Release from Debtor's Prison: Achieving Financial Freedom: A Proven Formula for Changing the Attitudes & Habits That Keep You in Debt

364 Pages·2000·0.75 MB·English

by  Margaret St. John

Release From Debtor's Prison : Achieving
Financial Freedom : a Proven Formula for
title:
Changing the Attitudes and Habits That
Keep You in Debt
author: St. John, Margaret.
publisher: Hazelden Publishing
isbn10 | asin: 1568383665
print isbn13: 9781568383668
ebook isbn13: 9780585347240
language: English
subject Finance, Personal, Debt, Consumer credit.
publication date: 2000
lcc: HG179.S55855 2000eb
ddc: 332.024
subject: Finance, Personal, Debt, Consumer credit.
Page iii
Release from Debtor's Prison
Achieving Financial Freedom A Proven Formula for
Changing the Attitudes and Habits That Keep You in
Debt
Margaret St. John
Page iv
Hazelden
Center City, Minnesota 55012-0176
1-800-328-0094
1-651-213-4590 (Fax)
www.hazelden.org
© 2000 by Hazelden Foundation
All rights reserved. Published 2000
Printed in the United States of America
No portion of this publication may be reproduced in any manner
without the written permission of the publisher
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
St. John, Margaret.
Release from debtor's prison: achieving financial freedom: a proven
formula for changing the attitudes and habits that keep you in debt /
Margaret St. John.
p. cm.
ISBN 1-56838-366-5
1. Finance, Personal. 2. Debt. 3. Consumer credit. I. Title.
HG179 .S55855 2000
332.024dc21 00-021891
Editor's note
The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions are reprinted and adapted
with permission of Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
(AAWS). Permission to adapt and reprint the Twelve Steps and
Twelve Traditions does not mean that AA has reviewed or approved
the contents of this publication, or that AA necessarily agrees with the
views expressed herein. AA is a program of recovery from alcoholism
onlyuse of the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions in connection with
programs and activities which are patterned after AA, but which
address other problems, or in any other non-AA context, does not
imply otherwise.
The Twelve Steps, Twelve Traditions, and preamble of Debtors
Anonymous are reprinted with permission of Debtors Anonymous
World Services, Inc. Permission to reprint this material does not mean
that DA has reviewed or approved the contents of this publication, or
that DA necessarily agrees with the views expressed herein.
Author's note
Although the names and identifying characteristics of the men and
women mentioned in this book have been changed to protect their
anonymity, the stories are real.
In accordance with the principles of Twelve Step programs, the author
has protected her own anonymity by using a pen name.
04 03 02 01 00 6 5 4 3 2 1
Cover design by Theresa Gedig
Interior design by Donna Burch
Typesetting by Stanton Publication Services, Inc.
Page v
For my parents, who set my feet upon the path,
and
for all debtors everywhere who still suffer
Page vii
Contents
1. "Financially Challenged" 1
2. Back in the Black: 7
Escaping from Debtor's Prison
3. How Did I Get into This Mess? 31
Identifying the Roots of Our Indebtedness
4. How Do I Get Out? 55
Stopping the Debt Cycle
5. Didn't I Just Have $100? 79
Getting Real with Our Money and Our Lives
6. What Am I Worth? 103
Money as a Metaphor
7. What If There's Not Enough? 125
Money as Self-Care
8. What Do I Owe You? 149
Money as a Means of Exchange
9. Where Do I Go from Here? 175
Living from a Larger Self
10. Experiencing Life as a Gift: 191
Cultivating the Capacity to Receive
Appendixes
Appendix A: The Twelve Steps of Alcoholics 201
Anonymous
Appendix B: The Twelve Steps of Debtors Anonymous 202
Page viii
Appendix C: The Twelve Traditions of Alcoholics 203
Anonymous
Appendix D: The Twelve Traditions of Debtors 205
Anonymous
Appendix E: Debtors Anonymous Preamble 207
Index 209
Page 1
1
"Financially Challenged"
I wouldn't say we're "broke."
I prefer to call it "financially challenged."
cartoon caption
Drowning in bills marked "past due," the husband and wife in the
cartoon caught my accountant's eye. She, more than anyone else, had
had an inside track on the state of my finances for the previous five
years. The year she enclosed the cartoon with my newly completed
income tax returns for filing, I had just entered a recovery program
most people had never heard of: Debtors Anonymous (DA). Although
my accountant has never needed to walk through the door to a DA
meeting herself, she has provided financial services to scores of
people who desperately need what a financial recovery program has to
offer. Debtors Anonymous, a fellowship of recovering debtors and
money mismanagers, is a spiritual program based on the Twelve Steps
of Alcoholics Anonymous.
Occasionally my above-and-beyond-the-call-of-duty accountant will
give me a call to say, "I hope you don't mind, but I just shared your
story, anonymously of course, with
Page 2
another beleaguered client." Of course I don't mind if my accountant
wants to practice the Twelfth Step; that is, "to carry this message to
compulsive debtors." I know, from my own experience, that
compulsive debtors need all the help they can get. And if my financial
life could be turned around, anybody's can.
"Financially challenged" is an accurate description of millions of
Americans today. According to the United States Small Business
Administration, total outstanding consumer installment debt rose
above $1 trillion for the first time in 1995, and the Federal Reserve
reports that American credit card debt, as of January 1999, amounted
to $565.9 billion. In 1998, the total number of filings for bankruptcy
in the United States was 1,442,549. According to the National
Foundation for Consumer Credit, the average American family's
outstanding unsecured debt, as of May 1999, was $6,000. The
American Bankruptcy Institute reports that approximately 619 million
checks were bounced in 1995, and that number is expected to jump to
731 million in the year 2000.
As a result of the dire circumstances of American consumers, the
number of debt collection and credit reporting jobs is predicted to
skyrocket to 2.93 million in 2005, an increase of 68.4 percent over
1994, when there were 1.74 million such jobs.
But, according to Mark Rosen, community relations manager at
Consumer Credit Counseling Service of Michigan, the most
distressing statistics are those reflecting personal savings trends in the
United States. According to the Commerce Department, Americans
were saving 2.9 percent of their income in 1996, 2.1 percent in 1997,
and only .5 per-