1. Live like we mean it today.
This may seem counter-intuitive, but it’s not. Jesus told a great story about a man who spent every waking hour accumulating things for the future and building increasingly bigger sheds to put it all in. Unfortunately, he never got to see ’20 years into the future.’ If we’re careful to live like we mean it today, then we’re building a solid foundation for years.
2. Practice balance.
Wisdom is not having to go to the store for milk right before breakfast. Living like we mean it today includes appropriate planning for tomorrow. Today balanced with tomorrow, family relationships balanced against making a living. Find that balance because it won’t find you.
3. Spend less than you earn—every month.
This is a simple guideline with complex repercussions. Digging out of debt is like building a wall with dry sand—more than half of each shovel load comes right back down. First, stabilize your spending. Second, pay off the debt. Remember that you will pay more interest on your debt than you can earn from your savings. Now you can build for the future.
4. Invest yourself in your children.
Here’s the math (don’t worry, it’s fairly painless!). Parental neglect to your five-year-old + a couple of years = 40% of the child’s life. But if you turn things around now, by the time he’s ten you’ll have been the world’s best dad forever. The more years we let slip away, the deeper in the hole relationships become. It is like negative interest compounded daily. Simply put, today is the right time to be a great dad. You’ll have that investment 20 years down the road and in spades.
5. Make the tough choices today.
– Don’t say, “I’ll spend time with my kids next year…,” invest in family time today.
– Don’t deal with your distant relationship with your wife “once we’ve got the kids settled in school…,” face the music before the damage solidifies.
– Don’t say, “we’ll take care of us, the budget or our priorities after the kids go to college…,” bite the bullet now.
