I have over £50,000 worth of debt.

Gulp.

It’s debt I racked up during my high-living twenties (earning some decent money for the first time in my life, I thought I’d live like I was earning 4 times my salary) and after I was laid off back in 2001, when I lived off credit for a good couple of years.

I’m in a debt management plan with my creditors, paying off a tiny amount each month to each of them, which I’ll be doing for the next 12 years.

The constant drip, drip, drip of the debt hanging over me has been the course of some genuine stress over the last few years, and while I’m earning great money in my freelancing work with some nice additional income on the side from coaching, there are times when the burden of debt means that I have to borrow money from my mates for things like train fare and food.

It would be embarrassing if it wasn’t so familiar.

Considering that I’ve only been doing it for 2 years, my freelancing earns me more than double of any job I’ve had before, which I’m astoundingly grateful for.  I affords me the ability to work for 3 months and then take a month or two off to focus on coaching.

But it means I’m fiscally reliant on a job that I’m good at but not really that interested in, so that I can manage my debts and give me a little space to work on what I’m really passionate about.  If I had no financial constraints, there’s no way I would do the daily trek to London, working myself loopy doing work that doesn’t really matter to me.

Add to that the reality of trying to cope with chronic fatigue syndrome while working in that same break-neck workplace and trying to build a business on the side so that I can go full time with it in the medium term.

Looking back, I can’t believe how fucking stupid I was to get myself into this much debt.  It’s easy for me to get frustrated with the situation and wonder just how the hell I can move things forward without making myself sicker or losing a piece of my soul.

The simple thought of waking up with no debt hanging over me brings lightness to my movements and relief to my breath.

But that’s not the reality I’m faced with, and the game I find myself in is one entirely of my own making.

At this point you might be asking yourself, “Okay, I get it, you’re a financial dumb-ass, what’s this got to do with anything?”

Good question.

It would be easy for me to give up.  To quit coaching and just focus on the freelancing, making as much money as I can as quickly as I can. It would be easy for me to quit, to sell my home to pay everything off and focus on getting well.

Sometimes those options seem really tempting.

But despite the situation I find myself in, despite the demands I place on myself, despite the days when I’m thoroughly pissed off and despite the days when my bones ache, I still trust in my ability to make things happen.

I won’t let myself do a bad job, whatever I’m doing.  I know what I’m like when I’m firing on all cylinders.  I know how it feels when I’m in the moment, at my best.  I know the talents I have and I know my strengths.  I know what matters to me and I know what doesn’t.

I know I’m better than the circumstances I find myself in.

And I trust all of those things.

That’s all confidence really is.

Being able to implicitly trust all the things you have, no matter how overwhelming the odds.

So while on paper I’m as broke as piano in a burning barn, I completely accept where I am and I know in my bones that who I am and what I’ve got is more than a match for the circumstances I find myself in.