How to get out of debt- Here is how I paid off $2,000 in Credit card debt

Are you in debt? Let me show you how to get out of debt quickly without having to live like a peasant. 

It wasn’t long ago that I had over $2,000 in Credit card debt. If you have had debt before you know that having any type of debt is a very taxing feeling.

When you have debt you owe someone something. This gives them power over you.

Debt can be anything from favors, money related, to emotional. There are thousands of different ways to easily get into debt.

As a reader of Calm & Collected I want you to be armed with information that will not only improve the quality of your life, but also allow you to avoid things that will hold you back.

I am against taking on unneeded debt by all means. The only time that it is okay for you to take on debt is because you will be able to profit from it.

Example of it being okay to go into debt:

You are starting a business and need to borrow $5,000. After doing some research you see that you can turn that $5,000 investment into $10,000 within 8 months.

That would mean that in 8 months you would have been able to pay the $5,000 back and then walk away $5,000 richer. In that case it would make logical sense to allow yourself to go into debt.

Example of it not being okay to take on debt:

In another situation let’s say that you get your brand new Credit card. This card has a $3,000 limit. You get filled with a feeling of having lots of money.

You start thinking to yourself about all of the things that you “need” to buy. The truth is that you don’t need them, but instead you just want them.

That same day you go out and buy a PS4, 50-inch TV, and then go enjoy a $500 meal with your girlfriend. You feel like The Man.

Your girlfriend thinks you are a successful man. Friends of yours come over and think to themselves, “Wow John has it going on.”. The truth is that you are in debt.

It will take you months to pay off that debt. You will end up paying more than you borrowed due to interest.

This debt offers you nothing of true value. As opposed to being able to double your money as in the first example. Now you will be limited as to what you can do because you suffer from what I call the “Consumer Credit Disease”.

How did I get $2,000 in debt?

It didn’t just happen all at once. For me it was a purchase here and there. Before I knew it I was in over my head.

I was always one of those guys who only would use their Credit card to pay for gas and nothing else. I would never use it to buy anything unneeded.

My motto: Only buy what you can pay for in cash.

At the time I had 0 credit. I decided that I was going to have to put more on my Credit card in order to build my credit score. I charged $250 on my Credit card.

I paid the $250 charge off in small portions so that I would be able to build my credit (slowly). I made payments of $35/month.

Everything was good, but then I went through a rough patch. I was in the middle of building a side venture as well as developing Calm & Collected.

I wasn’t making any money from them either. The day job that I had taken on after I left my Upper-Management position was only bringing home around $350 a week.

Haha I know.

I convinced myself that I would need to make several purchases. I needed a new computer so that I could build my businesses since at the time all of my businesses were online.

I bought an $800 computer which came with a keyboard and mouse (as that somehow makes it worth the price). Then to go along with my computer I purchased a $125 monitor.

Debt at this point: $925

From there I decided that I wanted to be able to write and manage my sites while travelling. I didn’t want to drop $600 on laptop so after speaking with a few friends I bought a tablet.

They claimed to be able to tweak their sites, edit videos, and write articles with their tablets. Spending $145 made more sense to me so I bought an Asus Tablet.

After having it for several weeks I came to the conclusion that it took way more effort than it should to do what I needed on a tablet.

Months later I bought a laptop for $780.

Debt at this point: $1,850

Although I can argue that some of those things were required. Without a reliable computer I could not have developed C&C or ran my side-hustles.

Due to a false feeling of security because of my Credit card I dug a hole for myself. Since I had $3,000 I felt as if I had plenty of money to be ale to live at a level I couldn’t actually afford.

To date I have only used my desktop 7 times. I primarily use my laptop as it is more convenient. My tablet is only used to read books.

Notes inspired from Gorilla Mindset.

I do not regret putting myself in debt. If I hadn’t gone into debt I could not have wrote this post for you.

I learned how much it sucks to owe money for useless things.

By being in debt and making hardly anything from my day job I was forced to make money on my own. Instead of relying on another man to pay me, I became The Man and paid myself.

I still have a day job. It pays my bills and gives me more money to put into my ventures. But if I wanted I could quit today and live off of my own efforts.

