Everything has a price. It may not be labeled with a $19.99 tag or be evident what the price is at the time, but a cost is associated with most everything we purchase or the choices we make.
At the moment, America has an ignorance problem. Rather than educating ourselves on what’s happening with current events, we’re relying on social media to drive our opinions of the world. We see social media influencers and celebrities living a life the average American could never afford, and yet, there’s a desire to attain their status and wealth. This desire leads to poor choices and eventual financial ruin.
Ignorance is bliss, until it isn’t.
The price of our ignorance depends on how far down the rabbit hole we let ourselves slide. When I was in college, a representative from a bank asked to speak with my fraternity to provide us with an option to apply for a credit card. The card was sold as a “great way to build credit.” I was lured into easy money, applying for an account on the spot and receiving my card weeks later with a $500 credit limit.
I proceeded to buy clothes, gas and food on the card, racking up a quick debt over the course of a few weeks. The price of my ignorance was to have credit card debt hanging over my head from my junior year in college until at least 2 years after I had graduated. That’s how long it took me to take care of the debt I had accrued in just 2-3 weeks time.
This is a small example and $500 is not a lot of money in the grand scheme of things, but it’s easy to see how you could add another zero or two and wind up with $50,000 of debt in the blink of an eye.
In past articles, I’ve told a story about how I leased a car in order to tow a boat that I could barely afford. The lease (or rental) of the car was $337/mo and the boat cost me $2K, which was essentially all the money I had in savings at the time.
I made a choice to be ignorant. There was a feeling in the pit of my stomach as I was leasing the car and buying the boat that both of them were poor choices. I did it anyway. The “want” of the items was so great it outweighed logic and allowed me to compartmentalize my emotions into a singular phrase, “I deserve them.”
My thinking was, I worked hard, had the money, why shouldn’t I have nice things? The short answer is, you should, if you can afford them. The price of my ignorance began to be felt a year later when I had to give the boat away for parts because the engine needed so much work it wasn’t worth fixing. It hit a crescendo when I turned my leased car in two years later to the dealer for zero return.
In the end, I had no boat and no car to show for the time, effort and money I had put into both items. My ignorance cost me over $14K in the long run ($12K for the car and $2K for the boat). Again, we’re not talking hundreds of thousands of dollars here, but that’s a lot of money when you’re just starting out in life.
Budgeting your money can be sobering. Once you write down what you bring in versus what you’re spending, it can be difficult to see a path forward, especially for anyone drowning in debt or living at a deficit. I know this because I had to do it myself. The choices I had made led me down a path of reliance on credit and borrowing. This is not a path you want to go down.
Removing the veil of ignorance can be difficult but it’s also necessary to accomplish your financial goals. Living your life paycheck to paycheck and attempting to keep up with the trends of the moment is not only fiscally irresponsible it puts you in a position of failure. The less debt you have, the more you’re able to control your financial outcome. Ownership in everything is the key to a successful future for you and your family.
Who knows? Maybe I’ll buy another boat someday.
The difference is, it’ll be sitting on my shelf in a bottle rather than in the water.
