How Can I Review My Financial Goals for the Rest of the Year?

Ralph00:00:00

You set those ambitious financial goals early in the year, but now we're past the halfway point and you start asking yourself, Ralph, am I truly on track?Well, what if I told you a simple mid year review could refocus your efforts and ensure that you hit your targets with confidence and hey, no more stress. Well, stick with me today because today I'm going to show you exactly how to make that happen.This is Financially Confident Christian, your daily dose of gospel grounded insight and faith driven tips to help you break the cycle of financial shame with confidence. Hello there and welcome back to Financially Confident Christian. I'm Ralph and we're in our series Smart Money for Back to School and Beyond.Now today we're going to talk about how to review for financial goals before the year ends. You know, you set those goals back in January, but if you're like most of us, life happens.RalphYou made great plans, you had great ideas, but then, hey, like most of us, life got in the way. And maybe right now you're starting to feel that loss of momentum.You feel like you've lost track of where you were going and maybe that frustration starting to build back in and you feel like you're kind of drifting and maybe, just maybe even you're feeling like you're under a little more stress than you thought you would be. See, the problem is your good intentions. They were great at the start. You had every intention of making wise decisions.You had every intention of doing the right things. But good intentions, as I see on the show all the time, don't always turn into consistent action.And here's the thing you got to understand, most people don't get this. It's great to set goals. Goals are, hey, listen, goals are something that I live by. They're living roadmaps that are great to set up.But here's the thing. You got to understand, they're not set to set it and forget it. They're just not. They're living roadmaps.Hey, you know, a lot of maps we use to get from point A to point B, those aren't changing. But here's one of the things I do recognize. I was out driving this weekend in the car and here in Delaware, it was like the perfect storm of traffic.We had the big NASCAR race in Dover, Delaware. We had the state fair. And on the weekends during the summer, there's a lot of people that are traveling to the beach.Well, if I had just assumed, hey, I've got a roadmap, here's what I'm going to drive. I would have been in trouble because, listen, the roads were a disaster. But I use an apple. My phone called Waze and I highly recommend it.I'm not a supporter. I'm not. You're not going to earn a commission from getting that from me.But listen, the whole point of that is, yes, I had a goal to get from point A to point B, but without that app, I wouldn't have known about this big traffic jam here. Goals are the same way. I can't just set it and forget it.Let's talk about some biblical anchors to this, because I think this is so important that we get into this. The first one is diligence. And listen, I use this verse on the show all the time.It comes from Proverbs 21:5, and you could probably know this one by heart, because it's all about planning. The plans of the diligent lead surely to abundance, but everyone who is hasty comes only to poverty.Let's put that in context of these goals that we set. Maybe we did a great job of setting those, and at the beginning of the year goals, we, we created those, those New Year's resolutions.But if you're like me, the New Year's resolutions usually don't last maybe through a week or two into the new year. But you set those goals, but it's all about keeping those plans going. Let's look at the idea of vision. This is right in the book of Proverbs as well.This is in, in chapter 29, verse 18, and it says this. Where there is no prophetic vision, the people cast off restraint. But blessed is he who keeps the law. Now, listen, goals are not really a law.You know, it's not these things cast into stone. You know, picture somebody there with a chisel and pounding these things in there. But the whole point of what the scripture is telling this is this.Keep those restraints in place. Keep those goals in mind. And now that we're in the middle of the year, it's time to start thinking about where are we at with those goals?Which leads me exactly to the third level of biblical stewardship I'm talking about today, and that's accountability. And this one comes to us from First Corinthians, chapter 4, verse 2, and it says this.Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful. I don't know about you, but that really addresses the issue, and that's accountability. You set those goals.It's not time to just abandon, say, well, you know, I set those goals at the beginning of the year. Ralph but hey, everything has gone haywire. Yes, life happens. Life happens to all of us.But now you're sitting there thinking, well, what can I do, Ralph, to keep moving forward with those goals and make sure that I'm still getting to that place I wanted to get to? Well, I've got a simple solution for you and that is schedule a mid year financial goal review.Listen, you can't just hope that you're going to make progress. Hope is great. Hope is a wonderful thing. I talk about the idea of hope as in a religious context here on the show all the time.But hope doesn't make things happen.You've got to really look at your progress, check your progress and that adjust because you can create space for clarity and you can create space, space for course correction. Hey, and sometimes even