You won’t find many people who will say that going through a bankruptcy was a fun experience. Bankruptcy is essentially the last resort when it comes to a bad financial situation, and you won’t find many words that have as negative an association.

However, if you pay attention you will learn a thing or two during the process, and these lessons can help you avoid a similar fate in the future.

Living Within Your Means Is Crucial

This is the issue that gets most people started on the road to bankruptcy in the first place, and it is what they learn to do during a bankruptcy. When you have access to credit, it is so easy to grab this or that and pay with a credit card. But that is not living within your means.

When you are bankrupt, there is no card or other form of credit to use so you have no choice but to pay for everything at the moment of purchase.

It Can Be Costly

Another thing that many people learn after going through a bankruptcy is that it is usually pretty costly to build your credit back up afterward. Once you’re back in the credit game, you’ll pay more in fees and interest and secured cards and pre-payments until you build your credit back up and lenders trust you again.

There’s No Turning Back

This lesson is often learned when you’re in the middle of a bankruptcy, because even if you change your mind and want to go back, you can’t. Your bills will be wiped clean, but the fact you did it can follow you around for quite some time.

It Can Relieve a Lot of Pressure

The bankruptcy lessons aren’t all negative, because it can relieve an awful lot of pressure, especially if you had multiple creditors hounding you everyday. Some people experience tremendous anxiety and stress because of their debt load, and even though a bankruptcy is serious and long-lasting, relieving that pressure allows them to breathe and relax a little.

You Should Respect Your Credit

Perhaps the most important thing you’ll learn after going through bankruptcy is that credit is something you should respect all the time.  It’s so easy to think of it as free money when you want something, but you have to be disciplined and you have to follow some sort of system, because if you don’t it’s going to cost you in the end.