January 2025
Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about purpose. I’m sure that, given the title of this post (and of my book), you will be shocked to hear that. But January is that one sweet spot where the rest of the world seems to be thinking about purpose and intentionality, too. And that can create some magic opportunities to spark ideas, generate change, and make a difference.
Business as usual vs Business on Purpose
When we think about entrepreneurs and business owners, a few words come to mind almost universally: Driven, motivated, dedicated. But if we think about it a bit harder, those words tend to morph into one of two directions. One the one side, we see burnout, 24/7, always on. On the other, we see success, the American dream, being your own boss, balance. So the million-dollar question is: What determines which path you take?
The answer is, of course, PURPOSE. But maybe not the way you think.
Most of the time, when entrepreneurs think about goals and purpose and mission, they think only about the business. But I challenge business owners to think about your purpose as a person… and where your business fits in with that. Most of us started a business for a reason, even if we didn’t do so consciously at the time. So the challenge now is to step back and think about how your company fits into your broader purpose. There are very few things I can guarantee as a financial planner, but I can close to guarantee that this shift in thinking will help you end up on the high road for entrepreneurs.
I wrote about this more extensively here.
Flip the script on challenges
I was reading about New Year’s resolutions recently and discovered someone who resolved to try a new type of pasta every week in the year ahead. Someone else vowed to give at least one compliment every day. Every time these people shared their resolutions with others, they were received with shock. We have become so engrained to think about resolutions as a negative thing.
The same goes for conflict. At its heart, conflict is just two things that don’t align.
One of the core definitions of a conflict is a situation where two things are very different. Of course, the situation can evolve into other definitions of conflict, such as protracted arguments or even war. Researchers often call this high conflict.
But normal conflict can be pretty healthy. In fact, you could look at conflict like a New Year’s resolution—you can turn it into an opportunity for something amazing. Nowhere is this more true than when it comes to money and our relationships.
I find (healthy) conflict to be one of the best ways for couples to learn and grow together… since a working understanding of how you relate to money as a couple and where your ideas and plans, dare we say, conflict, can be critical to a relationship’s success. I’ve been sharing some additional tips on this front, including how I approach this in my marriage, on social media—so make sure you’re following those accounts if you aren’t already!
The best music is on purpose
As promised, I posted my top 5 albums of 2024 on January 1st, with a special shout out to the fifth album on the list, which is sure to be one of my favorite albums of this year and many years to come.
You can read the full recap here.
My band, Stone Arch Rivals, will be rolling out our first singles in the months ahead with a full album release expected this summer. And I want to pause for a moment to reflect on the purpose of it all. Because in a lot of ways, embracing that music is part of my purpose last year led me to embrace other things that I’d been keeping at arms length.
For instance, I knew my purpose was to help folks build more purposeful relationships with money—which manifests in myriad ways. And I did that by building a business, something I’m incredibly passionate about, as the son of an entrepreneur. But it took really embracing my purpose with music to realize a bigger part of my reason for being is to talk about purpose at a larger scale… and specifically, to do that with business owners. To build something for entrepreneurs to help them make what is undoubtedly one of the hardest things—building a business—manageable.
Purpose Can Be Easy
I talk a lot about doing the work around purpose. For example, writing a mission statement requires thought and shouldn’t be done haphazardly. But in the same way, resolutions don’t have to be hard, and conflict doesn’t have to be an argument… purpose doesn’t always require work. There are moments when your purpose just comes to you—when you see a woman in a Montana airport and know that loving her is part of your purpose even if you don’t have the words to explain that yet.
And I want to make sure that as we kick 2025 off, we stay open to those moments where purpose is effortless and obvious. Because the work (like the marriage and two kids (the oldest of whom just turned 7 – geez!) will come… but those moments in airports are just as important.
And I wish many of those moments for you this year.
