How Working on Credit Card Debt Helped Me Lose Weight

Weight loss — two words that, when combined, send homo sapiens into a spiraling depression or shatter the golden arches of their, otherwise, beautiful day.

It's Personal

Fitness proved to be a genuine area of struggle for me. At the age of 12, I was classified as "husky" and by the time I was in college I reached the point of being clinically obese. I topped out at 265 lbs and I sat there in my misery, hating my body, and feeling hopeless to ever reach my fitness goals. Until recently that is...

Over the course of six months, I dropped my weight down to 220 lbs and now I, at 27 years old, am finally on track towards completing my weight goals. I have more energy and I look in the mirror and feel so much better about myself.

How did I do it? I used a metaphor! Well, sort of...

I began equating my weight to credit card debt. Weird I know, but it worked for me and maybe it will work for you. Let's break it down.

Money Vs. Mass

I think that we as a society are pretty familiar with credit problems and the related debt. All it takes is one weekend of no self-control and suddenly...BOOM! you have a bunch of guys (or girls) in suits hittin' up your phone, asking for that $10k back.

Being overweight and having credit card debt is very much the same. No one wants them, nearly everyone has them, and most feel like they have no way out. What can be done?

Problem Solving

When I looked at my spending last summer, I came to some conclusions:

1. If I keep spending, I'm going to get into more debt.
2. If I simply stop spending, I'll keep accruing debt through interest.
3. If I start paying it off, my debt will decrease and I'll eventually find freedom.

Pretty straightforward. It's simple logic. So I started working on changing my financial situation.

Then I realized that these three things also applied to my physical body as well. I could keep going as I was and increasing my weight and gaining more "interest," OR I could start paying off my debt as I spent it.

Less Spending, More Paying

Financially, I started setting limits on my spending, I had to pay off more than the amount I spent per month. I applied this same principle to my fitness, except instead of spending and paying it was eating and exercising.

I've always heard that If I wanted to lose weight I need to eat less and exercise more, but being able to directly anchor it to another real-life situation helped me to turn my knowledge into action.

With this understanding, I was able to make some really significant changes to my general lifestyle and daily habits. I broke down food groups into "currencies" and set a "spending limit." Unhealthy food (such as fast food and frozen pizza) are 100'\s. Desserts can be either 50s or 100s (depending on source and ingredients). Carby items are 20s. Etc etc etc.

Likewise, I assigned the same values to various types of exercise. For example, thirty minutes of walking equals a 20 and, therefore, covers one payment of carby foods. This also means I have to walk a minimum of two and a half hours to make up for a frozen pizza!

Final Wisdom

If your just getting started, begin by trying to simply break even. Spend and pay equally, and then little by little you can work up to a decent amount of exercise. I discovered that if I tried to do too much without setting small goals for myself, I would just burn out and get discouraged. In the same way, when I paid an extreme amount on my card, I was left without any cash and ended up using the card, sometimes spending more than what I had paid off.

I'm not going to deceive you into thinking it's easy. It takes discipline to get out of debt or lose weight. Most desirable things in life do. Remember, it's completely ok if you are only making a little progress. It's better than no progress or, worse, falling deeper and deeper into the hole.

Lastly, this method worked for me, but you might need something else. In fact, I strongly encourage that you personalize your goals, as well as your means of achieving them. The more you can be self-expressive, the more I believe you will be successful.