The theme this week on the Retirement Quick Tips Podcast is: Can Gratitude Help You Make Better Money Decisions? 

Today, I’m talking about how gratitude will keep you from overspending. 

If you sat down and made a list of the 10 things in your life that you’re most grateful for, my guess is that the top of your list would be occupied by life’s essentials - the people you love, your home, your job, good food and clean water. Probably not your latest purchase. Yet, still, we get sucked into the lie that if I just had this [fill in the blank here], I would be so much happier. If I had a better house or a better car, or got rid of those unsightly forehead lines with some botox, travelled more, or even just something as simple as a pair of jeans that actually fit me I would not be so discontent and I would be happier.

Not that there’s anything wrong with having a nice car or house or a perfect pair of jeans, or whatever it might be, it’s the longing for what we don’t have that can cause us to spend more than we should. Without gratitude, there’s a hole in our heart, that we just keep trying to fill with more stuff, which is a recipe for failure and lasting unhappiness if we continually try filling it with more stuff. 

Deep down we all know that real and lasting happiness can’t be found in having something we don’t currently have, yet we are still tricked into believing that the pleasure-seeking variety of happiness, which is always short-lived, will make us happy. 

But when you practice gratitude, you are more likely to appreciate the good things you already have in life, and less likely to seek happiness in having more stuff. And when our spending isn’t used as a means to buy happiness, we can better use our financial resources to achieve bigger and more important goals - things like saving enough for your kids' college, getting out of debt, paying off your mortgage, or saving enough for retirement. 

That’s it for today. But before you go, you probably know someone who is close to retirement and could benefit from listening to this podcast. If so, please share this podcast with them and encourage them to check it out by adding it to their flash briefing in Alexa or subscribing wherever they listen to podcasts! 

That’s it for today. Thanks for listening! My name is Ashley Micciche and this is the Retirement Quick Tips podcast. 

----------

>>> Subscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/2DI2LSP

>>> Subscribe on Amazon Alexa: https://amzn.to/2xRKrCs

>>> Visit the podcast page: https://truenorthra.com/podcast/ 

----------

Tags: retirement, investing, money, finance, financial planning, retirement planning, saving money, personal finance