Money Obedience

When we decided to write this personal finance blog, my wife and I wanted to use this blog for our own benefit to some extent. We want to explore how our financial choices impact our overall well-being.

I actually think that many blogs are partially written for the benefit of the writer. I read to a number of bloggers who track their success with their own personal finances by keeping their struggles and successes public. This makes them more accountable since they have readers watching over their shoulders. It seems like this strategy works pretty well. In the course of their public account they probably also give some of their readers an incentive to get their finances in better order. So, we hope that we will be as successful in exploring the connection between happiness and our financial choices and in stimulating our readers to think about this ultimate goal, too – what really makes you happy in the long run?

Now, today I was wondering whether our mission for our blog was still a viable idea after I read the article “Happy Despite It All? Thank Your Friends, Study Shows”. This article refers to a long-term study that shows that happy friends make you happy, too. Maybe we do not need to focus on how our financial choices make us feel better. Maybe we should focus on how we can make friends with happy people instead. For example they noted that someone is 5.6% happier if the friends of their friends are happy, while gaining $5000 makes someone only 2% happier!

Well, for all we know, maybe happy people have their personal finances in good order. I cannot cite a study that proves that. (Maybe we should commission one.) But people who stay up at night worrying about their finances are probably not happy during the day. Okay, then, I think we should stick with the mission for our blog. After all, the article also says that happy people cluster together, i.e., happy people attract other happy people. As long as we focus on how our financial choices impact our overall well-being, our readers may be inclined to do likewise. And right there, we would have a cluster of other happy people in our social network. Welcome to the club!