Bailing out? Going Galt?

You've all heard about bugging out. The organic fertilizer hits the rotary cooling device and it's time to head for the hills.

Bug out plans are great fun and all, a fascinating game of “what if?”

More likely than a bug out disaster is a situation where your financial situation suddenly takes a turn for the worse. It happens all the time. Jobs go away. Houses get foreclosed on. Bills pile up. Stuff happens.

Saturday I flipped out when I got a letter in the mail from the very same credit union I've been complaining about. Not to get into any details, but suddenly a payment schedule of mine got a lot more compressed and urgent. This new company is full of unhappy surprises. They are giving me a hard time over something the old company never bothered with.

I said bad words. With feeling.

Then I asked myself if this was time to bail out of the whole system. I'm not going to wait for things to get progressively worse to the point where I can't liquidate and escape. The system will not pull me down to where I'm dependent on luck and the mercy of strangers -again. I lucked out once, playing by the rules, but how often does a person hit a hole in one?

Everyone's financial situation is different. Putting the details of my personal bail out plan on-line might be a bad idea so it's not going to happen. Let's just say I have a plan and leave it at that. Thinking outside the box is what I do.

One thing to remember is to not give all your money to the debt collectors. Heck, it even takes money to file for bankruptcy -that's how messed up our system is. Keep some funds available for a financial escape plan.

I've seen people cope in a number of ways. One family decided to quickly liquidate the house, cars -everything but the boat. They moved onto the boat and found they could live debt free for a lot less.

An older couple jingled mailed their house keys to the bank and took an early retirement to a small condo they owned. Better to sacrifice one property than lose both.

James M Dakin is a big believer in putting an old trailer on junk land and getting by on a minimum wage job. He's living it.

A college buddy of mine actually did use the last of his money to pay for bankruptcy, and it gave him the fresh start he needed. Well, along with a divorce, but that's a whole different story.

Once I calmed down I figured my personal red line had not been crossed quite yet. Of course, the letter arrived on the weekend, and there's nobody in the home office until Monday. We'll talk and I'll find out what exactly is going on. If I have to to I can move funds around and take care of the problem. It's not how I wanted or planned to deal with it, but it's doable.

Every year I get a little less connected to the dominate system. That's been my plan. Progression has been gradual but steady. Then there are tipping points where things could go seriously sideways. I didn't quite reach my tipping point, but maybe I got a glimpse of what it might look like.


-Sixbears