Attracted a Tax Levy!

Yup… it works both ways.

I’ve owed the IRS some money for a couple of years now. I would continue to get notices from them, file them away (“I’ll pay them as soon as I can”), and forget about them.

As I continue to rebuild my life, I can make it really difficult on myself sometimes.

The real reason that I didn’t contact them? Fear. Not necessarily fear of what they would do to me… I didn’t figure that they would throw someone in prison who has at least been filing each year and is at this point in his life only earning enough to be taxed as a wage earner (which means that they are getting their money deducted from my paychecks), and I don’t own anything of value yet that they can seize.

No… the fear came from facing up to another person and saying “I don’t have enough right now to pay this.”

So they decided to send a letter to my bank and strongly suggest that they empty my checking account to pay them.

Whoa… now that got my attention. The rent needs to be paid, the lights need to stay on, and lord knows I’ve gotta keep my phone line and Internet connection! There go all of my plans for staying on track!

Mind you, this wasn’t a threatening letter. This was a notification of action they had already taken.

So how did I react to the notice? I figured that when my paycheck was direct deposited tomorrow, it would be scooped up, the lights would be shut off, my wife and I would be homeless, yada yada yada… so I got depressed. And when my wife said “You really should call them and work something out,” I snapped at her. “I don’t need any advice right now!”

My wife doesn’t like to be snapped at. So now I attracted a pissed off spouse.

I spent about 5 minutes in that confused, depressed state, until I remembered that the last thing that I wanted was to attract more of this… and that’s exactly what I was doing as long as I remained depressed!

So I picked up the phone, and called.

I waited on hold for about 45 minutes. It was about 6 pm here on the west coast, which meant that across the country, people were trying to get through. And of course, with April 15th right around the corner, this is one of their busiest times.

Eventually, I did hang up, and made a promise to myself that I would call the next morning. But of course, without it being resolved, my emotions were still boiling, and the anxiety and depression, although much lower in intensity, were still there.

Which is when I remembered The Golden Key by Emmett Fox:

“As for the actual method of working, like all fundamental things, it is simplicity itself. All you have to do is this: Stop thinking about the difficulty, whatever it is, and think about God instead. This is the complete rule, and if only you will do this, the trouble, whatever it is, will disappear. It makes no difference what kind of trouble it is. It may be a big thing or a little thing: it may concern health, finance, a lawsuit, a quarrel, an accident, or anything else conceivable: but whatever it is, stop thinking about it and think of God instead — that is all you have to do.”

So that’s what I did. Every time it popped into my mind, I thought about my own conceptions of God. I remembered that every problem has a within it an equal or greater benefit; I remembered that it’s good to have problems, because they help me to grow.

And I called the IRS again this morning.

The woman I spoke to was very helpful. She explained to me that the levy was actually sent to a bank back in Illinois where I no longer have an account, not my current bank. And after going through questions about my assets, and recognizing that I have, well, none, we agreed on a payment plan that I’ll be able to handle. No longer in collections, it’s all good as long as I stick with the payment plan.

After I told my wife about the conversation, she said “I knew they wouldn’t be taking any money out of your checking account.”

She’s still the best Law of Attraction teacher I’ve ever had.