*SLAP!* That was real life slapping you upside the head!

The truth is nothing in life is easy, and while this is true of so many things, success is so much more interesting because success in itself is both elusive and subjective.

In regards to financial success, there are two basic frames of mind – the dream involving a pashmina afghan on the deck of your yacht, and then the more realistic concept of financial security. I am assuming most of our readers do not hang out with T-Pain or mermaids [see video] so for the matter of this article I will be focusing on the latter.

We would all love to be as successful at age 25 as #2 man, Mr. Mark Zuckerberg, on Fortune Magazine’s Top 40 under 40. Facebook is worth an estimated $10 billion but the basic concepts of success all start at the same place. Financial security grants one the ability and freedom to for such passions as creating great things.

I may not know about constructing a social network but I know the four main parts to personal finance that once mastered, can also give you that freedom. Get these four things right early on and your quarterlife – and the rest of it – will have no limit.

Debt
In my work as a loan officer, this is the single thing I see hold more people down & keep them from their dreams. Being free from debt is a success in itself. So many people would probably consider themselves successful if they simply didn’t have to fork over half their money every month to Visa, MasterCard, etc. The two that seem to haunt quarterlifers the most are excessive credit card debt and student loan debt. Credit cards should be doubled up on until they are paid off. Every extra dollar that can be spent on paying down credit cards can save you hundreds in interest and boost your credit score. Before you can start putting your extra money away for savings and retirement and investments, you need to pay off your high-interest rate credit cards.

Student loans, if federal, should be consolidated once you graduate if the rate is lower and the payments will be made smaller. As far as private student loans go there are no longer any companies consolidating these loans unless all the loans are with the same company anyway and even then the terms may not be any better. There are many options with student debt like deference and assistance with economic hardship or unemployment. There are flex payment plans, and interest-only plans, and longer term amortizations. All these options make student debt seem the lesser of the debt evils but you must remember that student loan debt NEVER goes away. It can be reworked until you are blue in the face, but you will eventually have to pay it off along with all the interest. Most student loans are even immune to bankruptcy. So use the tools as you need them, but if you have the ability, it’s probably about time to start paying them down.

Retirement
Ah yes, retirement, that thing way down the road. Why worry about that now? Two things: interest compounding and taxes. The money put into a 401K account are pre-tax dollars which means there are more of them because Uncle Sam hasn’t gotten his hands on them yet. Furthermore, most companies offer a 401K match, meaning that to a certain percent or dollar amount they will match every dollar you put into retirement with one of their dollars. This is FREE money people! If you are able, there is no reason not to deposit up to the level your company will match. IRAs are also imperative to planning your retirement. There are tons of online information on the pros and cons of both Roth and traditional IRS accounts, but regardless of which you pick, open one.

Savings
Managing a bank in my personal life, savings is the topic I feel the most at home with. My personal preference, and I know I’m going to get a lot of flak for this, has always been toward savings rather than investing. I know, I know, the market is coming back and things will be better than ever and so on. I just feel a little better knowing that my money is all accounted for, and I know the exact return before I buy in. Saving is nationally on the rise right now but the interest rate is still in the gutter, the average 6-month CD is down between .5 and .8 percent, and savings accounts are lower than that. I believe the best approach to saving in this economy is a two-pronged attack. You need to have a good relationship with a smaller community bank and utilize the great rates being offered by internet banks. My bank currently offers 2 percent on 6-month CDs and offers .75 percent on all savings accounts, while my current favorite with the internet banks is Ally Bank. They offer a high yield savings account with a 1.55 percent interest rate and no minimum deposit. I advise keeping a cash reserve with your community bank for quick access and keeping longer term savings in a high yield CD with an internet bank. Check out Bankrate.com for the latest rate offerings online and in your area.

Investment
I definitely feel the least safe in this field. I have never been an expert on picking stocks or investment plans for that matter, but I have owned a few here and there. I cannot stress the importance of caution and prudence in selecting investments in this economic climate and for those in the quarterlife age bracket. Yes, we are younger so we have more time to recoup our loses but at the same time, we have less income to work with and can’t afford to lose as much. Depending on how much you have to invest (and for most quarterlifers that’s not a whole lot), there are some great no-load indexed mutual funds some with minimums as low as $1000. Or if you feel pretty certain about one particular company and can do the research on your own sites like TD Ameritrade, Scott Trade, etc. are cheaper than ever. As your dollars grow, you can turn your portfolio over to a full service brokerage such as Fidelity.

