By: Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robin
When this book first came onto my radar as a book I might like to read, it was with reviews from my fellow personal finance bloggers that described it as one that will change your life, and that will make your finances follow you rather than the other way around. Both of those descriptions are pretty accurate.
For someone like myself, who’s been writing on personal finance for over 5 years (Beating Broke turns 4 next month!), I’ve seen just about every bit of advice and every bit of financial knowledge that there is out there. Or, at least I think I have. Then something like this book comes along and puts it all together in a different way, or expresses it in a slightly different way, and I learn something new.
So, here’s the short review. If you find yourself struggling with your money, and with how your money and your life can meet, this is most certainly a book for you. It’s not your typical personal finance book that’s going to tell you how to balance your checkbook, what to spend on (and what not to), or anything of the sort. What it is going to do is give you the tools to tracking what you’re spending your money on and then coming to terms with whether those spending habits are habits that are putting you on a track towards a much more fulfilled life. They go a bit further than that, and get into how you can take your reformed spending habits, track them, and then turn your life into something that you want it to be, that uses money as a tool to further your life-long goals rather than postpone them.
It’s not just a book for those that are struggling with money, either. I found several small things that I’ll be working on implementing over the next few months that I hope will bring my finances into further alignment with goals and ambitions that have little to do with work, or money.
Have you read it? What was your reaction? Did you follow it’s steps, and how did they help (or not) you?