Recently, a woman told me how her last financial review ended. Her advisor told her, “You’re fine and on track.”
She asked him one question: “On track to what?”
He didn’t have an answer, because nobody had ever set a goalpost to work toward. I think about that exchange a lot. Most financial plans start exactly the same way—with a number. How much do I need? Two million? Five? Whatever the calculator or financial planning software says.
A couple earning well over $1 million asked me something similar: “What number are we chasing?” They save, they live below their means, and they had no way to tell whether it was enough.
That’s the problem. A number with no reason behind it isn’t a goal. Hit it and nothing changes. Miss it and you can’t tell if it matters.
A plan shouldn’t start with money
Don’t get me wrong. I run the numbers every day, and they matter. They just can’t come first.
Why does everyone in the financial industry start with the numbers? I think it’s because a number is easy. It fits cleanly into a spreadsheet. Where a purpose and reason we’re actually building the plan doesn’t. But a number from a calculator is someone else’s answer. It comes from an average or a rule of thumb, and no one lives by a rule of thumb.
It has a second problem, too: it can always go higher.
Two million becomes three. Three becomes “just a little more.” Nothing in the number says when to stop.
A purpose, on the other hand, has an edge. When you know what the money is for, you know when you’re on track. That’s what keeps the goalpost still. I see this all the time in people who are doing very well.
One household I work with could save $60,000 to $70,000 less every year and still hit their retirement target. Over decades, that adds up to millions less in accumulated wealth, but it lets mom stay home and raise her kids. On paper, that’s a terrible financial decision. For that family, it’s the whole point. The default would have told them to save more. But a clear purpose could tell them it was the right decision.
Take another example: a young couple with a lot of company stock. They told me they wanted clearer “rules” so every decision stopped feeling ad hoc. Right now, they’re trying to time their exit perfectly. They wanted to know when to sell, how much, whether to do it before the next run or after the next dip.
Say they nail it and sell at a great price. Then the stock keeps climbing. If timing is the only thing they’re measuring, that perfect sale still feels like a loss, and there will be remorse. You can’t win that game because the stock can always run after you sell.
A purpose gives them a different measure: did the sale fund the life they’re building? That question actually has an answer, and it doesn’t change when the stock price does.
Some people really are behind. I’m not going to pretend otherwise, but defining a purpose is how you find out. That’s why building a Freedom & Legacy Statement is where we start.
Write the statement
We didn’t always do this. But in the last year, we started writing a Freedom & Legacy Statement for every new client, and we constantly come back to it to make sure we’re still building what they actually want.
It changed every plan we built. Instead of a rule of thumb or a million-dollar target, the plan became something deeply connected to their lives. It’s simply three to five sentences on what the money is for—not the portfolio, but the life.
Here are three examples, with the identifying details removed.
When the number isn’t the point
They’ve spent two decades building, and they’ve built more than most people ever do. But the goal was never the number. One of them could stop working today. The other isn’t ready, not because the money isn’t there, but because the business isn’t, and she wants to hand it off on her terms to the people who built it with her. They want to live well in a home they love, travel without watching the bill, and never take a meeting they’re forced to.
The window
They’re building a life where the biggest decisions aren’t driven by financial pressure. They want the next chapter on their own terms: the kids still at home, the option to spend a few years near family abroad, and enough room to step back from careers they’ve given two decades to without money being the thing that stops them. The kids are growing up, and the window to spend time with them won’t stay open forever. What they’re protecting isn’t just the portfolio. It’s that window.
Time
They’re building the one thing they’ve worked toward for years: a June morning next year when the last paycheck clears and neither of them has to be anywhere they didn’t choose. They’ve already done the harder work: the trust is in place, the financial plan is written, and the people who’d step in know what to do. What’s left is the freedom to enjoy retirement, take the annual trip, and wake up with their time finally their own.
Now write yours:
Start with what you’re building toward, not what you’re running from.
Name who it’s for. There’s usually a person behind the goal.
Add one detail only you would say.
Skip the dollar signs.
Then, read it aloud. If it doesn’t sound like you, rewrite it.
Stuck? Picture five years from now with everything going right. What does an ordinary day look like?
Once you have a clear vision of what freedom looks like, decisions get easier. Then the numbers finally have something to answer to: What does that life cost? When can you stop? What has to be true to get there?
That’s it.
Go back to the woman and her advisor. His numbers may have been perfectly right when he said she’s on track, and the projections may have worked. What he couldn’t tell her was what they were for.
That’s the gap. It was never a math problem. It was the purpose.
You don’t need a perfect financial plan or optimized numbers right now. You need three to five sentences about the life you’re building and who it’s for. Write them this week. Reread them once a year.
Then, the next time someone asks if you’re on track, you’ll have an answer to the only question that matters.
— Ryan
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Opulus, LLC (“Opulus”) is a registered investment advisor in Pennsylvania and other jurisdictions where exempted. Registration as an investment advisor does not imply any specific level of skill or training.
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