Debt has made ease feel suspicious

Dear Delyara, That may be one of its ugliest effects. Not just the numbers. The way ease itself becomes hard to trust. A quiet week, a small pleasure, the idea of buying something helpful but not absolutely essential — all of it gets filtered through caution and guilt so quickly that softness begins to feel almost morally dangerous. Debt doesn’t only reduce freedom in practical terms. It teaches the nervous system to distrust comfort. I’m tired of that lesson. I want to unlearn it.