Getting Your Finances Under Control Once and For All
We’ve all been there. We say we are finally going to stop the endless cycle and a few months later find ourselves still struggling along. This pattern holds true for various goals we might have – to lose a little weight, eat healthier, or even to find a better work-life balance. But today we are going to talk about breaking this cycle when it comes to our finances.
Whether you are looking to start budgeting, save money, pay off debt, invest or all of the above, the below tips will help you to finally break the cycle once and for all.
5 Tips To Breaking Your Bad Financial Life
1. Take Some Time To Figure Things Out
In order to break a cycle, you have to first understand why you are in the cycle you are in. The main issue here though is that most people are quick to judge. What we mean by this is that if they are in debt, they simply think they have a spending problem. In reality, the issue is something else and the overspending is just a symptom.
So take some time to really dig in deep as to why you are in debt or don’t like to budget. Once you figure these things out, you can start thinking about your goals. Where do you want to be financially in 10 or 20 years? The more you can form an idea of what you want your life to look like, the better off you will be at breaking the cycle.
2. Create An Action Plan
Once you complete the above, it is time to create a plan. But not just any plan. You need a detailed plan for how you are going to reach your goals. For example, you can’t just have your plan say “I want to retire at 60 years old”. This isn’t going to cut it. It’s too vague and you will never follow through long term.
Instead, get specific. Have you plan talk about why you want to retire at 60 and the things you will do. You can then work on filling out the steps you need to take along the way to make that a reality.
3. Keep Things In Perspective
After you have your plan written down, you need to review things to make sure they are attainable. In other words, you need to keep things in perspective. You can’t retire with $1 million dollars tomorrow if you have just $50 to your name today.
Likewise you can’t get out of debt by the weekend if you have a significant amount. You can however set up attainable goals to speeding up the debt repayment process, which includes easy ways to borrow money. Yes, for many people getting out of debt, finding different ways to borrow money can help to pay off high interest debt and make repayment more manageable and quicker.
4. Make Adjustments Along The Way
As you will find, after you have your plan and follow it, life will happen. Roadblocks and detours will come about trying to derail you on reaching your goal. Accept this. The sooner you accept that things will happen and you need to make adjustments, the better off you will be and the more likely you will be to reach your goals.
For example, you might be trying to get out of debt when a friend has decided to marry. You may have to delay or reduce debt repayment for a month or two while you buy your dress and attend the wedding. It’s not the end of the world to put things on hiatus, but make sure you don’t let the hiatus become the norm.
5. Celebrate
Finally, you need to celebrate little victories. Many times our goals will take years to achieve. If you can make it a habit to celebrate smaller accomplishments, you will increase your odds of success.
So if you are paying off $15,000 of debt, have a mini-celebration when you pay down your debt to $10,000 and again at $5,000. You will feel great and it will motivate you to keep moving forward.
Overall, if you can follow these tips, you will break the endless cycle of bad financial habits. In fact, you can use these tips for helping you to break out of just about any endless cycle you may find yourself in. You just have to modify things a bit to relate to your issue, but the core advice will apply. So don’t wait any longer, start taking the first step now at breaking the cycle and reaching your financial goals.
