positive image of the outcome, the rest will follow. You need a plan of action. There is always something positive you can do to reduce your debt. Of course there’s no magic. You can’t make your debt disappear overnight, but you can banish you debt forever the same way you’d eat an elephant – one bite at a time.
Imagine how you’re going to feel when that first bill goes away. Pick the smallest debt you have and concentrate as many of your financial resources as you can on paying that bill – one bite at a time. Instead of worrying, you’re taking positive action, action that brings relief and feelings of accomplishment, not despair.
Keep it up. Pay off the next larger bill the same way. Each time you make a payment, each time you “retire” another bill the pile goes down along with the emotional baggage. The financial resources you have will increase as each bill is paid and will build your momentum.
“As far as your emotions are concerned, the proper response to worry pictures is to totally ignore them.” (Maltz) Getting out of debt won’t always be easy (probably never easy), but so long as you maintain that positive, I can do something picture, you will prevail, your emotions will heal, and you’ll be well on the road to financial recovery.