The B-Word: Part 1 — An Introduction to Money
Have you found yourself anticipating a paycheck from work and then feeling slightly excited when that money hits the account? A sense of power, freedom, and endless possibilities can sometimes come when those numbers show up.
Ok, maybe that last sentence isn’t quite true. But we do have a strange connection to money.
Money itself doesn’t do anything. After all, it’s just paper or numbers on a screen. But money represents something more. For the employee, it represents evidence of work. For a provider and caretaker, it represents the ability to put food on the table. For a salesperson, it solidifies their abilities. For an investor, it is an opportunity. If you’re like my wife, money means a chance to spruce up a room in the house with the latest bargains at Target and Goodwill.
Money means so many different things to so many different people—more than I have time to share in this post. But at its most basic level, money is a tool. It’s a tool to help us create change. It’s a tool that creates new experiences, builds comfort, and allows us to catapult into a new way of life.
As I think of money as a tool, I am vividly reminded that tools have to be used correctly to be effective. There have been countless home projects that I’ve tried to tackle with the wrong tool. I remember trying to unscrew a large bolt on my tractor with needle nose plyers because I didn’t have the right wrench at my disposal. That led to bloody knuckles and utter frustration.
As a banker, I’ve seen what money can do for people and what it can do to people. I’ve had a front-row seat to companies that make billions of dollars every year. I’ve also witnessed what happens when business owners don’t use this tool rightly. In my own life, I’ve made countless wise purchases that were necessary for my family and enhanced our lives, and I’ve made numerous unwise purchases as well.
Money On Autopilot
If you’re like me, you pay little attention to your bank account with an “ignorance is bliss” mindset until the numbers start getting close to zero. In those moments, I realize that I haven’t spent much time considering the impact of my purchases that month. Typically, I just buy things. The morning coffee trip, the online Amazon shopping spree, and the regular fast-food trips are mostly purchased on autopilot. Technology has gone so far as to allow our accounts to be debited directly for bills, so we don’t even have to think about them.
All of these are good things and are simply a part of our daily American Lives. I’m not harping on any of the ways people use their money. But more specifically, my goal is to get you to pause and reflect: How are you spending your money?
Since so much of our spending is automatic, do you know where your money is going? If money is a tool, as I suggest above, are you using the tool the right way?
The answer to that question largely depends on your goals in life.
You may be saving up for a vacation you’ve always dreamed of going on, or you may be seeing all your money leave your account with bills, school, and other necessities of life. Whatever the case may be, I believe how we interact with money largely depends on how and what we were taught about money.
Always Learning
As a father of three girls, I’m always seeking new ways to teach them about the responsibilities of life. One of those areas is in finance. And to be honest, when you look at our national debt and the skyrocketing consumer credit card spending, I believe that finance hasn’t been taught enough.
One of the five F’s at Abundant Journey is Finance. This area of our lives affects almost all the other aspects. And if we’re truly seeking to grow and improve daily, finance must be something we discuss.
So many people are neglectful in their responsibility to handle money well—myself included at times. Even more, I believe many of us lack the knowledge of how to use money as a tool or the self-control to handle it well. That is because money is powerful.
There’s a reason the Bible says that money is the root of all sorts of evil. The tool itself has an opportunity to do tremendous good and tremendous evil. Its power lies in the one who holds it. I’m not saying that to scare you but simply to put in perspective the weightiness of how important the topic of money is.
Each decision with every dollar made will affect you in one way or another, and it’s up to you to decide.
As we embark on Abundant Journey, we will focus largely on money and finance. As I stated above, this is one area many of us need to grow and learn together. My hope is that we will give you tips, suggestions, and nuggets that you can use in your own life to improve how you use the tool of money.
The follow-up post to this will be some practical tips on how to budget and give you ways to be creative when it comes to managing money. For now, I’d love for you to ask yourself a few questions.
Action Items
Ask yourself if you view money as a tool? What are some ways you use that tool properly, and what are some ways you use it wrongly
How did your parents view money, and how has that shaped how you interact with it?
Who in your life taught you the most about money, and are they the type of people you want to learn from with this topic?