I lose all the gains when I drop the habit or veer away from my diet.

Continuing my gym saga and your wealth creation saga, I do realize that all about weight loss and strength gain is creating good habits and sticking to them. However if I go to certain locations in Mumbai with tempting food, I do succumb. So one time indulgence can kill ONE week of effort. In fact not going to the gym for 2 weeks in a row or worse 2 months in a row puts me back by 1 year in terms of time taken to come back to where I was.

It is not all that different from personal finance. If you stop living relatively frugally, quit saving, stop making smart SIP investments, you can undo all the progress you seem to have made. Even Just One episode of selling low in your entire career could be irreparable, or could take a decade to repair. Buying a  fancy new car could eat up three years worth of retirement investing. A foreign vacation could cancel out 2 years worth of carrying food to work instead of eating at a nearby hotel. Letting your life insurance policy lapse accidentally undoes all that work you did to set it up.  Letting your medical insurance policy lapse accidentally means all your bonuses could be gone, and increase the waiting period for other illnesses. Thus undoing all the effort you did to set it up!

Being wealthy, like me improving my stamina, is a process, not a destination. Abandon the path and you’ll rapidly find yourself becoming poor as quickly as my shoulders droop!

The main reason, however, that I am not a good runner or lack a muscular physique, is simply that I get my priorities wrong. I act busy. I have a new assignment. I have to travel to see my parents.  I have a wife and a kid. I have people hounding me to come speak to them. My business manager is chasing me to write another book. I need to update my blog. So what doesn’t get done? Working out. In your case, maybe it’s reading that financial book, or even that post on Subramoney. Or meeting that advisor you know you should. Or actually looking at your PPF, and understanding what you’re invested in. Or getting disability insurance, or making a will or, or…..Just wrong priorities? See how both of us are similar?

If is funny that despite knowing that SIP is generally good for you you do not stick to it. I do the same. Knowing that I should not eat sugar or bad carbs, I cannot resist a cake. Or a dahi batata puri – even if I do justify that the moong sprouts are healthy 🙂