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Many years ago, when I was struggling to even come up with enough grocery money to splurge once a week on a 99 cent 2-liter bottle of Coke, I read something that changed my life:

An emergency is just something you haven’t prepared well enough for.*

That statement was especially striking to me because I’d been working hard to reduce my hated credit card debt, and it seemed like every time I sent in a payment something would happen and I would “have” to use the credit card. For example, I needed a new clutch on my newer 4-door Dodge Colt. There went $400 (or whatever it was) onto my credit card, when I’d only sent in a $50 payment. I felt like I could never get ahead — that there would always be some emergency “keeping” me down.

But when I thought about the idea of an emergency being something that I hadn’t prepared well enough for, I realized that I certainly didn’t have  to use my credit card to do it. I was choosing to use my credit card. I didn’t “have” to get my car repaired at all. What I needed to do instead was either prepare better for unexpected expenses or be willing to suffer the consequences of not preparing enough. In other words, if I planned for car repairs, I’d have the money for them, and wouldn’t need to use the credit card. And, if I chose not to prepare adequately for car repairs, I still  didn’t need to use the credit card. (I actually drove my car in the only two gears that worked – 1st & 2nd – for several months once because I didn’t have the cash for yet another clutch repair.)

Let’s face it, if you own a car, you know that it WILL break down at some point or another. Cars are mechanical things, and mechanical things ALL eventually have issues of one type or another. So a car breakdown is not an emergency — it’s an eventuality. There are a whole lot of things that frequently get lumped into the “emergency” category that really are not. Eventualities should be planned for. The more likely an event is to occur, the more thoroughly you should plan for it. Realizing this was one of the single biggest factors for me in getting out of debt.

*I wish I could find the source of this statement to give credit for it here, but a google search turned up nothing. I suspect it was from a book, but it’s been so long that I don’t remember. If anyone knows, please let me know!