I’ll do it when…

why waiting for the perfect time is never a good idea.

For my birthday this year, in February, my husband bought me the course materials to study to become an accredited financial counselor. The process can be lengthy – it is comprised of learning the materials, passing a test, and accumulating 1000 hours of experience. 

I’ve always tended to be the type of studier who crams (some might call this procrastination) – I would learn a whole semester of material the week before the final exam; I wrote my undergraduate thesis in a weeks’ time; I would read the materials for class the morning before class. I think that my logic is that I will have better retention if I can just sit down and do it all at once. Well, with a new baby, a full time (lawyer) job, and financial coaching and life on the side, I have not been great at making time to read the materials and there is rarely a chance to sit down and do it all at once. I’ve been making an already lengthy process take even longer. 

A couple of months ago we learned my husband would be out of town for a week for work. I decided I would take that same week off from my full-time job and read all the materials I’ve been neglecting since February.  I planned a dreamy week: I envisioned waking up and having a cup of coffee while playing with the baby; taking him to daycare; coming home and doing yoga before sitting down for the day to read with lattes and delicious salads. It sounded amazing and I was excited for weeks leading up to it. 

This past week was the week. Guess what happened? My dream week did not go as planned. Monday morning the baby woke up congested and coughing and I had to keep him home from daycare. He was sick the rest of the week, and at home with me. I didn’t spend the days reading as planned. 

This week taught me a big lesson – if something is meaningful to you, it’s important to not put it off for the “perfect time”. It is so important (arguably, life changing!) to me to enhance my knowledge about financial counseling and to become a financial counselor as well as a financial coach. And, in order to make that happen, I am going to have to study after long days at my full-time job, after cooking dinner, and after putting my child to sleep. Waiting for the perfect time means I am never going to get to it, because the perfect time will never come. 

I see this frequently in my financial coaching practice and I think it is a common human experience (in other areas, too) – we think things are going to change to improve our situation: childcare costs will decrease when kids start school so that’s when we can start saving; we’ll get a raise at our job and then we can pay off our debt; anomalous situations will stop occurring and that’s when we can figure out how to budget. If we are always waiting for something to change to improve our situation, we’re always going to be waiting to achieve our goals.

Research suggests that there are a few behavioral shifts we can make to help accomplish our goals. First, we can create structure. Creating structure means that we don’t leave completing our goals to chance. Structure might include scheduling into your calendar exactly when you will work on your set goal, how you will do the work, where you will do it, and what exactly you will do. Structure might also include creating accountability through a friend or a coach. It might include investing in help to create accountability. 

Second, we should take big goals and break them down into smaller goals. By breaking a big goal into its component parts, it is harder to procrastinate because it is easier to see how the goal can be accomplished. The goal no longer feels overwhelming. 

Finally, making a task enjoyable will enable more follow-through. Research shows that if you don’t enjoy something you do, you won’t persist at it because impulsivity will interfere. 

For me, I tend to set lofty goals that are overwhelming, and I try to accomplish them all at once, making them even more overwhelming (hello college/law school cramming!). This might have worked for me when I was younger, single, and childless, but my life has changed, and that approach obviously isn’t working anymore. This week demonstrated for me that I must take my big goal and make it more manageable. 

Today I am sitting down with my calendar and blocking off time that I will study. I am going to take the course material and break it into smaller pieces – pieces that I can accomplish in a day or a weeks’ time. Finally, I am going to find some accountability measures. One such measure will be to create a way to track my progress (tracking is a tool I frequently use in my coaching for clients to track debt pay-down and a tool that research shows helps build momentum and it creates a reward loop). I might also look for a community or find another person on the same or a similar path who can help keep me accountable. 

The same tools can be used to work towards financial goals. Create a roadmap for where you want to go and break it down into a clear path with manageable steps. If you have debt to pay off, make a plan for how you will pay it down each month. Schedule time to regularly track (every other day will make it much more manageable than weekly or monthly) your expenses and your progress. And, make it fun! Do it with a cup of coffee, a glass of wine, or a friend or spouse. Get a coach if it will help you. Decide exactly when you will work towards these goals. And, very importantly, remember why you are working towards these goals.  Making time to achieve your financial goals is life-changing. 

We all lead busy lives – between work, school, kids, and families, it’s hard to find time for things we enjoy, let alone goals we want to accomplish.  Waiting for the perfect time to accomplish a goal can prevent us from ever even starting. Is there a goal, financial or otherwise, that you’re working towards? Would any of these tools be helpful for you?

(P.S. I should say, I had a perfect week getting to be with my child – it was not what I planned, but it was incredibly special to get that one-on-one time that I take for granted during the chaos of the days and weeks. That time with him was even more motivating for me to make progress in achieving my goals so that eventually we can have more of it together. It was an amazing reinforcement of my why for achieving my goals and maybe the world knew it’s exactly what I needed this week.)