144 | Competing Desires

Lawyers often have multiple things they want competing for their financial resources.

But we sometimes forget that we always have the power to intentionally decide which things to focus on.

Many people allow their unintentional desires to direct the way they use their money, which leads them to not make the progress they want to make financially.

In this episode, let’s talk about how to manage your competing desires, including questioning your default thoughts and intentionally directing your desires to the things that serve you most.

• when lawyers want multiple things, including financial goals, that compete for their financial resources
• the key thing to remember about the things you want
• how most people typically handle their desires
• how to approach your desires instead
• client examples of navigating multiple desires
• an important question to ask yourself about the things you want
• a personal example of handling competing desires
• how to think about your competing desires

Episode 34: “I Work Hard. I Deserve It.”

If you’re ready to learn the mindset and strategies to master your money, let’s schedule a call.

You’re listening to Wealthyesque. We are a community of lawyers who believe that true wealth is having control of our time. I’m Rho Thomas, and as a busy wife, mom and former Biglaw associate, I know all too well the tension between the culture of the legal profession and pretty much everything else you want to do in life. That’s why each week, I’m bringing you the information and tools you need to improve your money mindset and manage your money to create true wealth. Because ultimately, it’s not about the money. It’s about the freedom and flexibility the money affords.

Hey friend. Welcome back to the show. I hope you’re doing well and having an amazing day so far. Today we are talking about your competing desires. Often lawyers have a few different things that they want that are competing for their financial resources. So on one hand, maybe you want to continue living lifestyle you’re living or maybe you want to start doing the next things that you quote deserve. Which was as getting a nicer apartment or house or a nicer car, kind of those next level things that we sometimes perceive as better than the things that we already have is that I work hard I deserve it mentality that we talked about before. But at the same time, you want to save money, you want to pay off debt. You want to manage your money better and know where money’s going and stop feeling stressed. So you have competing desires. But here’s the thing about competing desires. You get to intentionally decide what you’re going to focus on. You can want more than one thing and decide to pursue only one of those things at a time. constraint in that way will actually help you achieve all the things you want to achieve faster. What we tend to do is we let our default thoughts on the show, and we just go with them. So I wanna buy this thing now. I don’t want to wait. I have to live. Tomorrow isn’t promised YOLO right all that kind of stuff. And we don’t question any of it. We don’t think about alternatives. We don’t consider how we could do the thing we want to do or buy the thing we want to buy in a strategic way that doesn’t take us off track from our goals. We just go with it. Instead you want to approach your competing desires with intention, intentionally directing yourself intentionally directing the way you think intentionally directing your desires to the things that move you where you want to go. It’s like yes, I desire this thing. But I desire to save more. I desire to pay off debt more. I desire to have money in my account more. I desire to be financially free more and I’m willing to put off this thing for now to be able to make the progress that I want to make with my finances and get myself to the strong financial position I want to be in many of us are not directing ourselves in that way. And a few recent examples come to mind here with some of my clients where there were things they wanted that maybe weren’t the best strategically for their finances at that time, but they did them anyway and it took them off track of where they want to be financially or it just didn’t allow them to get to where you want to be financially. The first example is a couple who was living in an apartment that was more expensive than what I would recommend. I typically recommend that you not have more than 25% of your income as in the amount of money that you actually get deposited in your bank account each month. But no more than 25% of that goes into your rent or your mortgage. And it doesn’t have to be exactly 25% is just a guideline. But when you get too far above that and you have a huge chunk of your income go into this one fixed bill. You don’t have the money available for other things that you’re responsible for and for things that you want to do and for your goals. These clients had an apartment that was about 40% of their income. And then on top of that there were a few other areas where they had a lot of money coming out like minimum debt payments and restaurants and stuff like that. And to be fair, they made quite a few tweaks in their finances and made good progress towards getting the finances where they wanted them to be. But they weren’t making as much progress as they wanted to make. And it got to the point where they have made all the tweaks in other areas that they were willing to make. And the most obvious remaining area that could be changed was the apartment. We had a few conversations about alternatives like renting out one of the rooms moving to a cheaper apartment in the area they live in moving to a cheaper area a little further out because they were like right downtown. And every alternative we looked at there was pushback for why that can’t happen, or they weren’t willing to do that thing. They had these competing desires between the apartment they were living in and the financial goals they have and ultimately it comes down to which do you want most? Do you want to continue to live in this place? That’s kind of expensive for where you are financially? Or do you want to achieve the things you’re telling me you want to achieve with your finances. Another example is another couple who was in a life transition and he wanted to get some new furniture for their home, but they didn’t necessarily need the new furniture right then they could make do with what they already had because they already had furniture but it would have been nice to get the new furniture that they were looking at. So they were in a position of building up their checking account buffer and they were about to start saving and about to take off