Debt and how you deal with it....

Buddhist ethical conduct including the Five Precepts (Pañcasikkhāpada), and Eightfold Ethical Conduct (Aṭṭhasīla).
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Myotai
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Joined: Mon Aug 19, 2013 11:39 am

Debt and how you deal with it....

Post by Myotai »

Hi,

I had a lucrative career in IT many years ago. I accrued some debts, loans for various it's n bits that were the 'rewards' for hard work and a financially generous job.

I changed careers to work in social care ultimately retraining and I'm now a Psychological Therapist treating people for a variety of mental health disorders.

My salary now is what I used to get as a bonus!!

Some of those debts that I was able to pay at the time have come back to haunt me now. I'm having to face some litigation and rather complex issues that I'm finding really stressful.

I was wondering if you had experienced some real financial issues and how you dealt with them internally? The practicalities I can manage. But it's starting to feel like I am burdened or infected by them now and I can't seem to think my way out of that horrible feeling.

Thanks to you all....
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Crazy cloud
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Re: Debt and how you deal with it....

Post by Crazy cloud »

I have been on a steady slip slidin away down the social ladder for the last three years, and my best friend has been awareness or emtiness - that is my real home, and i've put it to the test a lot of times, and it doesn't fail in times of hardship. I'm quite sure that wordly facts wont change, but it is okay, and I just keep on trusting the teaching and resting in the here and now - and I try my best not to project my sufferings onto the world, but solve it at it's source (me myself and I) with kindfulness,

The positive outcome of the whole matter, is that i get a lot of experience and meditations are really interesting when things are real bad and disgusting

So my advice is to develop your own trust in "your true dwelling place" and put it to the test!

Be well and happy as can be, dear fellow striver :candle:
If you didn't care
What happened to me
And I didn't care for you

We would zig-zag our way
Through the boredom and pain
Occasionally glancing up through the rain

Wondering which of the
Buggers to blame
And watching for pigs on the wing
- Roger Waters
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Myotai
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Re: Debt and how you deal with it....

Post by Myotai »

That's really kind ...Thanks. .. _/|\_
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Ben
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Location: kanamaluka

Re: Debt and how you deal with it....

Post by Ben »

I lost a considerable amount of money during the GFC.
I dealt with it surprisingly well. Probably too well if you ask my wife.
At the time I was, and remain, very focused on my practice.
In your situation I hope you can draw on the wellspring of equanimity within. If you need to, get some legal advice. There may be options available to you such as mediation.
Don't forget. As part of your practice to extend metta towards yourself. If you find yourself becoming very stressed, try and recollect the qualities of the triple gem.
With metta,
Ben
“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”
- Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:
in mountain clefts and chasms,
loud gush the streamlets,
but great rivers flow silently.
- Sutta Nipata 3.725

Compassionate Hands Foundation (Buddhist aid in Myanmar) • Buddhist Global ReliefUNHCR

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Myotai
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Re: Debt and how you deal with it....

Post by Myotai »

Thanks Ben. I did see a solicitor for an hour, only to be billed forn £500. I have enlisted other help now. It's just the internal feeling of being stained by it all...
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Anagarika
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Re: Debt and how you deal with it....

Post by Anagarika »

Myotai wrote:Thanks Ben. I did see a solicitor for an hour, only to be billed forn £500. I have enlisted other help now. It's just the internal feeling of being stained by it all...
Terrible that a solicitor billed you so much...even in the US, that kind of hourly rate would raise ethical issues. I am sure there are ethical solicitors in your jurisdiction that bill at 1/3 that rate. On the pragmatic side, your country may have bankruptcy laws that might allow you to legally discharge some of these debts. Even the threat of a BK will cause some creditors to negotiate with you on a pay off plan, or discount of the amounts owed. That might bring some peace of mind.

Ajahn Brahm has a number of his talks wherein he speaks of guilt http://youtu.be/UCyuvjdI5YQ , and the idea that in Buddhism we don't have a concept of guilt. Guilt is a form of self punishment, and is a maladaptive device that we in the west cultivated. You are "stained" by these debts or these silly purchases only as much as you wish to be....why not look at these feelings as a bag of rocks that you carry, and just give yourself permission to set them down and leave them behind?

We all do such a good job of beating ourselves up, and allowing these internal criticisms to become a reality for our sense of self. Let them go. Maybe practice a form of Metta where you remind yourself to be well, happy and free of worry. Meditate that you wish that you can be free of guilt, regret and self-shame, and that you wish this for all of those around you.
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