Time’s up! So what came to mind? If I’m to be honest, the first thing that came to my mind was the picture of a business man in a nicely tailored suit opening the door of a Porsche 911. How about you? Was it something that had anything to do with money or material possessions? It’s not your fault. You’re not a shallow person, but that exercise shows you how effective incessant marketing can be. They—the multi-level marketers, infomercials for “abdominizers”, purveyors of secrets that aren’t actually so… as well as banks, brokerage firms, insurance companies… heck, even the companies that want us to buy their beer—they want us to keep their picture of success in our minds so that we’ll help them create their picture of success.
OK, now I’ll give you a few more seconds to get beyond your gut reaction and tell me what you’d rather picture…
For me, it’s sitting in my family room or around a campfire or at a scenic destination with my wife and two boys where everyone is laughing. That’s my picture of success. Now, that picture can certainly be enhanced by money or material things, but that picture of success is entirely possible without spending a dime. Conversely, all the money in the world would not make that picture a genuine success if there is brokenness in those relationships. Success may be accompanied by a pile of money, a sports car, or a 42-foot yacht pulling up to a second home in the Bahamas, but success isn’t actually any of those things.
But if not success, then, what is it that we really crave that leads us to a satisfying life? It’s another “S” word—and no, not THE “S” word, but instead, the word SIGNIFICANCE.
In all of us, there is a desire for significance. We want to be about something. And that’s why I start every financial planning engagement, discussion or seminar by telling folks to clear their minds of all things financial for just a moment—forget about 401ks, IRAs, taxes and insurance—and focus first on what it is that you want to be about in this world. Franklin Covey calls them Values, Ben Franklin called them Virtues—and since each of those words has taken on a slightly different connotation since those wise men used them, Jim and I refer to these foundational bricks of life in The Financial Crossroads as our Personal Principles. We encourage you to create a tangible list in writing of the 5 to 10 founding principles of your life—the stuff you want to be about.
It’s true that you can reach someone’s view of success by reading any number of financial books and periodicals telling you what to do with your money. Their downfall is that they’re telling you what YOU should be doing based on THEIR personal principles—not yours—and that means that you could end up achieving these financial goals successfully but still feeling hollow because your path lacked significance or your personal purpose. Is it extra work? Yes, it will take some time and deliberation to articulate a defined set of personal principles, but it is incredibly worth it because it validates—or sometimes even more helpfully, invalidates—the steps that you’re taking in money and life.
You can find tools to help you flesh out your Personal Principles and Goals at our website in the Tools & Applications section by clicking HERE. And, of course, you can read more about how to go through that process in The Financial Crossroads—specifically in Chapter 2: Cart Before the Horse.
By the way, be sure to check out the latest 90 Seconds or Less video where I explain the importance of placing values over money. It is called Cart Before the Horse.
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment