About book The 9 Steps To Financial Freedom: Practical And Spiritual Steps So You Can Stop Worrying (2006)
This book was pretty light and very emotionally-driven. Not so much hard and concrete advice, like a 50-30-20 rule (All Your Worth), but more about how you feel about money and what you’re hoping to accomplish. It can’t hope to live up to its title, “9 Steps to Financial *Freedom*” because, to me, freedom means not doing anything I don’t want to do for money. It reminds me of another book title, “Tap dancing to work” and the sentiment, “If you love what you do, you never have to work a day in your life.” Nice work if you can get it, but that has yet to be my experience. I suppose this is easier if you love tax accounting or computer programming!The names of the chapters provide some insight into what they contain. Orman includes helpful exercises, and I especially liked her vignette stories.WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM YOUR MONEY? – What are you hoping to accomplish? Be realistic!STEP 1: SEEING HOW YOUR PAST HOLDS THE KEY TO YOUR FINANCIAL FUTURE – I actually enjoyed this chapter. It asks how your childhood attitudes about money shaped your attitude toward it today.STEP 2: FACING YOUR FEARS AND CREATING NEW TRUTHS – This chapter talks about “the power of positive thinking,” a tactic I’m extremely skeptical of.STEP 3: BEING HONEST WITH YOURSELF – Living within your means. Don’t live a $100,000 a year lifestyle on $50,000 a year.STEP 4: BEING RESPONSIBLE TO THOSE YOU LOVE – This chapter included a lot of good, solid advice about preparing for retirement and estate planning: trusts, IRAs, health care directives, life insurance, etc. This is one of the most substantive chapters in an otherwise emotionally-centered book.STEP 5: BEING RESPECTFUL OF YOURSELF AND YOUR MONEY – In short, if you’re careless and don’t think about money, you might find it difficult to save.STEP 6: TRUSTING YOURSELF MORE THAN YOU TRUST OTHERS – Orman writes something really provocative in this chapter: That little voice inside you is the voice of God. Is the little voice telling you to buy, or sell? Is it saying don’t do that? That’s God! I consider that a remarkable way to think about it. But… it makes me wonder, what if one person’s voice says “Buy,” and the other’s says “Sell?” Does that mean that God has different life plans for them? And that everything that happens is for a reason? That’s where “little voice as faith” gets cloudy to me. But, I agree, and Suze frequently insists, that you should trust your instincts. It makes you less likely to regret your decisions.STEP 7: BEING OPEN TO RECEIVE ALL THAT YOU ARE MEANT TO HAVE – Orman believes in the dharmic flow of money which boils down to “Don’t be miserly.” I don’t think it’s quite that simple. I’ve met people that will return generosity with generosity … and I’ve met some real self-centered users. Whether karma rewards or punishes people *in this life* is an open question. Abbey Road: “And in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make!” Maybe!STEP 8: UNDERSTANDING THE EBB AND FLOW OF THE MONEY CYCLE – It comes and goes! Orman includes a nice story here about her late father, in which they would discuss whether he was lucky or unlucky. “You sure are lucky, Dad!” “Maybe yes, maybe no.” “Jeez, Dad, you must be the most unlucky guy on the planet.” “Maybe yes, maybe no.”STEP 9: RECOGNIZING TRUE WEALTH – Or, you can’t take it with you! Sounds right!Also, Orman includes six “laws” of financial freedom:THE FIRST LAW OF FINANCIAL FREEDOM: People First, Then Money.THE SECOND LAW OF FINANCIAL FREEDOM: Respect Attracts Money-Disrespect Repels MoneyTHE THIRD LAW OF FINANCIAL FREEDOM (PART 1): The More You Make, the More You SpendTHE THIRD LAW OF FINANCIAL FREEDOM (PART 2): The Less You Think You Make, the Less You Will Spend - I’m afraid I’ve found this to be the case. However, there’s no substitute for income. If you are worth/take in a certain amount, you can’t help but save … unless you’re in “Brewster’s Millions!”THE FOURTH LAW OF FINANCIAL FREEDOM: It’s Not What You Make—It’s What You Get to KeepTHE FIFTH LAW OF FINANCIAL FREEDOM: You and Your Money Must Keep Good CompanyTHE SIXTH LAW OF FINANCIAL FREEDOM: Inner Trust First, Then Outward Action
Another one from Spencer's finance class. What I liked best about this book is that it begins by encouraging you to address the issues that you have about money, before you start trying to manage it. Brilliant. The second thing I liked about it is that it encourages you to get your affairs in order for peace of mind, and by 'affairs' it doesn't mean current income/expenditures, it means will, trusts, medical affidavits and so on, so that if anything happens your heirs and loved ones will have the least amount of worry about the financial side of your passing. My husband and I are definitely going to move out on this, because we don't have any of this in order although it's been bugging us for some time that we need to get it settled. Her steps for financial planning (getting out of debt, saving for the future) are much less concrete than some of those offered by other gurus, but the two principles I just listed make this a worthwhile read.
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I am just graduating college, and besides my father instilling the message to, "save, save, save" and "budget, budget, budget," my financial knowledge is not extensive. I picked up Suze Orman's book in hopes of setting a good foundation for my money knowledge, as I branch out on my own. I think this book was great to really set a foundation for knowledge about all things green. While some of the book did not apply to me, just because of the age I am at right now (young and just starting off), it was still a great book for me to learn from. I think the book was super easy to understand; Suze explained everything in the book in very easy-to-understand terms. I also love that Suze considers the emotional aspect of money, and the importance of giving and taking care of our loved ones.
—Michelle
The 9 Steps to Financial Freedom is one of Suze Orman's early books, if not the earliest - it was originally published in 1997, and so in the specifics all of her advice is suspect, as the economic and legal situation has changed in fifteen years. Beyond that, well, I can see why some people hate her.For one thing, from my moderately-read layman's perspective, her advice is very conservative. Lots of emphasis on retirement planning and long-term investing, next to nothing about short-term or day-to-day planning. For someone my age, that's not all that interesting or helpful, and part of me definitely rebels against the idea of putting all of my money away somewhere safe so I can enjoy it when I'm 70. I want to enjoy it now, dammit!The other striking thing is that she shifts back and forth between highly technical discussions of revocable living trusts and durable power of attorney and woo-woo new age talk about how money is a living thing and it responds to positive energy and how all of your money woes are caused by some Freudian childhood incident. It's not that I think she's completely off, really. Certainly lots of people have destructive relationships with money, bad or no experience with it in childhood, etc - but the language was a little too hippie for me to take seriously, and the clash between those sections and the hard-boiled estate planning sections was jarring.
—Jeremy Preacher
I will likely be starting my first real job in the next couple months so I decided I should learn more about finances in general. As a student, it is fairly easy because no matter what, my wife and I will be spending more than we bring in. Now, with a real job, things will be different. I really like the way Suze explains concepts. She always follows up definitions with concrete examples which helps a lot when you don't know much about the world of finances and retirement. She also spends a lot of time (at least in this book) explaining the psychology behind our finances and how so often we lie to ourselves and our loved ones about our financial situation. The version of the book that I listened to on my phone contained a group discussion with actual people which was really boring. I got tired of Suze enthusiastically telling a man to stand on his chair and shout "I am worth more than money!" four of five times (really) to the audience. But other than that, the rest of the book was great.
—Bradley Ferguson
