Anyone who's dealt with significant debt knows how difficult it is to write out a large cheque every month to pay it off. Instead, financial weblog FiveCentNickel suggests paying off debt in micropayments:

In short, pay what you can afford, and then scrape together whatever else you can during the month and send in multiple, smaller payments... Believe it or not, [a friend] got to the point where he was sending Citibank an extra $5 each and every day via online billpay. By making a game out of finding an extra $5/day, he managed to stay motivated and slay the debt beast well ahead of schedule.

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Avoid the harassment and hassle from debt collectors by taking away their power. Weblog Five Million Dots advises to divide your funds among entities you owe money to. This reinforces the notion that you are aiming to follow up on your end of the deal. Solidify that commitment by picking up the phone and calling the debt collectors to inform them that you've made a payment. As you continuously do this, the collectors will be less compelled to remind you about these expenditures as you are already on top of it. Additionally, if you're being hounded by collectors, check out your rights when dealing with debt collectors. What are your best tips for dealing with debt collectors? Share them in the comments.

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Personal finance writer J.D. Roth is walkin' the walk over at his site Get Rich Slowly, where he just celebrated eliminating $35,000 worth of debt. That's 35 THOUSAND DOLLARS, people. It took him 20 three years of being committed to new habits, like setting goals, tracking every penny he spent, lowering expenses, and bringing in extra income. Check out his full post for the way becoming debt-free changed his career, too. Congratulations, J.D.! What an incredible accomplishment.