Your Financial Life As You Want It
Posted Under: Career and Finance
If you’re an ordinary Jane or Joe, few things in your life are as scary as the words “money”, “finances”, “business”, “debt”, or “mortgage”. Even terms like “balance the checkbook” have a way of giving us a shudder that is usually reserved for Jaws or “the plague”.
This is perfectly understandable. After all, most of us were raised with a mental picture of “lack” or “want” or “there’s not enough to go around”. This mental concept is so ingrained in us that it even comes to define us. And, as a result of this kind of indoctrination, we find ourselves living from paycheck to paycheck. We believe that the wolf is just outside the door. And we fall prey to Parkinson’s Second Law, which states, “Spending rises with income and tends to exceed it.” After all, how many times have you bought something simply because you had the money for it in the moment? This is the perfect example of an “impulse purchase.”
In order to achieve a sound financial life (to achieve your life as you want it), we have to become fully conscious of our relationship with money. This is a multi-step process. We begin by having a look at our current financial status. Make an honest assessment of where we are in the full light of day! Open our kimonos and expose our financial selves, warts and all. Yes, this can be scary.
There are the obvious things: income and expenses. What are all the sources of income that we actually count on every month? Salary, tips, bonuses, whatever. And where are all the places it runs off to? All your bills; all your credit cards; all the out-of-pocket expenses. Catch yourself as you hand money over to your kids or to your spouse. Record the amounts you spend day to day, week to week over a month. You’ll be surprised. “Inconsequential” things like coffee, cigarettes, newspapers all add up to big bucks over the course of a month.
If you do this simple exercise honestly and humbly, I promise that you’ll be rewarded with a whole new appreciation for the role that money plays in your life.
In my next post, I’ll be writing about the “dark side” of finances. Hint: your behavior.
