It’s a great time to be alive, though you might not believe that because you have to pay down debt. The truth is that while debt reduction takes up time, money, stress, and energy, the reality is that it’s a good time to be paying debt right now. That’s because there’s a lot more information out there about really making a good run in the world of debt elimination. There are more forums where people are sharing their tips and strategies for finally getting out of debt, and there are thousands of articles about the subject. It is possible to get out of debt and live an amazing life, but you have to really want to do that. You have to really want to step out of your comfort zone and pursue that debt of getting out of debt.

The problem here is that a lot of times people feel that there’s really no way that they can ever escape the heavy toll of debt, but this doesn’t have to be that way. Actually, if you really change your perspective you’ll find that there are a lot of ways to get out of debt just by adding a little extra money to your bottom line.

There are two ways to do that — extra income from a side job or small business, or shaving money from your budget and redirecting it to your debt reduction plan. Your budget may be filled with things that you can remove in order to put them towards paying down your debts. For example, if you’re like most people you probably have a few magazines that you’re subscribed to — but you never read. That’s a lot of money being thrown away when it could be going towards getting you out of debt, not taking away from the money you need to accomplish this goal!

What about your grocery bill? Surely you and your family eat things that you really don’t need but you like to have around. Convenience foods tend to be very expensive when compared to foods that are fresh and require cooking. Sometimes you really need to spend more time in the kitchen to feed your family this way, but what if you could actually save a lot of money.

Yes, there are shows that talk about saving money through clipping a lot of coupons, but most people aren’t going to have time to do that type of thing. You’re going to have to focus your energy elsewhere in order to make absolutely sure that you can afford to get your debt reduction plan up and running.

Cutting out the unnecessary expenses from your budget can free up a lot of money, but there’s also something special about building a little side income to help reach your goals. If you have a skill to sell to other people, you can certainly use this as well. Don’t feel like this is the only way that you could ever possibly get things done — that’s just not true! However, you should see this as one more tool that you have in the fight against debt. Why would you ever want to waste another moment standing still when there are so many things to get done?

You can also turn towards the Internet if you want to make more money. You can offer your skills online and wait for people to get back to you. Publish that you’re available for work on just about every channel that you can find. If you’re on Twitter, then you can certainly talk to people there. In addition, you can also go ahead and pour over some of the freelance sites like RentaCoder (for programmers) and oDesk (for just about everything else). You’ll have to pay your dues and work up the ladder, but there’s definitely money out there.

Many webmaster forums are also looking for people with computer skills, so don’t overlook them while you’re looking around for work.

Yes, you’ll have to pay taxes on your income, but wouldn’t you have to do that with just about any type of income you make? This is something that you’ll just have to deal with if you really want to move above and beyond where you’re at with your debt reduction plan.

Speaking of the world of debt reduction, there’s nothing that says that you can’t remove debt simply by pursuing debt settlement. Many creditors are willing to strike up a deal because they want to get something for their money rather than having to write the whole debt off. Debt collection agencies are the same way -=- if you’re willing to negotiate, they’re definitely willing to listen.

There’s nothing wrong with exploring all of your options if it means that you end up staying out of the bankruptcy loop. While we’re not against bankruptcy, there are so many cases where bankruptcy could honestly be avoided. There’s a lot of scare tactics done in order to make people feel like bankruptcy is really the only option, but that’s not the case at all. Everyone’s situation is going to be different, but if you really feel that you have what it takes to just get out of debt, then the time is definitely know to push forward — why not get started today?

By Jasmina