A special for you today with some tips on how to avoid debt hole after Christmas celebration, how to manage your fears, think wisely and make good presents without great expenses.

  All cultures have different traditions of celebrating Christmas. Even the days differ: Swedes celebrate the 24th of December, USA and UK on 25 th, Russia and Greece go nuts as usual and celebrate on 6th and 7th of January. The traditions of giving the presents on Christmas also vary.  While Swedes are very overly generous when distributing Christmas presents compared to other countries, Svenska Dagbladet (SvD) recently published an article about the dangerous situations that arise as a result of giving gifts in the Christmas spirit.  The following quote stuck out to me especially:

 “20% of people, according SvD, are ready to take a credit in the bank to buy Christmas presents.”

Idiots! (It makes me angry! I simply cannot tolerate stupidity). I have nothing against generosity, but I have a lot of against the stupidity of people that allows them to  put themselves into debt hole.  All because of certain fears which we are afraid of to face. For example,

1. I will be a bad parent. Let me tell you something – you are already a bad parent if you have not planned and saved and are now thinking to put yourself into debt just to look good! Hello, you live in your fantasy world. Wake up, NOW!

2. My kids will love me less if I do not buy all the presents they want… Of course, they would because being an irresponsible parent you could not explain your kids that love feeling should not be connected with the price of the presents.

3. It will look bad if I will receive a present and cannot give a present of equal value back. Ok, if your mind is like Sheldon’s (watch the video below) and is concentrated on equality – God bless you (it is Christmas)! The problem is that you, very deep inside, like anybody else, want to have a present too! Maybe your finance problems will stop you from buying expensive stuff for yourself, but you just created an apology for spending money – you will spend it n others… otherwise you will look bad. Look, your mind being creative and putting you in financial trouble. Will it be the similarly creative in taking you out? Hmm…

O.K. So what to do then?

Well,first of all try to avoid items of bad quality and items that will break very soon – this is very impolite. What is polite and smart is it to take a second and think! What are your partner or friends are interested about and passionate for?

And use your creativity!

There are some web shops in Sweden (I think there are similar in other countries) that can help you, like http://www.hundraklappen.se/ all presents are under 10 euros and http://fyndiq.se/ where usually only two or less items of different products are for sale.

I also love the idea of supporting other peoples talents and so international web sites like http://society6.com or www.etsy.com could really work!

Maybe you have unique skills that could be a present and  could be given away as a present, for example, if you a photographer – a free photo session or an art photo in frame could be a good idea.  The same could work for a make up artist, a hair dresser, designer, artist, musician, poets–the list goes on.

It could also work to postpone the giving of a present. For example a trip to some country. You can book a hotel (there are booking options when you pay on the day of arrival  like  on www.booking.com) and plan to have a trip in a month, when your money situation is better.

Just take a minute to think, and do not forget to be creative!

Merry Christmas!!!

or on Swedish

God Jul, när det är dags!

Hugs, Norda!