Ah, the new year. Time for fresh starts, new habits, prosperity, building good habits and overall, making our lives better.
For January anyway.
Then February rolls around and for many of us, the enthusiasm that we had in January slowly begins to die. And by April, we’re back to our old ways, telling ourselves that we had to give up on our goals (or resolutions) for whatever reason that we use to justify that quitting is okay.
I know I’ve done this on a number of occasions. But I’ve started to ask myself why. Why do we keep doing what’s bad for us? I’m sure there are plenty of psychology experts who can give you real answers but I’ve come up with a few of my own:
It’s easy. I don’t know about you, but for me it’s just easier to fall back into old habits. I know that before my husband and I got serious about paying off our debt and managing our money this was definitely true. We would commit to not using our credit cards but then, we’d be out or see something that we wanted and, instead of sticking to our commitment, it was easier just to blow it off and swipe the credit card. We wanted whatever it was NOW! And using the credit card made it possible. But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve learned that just because something is easy doesn’t mean it’s good (note: this does not apply to cooking). If you are not one of the lucky people who can control her credit card usage, then using that credit card is not easy. It’s the hardest thing you’ll ever have to do because in the end, it’ll just cause you more problems.
It’s comfortable. Using a credit card was like wearing a comfy pair of pajama pants. It was relaxing, it felt good and damn, was it comfortable. I felt warm and fuzzy and calm every time I made a purchase with a credit card. I didn’t feel constrained by the limitations of our income and the sense of swiping the card was familiar. And I liked it. I like feeling comfortable. What I didn’t realize was that that instantaneous comfort was setting me up for years of awkwardness and feeling more uncomfortable than I’ve ever been in my life. So, before you do something that feels comfortable and familiar, ask yourself if you can live with the potential consequences of that action. If the answer is no, don’t it.
It feels good. While I can delay purchases now, it wasn’t always possible. I wanted what I wanted and I wanted it that minute. Having the credit card made it so I could have whatever it was at that moment. And it felt good to walk out of a store with makeup or new shoes or books. I had the satisfaction of bringing home new things and being able to use them immediately. I liked going to work and getting compliments. I liked being able to have a big library of books I’d only read once. Surrounding myself with those things made me feel better (we’ll deal with the fact that I have low self esteem another day).
It’s possible to rationalize that it’s not so bad or we can live with the consequences. I spent years in denial of exactly how high our consumer debt was. Every time we added to it, I told myself “Meh. What’s a few more dollars?” or “We’ll pay it off eventually” or “In comparison to others, our debt is pretty low”. They were lies. All lies. And they were just rationalizations for my poor behavior. Really, thought, that got me nowhere. If you truly want to change, you have to stop rationalizing the end result. You need to confront the reality of your situation and stop making excuses.
Breaking a bad habit is hard work. I’ll never forget the day my husband and I realized we had to fix our finances and get out of debt. That day sucked. We had to confront our poor habits and acknowledge how bad our situation had become. But we did and from that day forward, we did whatever we could to break the habits that had put us in debt. The 5 years we spent paying off that debt sucked. I’ve never worked so hard at anything in my life (including finishing my Master’s thesis). It would have been so much easier to quit and go back to what we were doing. However, in order to break the bad habit, you have to put in the time, effort and energy to reshaping that habit.
While I used my credit card problem as an example, these excuses work in so many other areas: going to the gym, losing weight, building relationships, finding a new job…the list goes on. There are so many facets of my life that remained stagnant because of all the reasons I’ve listed above. And now that I know why I keep doing what’s bad for me, I can pause, reflect, and start asking myself more questions. Because the only way I’ll affect change in my life is to accept that these excuses aren’t good enough.
Readers, how about you? What are some reasons you think we keep doing what’s bad for us?
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I think one of the biggest reasons, and it kind of fits in with the being hard work issue, is that most people don’t know how or where to begin and may not have a support system to encourage the change. Each bad habit is undoubtedly different but if you have a plan and make sure that the people around you know about it, it should become easier making success a more likely outcome.
