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How to Use Simple Lists to Set Better Goals & Make Smarter Financial Choices

Lauren Lawson • August 23, 2024

6 Unbelievable & REAL Payoffs of Using Lists to Set Your Big Financial Goals

1: Lists can change our top goals

What’s your number one financial goal right now?

Retiring or buying a house is most folks’ answer to that question.1

At least 1 in 4 changed one of their top goals, though, after they look at a master list.1

And nearly 3 in 4 changed one or more of their top three goals after seeing a master list.1


Benefit: Lists can help us see our main objectives and big-picture goals more clearly.1




2: Lists can refine our goals

How specific are your financial goals?

Many of us don’t set the most defined goals right out of the gate.1

And unspecific goals can sabotage our success.3 But after looking at a master list, more than 1 in 4 folks will end up clarifying their top goal, moving away from a generic goal, and setting a more specific one.1

Why?

Because a list can elaborate on generic goals and reveal more of the intent behind them.1

In fact, many folks who’ve said they want to “grow wealth” as their top financial goal will change that after looking at a list, picking a more specific goal showing WHY they wanted to grow their wealth.1


Benefit: Lists can bring specificity to our goals. That can keep us motivated and help us see better ways to achieve our objectives.1




3: Lists correct our misconceptions about our goals

How much does a limited understanding of finance factor into your financial goals?

Lists can help you answer that question and see what those misconceptions may be.1

That’s because any of us can be misled by common misunderstandings about money and finance.4

A clear example of that shows up in the area of paying down debt. More than 1 in 4 folks whose top goal is to pay down debt change that goal after seeing a master list.1

Why?

Because they realize that saving for retirement and paying down debt aren’t tradeoffs.1


Benefit: Lists can inform and educate us about our options. Lists can also set the record straight when our thinking or facts are off base.1




4: Lists can reveal the emotions behind the financial goals

How much do your emotions factor into your financial goals?

They could be a bigger factor than you realize, and that’s not a bad thing.

In fact, even though emotional decisions aren’t always the best in finance, they can help with goal setting.1

That’s because our emotions can get to the real purpose behind our goals, answering the “why” of it all.1

And that becomes really clear when we see how many folks end up changing their top goal after looking at a master list.1

At least half will revise their top goal to be an emotion-based goal, like “feeling more secure with finances” or “not feeling like I’m a financial burden to my family as I grow older.”1

Plus, the emotional rewards we get from achieving our goals can be just as valuable as any financial returns.1


Benefit: Lists can show us how emotionally rewarding our financial goals can be — and how it’s not just all about the numbers and bottom line.1




5: Lists can help us see our cognitive blind spots

What biases could be limiting your goals?

No matter how smart we are, we’re all working with limited knowledge.1

After all, no one knows everything.

On top of that, any one of us can be swayed by biases without even realizing it.1

That could mean something like the “present bias” gets in our way. If that happens, we could overvalue the short-term rewards over bigger, longer-term gains.1

That can all change just by looking at a master list of goals.1

How?

Well, master lists can put things into perspective and open our eyes to things we’ve assumed or overlooked before.1


Benefit: Lists can help us recognize our biases and blind spots, giving us a better perspective on our goals.1




6: Lists can help us prioritize our goals

What do you really want out of your financial goals — and life? How will that make you happy?

Believe it or not, many of us don’t really know what we want.1

We don’t truly understand our preferences, and we may not even know what actually makes us happy.1

With that, it can be pretty challenging to prioritize our goals.1

Lists can turn that around, though.1

They can help us dial into what we actually want and better understand where our happiness lies.1

Think about this on a smaller scale, like when you’re going out to eat and you don’t know what to order. That “Aha!” moment when you see something that sounds great — and that you didn’t know you wanted — until that exact moment you saw it on the menu is a little moment of self-discovery.

And those discoveries can happen with lists in your financial life and goal setting too.1


Benefit: Lists help us learn more about ourselves, what we want, and what’s really going to make us happy. Lists can also help us sort out our priorities and set goals that are truly important to us.1







Sources

  1. https://www.financialplanningassociation.org/sites/default/files/2020-07/Sin_Murphy_Lamas_July2019.pdf
  2. https://hbr.org/2021/01/why-we-set-unattainable-goals
  3. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.704790/full
  4. https://www.cnn.com/cnn-underscored/money/financial-misconceptions-debunked

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