And it got me a’thinkin’.
(FWIW, I don’t know this Ben chap from Adam. His post simply struck me.)
In tech, yes, there’s a tendency towards optimization, towards complexity, towards sexiness.
The “sexy” problems, the “sexy” solutions: they get all the media, all the headlines, all the clicks, just as Ben Casnocha mentions above.
But the important problems? Not so much. Why? Well, that’s above my paygrade. But if we truly valued “important” over “sexy” in this society, teachers would get paid a heck of a lot more.
The same thing goes for personal finance.
Everyone is attracted to sexy (complicated, optimized, conversation-worthy) answers to financial questions. But you know what I think? Sexy finances are a distraction.
I think your finances should enable you to focus wholeheartedly on your life, not distract from it.
Yes, there are some aspects of personal finance that are unavoidably complicated. The Internal Revenue Code makes sure of that. But much of the complexity is of our own making, and we can undo it or avoid it with our own hands.
Wouldn’t you like to understand your finances, know that your finances are taken care of, and then put them out of your mind because you’ve got more important problems to solve?
I want to help those people who are solving important problems rather than seeking meaning in their finances. And I think unsexy finances are the way to do it. Personal finance can be challenging. It can be (it is!) important. But it shouldn’t be sexy.
There are a lot of important problems that need solving out there. Important problems in the workplace, like the biotech problems mentioned in the LinkedIn post. (Hell, I’ve got a client right now working on cancer cures, as the LinkedIn post mentions, and it’s simply awesome to witness.)
Also, problems like:
“How do I raise my children while also pursuing a career I care about?”
“How do I protect people in my community or country?”
“How do I carve out time to create art while living in a really expensive place?”
“How do I care for my aging parents who live in a different state?”
I can’t solve almost any of them, but I can help support the people who are. I want to help you tell the difference between “unavoidably complex” and “nope, we can just keep this simple.” I want to help you get through the unavoidably complex things as easily as possible.
No matter if you work with me, another planner, or rock it DIY-style, my advice is the same: keep your finances unsexy, and reserve all that sexy-time energy for the important problems in your life.
What important problem are you solving?
