‘Twas the night before Christmas, etc. etc., and you’re jazzed. Christmas is great! Morning comes, you let the dog out to pee and fix yourself some coffee. Fresh cinnamon buns! Soon it’ll be time to open presents.

You bend down low by the Christmas tree, and there, behind the nicely wrapped boxes and doo-dads, you see…a plain bag full of puzzle pieces? …With YOUR name on it?!

I think you’d immediately face three burning questions: 

1. The first and most obvious: What the hell?! Whose sick idea is this?
2. Second, once you’ve accepted this strange reality: Are you supposed to solve this puzzle without the standard “image on the puzzle box” to guide your process?
3. And then: How can you be sure your “gift” even contains all the necessary pieces in the first place?

What a raw deal! Solving this puzzle is undoubtedly possible. But it’ll be tedious, error-ridden, and frustrating. Grinch!

How does this bizzaro Christmas morning dovetail with financial planning? I think a similar puzzle (oooo!) faces many people in their personal finances. Thankfully, though, there are a few better solutions.

First, let’s define the problem.

In general, I notice many individuals and families are unsure if they’ve identified all the essential financial “puzzle pieces” in their lives.

They might have some numbers on paper, and they might know which of their accounts exist. But have they correctly identified what’s most important? Which pieces are missing, and how consequential are those omissions?

Second, they don’t have any semblance of a “solved picture” to go off. What does a “good” financial plan look like? How will they know they’ve “fit their pieces together” properly? What exactly are they solving for?

Much like our disappointing Christmas morning, they have an unmarked bag of financial puzzle pieces and don’t know what to do with them.

But as I mentioned, we have some promising paths forward!

1. Education is a fantastic start. By reading, listening, and watching content related to financial planning, you will both A) identify more puzzle pieces in your life and B) understand how they fit together.
2. Ask others. I routinely bounce questions and ideas off other people – some friends, some colleagues (I’m lucky in that sense, that my colleagues know more about this stuff than I do). See what other people do, how they go about solving their puzzles.
3. Hire others (if it makes sense). If you want to solve this puzzle by yourself, I commend you! I think it’s enjoyable and rewarding (you might be able to detect my financial enthusiasm with this whole blog and podcast and all). But not everyone wants to solve this particular puzzle – they’d rather tend the garden or walk the dog or watch the grandkids play soccer.

That’s one of the bigger lessons I’ve learned over the past ~9 years (the timeline over which I’ve gone from financial neophyte to DIY investor & semi-informed blogger, then to podcaster and now financial planner):

Some people love solving this puzzle. Others can’t wait to hire an expert to solve it for them.

To each their own. For me? Pass the cinnamon buns. I have some puzzles to solve.

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-Jesse

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Jesse Cramer Writer & Financial Planner

Jesse Cramer is the writer of The Best Interest blog, the voice behind The Best Interest Podcast, and works full-time as a fiduciary financial planner for Cobblestone Capital Advisors in Rochester, NY.