Yes, things are weird…and what you can do about it
Things are strange right now. Sometimes I feel like Jim Carrey in today’s version of The Truman Show, trying to figure out what is real, and what can’t possibly be true. We have tech moguls offering to build us AI friends to help bridge our gap of actual human friendships. No thanks. An electric car CEO decided to get into the kind of politics that his core customer base generally dislikes. It has not been good for business. The “health” director of the US, who is not a Doctor, is telling young parents to do their own research on basic vaccines. Side note, if you do not know what a double-blind study is, please do not do your own research. Bill Belichick is dating a 25-year-old. It does not seem to be going great. You can literally hand the president a bag of cash by buying his memecoin. The education department is being run by the world wrestling federation people. Everything is just so……weird.
What does this have to do with your finances? Great question. When things feel unsettled, finances get a bit tricky. I never want to get into the prediction business, as that truly is a losing proposition. There are plenty of places you can go to see someone in the news talking about how a recession is imminent. It’s always the same people, saying the same thing year in and year out. Eventually, they will be right, because recessions do happen. They will just be wrong a lot before they get it right. I am going to avoid making predictions and just offer up some actionable things you can do to help wade through all the strangeness going on.
Here’s a couple of thoughts on what to do if you are not feeling it.
- Save more money. To be clear, I am not saying to invest more money, I’m talking about good old-fashioned cash in the bank. Cash savings gives you flexibility and peace of mind. If you are worried about things, put off big purchases until you feel better. Make sure to put your cash somewhere where you are earning some interest. Cash offers great flexibility to you if things don’t go as planned.
- Use your money in a way that lines up with what you believe. Support charities that have been impacted by cuts. Feedmore WNY is a great local example. Use your agency as a consumer to support the things that align with your beliefs. If a company is doing something you do not agree with, then do not give them your business. Your power as a consumer is something that can help lead to change.
- Get professional help. No really. I saw something recently that said millennials are more apt to get medical advice from Tik Tok, than their doctors. Now more than ever, you will need trusted professionals in your life to help you wade through the large volume of disinformation out there. This goes for your financial life as well. See my blog post from last October.
- If you need your money soon for a specific goal, give it a pause. If you are uneasy about the chances for a recession in the near term, give yourself some relief by taking money that is designed for a short-term goal, out of the market. Recently I told my clients that we took most of our son’s 529 savings out of the market. Why? Because we need to use it in the short term and we did not want to risk it moving backwards. Will it be the right decision? Yes, because it made us feel better.
- Turn off the news. If you have a favorite cable news channel to watch (left or right), that is a problem. It is unhealthy. It is designed to make you mad. It is curated to make you dislike others and feel afraid. And it is often just opinions passed on to feel like actual news.
- Block words or phrases on your social media accounts so that content stops showing up in your feed. Start with the word “tariff” and work your way from there.
Lots of strange things are happening each day. Control what you can control. Try to let go of what you can’t control. If you did not panic at the first large market drop in April, you made the right move. But if you are still not feeling great about things, now might be a time to make a few adjustments. Reach out to me if you need some help. And check in on your friends and family. You want to make sure that you don’t get replaced by an AI chatbot.
