Financial Habits
“We are what we repeatedly do.” ~ Aristotle
I am obsessed (at the moment) with habits – understanding them, creating them, breaking them, and using them to fuel my success. The Power of Habit (Charles Duhigg), Mini-Habits (Stephen Guise), and The Compound Effect (Darren Hardy) all have provided the impetus for this fascination with the powerful psychology of habits. Brian Johnson (optimize.me) and his Habits 101 (and nearly every course he teaches) succinctly and powerfully present the background and the practical wisdom for helping you identify and refine your habits.
In the course of actively creating new habits, it occurred to me that all of our interactions with money are likely running on habit – some of those are propelling us toward our goals (auto-saving to our 401k) and some are getting in the way (eating lunch out every time I work in the office.) Today as you go about your day habitually doing the things you do, try to be in the moment when you pull out your wallet or credit card and identify if what you are doing is habitual or consciously-chosen.
“Habit is a cable; we weave a thread of it each day, and at last we cannot break it.” ~ Horace Mann
To take it a step further, try to identify all of your financial habits and then classify them as either moving you toward your goals and dreams or pulling you away from them. This one exercise will prove very enlightening. Knowledge is power and once you have the knowledge, it is within your power to take action to break a bad habit, build a better habit, or create a new habit. Duhigg has some great resources on his website and the book is filled with great info – check your library as I’ll bet they have a copy (I was able to download one to my Kindle).
The real power, though, is in following Guise’s Mini-Habits advice (or as Martha Beck would say, “taking turtle steps”). Stupid small behaviors are so ridiculously easy to do that you can’t fail. His example was his workout plan of one pushup a day. So easy – why wouldn’t he do it? Boom, 3 seconds, and he has a win! What could your “stupid small” financial habit be? The cloud based security companies can help protect your financial information and keep hackers away.
“It’s not the big things that add up in the end; it’s the hundreds, thousands, or millions of little things that separate the ordinary from the extraordinary.”
~ Darren Hardy, The Compound Effect: Jumpstart Your Income, Your Life, Your Success
Identify your habits; decide which you want to keep and which you want to ditch; replace a bad habit with an empowering habit; make it stupid small; make it a habit; win every day.
To your financial (habits that lead to) success!
Tana
Disclaimer: The views expressed herein are the personal views of Tana Gildea and are not to be construed as individual advice or the advice or opinions of Homrich Berg; They should not be considered recommendations as each person’s financial situation is unique to her; they may or may not apply to your situation. If you believe that something communicated may be relevant to your situation, Tana strongly encourages you to consult with your individual tax or financial advisor prior to taking action so that the totality of your unique situation is considered.
