Let's Talk About Money, and it's no Secret

I took quite a few notes as I was watching The Secret for the first few times, and especially when it came to their take on the secret of money.

And yet while all of that sounded true to me, I have not as of yet cracked that one. I am pretty well informed on financial things, but that is because I have read piles and piles of financial books, not because I watched the secret and cracked the code.

There are some tricks for those who know what they are doing. To get into our current home, which is our dream home, we neither made a down payment, qualified for a loan, nor paid any closing costs. I wrote a small eBook on how to do that and you can read about it here.

I want to say something on this money thing, and this is something that was not really discussed in the movie The Secret. I want to talk about retaining your money, not making it.

If you have any kind of a job or profitable business or return on investments, then you make enough money to eventually be rich. Sound strange? Well it's true, at least until you come to the point where you have spent it all (and possibly more) and not saved any of it.

In an earlier post, I talk about how focusing on spending less as opposed to focusing on making more is lack thinking, and I still believe that. But there is a fine line here, because if we do not learn to spend a little less prior to our figuring out how to make more then we increase our debt, and that is just the opposite of the direction that we want to go.

What I am sayting here is that there is just no substitute for a good financial education. You could learn to attract a million dollars using the law of attraction; but if you have no real financial education, how are you ever going to keep it? If you do not know how to make $100.00 work for you in some positive way, then how can you make larger amounts work for you?

Here's hint number one, courtesy of Dennis R. Deaton. The best hedge against inflation begins with not losing a fortune. I know far too many people, including myself, who have learned valuable financial lessons the hard way by losing five digit sums of money. Mostly lost on investments where I thought I knew what I was doing when I did not. Nothing is more dangerous than an investor who thinks he has it figured out.

If you really do not understand the markets and what moves them, if you do not understand and use stop and limit orders, then I have to say that you will be much better off parking all of your savings in cash vehicles, despite what all the other financial "experts" say. All of those "experts" are never around to take responsibility when they help you to lose a lot of money.

Second point. You will never make money by paying large sums of money to someone else so that they can tell you what worked for them. There is no guarentee that it will work for you. In fact, there is hardly any chance at all that it would work for you. If you matched with them on all talents and attitudes then maybe, but when is that going to be true?

No, you have to find your own way. Some people may have different opinions, but I am not big on life coaches or any kind of coaches or paying anyone a large sum of money to help you. They can only tell you what works for them, and nothing works for everybody. I especially do not like the fact that they all want they money up front and if they fail to help you earn any additional money, then it is your fault, not theirs. I have direct experience with this.

Yes, you should educate yourself based on what successful people have done in the past, but all you have to do to begin and continue this process is to obtain and read a book. If you go to the library then the books are free. It need not cost a lot of money.

Someone who understands insurance, and who understands what you really need versus what you do not, can save tons of money buying insurance. The understanding must come first.

If you do need someone to help you, see if you can find someone who does consulting like I do.

I do financial consulting in the facts and figures world of finance. I cannot and will not attempt to teach you how to attract one million dollars, but I guarentee that I can work your family spending plan so that you come out at the end with more money. What do I charge for a fee? I charge a percentage of what I have saved you. So you win with the savings, I win with the percentage of the savings, and everyone wins. What a refreshing change versus coach always wins and the coached person might win something.

If you have a coach, ask them if they would be willing to charge you on a model of a percentage of the increased income you earn because of their coaching. In my experience not one of them has been willing to do this. Why should they have to take any responsibility for all that money that they are being paid?

It seems like the new Information Age race. Who can make the most money while providing only dubious value and not taking any responsibility whatsoever ?? I am here to tell you that there are a lot of people around who are good at this game, and you want to avoid them like the plague!

So we search together for the key to the code of attracting a big pile of money . . . but in the meantime let's improve our financial education so that we are ready for the windfall when it comes.

Because you would hate for it to all blow away.

Joseph