Financial Checkup - Behavior
October 16, 2006
Principle 1 - Behavior
Managing our behavior is the first step to good financial and physical health. My dad is a family practice doctor. He can offer preventative counseling, diagnose his patient’s problems, give them tools and steps to improve their health, and monitor them with regular checkups.
Despite all of the help he provides, many of his patients still struggle with their health issues. Why, because they don’t change their behavior. He lays it out for them, all they have to do is follow his counsel, but unfortunately many of them don’t follow through.
Many of us have similar problems with our finances. The basics of personal finances are all around us in books & magazines, on television, on the radio, and on the Internet. We can choose to take advantage of this information or not. As I see it, there are two behaviors that prevent us from being financially healthy:
- We don’t go to the “financial doctor” for our initial checkup. We’re overwhelmed or uninterested in the topic of our finances. We have a mindset that we can’t or don’t want to learn more and we don’t seek the knowledge or the help of professionals.
- We don’t build and maintain healthy financial habits. You could say that we don’t visit our “financial doctor” for regular checkups. We may get started but are distracted or discouraged and don’t continue.
Stay tuned for the next principle in Financial Checkup – Motivation
[…] Financial Checkup Recap The Financial Checkup series looks at how to improve our financial health. So far we’ve talked about our financial Behavior and how to Motivate ourselves to change it. Surrounding ourselves with good Influences will help us learn from them and pick up their financially healthy habits. One way to find an influence that will jumpstart our financial habits is Finding a Mentor. Principle 5 - Teamwork Why are there so many inspirational movies about teams of people accomplishing great things? When people that share a common goal or purpose come together, the sum is greater than the whole of the parts and the results can be incredible. […]
[…] Behavior […]
[…] Financial Checkup Recap The Financial Checkup series looks at how to improve our financial health. So far we’ve talked about our financial Behavior and how to Motivate ourselves to change it. Surrounding ourselves with good Influences will help us learn from them and pick up their financially healthy habits. One way to find an influence that will jumpstart our financial habits is Finding a Mentor. […]
[…] Behavior […]