What's holding you back?

To set the scene, I am listening to the waves roll into the beach at the beautiful South Australian seaside town of Port Elliot. My wife, Kelly and our two little people are over here on a family holiday, time that we genuinely appreciate and cherish.

Holiday’s...... don’t we all love them! For me, one of the many thing’s holidays provide is time, time with my family, time to relax, time for me and above all else time to think.

Thinking time is such an important part of life as we can easily get swept up in our daily hustle and can become too tired to really think. Without thinking time, we can lose sight of what really matters or even worse we drift along without the confidence or clarity to make good meaningful decisions.

For me, I started thinking about the last 12 months as it was just over a year to the day that upon embarking on a family holiday, we had a serious car accident. We were so very lucky that all four of us walked out of the car with no physical injuries and for as long as I live, I will be forever grateful for that.

Upon reflection, the car accident has in many ways defined the last 12 months, some things positively but also some things for the worse. 

What has become clear to me is that car accident belted my confidence, to the tune of Mohammed Ali’s knockout of George Foreman in 1974 and it hasn’t yet fully picked itself up off the canvas.

Now fortunately, life has continued in a positive manner which again I am very grateful for, however for me the decision-making process has been cloudier than normal as my lowered confidence has caused some self-doubt and second guessing (two things that I have never really experienced). So the question I have asked myself is, what’s holding you back?

Having time to think about this question has been wonderful, as I simply couldn’t find an answer and was able to dismiss those ‘reasons’ we all seem to find when we procrastinate. In keeping things simple, there is nothing in my way nor is there anything holding me back. Time to get busy living! 

At this point, you may be wondering why am I sharing this with you? Well the short of it is, throughout my professional life I have shared many moments with people where there is something standing in their way and holding them back from making clear life and financial decisions.

By decisions, I am not referencing those big life changing decisions but often it is those small decisions that we procrastinate on, for example, should I start putting more money into super? Should I start paying off more debt? In reality, these are pretty easy straight forward decisions however when you feel either consciously or sub-consciously, there is a barrier in front of you, our default position as humans is to keep in our comfort zone and do nothing.

Again, I appreciate that as you are reading this the decision-making process will feel as though it’s not that hard, however procrastination is like the devil, it will keep chipping away at you. To help overcome this, start with writing a few of the key decisions you need to make down, prioritise those and then make a conscious decision to resolve one of them. You will feel better for making the effort and above all else reward yourself for making some progress.

In conclusion, the question I would pose is, what’s holding you back?

My advice is, give yourself some time, time to reflect and time to think with a purpose of getting a clear headspace so that you can make those pressing life and financial decisions. Then, take action (ie. stop procrastinating) with the appropriate amount of confidence and clarity to ensure that you again have control of the steering wheel and too can get busy living!