The Stratagem’s Archive

Category: Personal Finance

  • Navigating Financial Struggles and Guilt: When You Want to Help Your Family but Can’t Afford To

    The Guilt of Wanting to Help Family When You’re Financially Strapped

    I went home to visit my family for a day, and nothing really changed: same property, same house, my Ma, grandma, and uncle were there, and my two dogs were ecstatic to see me after nearly a year of living on my own. But time shows the truth—the guest house I grew up in on my grandma’s property is showing its age.

    The wooden stairs have rotted; the middle step caved in. The patio connecting the guest house and main house floods slightly after the recent rains. Even my parents’ bathroom had needed repairs my dad handled himself. Gnats buzzed around incessantly—more than usual—landing on my face, buzzing near my ears.

    While helping Ma with some simple math problems, she overshot an answer from $1,200 to $12,000. I told her that if I had $12,000, I would help fix the place up. Like always, Ma shook her head and said, “Don’t worry about the house.”

    I hate it whenever my parents push against me when I talk about not earning enough. I understand the sentiment—they want me to be grateful I’m working, that I’m earning—but I hate that I can’t help more financially because I need to take care of myself first. I’m not broke enough to need help anymore. But I’m too broke to help my family. And it kills me inside.

    When Advice Says to Earn More, But You’re Capped

    I’ve heard the same advice over and over: earn more money, and you’ll be able to help. Yeah, no kidding, Sherlock. That doesn’t make it any easier.

    I was born and raised in Hawaii, one of the most isolated and expensive states in the US.

    Paradise isn’t free. It’s only paradise if you can pay for it. If you can’t, it’s just a place that slowly crushes you under the cost of living.

    Jobs that pay enough to live comfortably are limited to tourism, hospitality, medical, and other customer-facing roles.

    A statistic from years ago said that to live comfortably in the 808, a household needs to earn over $132,000 annually.

    Meanwhile, I make under $40,000 per year, juggling a warehouse job and a part-time role, while carrying roughly $10,000 in personal debt.

    Even when I find ways to make things work for myself, the financial gap to help my family feels impossible.

    What Do You Do When You See Family Struggling?

    This is a hard truth I’ve had to accept:

    I don’t help.

    At least not in any substantial financial way like I used to.

    Occasionally, I’ll see if I have leftover cash to buy lunch or dinner for my parents when we have the same day off, but repairs? Major bills? I can’t do that.

    A few years ago, before I moved out, Ma asked me for help financially. At the time, I only had a car loan and a few credit cards. She needed money. I didn’t ask what it was for. I took out a few personal loans that accrued to roughly $30,000 over the years—bigger ones Ma handled, smaller ones I paid.

    Those loans are long paid off, but the emotional and financial toll left a scar. It reinforced how much we were scraping by just to make sure basic living conditions were met.

    And all because the only resources available to us, when paychecks were already stretched thin, were loans.

    When Family Says to Help Yourself First

    Ma always tells me: “Don’t worry about the house.” She and Dad will figure things out, even if it takes time. Sure, on paper, their combined income is over $100K, but the reality—the repairs, the small, unseen struggles—says otherwise.

    I used to give them money to cover repairs, but now, Ma tells me to focus on paying off my current debts. Without loan payments draining my wallet, I can rebuild my emergency fund, invest more into my Roth IRA, and eventually help my family—not because I have no choice, but because I want to.

    Choosing Not to Help Is Still a Form of Care

    As frustrating as it is, as much as it feels like abandoning your family, not helping when you’re drowning is still a form of care.

    I learned this the hard way after taking on loans years ago to cover immediate needs. The emotional and financial toll made me feel like I was running with cinderblocks cemented to my feet. I was going nowhere, except down.

    When the time comes that I’m debt-free—maybe not earning everything I’d like—I can give support from a place of stability. I can help because I choose to, not because I have no other option. And that matters.

    Final Thoughts

    This isn’t easy. The guilt of wanting to help while being financially constrained never fully disappears. But being honest with yourself about what you can handle is an act of care, not cowardice.

    You can still love your family, support them in small ways, and plan for the future—without sacrificing your own stability.

    Like Hawaiian Airlines says during their demonstrations before take off—put your mask on first before helping someone else with theirs.

    If You Made It to the End

    Hey—you made it! Thank you for sticking with me through this post. I share these reflections because I believe in being honest about the struggles we all face, and I support the Archives myself so that it stays available.

    If this resonated with you, or if you get what it’s like to want to help others but need to take care of yourself first, you can click the tiny wave button below. It’s completely optional, but it’s a nice way to let me know a real person visited and spent some time here.

    Either way, I’m grateful you were here and took the time to read.

