Who Do You Trust About Money?

Reflection can be a good thing. Especially when it comes to money. Unfortunately many people simply avoid every serious thought about money because they find it uncomfortable.

One important area to think over concerns the source of our thinking about money. Examining an attitude in the light of its source can often make it possible to develop a different viewpoint that can result in major changes for the better.

Most people simply soak up what they know from their family, from their friends and from what they hear in the media. Most of this kind of thinking is destorted if not completely false.

Take time to think about your own financial education.

• Did you learn much from your parents about money?
• Do most of your concepts come from friends and other acquaintences?
• Have you tended to listen to the messages in TV and radio ads about money (home loans, using credit cards, etc) without any real critical thinking.
• Have you read any good books about money?

As you think about these things, there are two suggestions I would encourage you to consider. First, become more conscious of your habitual attitudes toward money and the source of every money idea. Second, make a conscious effort to become more critical (in the scientific sense of carefully examining) in your thinking about money.

Consider whether your financial ideas come from people who are successful with their own money or people who aren't. Do suggested options come from someone who is looking out for your interests or from someone looking to make a profit by getting you to accept their suggestions?

Why is all this so important? Isn't it even a somewhat cynical viewpoint? Actually, it is simply a reasonable and obvious approach in view of the reality of life.

Most people are making poor financial decisions. A few are making excellent ones. If we want to be successful with money it is essential for us to learn to discern the difference between helpful and destructive financial advice and choose to think in ways that will truely improve, not harm, our personal success.

So the answer to who we trust turns out to be, “No one!” We listen more to people who prove by results that they know more than others. We trust ourselves more than others because we know we are thinking more than most.

But we recognize that because we have all absorbed a lot of poor thinking along the way, we need to examine even our own thinking and use our mental capacity to reason and choose wisely about money if we want to be successful.