Carl Richards

Just a reminder.

Every financial decision is a tradeoff.   It's not about right or wrong. Or good or bad.   💥 It's present vs. future.   We don’t always say it that way, but that’s what’s happening.   Once you see it, things get clearer. You stop looking for the perfect answer.   You start asking a better question: 👉 What am I trading away to get this now?   I wrote about this idea in Your Money: Reimagining Wealth in 101 Simple Sketches. If you like my work, I think you'll love this new book. Order a copy from your local bookstore here: buff.ly/pqdwHmh

We talk about goals like they need to be precise, clear, and certain.   But most goals start as a guess.   They are a guess about what will matter. A guess about what the future might look like.   And that’s okay.   👉 You don’t need perfect goals. You need a current guess.   That’s one of the ideas inside my new book, Your Money. If you haven't picked up your copy yet, you can do that here: buff.ly/QwH0YNn

When markets get scary, the instinct is to do something. That instinct is normal. It’s also where most mistakes get made. In those moments, people don’t need a lecture. They don’t need charts or reminders about long-term returns. They need to be heard. They need someone to sit with them for a minute and say, “Yeah, I get it. This feels scary.” Then, once things settle, we can talk about the plan. Real Financial Advisors know that order matters. I recorded two videos about it here: thesocietyofadvice.com/scary-markets

It’s easy to get pulled in a lot of directions.   …What you should want. …What you should be doing. …Where you should be by now.   Pretty soon, it’s hard to tell what’s yours and what isn’t!   👉 So here’s a simple reminder today: The only goal that matters is yours.   Sounds simple, but it’s not. It takes a little work to even know what that is!   That’s the question behind one of the sketches in my new book, Your Money.   The book is full of better questions that are worth talking through with someone else. If you like my work, I think you'll love the new book. Order it here: buff.ly/Z507RkM

My next Weekly Letter "The only goal that matters" is coming tomorrow on April 30. Subscribe to get it and stay in the loop on everything I'm creating. behaviorgap.com

💥 Enough is not a number. Clients often ask how they’ll know when they have enough. There’s a version of that answer that lives in a financial plan. You run the numbers, you look at the projections, and someone tells you, “You’re going to be fine.” That’s helpful... But it’s also a little misleading. Because the moment you pick a number, it has a way of moving. I’ve seen it over and over again. One more year and one more dollar. Just a little more. It doesn’t stop. So I’ve come to believe that enough isn’t something money can solve. We’ve given money a job it can’t do. Just like it can’t deliver happiness or self-worth, it can’t tell you when you have enough. 👉 That turns out to be a different kind of work. And here’s the part that surprises people... 💥 The same habits that helped you build wealth, discipline, saving, working hard, can actually make it harder to feel like you’ve arrived. They were exactly what you needed in one phase, but they don’t always serve you in the next. At some point, the work changes. It becomes less about building and more about learning how to use what you’ve already built. That doesn’t happen all at once. In fact, it usually feels uncomfortable at first. So you practice. You start small. ✨ You spend a little in ways that feel meaningful. You take the trip. You buy the gift. You create experiences with people you care about. It sounds simple, but it’s not easy. Because in the end, this isn’t really a financial problem. It’s learning how to recognize when you already have enough 💪

Financial planning isn’t a one-time event. It’s a lifelong process.   And it keeps coming back to three questions: …Where are you today? …Where do you want to go? …How will you get there?   My new book, Your Money, is just a collection of ways to sit with these three questions a little longer.   If my work has been useful to you, tell three people about it.   You don’t need to explain it.   “This made me think of you,” and the link to the book is enough → buff.ly/AQTgu6L   Over the last couple of decades, that’s how my work has spread. One person helping another person take the next step.   Thank you for being part of it.

Most people don’t believe you exist. They think financial advice is about products and sales. ...But I know better! A Real Financial Professional is someone I’d trust with my closest friends and family. I wrote a Manifesto for us. 👉 Get the Manifesto (it's free) here... thesocietyofadvice.com/manifesto

Most of what you’re worried about right now… you can’t control. Years ago, I drew a simple sketch with two circles. Things you can control. Things that matter. 🎯 The overlap is where your attention belongs. When your circle of concern gets bigger than your circle of control, you feel it. So I come back to a simple question: 💪 Does it matter… and can I do anything about it?

It’s been about six months since my latest book, Your Money, came out. buff.ly/AQTgu6L   I’ve been thinking about what success looks like. For me, it’s not sales or rankings. 💥 It’s conversations.   I’ve heard from readers using the book in ways I never would have imagined.   …Friends picking a sketch and talking about it over dinner. …One reader uses it each morning. …Another is going through it with their kid, one sketch a week.   That was the whole point. You don’t have to read it front to back. You don’t need a plan. One sketch is enough.   The one in this post is a good place to start.   👉 It's just one word: Why.   Most of us skip "why" and go straight to "what" and "how," but "why" is the part that gives everything else meaning.   Try this: 1- Pick one sketch. If you don’t have the book, use the one in this post. If you have a copy of Your Money, open it anywhere and start there. 2- Use that sketch to start one conversation about money. 3- Then listen.   And if you’re up for it, email me at hello@behaviorgap.com and tell me what happened. I read every message.