    Tiny Wave 👋

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  • How I’m Paying Down Debt While Working Two Jobs on a $40K Salary

    How I’m Paying Off a 0% APR Loan Before It Jumps to 30% Interest

    If you’re trying to pay off credit cards or personal loans while earning around $40,000 a year, it can feel like every financial decision is just choosing the least painful option.

    Over the past 7 months, I’ve paid down roughly $6,000 of my personal debt while working a full-time and part-time job on a low income. I’m still in debt—but seeing that number drop has changed how much pressure I feel around money.

    It’s taken me a very long time— as long as The Stratagem’s Archives has been around—but I’ve finally managed to drop my $17,000+ personal debt down to roughly $11,000+. 

    Do you have any idea how much of a relief it is to have that number drop?! I knew that I felt my body was constantly bracing, but I didn’t realize how wound up I was until I let some tension go.

    That’s $6,000 eradicated and the money I used for this debt can be used towards my remaining balances.

    Of course, my material situation hasn’t changed too much:

    • I’m still carrying debt 
    • I’m still earning roughly $40,000/annually with a full-time and a part-time job
    • Rent, necessities, and other expenses still exist

    However, the fact that I’ve been making incremental progress on my low salary, to be able to chunk off so much money from my overall debts, is monumental for me.

    I felt my anxiety, my anger, my resentment almost melt away—enough where my chest wasn’t trying to crush my rib cage with every exhale.

    They’re not completely gone—I still feel anxious, I still hate my situation, I resent past-me for not having as many financial options as present-me does—but it’s enough where I’m not constantly holding my breath.

    I HATE debt; I hate the fact that I owe someone else money because I didn’t have the cash on hand at the time something came up. I hate how I can’t save, invest, or use my money the way I want to, but I’ve always prioritized automatically saving and investing anyways.

    This—seeing how far I’ve gotten from point A to now—gives me a faint glimmer of hope that I’ll be able to get out of debt after all.

    The Debt Lesson I Learned After Years of Using Personal Loans

    I was reliving the same money lesson over and over, spending years stuck in revolving debt.

    It wasn’t just credit cards I had to deal with either. I had to factor in for the personal loans that I took out because I needed money THEN, that present-me is paying for NOW.

    When you earn as much as I do, you don’t have a lot of options when it comes to financial kindness. 

    Not being financially generous—rather being kinder to ourselves. When you’ve weighed every financial option you had at the time, you realize that you had to pick the less painful option.

    Not the most good option; the least painful.

    Why I’m Avoiding Personal Loans Going Forward

    I decided that, before and after my debts are gone, I’ll never take out a personal loan again, if I can help it, just because I lack the money now.

    Keeping as much of my money for myself gives me more agency—both in how I use my money and how I use my time.

    Not just working to pay off debt, but giving myself a chance to imagine life past survival mode.

    If I managed to slog my way out of $6,000, then I’ll be able to slog my way into saving at least $1,000-$1,500 into my emergency funds.

    I used to have almost $20,000 in my emergency fund at one point in my life. 

    However, I made the best decision at the time a few years ago to use around $15,000 to pay towards my $35,000 car loan. 

    It was a smart decision at the time, until a real emergency came up. A Ford truck T-boned my car on my way home from work that my car was unsalvageable.

    I had more expenses piling up than I could pay off and everyday felt like a noose was wrapping tighter around my neck.

    Aren’t You Using The IWT’s Conscious Spending Plan?

    Yes, I am using Ramit Sethi’s CSP from I Will Teach You to be Rich, but in my other blog post, Where Do Frameworks and Tools End and Our Thinking Begin?, I explicitly said that I’ve taken that framework and made it my own.

    Instead of having 4 numbers to track, I keep track of 3: expenses, savings, and investing.

    Guilt-free spending doesn’t exist for me right now because, with my debts, everything falls into my expenses category. 

    I use credit cards to pay for everything. 

    I prioritize ensuring my balances are paid off within my next weekly paycheck. Or at least paid off before my credit card’s closing date to avoid interest being adding on.

    Being debt free is more important to me than spending money on things I would feel guilty spending on.

    My life feels heavier without a small reward every now and again.

    However, this was a choice I made because I would rather suffer in the short-term than prolong my debts.

    Money, or rather my lack of it, was constantly stressing me out. However, I think that I’ll finally be able to have enough money to go somewhere with a deep bathtub and soak in hot water to congratulate myself on taking care of my debts.

    That will be the day where I can experience using my money guilt-free.

    If You Made It to The End

    If this post made you feel seen, or if you recognized your own situation here, you’re welcome to quietly nod along.

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    You don’t have to explain yourself—your presence matters.

    If you feel up to it, you can like, share, or subscribe to the Archives. Someone might benefit from hearing about tackling personal debt from someone still working on it themselves, rather than from someone without debt.

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