If I gave you $100 with instructions to give me back $40 later that day or else you’d be in serious financial trouble, you’d probably happily spend the other $60 without a second thought and hand over the remaining $40 with a smile. No guilt, no stress, no uncertainty. Now imagine I give you $100 with instructions to give some of it back to me at a later date or else you’ll be in serious financial trouble. You don’t know how much money you’ll have to give back or when I’m going to ask for it. All you know is that some amount of money will have to be available at a moment’s notice when I come calling for it.

If this were the case, you’d probably spend much less than $60, just to be careful. Maybe I’ll ask for only $20 back and you could have spent $80, but you simply won’t know. The result would be apprehension every time you spent any of that money, because you might be overspending. I might come back demanding $95, making even a $10 purchase risky. Uncertainty breeds guilt, fear and constant worry. It’s exhausting.