Instant Money............

From Nicholas Bate:

What is it about money?  It's a measure.  It's a calibration.  It's easy to compare.  That's what it's about.  The difficulty with other forms of wealth is that they are more difficult to calibrate, to check, to compare.  How happy are you?  How good are your relationships?  But how much money do you earn?  How much was your new car?  And so we get distracted by simple measurability:  a Newtonian, Cartesian world seduces and confuses us.....But why do we want to compare, anyway?   Because as human beings we must grow, it's just that this form of growth can only lead to frustration.

1.  Think wealth not money.  There's hard wealth: cars, stocks and shares and houses in Tuscany.  And there's soft wealth:  wellness, fun and conversation.  When 'push comes to shove' we know which one we really want.

2.  Somehow we get confused:  we think the former (hard wealth) is our only route to the latter (soft wealth).  Not.

3.  True Wealth?  The stuff money can't buy, of course.  The stuff we forget about until it's damaged, receding or gone.  Health, relationships.  An interesting job.  A view over the sea.  A garden to tend.  Kids to play ball with.

4.  The irony and the reality is that these things are often easy and accessible because so often they are remarkably simple.

5.  But if you need to talk money, calculate wealth not by salary nor car but by balance sheet.  Otherwise you might become 'big hat no cattle.'

6.  Your personal balance sheet = assets (house) - liabilities (debts).

7.  Simple strategies to sort one's finances.
         a.  Save, then spend.
         b.  Know what comes in and what goes out.
         c.  Create and stick to budgets for areas of spending
         d.  Minimise debt.
         e.  Use cash rather than credit cards more often as you will
              feel the appropriate value of money more easily.

8.  But what about the pension?  If you love your job and stay well a simple plan of continuing to earn a little into your later years is an easy route, a pleasant rout and negates the need for the huge and daunting and frankly often debilitating pension pot plan.

-Nicholas Bate, Instant Brilliant 2010