Twenty-five years ago, the credit card companies started making it easy to spend money you didn't have. They showed up on college campuses all across the country. They gave you a prize by simply filling out their application. Approved or not, you still got t-shirts, mugs and pizza.

You got a little short of cash. You knew you shouldn't use the card except in extreme emergencies. You thought, “Just this one time.”

The bill came and you thought, “Hey, that wasn’t so bad. I can just pay the minimum.”

The next time you were short of cash, you knew you shouldn’t, but you used the card anyway. When the bill came the balance was more, but the minimum payment was still the same. “Hey, this is really cool.”

Soon, you were just like all the big people, you were a financial tycoon. You'd moved into adulthood and high finance. A right of passage had occurred. You had established credit. No! You had created debt !

Maybe you ran the first card up to the maximum and got another offer from another company. You started carrying another balance. After all, the minimum payments weren't very high. We can get so many of the nice things life has to offer, just as we see on the television, and only pay a few cents per month for them.

You realized you could pay utility bills and cable bills with the cards. You started doing that, too. You took trips on airplanes, bought VCRS and cell phones with the cards. You were creating debt.

A fantastic example of this concept is the way we pay for things we want when we are on a cruise ship. The cruise company wants us to have a good time. They want us to tell our friends about the wonderful time we had. To help us do that, they've taken greenbacks out of the picture while we're on board the ship.

Before we're even allowed onto the ship, they have us put a deposit guarantee onto our room. Most of us use a credit card. They tell us whatever we'd like to have while on board will be paid for by showing our room key (plastic).

Everything we spend is billed to our room. Later it's billed to our credit card. If we want souvenirs, soft drinks, pictures, cocktails, clothes, or spa treatments, it all goes onto our room charges.

We're having the time of our lives without any thought about what it's costing. Since we're spending and not using cash, we spend a lot more than we might otherwise. Three weeks after we're home, we realize how much we spent.

We had no idea how much it was. Does this mean we should be upset with the cruise line? No. They helped us have a good time.

They took away any thought about money for a few days. We had the option of saying yes or no at each little spot when we spent the funds. Since it was on our room account, we didn't pay attention.

You pay for your gasoline, buy groceries and pay for hair styling with the credit cards. You buy lawn mowers, clothing and tires with the cards. You pay your fuel oil and electric bills with the cards. It's all jumbled together.

Even if you're using a financial software program to track it all, you're not really paying attention. You're so mixed up between what are necessary expenses and unnecessary expenses; you think they're all necessary.

It's not all necessary.

We got into the habit. It's natural. Humans are creatures of habit.

Many years ago, we were acquainted with a man who was a sergeant on a small town police force. He told me being a police officer was really a matter of watching people.

Being aware and watching people’s habits was his greatest asset. It helped him solve most of the crimes assigned to him. He said sometimes people committed crimes they knew down deep were wrong, yet they did it anyway.

These ordinary people thought they were justified in stealing or embezzling from the companies employing them. Their low salaries justified their crime. They told themselves it was okay; they were entitled.

The habit kept getting bigger and they stole more. It was relatively easy to solve the crimes. The thieves and embezzlers didn't attempt to disguise their activities. In their minds, they weren't committing a crime.

When we start to believe the life advertised on television is real, we also start believing things are the way they aren't. We buy things beyond our means, pay the minimum payments and tell ourselves, it's real. We don’t even give the debt we’re creating a second thought.

We walk around acting as if this stuff is paid for and we start believing it is. We assume everybody else has the things they want and that they have these things paid for. We tell ourselves this, repeatedly. However, their things are not paid for, either

Day after day, month after month, we tell ourselves this lie. One day we wake up actually believing all this junk. We believe the fantasy. We must be doing a great job of selling it, too!

So many of the world’s peoples are doing everything they can to get to America and enjoy all the things we have. Little do they know, most of it’s not paid for.