I keep my day job because I only work Wednesday through Saturday. Sunday through Tuesday are my days off which is why I often publish articles on those days.

How I got out of debt?

Instead of worrying myself over the debt I had accumulated I did what I do best. I sat down and came up with a list of things I could do to pay off my debt.

After 1o minutes I had a list of ideas I could act on. Ideas that wouldn’t require much time or effort.

Actual notes from the day I sat down and figured out how I would eliminate my debt.

I recommend creating a similar list when looking at getting out of debt. It really helps to put everything on paper. You can better organize your ideas and create a plan of attack when you can see everything in front of you.

It can be confusing when you have dozens of ideas floating around your mind. Get a notebook and actually use it. My notebook is used for everything from title ideas, journal entries, to things such as the image above.

After looking over my ideas I settled on the following:

• Help increase sales for local businesses
• Switch phone carriers

Help Increase sales for local businesses-

Something that I pride myself in is being able to take something average and make it great. I noticed at my job that they had sales flyers that they had been using for a while.

These flyers weren’t that emotionally charged. Although they were making sales I knew I could make them better.

I took one of the flyers home with me and put myself into Flow. After about 30 minutes I had crafted a new flyer that was 100 times better than what they had.

From there I tweaked it and then drafted a proposal for the General Manager. In it I said that I would give him the new sales flyer and then 3 more over a 6 month period.

The total fee was $1,000. As an initial fee I wanted $250. Once he made sales from my flyer I wanted another $500. After I gave him the other 3 flyers I wanted the other $250.

You might be thinking to yourself who in their right mind would pay someone $1,000 for a simple flyer?

My response would be when you are selling $15,000+ cars only paying $1,000 is nothing if you are able to sell 10 cars from one flyer.

After presenting the idea to him he loved it. The dealership was able to sell a total of 30 cars from the first two flyers I created.

He ended up paying me the $1,000 plus a bonus of $700. Needless to say I helped tweak some other things within the dealership for free and am working on another proposal right now.

I will be doing a presentation this week with ideas I have to modernize the way they do business. If it goes well I will be paid very well.

I’m not telling you this as a way to brag about how awesome I am. But rather to show you that even though you are young, you can do things that you might believe only older more experienced people can do.

I am nothing special. I’m probably no smarter than you are. The thing that sets me apart from most guys my age is that I believe in my ability to do things better. I know that I can take one idea and turn it into gold. (Literally)

With that one idea I was able to make a total of $1,700.

Total debt= $2,000/Idea= $1,700

Debt-Idea= Total debt left $300

Switch Phone Carrier- 

At the time of me writing down how I would eliminate my debt I was spending $130/month for my cell phone. I loved the service I received from Verizon, but spending that much every single month for one line would total $1,560 within a year.

Not worth it.

After thinking about it I decided to switch to Virgin Mobile. Now instead of spending $130/month I was only paying $45/month.

Big difference right?

I did have to go from using my iPhone to use a very primitive Android phone. (I am switching back to my iPhone after using the Android)

With Virgin I will spend a total of $540/year as opposed to $1,560 with Verizon. I could have stuck with Verizon and spent less money, but I have certain requirements.

On average I use at least 5 gigs of data every single month. With Verizon that would be pricey.

 Conclusion 

After the first thing I did I only had $300 left which was easily paid off within 3 months. I used the $85 I was saving every month from switching phone carriers to put towards my remaining balance.

I want you to walk away from this article with two things:

1. Do not take on unneeded debt unless you will profit from it
2. If you are in debt be logical and figure out how to get out of it ASAP

There is nothing in this world that you can’t overcome. Humanity has overcome great things. We have survived things such as epidemics, climate changes, and wars.

Do you think that something as silly as debt, getting in shape, or creating an amazing life is hard?

Don’t make me laugh. Put your mind to whatever you want and then you shall get the desired result.

Next read: How to Turn $1.90 Per Hour Into Millions

Your friend,

Dylan Madden

PS: It’ll take you a while to pay off your debt if you rely on your paycheck. The BEST way to speed up this process is to have another source of income.

Craigslist is one of the fastest ways to get paid week after week. If that’s what you’re looking for, check out my Craigslist Profit Accelerator.