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It’s twenty years since we got rid of our credit cards. Prior to this, while we utilised them, we always paid off our balance as soon is it was due, so as not to pay a penny of interest.

In the years before the 2008 financial crash, we were constantly in receipt of invitations to take a new credit card. American Express would offer us gold and platinum cards weekly. Nearly every retailer we visited, meanwhile, would offer us their own.

Despite this constant bombardment, we always turned them down, refusing to jump on board the debt caravan. Surely that creates unnecessary hardships, someone might say. But given that the average UK credit card debt currently stands at £5,400, I don’t think so, personally.

To buy only what you can afford and live within your means: this has always been our guiding principle. The only thing we ever bought with money we didn’t have was property: a place to live. But even here we sought only what we could afford given limited means.

My first car I bought with all my savings since childhood: a second-hand Ford Fiesta. The first laptop I bought came from a tech fair in central London. If there is something we need or want, we must save up for it.

While our children petition us to buy the latest iPhone, I retort that I am saving up for something better: to be able to put them through university in five years’ time, if the Most Merciful wills. My hope: to help them start out on adult life debt-free.

I really believe that the debt economy is a form of slavery. We’re taught to desire what is out of our reach, and then to perpetually live under that yoke of paying for all that is out of our reach. In pursuit of the finer things, I could quite easily join them, but we choose not to.

In the early years of marriage, we lived in an area of London we grew very fond of. We would have loved to remain, but in order to do so we would have had to take a mortgage multiple times our joint income. So instead we moved out of London completely, settling on the edge of a commuter town out west.

Double glazing had to wait until we could afford it. An extension the same. Ditto the new kitchen. Many a renovation has only just been done, or awaits our attention. Making this shell a home has been a long process.

We could, I suppose, have done it all the modern way: buy now and pay later. I’m glad we didn’t though, because that is a stress nobody needs. Alhamdulilah, God has been most merciful and most kind, granting so much ease.

To be able to survive on a single income when so many are struggling is a real blessing. How is this possible? A frugal lifestyle helps. No Sky or Netflix subscription. No car financing. A minimal phone contract. Being content with what we have.

But above all? Avoiding debt like the plague. The trouble with the debt economy is that you really do pay later. It’s a trap which springs closed on you, and very often there is no way out. Is there any fate worse than debt?