Why your best is good enough
Created by: Lorie Jones
I decided the other day that I was pretty sure I had a world-class cookie decorator inside of me.
You have all seen the fancy cookies that look like works of art and taste like tiny sugar cookie pieces of heaven. All that stood between me and cookie decorating fame and fortune was any clue how to actually decorate cookies. Luckily, Andi Kirkegaard over at Kirkie Cookies was putting on a Valentine’s decorating class, so I gathered up my friend and immediately signed up. Goodbye Wealth Manager, hello cookie artist.
When I showed up to the 4-hour cookie class, I was greeted with four cooked but undecorated cookies and various tubes of frosting.
“How in the world could this task possibly take four hours?” I wondered. Andi proceeded to guide us through the different techniques of decorating with a running commentary on the chemistry behind her cookie recipe, which basically made my eyes glaze over and left me thinking, “This is probably what people feel like when I start talking about bond yields” which are utterly fascinating to me but downright boring to everyone else I meet.
Over the next several hours I proceed to systematically make every mistake the lovely cookie lady told me not to. One time I even had to use the “shovel of life” to fix something, which is the equivalent of giving up and starting over. It took me four hours to finish four cookies (a fact I mentioned to David no less than nine times before I presented him with them as his Valentine’s gift). Spoiler alert – there is not a cookie Diva waiting to emerge from somewhere deep inside me; I was made for Sharpe ratios and benchmark analysis.
But despite every flaw in my cookies compared to Andi’s masterpieces, mine were good enough. David thought I was a cookie genius and didn’t notice the glaring imperfections.
This brings me back to my one true love—finance.
Often, we meet clients who want to craft the “perfect” financial plan. Nothing but a flawless execution will do. Then, as the realities of life set in and unexpected illness or job loss happens, and their financial plan is no longer the perfection they had envisioned, they are tempted to throw their hands in the air and just give up. They aren’t good at this, so why even try?
That is where we come in. We get out the “shovel of life,” scrape it off, adjust, and try again. We consider contingencies and examine potential future probabilities of unexpected events. Although the final product is never flawless, to others, it looks fantastic. It is dynamic and moves with the client as their circumstances change and unexpected events appear to blindside their best-laid plans.
So, keep trying. Life happens, and we make bad financial choices sometimes.
Come in and let us guide you towards better financial decisions. Your end result will look splendid to everyone else, even if you could point out every single mistake you made. Your best is good enough.
