I was recently looking through our list of goals for the next 12 months. A lot of it is buy this, replace that at the house, take this trip with the family, etc.

If your goal list look similar, you might end up frustrated and wondering what went wrong. While it’s fun to plan these “goals” and shoot for them, they are not really goals at all. They are a lot more accurately described as results, or even options. Option as a result of what? Making and saving more money.

Everything we want to purchase, replace, repair–whether it’s physical (like a new computer) or an experience (like a trip to Disneyland), it takes money and more of it. The problem with excessive planning and focusing on these results is that we can never really work “on them.” What we’re really working on (or should be working on) is making more money and keeping more of it.

If we’re successful, then we can claim the ability to purchase what we want.

Keeping it Simple

It’s great that we can use all these desired results as motivation to save. But they easily become distractions and the focus instead. If we’re spending all of our time setting up these amazing goals, are we spending it where it counts–figuring out how to make and save money? Because that’s what will really get us where we want to be.

Look through your list and see how many of your goals can be tracked back to this simple pursuit. It’s possible that you have to retrain your brain to reject the stigma of pursuing money. We’ve somehow tagged this as  not noble, but the reality is that nearly everything you want to do, whether perfectly reasonable or insanely excessive, still requires money. The skills of making and keeping it are essential to success in life.

Focus on the right things, and the results will appear.