The shopper knew she had to move fast. She only had fifteen minutes before her meeting started, but she just had to pick up another storage box from the home decorating store, so she could finish organizing her closets. “Hmmm….” she mused, “I didn’t know they were having a 50% sale. Doesn’t hurt to look at what they have.”

Forty-five minutes later, she staggered out of the store laden with three bulging shopping bags and a bill for J$8,000. The pleasure derived from her half-priced acquisitions disappeared in an instant when she remembered her important meeting and her non-existent spending budget. “What just happened?” she wondered out loud, “How did I end up paying all this money for things I don’t even need?”

If this scenario sounds even remotely familiar, don’t despair about your inability to control your spending habits or think that you’re a financial loser. If you’re breathing and your heart beats, and you don’t live like a miser or hermit, at some point you’ve been stricken with an attack of ‘Crazy Consumption’.

You might have heard of an old disease called consumption, if you’ve ever listened to old-time stories from your elderly relatives, or watched the hit movie Moulin Rouge. Also called tuberculosis or TB, it was a highly contagious disease that killed about 1 billion people over the past two centuries. Although modern medicine has reduced its occurrence, millions who contract the disease today still die from it.

What does an ancient killer disease have to do with our finances today?

Like the real illness which had destroyed the health and lives of millions, so does ‘Crazy Consumption’ – out-of-control spending – devastate the financial well-being and vitality of millions of consumers.

Persons are unable to meet their monthly requirements, much less plan for important financial goals, because they can’t manage how they spend their money. Even those victims who think they have been cured can succumb to a fresh attack, as the disease constantly evolves to produce new vicious strains that can leave many consumers almost powerless.

So how do you know if you’re a victim of Crazy Consumption?

Signs and Symptoms of Crazy Consumption

1.   Cold sweat, shaking hands and palpitating heartbeats at the sight of a SALE sign.

2.   Temporary deafness that renders you unable to hear that little inner voice that says “You can’t afford that!”

3.   Loss of ability to do simple mathematical calculations that will show that the total being spent is actually more than what’s in your bank account.

4.   Temporary loss of memory that removes recollection of all transactions in which money was spent.

5.   A surge of super-human strength that allows you to balance loads of heavy items in one hand while searching through clearance racks with the other.

6.   Several hours or days after you were stricken with an occurrence of Crazy Consumption, you might suffer from a crippling panic attack when your memory returns and you recall how much you spent on the shopping spree.

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Factors Promoting the Spread of Crazy Consumption

1.   Seasonal events like birthdays, anniversaries, Valentines Day and Christmas Day. In fact, the entire holiday month of December brings on a particularly virulent strain of the disease called Crazy Christmas Consumption, which can totally devastate the victim’s finances for several months, and even years.

2.   End-of-month sales, two-for-one specials, free gifts with purchases, and any other promotion that offers the consumer a deal that’s just too good to pass up.

3.   Windfalls of money such as a salary bonus, lottery winning, foreign remittance or family ‘dead-lef’ (inheritance) that was unexpected.

4.   The constant bombardment of advertisements that promote the message that you are not ‘with it’ unless you have the latest model and newest brand of shoes, clothes, cars, mobile phones, music players, TVs, toys, etc. etc.

As we are currently entering the season when millions of consumers fall victim to the destructive effects of Crazy Christmas Consumption, I thought it would be a good time to focus some attention on this dread disease. Over the next three weeks we will look at true-life cases of chronic sufferers, showing how out-of-control spending has withered away their savings and crippled their financial vitality. We will provide the remedies for their ailments and demonstrate how they can recover and be restored to robust financial health.

Have you have suffered from Crazy Consumption in the past? Are you worried that you might fall victim to the vicious Christmas strain of the illness in the coming weeks? Please email your story to info@financiallyfreenetwork.com and you could be one of the three persons who will receive a personalized treatment plan which will help to cure you of this dreaded financial disease.