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Financial Empowerment or Financial Advice?
In the next couple weeks I am going to be publishing a post about financial empowerment. Before I gave away my view on financial empowerment, I thought it would be interesting to poll my readers about what you would value more.
Would you prefer to work with a financial planner who's goal it is to financial empower you to make well-considered financial decision on your own? Or would you rather work with a financial planner who offers financial advice to help you work through the financial decision-making process?
Would You Rather Hire a Financial Planner Who Offers:
5 Simple Steps To Improve Your Financial Well-Being Now
Finances and financial planning can become very complex and intimidating. Often I believe large financial institutions intentionally make finances appear even more complex than necessary to convince you to seek help from one of their salespeople. There are some very important things you can do to dramatically improve your financial well-being that are extremely simple, however. Below I have listed a few steps you can take that will have great impact on your finances.
1. Spend half an hour today writing down (don't just think about it, but write it) what your perfect life would look like. Where would you live? What would you do for work? Whom would you share your life with? Include details.
2. Make a budget. Detail how you use your money now. It doesn't matter if this is a pencil and paper budget, a spreadsheet you set up, or an online budget like www.mint.com. Make a budget that works for you. It can change your life.
3. Look at that "perfect life" you wrote down, and create two or three goals you will pursue beginning today that bring you closer to reaching the perfect life.
4. Review your budget. Is there anything that surprised you or that you wish you spent more money on or that you were very uncomfortable with? Decide if there is anything you spend money on now that would be better served to reach one of the goals you've written down. Adjust your budget to reflect that changed priority. Make sure to include your goals in your budget, this will create commitment to using your budget.
5. Consider your goals and "perfect life" before each major purchase. Does it help reach your goals or perfect life? Does the purchase represent a new goal of higher priority than what you've written down?
Making certain you are aware of how you are using your money and that it is in alignment with your goals and values will change your life. Keep pursuing your perfect life and recognizing what your priorities are, your financial well-being will improve.
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