Eric J. Nisall – DollarVersity recently posted…TurboTax Reviewed From an Accountant’s View
People have good intentions of quitting something that is bad but in the heat of the moment they are not thinking of the future result of their decision but just thinking of the now. That is why it is so hard for anybody to quit the things that are bad. Have fun now and pay for it later is the mind set of a lot of people. Not just in credit card spending but in a lot of things with life as well.
Tanya recently posted…The Best WordPress Anti-Spam Plugins for 2012-2013
Good post! I think you hot the nail on the head with many of your points, especially it being hard work to break the bad habits. It takes work and time to develop a new habit and without a solid plan you’re more likely to slide back again. I find that I really have to want something and have a plan to get out of whatever habit it is I am trying to break.
John S @ Frugal Rules recently posted…Frugal Friday: Posts That Ruled This Week, College Football is Over Edition
The answer is because you get SOME kind of payoff. I had a friend who would constantly pine for the same guy even though he treated her like crap. When he snapped his fingers she went running to him. Why? Because she liked ANY attention versus having none at all, even though none was healthier than what she had. She you have to dig deep and find out what the payoff is for any habit, and see what you can replace it with.
Budget & the Beach recently posted…Link Love/Week in Review 1/11/13
I’m in the midst of breaking the credit card habit, so this was a great read for me.
SMD @ Life According to Steph recently posted…Friday what what – Five days, five shoes.
Great post Jana. We all get into a certain groove and don’t want to get out of it. It is always harder to make a change, but people don’t like hard. I had to make a change with my credit card spending and once I did, I was better off.
Grayson @ Debt Roundup recently posted…Weekly Personal Finance Blog RoundUp – No Sleep Edition
I think many people lack proper motivation. Until you have a mouth cancer you don’t stop smoking. Until you can’t climb the stairs you keep eating crap. The control and discipline required to take action before it is too late has to be triggered by something or you can procrastinate on your resolution for years.
Pauline recently posted…Friday recap, early rising and a hatching hen
Excellent post, Jana! Until we confront why we do what we do, we’ll never stop doing it.
I think often the instant gratification of spending seems so much more obtainable than waiting for the long-term gratification of being out of debt, and so we cave. But if you keep your eye on the real prize, financial peace/freedom, you’ve got a much better shot of sticking with it.
Thanks for the great info!
Laurie recently posted…Playing Defense: Avoiding Temptations to Get off Budget
If it wadn’t fun or gratifying at some level, we wouldn’t be doing it, whatever the bad it happens to be. The main reason we give up on resolutions is we frame them in negative terms. “I’m going to deprive myself from this or that because it’s not good for me.” That doesn’t work, because it’s like going on a diet and thinking about food all the time.
The resolutions that stick are the ones that bring gratification of a different kind. I’m going to start a new blog next month, and that’s a resolution I hope will stick because it’s going to be fun. I’m going to the gym as soon as this comment is done, because I’ve chose a place and a setting that’s enjoyable. It doesn’t hurt that the fancy headphones I got as a gift makes the workouts more enjoyable.
And not spending money on frivolous stuff is a resolution we made years ago and stuck to, because it freed up money for travel to places we really, really enjoyed. Now we’re so in the habit of saving money we do it even if we have no travel plans.
And that’s really what it comes down to: building habits based on a reward that’s real to us as individuals, not on deprivation.
It is harder to change than to keeping doing the same thing! It takes 21 days of change to form a new habit or change an old habit.
krantcents recently posted…There Is Always Something!
Hi Jana,
These are good points. yes, learning how to break bad habits is difficult but we have to do it. Let us not keep doing things that are not good for us. This will really hurt in the end. besides, we will feel good after doing this successfully.
Lakita recently posted…My Home Insurance – An exercise in futility
I really like this post. You hit the nail on the head with these reasons (excuses) we tend to get in and stay in debt. I think for our family the words laziness and immaturity just about sum it up the most. It was definitely easier and funner to get into debt than to “deny” ourselves all the things we wanted to buy. Learning to say no to yourself may not be fun at the time but is ultimately far more rewarding than just doing and buying anything you please with no thought to the consequences. We’ve now paid off over $100k in debt with just about $14k more to go. It’s been a long road but I’ve learned so much about myself and my husband it has been worth it.
Stacie@Not a Guru, Just a Gal
Stacie Standifer recently posted…The Real Cost of Your Debt