For total control and understanding of your financial world and everything in it, one of my favorite resources for everyone is Money 101 from CNN Money.

If that is so, then classical composer J.S Bach from 300 years ago would not have qualified for “success.”

He is considered by most to be the greatest composer to ever live, and if you have seriously studied any musical instrument you probably would have played one of his pieces. Yet in his time he was relatively unknown.

There is a saying, “He who pays the piper calls the tune.” Indeed, this is the case right through history. From the Catholic church at its zenith, where artists found employment painting pictures of saints and composing “sacred” music – doing what they were told to earn a crust; to the Medici of the renaissance, the wealthy banking family who financed Leonardo and Michelangelo.

This has continued to today where record companies will finance whatever sells, or at least what they think sells. However, the result of record company’s patronage often has the shelf life of milk, instead of fine wine – and yet we buy it.

Just like most other things we do not need, we buy into the hype of these “successful” people and into the presumed life they lead, spreading the disease that plagues most in their quarterlife; the deadly disease, “success-consumerism.”

Symptoms are:

1. Having 2+ credit cards, of which at least one is maxed out, and you are applying for another credit card to buy the latest Ed Hardy bedazzled shirt.
2. You measure yourself not by how much money you have in the bank, but by the amount of credit organizations are prepared to lend you.
3. You have a million dollar condo and you tell yourself you’re a millionaire, forgetting about the 110 percent mortgage.

In our quarterlife, we become susceptible to the wiles of the deadly disease “success-consumerism,” simply because we want to feel successful.

So, why is the idea of success via consumerism so catchy?

I think it’s because it plays on our basic need to be loved, and if you’re wearing designer underwear you are just a little bit better than everybody else, and everyone you know will look up to you with reverent oohs and aahs because you have somebody’s name written where very few will see it, and thus you are loved – well kind of.

This fake love/self-esteem will do because real love is in such short supply in this world.

So film, music videos and advertising have began appealing to us earlier on, calling their tune with the brilliant creative minds of our day just doing their job, earning a crust.

When you were in your teens all you want to do is fit in, and you haven’t got a chance of not getting ensnared by consumerism because the house you see on TV, movies or music videos is way better than yours; and the edited biographies of so called “reality show” lives that are so much more desirable than yours how can you not aspire to consume whatever your hero is consuming.

So what happens is you start training yourself to listen to music that you don’t even like to fit in, you start wearing clothes that look ridiculous and don’t suit you just to look ‘cool.’ You start cussing like dem guys from da hood cuz dey steet yo, da real deal – and its cuz you only want da truth.

The sober reality is, eventually after being plugged into popular culture for too long all you have to show for it is a wardrobe full of clothes you don’t like, a stack of CDs you never listen to, friends who are losers that you used to think were super-cool (and who just won’t go away), and bills, bills, bills.

Warren Buffet, the world’s second richest man, has something to say about success in his biography Snowball. Later in his life when asked to define what success is he would say something to the effect of “it’s having the people that you want to love you actually loving you.’”

What is funny about that statement is that having people love you most of the time is a result of giving. Giving money, giving time, giving respect, giving love and giving forgiveness – the complete opposite of consuming; and I do not hear many pop songs about that.

How would I define success?

I’m not sure I’m old enough to answer that question but I have a suspicion that it starts with being able to wake up every day and love what you do, regardless of the pay – but being able to pay bills sure is nice. What a quandary.

I am referring to the use of credit cards and the ability of the card companies to use sophisticated computer algorithms to analyze your shopping habits over time.

If the company determines that your habits are similar to those of “problem customers,” then they may raise your interest rate or lower your credit limit.

Did you read all the fine print that comes with your credit cards? “Of course not,” most people don’t, but it almost always says that the card company reserves the right to change your credit terms at their discretion for any reason.

So to put it in terms we’ll all related to, perhaps all that excessive boozing or porn surfing on the credit card was not a good idea after all – maybe it wasn’t a good idea to start with.

Outrageously, even something like buying your food at Wal-Mart could be viewed negatively. [Although some view Wal-Mart as dirty as porn.]

So take the time to look over these 10 things that have been known to have negative effects on your credit provided by ConsumerismCommentary.com.