It is no fun at all to be in credit card debt. If you are one of the unfortunate people in credit card debt, then you know what I mean. There is a tingly, queasy sensation every time the phone rings, or that panicky feeling you get when you open your mailbox every day. Your heart practically stops if your doorbell rings unexpectedly! Any, or all of these, can be symptoms of being in credit card debt, especially, if it is serious.
Most of the time, fortunately, it is not so bad when I am in credit card debt. I was quite certain a couple of times, however that some angry goombahs were getting together in order to break my kneecaps after having been hired out by the major credit companies. You are certainly not alone if you have found yourself in this situation. Many countries around the world have been recording credit card debt raising at record speeds lately.
The average American family today, according to some recent studies, has over 8000 dollars in credit card debt. This is a huge increase over past debt levels, even above and beyond inflation.
Why are we spending so much of the time these days covered in credit card debt? Is this really just a result of a post industrial society, or have we lost any semblance of control that we might have had over our spending? One this is for certain, even though I am not exactly sure what the answer to that may be: it can be an absolute nightmare to be in credit card debt.
If you can avoid getting in credit card debt in the first place, this is the best way that I have found to stay out of credit card debt! You can almost hear the credit card companies reeling with laughter far off in their corporate strongholds somewhere deep in credit card land, once you rack up a large debt where the interest alone begins to bog you down. You may want to consider closing out all but one or two lines, if you have several open credit lines and find yourself getting deep in credit card debt quite frequently. It has been a lot easier to manage my credit card debt ever since I cancelled all but one credit line.
I also try to limit the frequency I use my card as another way that seemingly helps me to avoid falling too deep in credit card debt. I try to limit myself to just one use of my card a week, as a general rule, and then I force myself to pay for everything else with a check or with cash. Of course there are times when I have to break the rule, but just by trying to follow it has helped me to cut down on my extraneous costs quite a bit, at least for those items that I don't really need anyway.