We can’t predict the future. Oh, some folks claim to know who’ll win the next Super Bowl or which Kardashian will get married and divorced within a 18 hour period but they’re just speculating. Or, as the scientists call it, speaking out of their posteriors. For the most part we don’t know what’s going to happen in the next year, next month, or next few minutes. There’s no doubt an individual can plan out their future somewhat; however, one minor incident can throw it for a giant loop. Yes, even with finances.
As we said — you can’t predict the future, and yet, there are people out there who believe it’s their destiny to be broke forever. How do they get to this point? Some folks connect their potential failures to the way their parents or other people close to them handled money. Others don’t go back to the way their parents handled money. Instead they focus on the more recent past and figure what they did then will continue throughout the rest of their life, to the point they’re still paying credit cards as the dirt is shoveled on their caskets.
Is there a true correlation between past issues with finances and the belief that one’s destiny is to be forever financially strapped? Well, yes and no — it all depends on an individual’s thought process. The ones who believe their future is already set tend to be fatalists … they think the worst-case scenarios and add a dash of fate into the equation. No matter what another person says to these folks, they believe the hand dealt to them is set and finances will never be easy to come by.
Those who answer ‘no’ to the question believe differently. They may have been dealt a bad hand while they grew up — perhaps an abandoned parent or issues with substance abuse — but they feel their fate has yet to be dealt. These are people who examine their spending habits, create a budget and try as hard as they can to make themselves debt free. And while these folks understand something could trip them up, they see a brighter future full of who knows what.
Can a fatalist move toward an optimistic view of freedom with finances? Yes, with a few caveats. First, the individual needs to distance themselves from other fatalists. This doesn’t mean disassociating oneself from a friends or family which think the same way, Instead, it means switching the subject away from money when the topic comes up. Second, the individual needs to take a good look at their finances with an open mind. Going into an examination with the pre-conceived notion that it’s not going to look good will set the individual up for disaster. Should this not be possible, the individual may wish to consult with someone else who can provide both good and bad news on finances and the potential ways of righting their monetary ship.