You’re in debt. You have more month than you have money. You desperately want Financial Freedom, but you have no idea where to start. I’ve been there–many times as a matter of fact. I’ve succumbed to the call of refinancing my home, signed up for new credit cards just for the introductory financing and traded one problem for another. When you’re in this position, what are your first steps to Financial Freedom?
Your first best action is to see where your money is going. How many times have you done this only to overlook an important expense like repair costs or school fees? All too often we forget to pencil in a monthly amount for these type of expenses. New tires? Vacation funds? Gifts? Holidays? This is exactly where I struggled for many years–until Financially Fit Bootcamp. Going through Financially Fit Bootcamp is what finally helped my spouse and I figure out how to allocate the funds we needed for these type of expenses.
These few steps are only the beginning to achieving Financial Freedom. But we already have far less Money Stress, because we’ve completed the tasks outlined in Financially Fit Bootcamp. What makes this financial plan different than any of the others that we’ve done in the past? A podcast I heard on the Wealth Standard Radio got me thinking about this question.
Geoff Woods VP at The One Thing describes success in an activity as being contingent on three ideas:
- Clarity;
- Control; and
- Community
And that’s what made the difference for us.
Clarity
FFBC gave us the tools to decide what’s truly important to us. What do we really want to spend our money on? Many times we spend without thinking only to find our closets full of useless stuff. We fill our lives with material goods that aren’t really important, and that aren’t congruent with our thoughts and desires. Using the steps we learned in FFBC, when we clarified what was truly important to us, we had more direction and started making better decisions about purchases.
Control
FFBC clearly shows you the benefits of creating multiple accounts and automating the transfers between each. It was only until we actually created an account for each us, a family of four with two college-age children, that we could actually keep track of what each of us spend. Weekly transfers into these accounts assures each of us that we’re no more than six days from a “payday.” We each have complete control of what we spend individually and as family. This control is integral to creating freedom.
Community
Having a community of like-minded individuals moving in the same direction has incredible power.
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.–Margaret Mead
When you have this type of community, you have people who inspire, encourage and stand by you when things get tough. You have thought leaders who give insight into your problems and assist with solutions. The emotional and emancipating experience that comes with this type of support defies explanation.
Clarity, Control, Community. This is what separates success from failure. Many of us stick with the same financial decisions and habits despite negative consequences. We fear change. And self-sabotage is created through this fear. Our instinctive nature to resist change keeps most of us in dire financial straits. Only when the pain of dealing with those decisions becomes greater than the fear of change do we actually do something different. My experience with FFBC helped us to write a new financial plan through clarity, control, and community.
Larry Malone is a MindShift.money Certified Coach for Financially Fit Bootcamp. You can learn more about Larry at LarryDMalone.com and FinancialTitan.com.
The views and opinions expressed are those of the guest author and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of MindShift.money.
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