Credit cards are evil. Credit card companies are predatory, aggressive entities who seek only to make money.  Poor consumers are victimized by high interest rates and ridiculous penalties.  Credit card companies are worse than baby kitten stompers, and we all know how evil THEY are.

Except, of course, they are no worse than any other type of corporation-for-profit. They do use aggressive, sneaky tactics to hide charges and interest rates from consumers – but they do disclose them when you get a card.  They make cute commercials (Credit One, I’m looking at you) but then again, so do the soda companies – and they are selling a product that rots your teeth and makes you fat.  They charge high interest rates, but would you be willing to lend a total stranger tons of money at 0% interest?  If so, head over to Lending Club – I’m sure you will be the most beloved lender in their history.

I get tired, from time to time, of the demonization of credit card debt. I understand some people weren’t as lucky as I was, to be raised in a home in which debt was frowned upon.  Lord Polonius’ words from Hamlet were uttered more than once in my family as I grew up:  “Neither a borrower nor a lender be.”  Those words made an impression on me, and other than one impulsive purchase of a car using a loan from GMAC, I have never entered into any non-mortgage debt.  But let’s face it – credit card debt is a debt, just like a mortgage or a loan to start a business or a student loan.  It’s just how the individual chooses to use it that causes a problem.

Our family has a credit card – and we use it for everything we can possibly use it for.  Buying something for $2 at the store?  I’ll use the card if they take Amex.  Phone, cell, satellite – all paid on the card.  I’d pay my mortgage with my Amex card if possible.  Why?  Because I made $640 with it last year. Amex Blue Cash pays some nice cash back bonuses.  Other cash back cards – Discover, etc. – pay similar bonuses.  I used Amex’s Membership Rewards for years, and it paid for – among other things – a roundtrip business class pair of tickets to Europe for our honeymoon, hotels here and there through the years, even some gift certificates. Over the last year I have received a flat screen TV and a baby stroller – by redeeming credit card rewards points.

Every type of tool can be used for good or ill. I can use a shovel to prepare a garden for planting, or I can assault someone with it.  Credit card companies offer a product that many people have trouble using.  Yet at the same time, if you use the product they offer – easy and unsecured credit with “bonus” or “reward” programs – you can make a lot of money without incurring any risk at all.

photo credit: annia316

For years I have dreamed of early retirement. The idea that someday I would be free to pursue leisure, and have time to do what I wanted, haunted me.  It was the driving goal of my investing and saving plan.   That was after I read Rich Dad, Poor Dad (yes, I know, but it gave me a new perspective) – but before I left my last employer to become a consultant.

What I’ve realized since then is that I don’t want early retirement. I don’t want to stop working at all.  What I do want is to find work I enjoy, or at least tolerate.  There are a lot of advantages to work.  I’m not talking about 9-to-5 corporate work, but just work in general; freelancing, public service work, contract consulting, whatever you like.  If  you like 9-to-5 corporate work, fine.

Work gives you a structure and meaning – if it’s good work. Work provides you income, of course, which isn’t a small factor.  Work gives you a sense of self – again, if it’s work that you can identify with.  Work can sometimes provide colleagues, or challenging opportunities.

Work can also drag you down. If you don’t like what you do, early retirement is the best escape.  Getting away as soon as possible is the only exit.  I don’t think this applies just to people who work in white-collar jobs, either.  Some people work at heavy labor or in non-white collar jobs who love it.  My father-in-law is happiest doing manual work, for example – gardening or building things.  I think he would detest a desk job now, although he worked at one for most of his life.  Work doesn’t have to be high-tech or “cool” – just something that makes you happy.

For me, meaningful work is something that you enjoy. I know people who love accounting, for example.  They like the complexity, the challenge of figuring out the interplay of accounts and the theology of GAAP.  I don’t.  I know people who love making things, and corporate politics, and writing, and teaching, and a myriad of occupations.  I also know people who do work they hate, and people who do work they love.  Most of my life I’ve been someone who worked at something I hate while seeking something I love.  I think – but don’t know – I’ve found something I love in writing, but it comes and goes in spurts.  I started writing this blog to practice writing, then morphed into a personal finance blog.  Putting myself in that box has hampered my writing a bit, so I’m going to try to write on a broader range of topics in the future – because I still want to find work that means something to me.

If you can find something that makes sense to you, as a person, early retirement is pointless. I honestly believe that if I ever find my groove as a writer – I haven’t yet – I could be happy writing up until the day I die.  Early retirement would be pointless.  I’m not a good enough writer to earn a living writing yet, so I have to supplement with other work.  I suck as a writer.  I have a long way to go to be – by my own measure – creative, although I tickle my own ego by thinking I’m technically proficient.  But I have realized that my real dream is not early retirement, as I often thought it was.  I dreamed of days of leisure.  I’ve had those days now, as I’ve been unemployed.  I don’t want leisure.  Iwant work with meaning.  My real dream is finding meaningful work, and it should be everyone’s dream.

photo credit: extranoise