26 Jan If God Is In Control, Why Do I Need To Plan My Finances?
I want to illustrate why I advocate personal financial planning when I know we cannot control every outcome. Even on our best day of planning for every detail that may or may not occur in our lives, we are still not in control. God is still on his throne and we are not.
Friend, even if we are not in control, we can still be organized and productive. By nature, we feel much more at peace when our lives are organized rather than cluttered. When I was in the midst of writing my book this past year, my office closet became a dumping ground for everything I needed to file, but did not have time to attend to at that exact moment. I was dealing with the “tyranny of the urgent” in order to meet hard and fast deadlines for my book, while also taking care of my family and managing my investment firm. That was my excuse. I kept thinking that I would just deal with the paper and the clutter later. I took the easy and long road of denial. I convinced myself that it would be easier to deal with all of the paper and clutter after my book was finished and released and tied up with a nice little bow.
However, the clutter in my office closet did not go away on its own. Shocking. It is now out of control and I do not even know where to start to get it back in order. It completely overwhelms me when I look at the mess. If I had just taken the time to file a few papers at a time, it would have been so much easier. However, I kept putting it off because I thought that I was too busy. I find that many clients and friends take this same attitude with their personal finances.
Please learn from my mistake. Do not put off today what needs to be done until tomorrow. I want you to take the time to get organized from a personal financial planning standpoint so you can live a more peaceful and fruitful life. I promise you will be so glad that you took the time to identify your personal financial goals and then develop a plan to achieve them. It is so much easier to reach a goal incrementally over time than it is when you are overwhelmed and what were once small problems are now huge challenges.
How do you feel when you look at the following picture of the clutter in my office closet? It personally makes me feel very uneasy and stressed out. I do not want you to feel this way in regards to your personal finances.
On the flip side, I did take the time to organize my mudroom. However, I asked for help from a professional organizer. I knew I could not do it all by myself. I needed a plan and systems to help keep it organized for the long term. My family needed to be able to maintain the organizational plan for the mudroom long after the professional organizer left our home to move on to someone else’s clutter problem. This is what a Financial Advisor does for your personal finances.
The organized mudroom may sound irrelevant, but it has changed our lives. As a busy family with two working parents and two children in school and extra-curricular activities, being organized is a lifeline to harmony in our home. Every time my family members arrive home, all of our belongings have a place to go. It is now so easy to find coats, purses, backpacks, homework, any mail that needs to be addressed or delivered, packages and presents to wrap, etc. We can get out the door and leave our house in a peaceful and timely manner. I feel so good when I enter and leave my home via this mudroom. It eliminates so much stress and anxiety.
I want you to feel at peace regarding your personal finances. Our days are numbered so let’s be as productive and organized as possible. Do not put it off any longer! If you need help and do not know where to start, ask for help from a Financial Advisor whom you know and trust. If you do not know an advisor personally, the best place to ask for a referral is from your inner circle. Talk to people whom you know about who they have worked with in the past and if the Advisor successfully helped organize their personal finances. If so, pick up the phone today and ask for a consultation. It may just change your life! Let’s all take the time now to be organized and free from clutter in both our personal and financial lives.