What is the beautiful work of a certified life planner?

As financial philosophers, we look at the remaining years of our lives and ask – what would be a life of most significance? We plan that.

We consider all of us – it’s called the whole person paradigm. Financially we need enough for basic needs to be met – physically, mentally, and emotionally. We live to meet our soul desires –to know ourselves, find our tribe, and contribute in our own way through some form of collaboration to evolve humanity. To make the world better for us having lived.

We need a strategy this year, next year, and so on and so forth, with some contingency plans for what life can throw at us – preparation for things beyond our control. Examples of misfortune, incapacity, and death. What is within our control is the decisions we make, day by day.

We make a deep enquiry into knowing ourselves. We discover what we are good at, what we love to do, and what the world needs and will pay us for. We know this to be an optimum strategy for leveraging economic opportunities, year by year, to create a sustainable livelihood.

We deliberately choose to correct our path each and every day – and follow our path of purpose. We live on purpose.

The financial part is our life of significance has a price we must pay – a liability. Our economic endeavour, our great work, must generate an asset to match this liability. Our strategy must include a business plan – for the business of you. The business plan must leverage our productive assets to create the requisite financial assets to meet future financial liabilities.

Our life strategy must also invest in vitality assets to live a longer, healthier life.

Our life strategy must also invest in transformational assets to make us resilient to what life might throw at us beyond our control, reducing our risk of failure.

We create a lifetime financial forecast. Basic expenses to meet our basic needs and lifestyle expenses to meet our soul desires. The income from our sustainable livelihood. Our assets and debts. Each we plan to live our life of significance longer and better without outliving our capital. Where there is a risk of a cashflow shortfall, we plan to increase income and reduce expenditure; for the net-worth shortfall, we plan to create assets and reduce debts.

Where there is a surplus, we plan our legacy.

We generate asset strategies to overcome obstacles.

We look at best-case and worst-case scenarios.

We look at short-term and long-term goals.

We explore alternative futures with what-if scenarios and choose our favourite future, beginning with our next chapter. We have a continuous conversation with ourselves – and re-adjust our course.

Every year of our life, we strive for significance. We do not prioritise our future selves against our present self or vice versa. We understand that we must have meaningful projects every year and always live as if our most significant achievement lies ahead of us. We don’t sacrifice the significance of our lives today to cruise in a life of comfort tomorrow, nor do we seek to cruise in a life of comfort today at the expense of our future selves.

Though this asset alchemy resembles a holistic accountant’s work, we call it advice-only financial planning. This strategy is not financial planning as you may have become accustomed to knowing it – this is a life strategy. A theory that acts as a guiding principle for behaviour. A philosophy.

If you would like to learn our life planning process so that you can help others live their life of significance, contact us for details.