the best of us, that's what I do for a living. Sometimes I've got to make a course correction.So here's your one action step for today with the goal of making a mid year financial checkup. And I'm going to encourage you to do this. Put this on the calendar every single year.Just schedule 20 or 30 minutes and do it this week to really go back and look at your goals for 20, 25 and say, hey, where am I with these goals? Maybe you had a goal to get out of debt. Assess where you are with that.Maybe you had a goal to put more money into your intentional savings plan, that emergency savings plan. Where are you with that? Maybe you're launching a small side hustle to bring in extra money. Assess where you are with that.Put together, you know, this 20 or 30 minutes and really understand where you are with your goals. And I'm hoping they're written.But look at your recent spending and look at your tracking formation and see, you know, how close are you to getting to those goals. And ask yourself some really tough questions. You've got to be honest with yourself.Hey, listen, if you're not honest with yourself, you're never going to get anywhere. It's that accountability fact. So ask yourself this, hey, am I on track?Let's just say, for example, you wanted to create that emergency fund that you make sure you had about $2,000 in your emergency fund by the end of the year. Well, if we're halfway through, ask yourself a real tough question. Am I at a thousand dollars? Am I getting there?Maybe you're ahead, maybe you're a little bit behind and that those questions are all positive questions. But then the bigger question you need to ask yourself is why?See, that's where the, that's where the real value is in this, this assessment of where you are. Start to ask yourself, hey, why am I where I am? Maybe something happened. Maybe you had that unexpected repair.Hey, that's the whole point of the emergency fund in the first place. But really assess why you are where you are. And maybe look at two or three, you know, key spending categories.Look for things that we talk about on the show, like that lifestyle creepy. Hey, we talked about that creep, kick him out of the house. But no, I'm serious about this now.But talk about, you know, what are those lifestyle creep things? Maybe you're eating out more, maybe you're spending more on entertainment than you expected.Hey, maybe just the fact of the matter is your grocery bill is more expensive. Maybe you need to go visit that idea of planning your meals and building that grocery list before you get to the end of the year.And you know, you know, because now we're mid year through this, you can make some adjustments, which is the whole point of the last piece of this puzzle is make those adjustments. Maybe you don't adjust everything, but just maybe increase your savings. Maybe this is a time to reduce some of those non exp, non essential expenses.Or maybe it's time to revise a deadline. Maybe you set a deadline for yourself. Hey, I want to have that emergency fund of $2,000 by the end of the year.But you're like, you know what, Ralph, I'm not going to make it. But here's what I can do. I can add an extra 50amonth.Yeah, that might not put me at that 22,000 by the end of the year, but at least I'm making progress. I'm building at momentum. And that's the whole thing. The big key takeaway from today is are you building that momentum?Are you still working towards those goals? And hey, you know, sometimes this is a, it's a brutal truth. Sometimes you may have set goals.You're like, Ralph, those goals just aren't relevant anymore. Maybe it's time to set some new goals. Well, how about we pray together?Father God, we just thank you for your wisdom, Lord, and we thank you for giving us vision. And Lord, we confess that we often drift financially and it's so easy for us to lose focus, Lord.So we would just ask that you would grant us clarity, Lord, as we review our goals this mid year, Lord, help us to assess this honestly, Lord, and help us to adjust diligently to really fulfill our purpose that you have for us. And may our efforts align with your will, Lord, bringing you glory and peace. And we ask this in Jesus name. Amen.Listen, regular reviews like I talked about on that trip are like a roadmap. They're a roadmap to peace and they're a roadmap to progress. But sometimes you've got to make some adjustments.So I'm going to encourage you again today, take your mid year check in seriously and then adjust and move forward. Another thing I want to ask you to do seriously is share this episode with someone who needs encouragement.You may know someone in your, in your life who's really struggling financially and maybe you're getting a lot of value from the show and you can just share our website with them that's financially confident Christian. You can send them an email or send them a text and just say, hey, I know you're struggling right now financially.You've told me about the struggles you're having. I listen to this daily show. It's usually about less than 10 minutes, but would really be impactful to your life.And hey, that'll help grow the impact of the show. And you can do it. You can have an impact on someone else's life.Now tomorrow we're going to talk about how to wisely plan for college or higher education cost. We're going to start small, but we're going to think big for the future generations.So as I close today, let's all go out there and be financially confident Christians. You can do this. I have confidence in you, have confidence in yourself, stay financially savvy, God bless you and you have a great day.