A budget isn’t about restriction. It’s about noticing. What did you just spend money on… and did it feel like a good trade? This idea is from my new book, Your Money.   Pick up a single copy here: buff.ly/jdrn2AX   Or if you’re ordering copies for a team, firm, or event, you can get an additional 5% off bulk orders (U.S. shipping only) with the code ADVISOR5 here: buff.ly/gBHEWQ1

Most financial advisors think better advice comes from better answers. It doesn’t. It comes from asking better questions. 👉 And that’s what The Manifesto is about. It’s my reminder to Real Financial Advisors that this work isn’t about products or predictions. It’s about helping people align their use of capital with what actually matters to them. A few ideas you’ll find inside: • Start with why before you ever talk about money • Goals are guesses. The work is helping people move anyway • The plan matters, but the real value is in the course corrections • You’re not selling a product. You’re guiding someone through uncertainty • The work is not the spreadsheet. It’s the life that happens because of it 💪 If you’ve ever felt like there’s something deeper to this work… Guess what... There is! You can grab a free digital copy of The Manifesto here: thesocietyofadvice.com/manifesto

A Real Financial Advisor's value often lives in one thing… 👉 Creating a little space between what happens and what a client does next. That space changes everything. But it’s small and easy to miss. And yes, it’s hard. That’s the work, and that’s why we practice. I wrote about this in my new book, Your Money. If you haven't picked it up yet, you can order a copy from your local bookstore here: buff.ly/NCjbRlo

What matters and what you can control. The work is in the overlap. This is sketch 22 in my new book, Your Money: Reimagining Wealth in 101 Simple Sketches. If you like this sketch, I think you'll love the entire book. buff.ly/pVEGGDC

A lot of financial stress comes from trying to evaluate every opportunity that shows up. A simple plan filters most of them out. Mine fits on one card: 💪 Time with my family, mainly outside, and serving in my community. When something new appears, I ask one question: Will this get me closer to what matters most? This idea appears as sketch #21 in my new book, Your Money: Reimagining Wealth in 101 Simple Sketches. If you haven't yet, you can pick up your copy here: buff.ly/3kiffEo Something to sit with today... If you wrote your One-Page Financial Plan, what would it say? 💥

How do we help clients we love make rational decisions aligned with their values and goals when everything around them is irrational? Let's talk about it. The first video is a heart-to-heart between us as friends, as Real Financial Professionals. The second video will teach you, word-for-word, exactly how to have this conversation with your clients. Get them in your inbox. 👉 thesocietyofadvice.com/scary-markets

Enough is a decision.

For years I have been talking about something I call a "Real Financial Professional." 📈 Not a product salesperson. 🗺️ Not a defender of an outdated map. 🥾 A guide in a changing landscape. Someone who helps people align their time, money, energy, and attention with what actually matters to them! That work is harder than most people realize. It requires technical skill, emotional awareness, and the ability to sit with uncertainty alongside your clients. It is not about being precisely right today. It is about helping people be less wrong tomorrow. A few years ago I wrote a Manifesto about what this work really means. If you care about the craft of advice, I think you’ll appreciate it: 👉 thesocietyofadvice.com/manifesto

Before you replay the mistake again, ask: Would I judge someone else this harshly for the same thing? If the answer is no, that’s useful information. This sketch is from my book, Your Money. It’s about noticing the stories quietly shaping our decisions.   📚 You can pick up a copy at your local bookstore or wherever you buy books: buff.ly/SDQF3Xb

You can’t make it too simple. Most of us in this industry are really good at complex things. We’ve “Kitces-ed” it to death. Big spreadsheets and more and more technical precision. That’s required. But here’s what’s easy to forget: Most clients don’t know what you mean when you say volatility. And they won’t tell you. They’ll nod. They’ll say yes, yes, yes. Then they’ll go home and think, “I don’t know what she just said, but she seems smart.” 🤷 We use words like "risk" and mean standard deviation within known bounds. A dial we can turn up or down. Our clients hear risk and think, “Am I going to end up under a bridge?” Same word. Completely different meaning. Keeping jargon out of conversations is like weeding a garden. It never ends. You have to stay vigilant. There’s a difference between simplistic and elegantly simple. Simplistic ignores complexity. Elegantly simple earns its way there. You’ve been through the edge cases. You’ve done the hard thinking. And you come out the other side and say, “Here’s what matters.” 🎯 That’s what clients pay Real Financial Advisors for. If you’re tired of hiding behind complexity… If you know you’re good at the technical work but want to get better at the human work… If you’ve felt that gap between what you know and what your clients actually hear… 💥 That’s exactly what we work on each month inside The Society of Advice. The Society of Advice is where financial advisors gather to practice the craft that can’t be automated. It’s a live, monthly conversation curated by me and featuring a guest worth paying attention to. Advisors who care about this work show up for it. No extra noise, just the REAL work on how to make things clear, human, and useful. If that’s the kind of advisor you’re becoming, you’ll feel at home here. Join us for the next live conversation: 📆 Thursday, March 26, 2026 ⏰ 11:00 a.m. Eastern for 90 minutes 👉 Register: thesocietyofadvice.com