Last week, I had the opportunity to speak to the Indianapolis chapter of the Young Nonprofit Professionals Network Indy (YNPNindy) for their November Professional Development event titled Financial planning on a Nonprofit Salary.
When I was creating my presentation for the event, I knew I was probably going to end up giving too much information and overwhelming some people – there’s just so much to know about personal finance that most people have never been taught.
And that’s the problem. There are so many areas that most people can (need to) improve in their financial lives and many areas most people aren’t even aware of.
Knowing this and having experience working through financial plans with a lot of people, I started out my presentation with the idea of, “Progress Not Perfection.”
This idea of progress not perfection is something that I preach to people all the time. If you’ve never been serious about your personal finances before (or even if you have), then there will probably be an overwhelming amount of things that you’ll learn that you need to change/improve/make progress on.
The problem with this is that when it’s overwhelming or the task seems too big, people tend to give up and ignore the issues (even the things that are really easy to change). This is why it’s important to create a prioritized step-by-step plan to tackle your personal finances and get you and/or your family to a better position.
You’re not going to be where you want to be tomorrow, and you’re probably not going to get there in a year, but if you focus on making consistent progress (and not on being perfect), then I’d bet that if you look back a year from now you’ll have made some significant positive changes to your financial life.
Figure out what you need to do, prioritize it, and make a step-by-step action plan to make progress. Progress can be small, but it can add up to great things over time.
