Personal Finance Isn’t for Everyone
Mar 3rd, 2010 by Carlos
Personal finance is kind of like breakfast—it’s crucial to get your day off to a good start, but you don’t want to be having breakfast all day long. This isn’t Seinfeld—you eat breakfast and then you move on to lunch and dinner.
And right now I feel like I’ve been eating Corn Pops and orange juice all day—personal finance bores me.
Once you get certain basics down (spend less than you make, contribute to your retirement, create a budget, etc.) you should move along and step into the next phase of managing your money.
In my mind, it’s making more money.
Before I get blasted for sounding materialistic or shallow, let me say one thing about money: it won’t bring you happiness (not on its own anyway) and it won’t solve any problems you have in your life.
But it sure doesn’t hurt.
The other day I was making my infamous sandwich at work and I realized that some people just aren’t built for personal finance. They have absolutely no interest in doing stuff like:
- Building a budget in Excel
- Finding the best rates to store their money
- Researching the best place to open a Roth IRA
- Calling the cable company to get a better deal
- Hassling your bank to get stupid fees refunded
This isn’t exciting stuff, but for some reason personal-finance nuts love to do it. We’re proud of it. We take what we have and we make the most of it. And we often rail on people who don’t “get it.”
But most people just don’t care.
They don’t want to spend time on the phone or online to save a few dollars here and there. And you know what? That’s totally fine.
As I stood there waiting for my sandwich to toast, I had an epiphany: there might not be a universal appeal to making your finances more efficient, but there is one thing I know we can all agree on.
We all want to make more money.
I’m not talking about whoring ourselves out for every extra cent we can get. I’m talking about doing something meaningful outside of work and getting paid for it. Like this blog (although “getting paid” is kind of a misnomer in this case). Like having side projects that help others and make some money.
And that’s what I’m working on right now: a side project that I’ll treat more like a business than I have this site, which is more of a place I use to chat and talk about the things I find interesting. Could I monetize it more efficiently and turn it into a good income?
Sure I could. But then I’d be writing about online stock brokers and the best banks to store your savings in.
And I just don’t care about that.
More on this project as it unfolds, but I’m pretty excited about it. I feel the way I did when I was getting this site off the ground and everything felt fresh and new.
Image by yaybiscuits123
This post was included in the Twenty Something Finances Carnival.
Good luck, shoot me an email if you want someone to bounce ideas off.
Congrats on this awakening. While I understand and agree with your feelings, I think your assumption is wrong. People want to earn more money just like they want to save money, but it is the implementation of the topics you’ll discuss in the upcoming months that separate people.
I think most people don’t care about personal finance until they reach “mission critical”…job loss, can’t pay electric bill…it’s unfortunate but true.
Most people I have seen suffering financially at their own hand look at personal financial freedom like a guy with a spare tire looking at 6 pack abs. They want that 6 pack (financial freedom), but they don’t want to do the crunches (budgeting), sidebends (debt reduction), and dieting (saving) that they need to do!
Wouldn’t it be nice if everyone realized the more work you do on your finances the easier it becomes as success builds on success?
Yes it is a sad fact that so many just don’t care about their finances. It can be boring but it is necessary. I think many people don’t manage their money because they are intimidated because of their ignorance on money management. Hopefully the internet and information like this can get more people educated about the importance of managing their money. Like it is said here, it does not have to be too complicated. Keep it simple, get on a simple budget and spend less than you make and save the rest. Nobody ever regrets saving money in the long run so learn how to do it whatever way you’re most comfortable with doing.
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