When I first started receiving an allowance, I did what any kid in my shoes would have done…I stole my brothers old velcro neon yellow wallet, and from then on I would walk around with my wallet just like I had seen my dad and brothers do. A wallet was like magic, you open it up and money comes out. “I’m a big kid now,” I thought to myself.

I went everywhere with my wallet, but I soon came to realize that my wallet was always empty. A couple years later, in an effort to make extra money, I began helping with my brother’s lawn business; but my problem remained…I never had any money for what I wanted and I was always broke. This especially hurt because I was now doing hard work with my brothers instead of the little made up chores my parents would pay me for to rationalize my “allowance.”

“I’m broke” is a funny thing for a 10 year old to say, and even though I still had full access to the ATM (Bank of Mom and Dad), I cherished being able to say that I bought stuff with my own money, so I had to figure out the problem. I remember looking around at all the stuff in my room and figuring out where all of my hard earned money went. I saw tons of crappy toys that I never played with, a pair of really cool sunglasses that I could never wear because I wore regular glasses, and a bunch of baseball cards in drawers. I realized that I had spent money on a ton of stuff that I never used and/or didn’t even like, and to make matters more ironic, I had bought most of it on impulse because I had my wallet with me and thought “Why not?”

After I came to this childish epiphany I began saving by hiding money around my room. Before I knew it, I had enough money to buy the new baseball glove I wanted, and when my parents realized I had started saving, they took me to the bank to open a savings account.

As children it’s easy to realize why we save. We set our savings goals for the short term in the form of the items we want. We save up, get our new toy, and set our eyes on the next savings goal, but as with everything in life, our perspective changes as we grow older.

I went a long time just making deposits to that savings account, in fact even at 16, when I finally did touch it, I managed to not waste all of it lifting my Jeep (OK, I did waste most of it). Soon after spending way too much money on my Jeep, I set my sights on homeownership. And for the next 6+ years I saved and invested with this end goal in mind; then when Mary and I got married, our combined savings allowed us to realize this goal.

As we grow older our financial goals change from being weeks away, to months away, to years away, to decades away. And now as I write this, financial goals are harder than ever to define. For us, goals are no longer defined by material things like a car or a house, but they are defined by ideals and the dreams of another generation that wanted to escape the workforce all together. Now these dreams that once seemed so defined are now obscure words that mean different things to different people. Words like entrepreneur, travel, and retirement.

To you retirement may mean leaving the workforce all together and escaping to some exotic beach. To me that sounds like an empty world of boredom because I don’t plan to retire in the traditional sense. I want to be just like my 89 year old grandfather who is still a highly sought after consultant; he doesn’t need to work but chooses to, and thus he remains the smartest and most quick witted person I know.

Saving without having an understanding of what you are saving for makes saving that much harder. You say you are saving for retirement but what does that mean to you? How much will it cost to live the lifestyle that you want for the number of years that you want? You want to start your own business? Awesome! How much does it cost to be an entrepreneur? You want to be able to drop everything and travel the world? How much will it cost, where will you go, what will you do? And most importantly, how long do you need to save to achieve your version of these goals?

Going through a series of questions like these either by yourself or with your spouse may be the most important time investment you make. Doing this allows you to define your goals and have a true understanding of why you save the way you do. Maybe you’ll find that in order to finance your goals you won’t need as much money as you thought so you can cut back on saving, or maybe you want to keep the same pace to achieve those goals earlier. Regardless, having a name to every dollar you save makes saving that much easier because it gives you a defined end goal.

Why do you save?

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The business students look at the Liberal Arts majors and think “What in the Hell are they going to do when they graduate? How will they support themselves? Maybe they will just disappear to the shores of Walden Pond…”

Excuse me if I’m wrong, I was always on the business students side, but those studying Liberal Arts look at the business students and think “All their work is so easy! I’m not in school to get a training, I’m here to get an education!”

To be fair, everyone seems to respect the Science and Engineering majors.

In college I was a member of the University Honors Program, which essentially meant that I (and 30-ish other students) took different core curriculum than the rest of the students.  And then we would have to write a thesis in order to graduate with an undergrad degree (something the rest of the University didn’t have to do).  I was also a business student (after spending 3 semesters in Film School) and I graduated with a degree in Finance and Entrepreneurship.

With that said, I absolutely hated the Honors program.  I hated it so much that I went in to the director of the program to ask out of it, he said I could, but that I would have to retake all of the basic University core.  I wasn’t about to take any extra classes, so out of laziness I stayed in. 

I stayed in through Faust, Dante, Sophocles, Plato, Aristotle, Friedman, Darwin, Dawkins, Antigone, and the list goes on…and on… and on.  I hated every minute of it.  I was writing 20 page papers while my other friends were writing 2 paragraph summaries.  As a result of my being discouraged and feeling stuck I was one of 3 or 4 underacheivers in the whole group, I was also the first to realize that like a Harvard student, you can’t fail out.  B- was the lowest grade I could be given which was to the detriment of my GPA.

Looking back on my years in college I have to say that I am thankful for the training I received in my business classes, but I am more thankful for the education I received through the Liberal Arts focused honors program.  Because of the Honors program I am more diversified.  I am able to hold high level conversations with my elders, drop jokes that only a handful of people in the room get, and I’m better at working with people who think differently than I do (or is it that they think along the norm and I think differently?).  Also, because of my film classes I am able to better relate to movies other generations grew up with, the classics that I’d be willing to bet most of Gen-Y hasn’t seen.

One of the best things we can do to improve our lives and our business relationships is to diversify and further educate ourselves outside of what we normally find interesting. Through continuing education and diversifying our lives we become more interesting people and we are able to speak and network with more interesting people.  You’ll be shocked to know how much diversifying your knowledge will help you network and relate to other people.

I hated every minute of my liberal arts education in the honors program, I was surrounded by people who I knew wouldn’t make any money, but I am extremely thankful that I finished the program, and most of my friends from the program are on their way to making good money.

Take a class at a community college, pick up an old classic that you read in High School and have since forgotten, watch Casablanca or Gone With The Wind.   My next step is to learn more about my worst subjects in school: Biology.  Diversify your life.

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