with the financial plan that we had laid out. But they decided to go and get this furniture one month and they hadn’t planned to get the furniture wasn’t part of their budget for that month. And it kind of took them off track. After buying the furniture they no longer had the buffer in their account and they had to start over with building that back up. And I mean this kind of thing happens which is why I work with my clients for six months because you’ll be moving forward and you’re on this upward trajectory and it’s working and you feeling good. And then you do something that kind of takes you a step back. And it’s because you’re straddling the line of the person you were before and the way you manage your money before and the new person you’re becoming in the new way. You’re managing your money. You’re just not fully to the other side of this person that you’re becoming yet and that’s okay. But anyway, in both of these instances, it was a matter of competing desires. I want to improve my finances, but I also want to live in this place. I want to improve my finances, but I also want to buy new furniture for my house. And again, when you have these competing desires, it’s a matter of deciding which one you want more. It’s a choice that you make. Many of us make that choice unintentionally and we don’t think about the trade off that we’re making with our money when we make the choice. Like I was telling my clients with the furniture I completely understand wanting to set up your house nicely and have the things that you want to have or even things you’ll need later but don’t need right now. But you can know that you want to do this thing and put it off for now. Put it off, you know, put it on the backburner until you can fit it in your plan so that it doesn’t take you off track from where you want to be financially. I was telling them the story of my own furniture in my own house where my husband and I had the competing desires and really wasn’t like I had the competing desires to buy nice furniture and set our house up the way we want and to get out of debt and be able to live the way we want it to without money being a major consideration for us. So we’ve been in our house for six years now. And we’ve just in the last year or so been purchasing new furniture pieces and replacing furniture we’ve had since law school and med school. We bought new things here and there especially when our kids were born and as they outgrew their cribs and stuff like that, but in terms of things it would just be nice to have a nicer version of we put those things off because it wasn’t something we had to do right then. And the goal of financial freedom was more important to us. And now being in a position where I could walk away from a big law job and pursue my business right, which lights me up more and where my husband can walk away from his job if he decides it’s not for him anymore, and we know we’ll be fine. I don’t care that we didn’t get a new dining table or a new living room set six years ago versus now. Can you put off the things that you want right now? Hold that desire that you have for this thing that you want? Put it on the backburner to pursue your goal of paying off debt or saving or financial freedom or whatever it is for you? Can you let your goal be in the forefront and let the pursuit of that goal direct all the things that you choose to do? I’m not saying and I’ve said this many times, but I’m not saying that you have to just sit in a house in the middle of nowhere with no furniture and not spend any money and not do anything, any of the things that you want to do until you get your finances in order. What I am saying though, is can you delay that gratification of getting the thing you want in the short term to get to your financial goal in the long term? Or even if you decide to get this thing you want? Can you do it strategically with your ultimate financial goal in mind, because once you get your finances in order and you know how to manage your money, you know how to do that. For the rest of your life. And you’re able to do the other things that you want to do from a place of strength, right from a place of being stronger financially a stronger financial foundation. I don’t think I’m articulating it very well by basically Can you wait to get the things that you want right now until you get yourself to a position where when you get those things it’s not a concern financially. Want you to think about that, when you have these competing desires. You’ve got these things that you want to do or buy or spend money on. But then you also have where you want to be with your finances. Were just more important to you. Is it more important to you to do those other things that fill those other desires first, maybe it is and that’s okay, but be honest with yourself about it. I’m really big on you being honest with yourself and not lying to yourself about how much you really want to get out of debt or save money or be financially free or build wealth or whatever else because if you really want to spend and do all that other stuff, that’s fine. But if you really want to get your finances together, you’ve got to manage those competing desires. You’ve got to put those other things on the backburner and intentionally direct yourself to what’s going to move you toward that goal. And again, it doesn’t mean that you always put it on the backburner and you never do those other things. But when you do them, you do them in a strategic way that doesn’t take you off track from your goals. So those are my thoughts on competing desires. It’s an important concept to consider because there will always be something that comes up that you could be spending money on that could take you away from the goals you have for your finances. And listen, I will help you manage your competing desires and make those determinations of what’s important to you. And I’ll help you think about the trade offs you’re making with your money every day. So set up a consultation and let’s talk rho thomas.com/call. All right, that is it for this week’s episode. Come connect with me on social media. You can find me on LinkedIn rho Thomas and Instagram at I am rho Thomas. Subscribe to the show and leave a review both of which help more people to find it and please think of a friend or two who use this information and share the episode with them as we close out friend I pray that you take the information you learn here, apply it in your life and open up to the realization that wealth is available to you. As you do that consistently. Week after week. You’ll continue to take steps to regain control of your time, build wealth and live a life of freedom and choice you deserve. Talk to you later.