Guide to the Blog
This post is a roadmap to the blog to help you get started. The blog is divided into 6 primary sections:
FI Top Tens
- I believe that the first key to financial independence (FI) is becoming financially literate. Whether it be medicine, politics, or law, every discipline has its own language, its own jargon. Personal finance is no different. One of the biggest barriers for people in personal finance is just knowing what the heck people are talking about. Most people don’t know the difference between a tax credit vs a tax deduction, a Roth IRA vs traditional IRA, a 401(k) vs 403 (b) vs 457 (b), term life insurance vs whole life insurance, and a bull market vs a bear market. If you don’t have the vocabulary, how can you understand your options and make educated and informed decisions?
- The problem is that most people are never taught personal finance. It is not typically taught in school and unless your parents were financially savvy, it isn’t taught in most homes. Yet, these are terms that are crucial to understanding what happens to your money, which in turn dictates your entire future.
- To help solve this problem and increase financial literacy, I am going to post lists of what I think are the top ten terms for a given area in personal finance. This will include sections on taxes, retirement, insurance, investing, etc. If you want to learn the most important and basic vocabulary of a given area, you can go straight to that list. If you want to become more fluent in all the areas of personal finance, you can review them all. I will also offer some of my own commentary for certain terms, such as for types of retirement acccounts, types of insurance, or types of investments you should consider or avoid, to help steer you in the right direction.
- Gaining financial literacy will help to shift your financial paradigm (the way you view all things personal finance) and will help you work through my next section on the blog, FI Step by Step.
FI Step by Step
- This section of the blog contains my recommended Steps on the Path to FI. I’ve tried to list these steps in an order that would make sense for most people, but of course it won’t apply to everyone, and that’s ok. You may choose to start halfway through my recommended steps, or you may choose to work on multiple steps simultaneously. The important thing is you assess where you are right now, and then start making forward progress.
- One of the key aspects of personal finance is that it is personal. No two paths will be the same. So, take the information I have here as a framework and customize it into a plan that works for you and brings you closer to FI. If you need further explanation on a given subject or have a question, please feel free to send me a personal message or post a comment to the blog and allows other readers try to help explain things further.
FI Topics
- Over the months and years to come, I plan to write multiple posts on various subjects that apply to all relevant areas of personal finance. I will provide links to those posts here based on the category they fall under.
- This section will ultimately include posts on the following topics: debt, retirement, insurance, social security, real estate, investing, traveling, buying a car, buying a house, taxes, and financial philosophies (consumerism, minimalism, FIRE movement, etc.). This list will likely continue to expand over time.
- So, if you find yourself in the middle of some financial task in your life, such as buying a new car or electing what investments to choose in your retirment accounts, you can go straight to that topic and read all the pertinent information I have posted.
FI Favorites
- While I hope you read and absorb everything on my blog, it will not, of course, be a comprehensive source of information on all things personal finance. My goal is to increase your financial literacy which hopefully will serve as a catalyst for you to take control of your own financial destiny on your own path to FI. A huge part of that journey is self education. I have read or listened to hundreds of books, podcasts, blog posts, and websites in order to self educate myself and I continue to do so every day.
- In this section of the blog I will list reviews on some of my favorite sources of financial education. Hopefully this will point you in the right direction as you search for more information. I will include my own summary of what each source provides. I will also share my own opinions on what I think is most valuable as well as areas I may disagree with the author.
My Path to FI
- In order for this blog to be successful, I strongly believe that I need to connect with my readers. If you don’t know who I am and what I’m all about, it is much more difficult to really engage in what I have to say, or to come back wanting to read more.
- Keeping this in mind, I have made the decision to disclose my identity and my own Path to FI. I will write a series of posts detailing the experiences in my life that have lead me up to this point in my own journey with money. In these posts I will pass on lessons I’ve learned that have really helped me along the way, as well as be vulnerable and tell you some of the mistakes I’ve made so hopefully you won’t repeat them.
- After you have read about my journey to this point, you can then follow me on my current Path to FI. I will update you on my progress and share new tips and tricks as they come my way.
Other
- I am creating an “Other” section of the blog as a creative outlet to share posts on other topics that interest me. It will not only give me a forum to express some of my thoughts and opinions on non-financial subjects, but will also help you get to know me a little better.
- Some of these topics will include health and fitness, Crossfit, photography, backpacking, and travel.
Now you are ready to explore the blog. I invite you to jump into whatever section seems most interesting or beneficial to you. If you aren’t sure where to go next, may I suggest you go to the My Path to FI tab and read both the About Me post and Why Am I Writing This Blog? post to learn more about who I am and develop a connection with me. I look forward to taking this journey together. Welcome to Freedom Through FI!
