It Takes Practice To Improve Your Finances
Posted on October 21, 2007
I’m flabbergasted at the number of people who want to play the game, but don’t want to practice. Athletes in every sport love to play the game, but hate to practice. Football players hate to hit tackling dummies, but will gladly give it their best shot in a game. Basketball players hate to run sprints in the gym, but will gladly give it their best shot in a game. Baseball players hate to chase fly balls for hours during practice, but will gladly give it their best shot during a game. Tennis players hate to spend time hitting balls thrown to them by a machine, but gladly give it their best shot during a match. The problem is, their best shot is seldom good enough to win unless they practice.
This same phenomenon holds true not just for athletes, but for almost any endeavor in life. People who seek perfection and practice the hardest are the ones who usually rise to the top, whether in sports, business, entertainment, or any other enterprise. So why are people so reluctant to practice? Could it be because practice tends to highlight weaknesses rather than strengths? When you practice, you are looking for ways to improve, which means you or your coach, or your advisor, are looking for weaknesses upon which you can improve.
When you perfect one weakness, you usually move on immediately to identify another and another. In the beginning, little emphasis is placed on what you do well. It’s not until you become very accomplished that the emphasis begins to shift from strengthening your weaknesses to enhancing your strengths.
The reluctance to practice derails many good intentions. Hardly anyone likes to do things they aren’t good at doing and as a result they avoid their weaknesses and focus on their strengths. Unfortunately, a balanced and successful life is much like a chain: It’s no stronger than its weakest link. Unless you are willing to practice and improve upon your weaknesses, you will always be vulnerable to disappointments and failures.
If you’re trying to achieve financial independence and your weakness is earning money, you won’t get there by becoming the biggest tightwad in town. Likewise, if you are great at earning money but your weakness is that you’re a spendthrift, you won’t make it by focusing on additional earnings. It takes strengthening your weaknesses to build a stronger future, and the way to do that is to practice.
Practice is important in every area of life. If you want to be a better athlete, you have to practice; if you want to be a better public speaker, you have to practice. If you want to improve you finances, you have to practice. Whenever you want to get better at doing anything, you have to practice. Practice will not only improve whatever you’re doing, it will also build your self esteem and confidence.
A good friend of mine started trading stocks as a way to enhance her income. Her first few trades were disasters, but she kept reading, studying and learning and practicing. Gradually, her trades became consistently profitable and she was able to wipe out the early losses. After months of continuing to practice she has become very adept at spotting stocks that are about to move up in value, watching them grow and then selling them for a profit. Although trading stocks is not my cup of tea, it has been encouraging to watch her learn and grow in an area of expertise where I am at best a novice. It is a testimony to the value of practice.
If there is an area of life in which you are struggling or unsure of what to do, look at it the way a coach would look at a team with a losing record. Would the coach just throw up his or her hands and say, “We’re losers!” Of course not! The coach would analyze everything the team is doing to find its weaknesses. Then when it hits the practice field he or she would drill the players over and over on the weak areas where they need to improve. A good coach knows that it’s much easier to beat a team of stars with a few weaknesses than it is to beat a solid team of average players with no identifiable weaknesses.
Here’s a tip! To improve your finances, start by identifying your weaknesses. Do you spend too frivolously? Are you prone to making impulse purchases, often charging them? Do you have a difficult time saving, even if you have the money to do so? Do you let others influence what you buy? Are you earning as much as you are capable of earning? Is there something you could do that would enhance your earnings? Honest answers to these and other similar questions will help you discover your weaknesses.
Once you identify your weaknesses, pick out the biggest one and work on it first; you can’t fix everything at once. Identify one or two things you could do to strengthen the weakness and start practicing them. Tackle the problem with a vengeance and concentrate on it until you conquer it before moving on to the next one. Correcting financial weaknesses is hard, so don’t expect instant results. Just as a losing team doesn’t become a winner with one or two practices, you won’t improve your financial picture by making changes for a day or two. You have to practice and practice and practice if you expect to make meaningful improvements.
» Filed Under Success Tips Articles
Comments
Leave a Reply