Let Them Carry You

When someone is motivated to fix their finances, they’re usually in the mindset of exactly that: fixing.

Fixing problems, changing bad habits, repairing past failures.

While viewing your financial picture that’s stressing you out through a lens of fixing problems is totally rational, more often than not, it’s useful to get out of that limited viewpoint by intentionally noting what isn’t a problem.

The problematic stuff tends to be obvious.

But the financial puzzle pieces worth your gratitude tend to be more invisible.

No matter your financial circumstances today, the various separate factors that make up your total financial picture will vary from abysmal to awesome.

It’s those 'pretty good' to 'awesome' pieces we need to look at intentionally sometimes.

Because they provide the positive fuel to work on the not so good stuff.

Because it’s important to see evidence that not everything is broken.

Money is such an integral part of modern life that money problems cause constant stress that has real effects on our mind, body, and soul. The stress is real.

Looking intentionally at what is working well is the antidote.

We need those things to help carry us through.

It’s showing our brain that it isn’t all bad, we have some things working for us, we have pieces of the puzzle doing well. Despite the challenges right now, we still have reason to be hopeful and optimistic for the future.

Sometimes this takes serious intention to pick out the few good things in a sea of bad. But it’s critical to hold those working parts up.

Perhaps it’s your dependable paycheck, a lack of credit card debt, good investment habits through your employer program, a spouse that doesn’t spend much… the list is as variable as each of our lives are.

Your parts that tend to work smoothly will be different than the next person.

But it’s your job to identify them, hold them up, celebrate them, be grateful for them, and let them provide reassurance in the moments when you’re struggling most.

Let them remind you that it’s hard at the moment, but there is reason for optimism about the long-term trajectory.

If one thing can work well, then so can the next. It’s only a matter of solving the problem areas over time, so that one day, some of those will be on the “working well” list too.

For me, when bills are rising, income is lacking, and things feel tight, I look over my mortgage payment schedule which will be ending in about 9 years. Compared to 30 years, that trajectory of 9 more years feels short, and reminds me of the progress we’ve made and the mortgage-free ease we’re heading towards.

Yours will be different, but find your bright spots.

Let what’s going well carry you through what’s not.