If you took a poll using a large or even a small sample size, you would not be surprised to find that most people wish they were slimmer and had more money.

While these concepts go hand in hand in New Year’s resolutions, they have a lot more in common than you might think!

Let us look at some of the parallels and see if we apply it to tick off two less resolutions next year.

 

PRINCIPLES ARE STRAIGhTFORWARD, APPLICATION IS DIFFICULT

If you have ever spoken to a very fit person, and I know a few, they will tell you that it is very simple, in fact they will say that weight loss is simple arithmetic. You have to take in less calories than you expend to lose weight.

In the same way, to build wealth, you follow the formula, save 10 per cent of your salary and invest the money. If it is so simple, why is it so difficult to achieve? I am sure you are already thinking of all the reasons that it can’t work. Maybe you can’t save 10 per cent of your salary, or when you save it, you have no idea how to invest it.

Furthermore, you may feel that your savings are too small to work with. But take comfort in the fact that it will add up.

FINDING WHAT WORKS

Have you tried 10 different diets? Did the grapefruit diet work for you? Atkins? Keto? There are way too many to name.

However, I am sure that many of the experts would beg you not to diet, but to make lasting lifestyle changes.

In the same way, maybe you tried buying stocks when everyone was excited about them, you may have bought at the height, got burned and sworn off them. Maybe you had bonds and panicked when the prices fell and sold at the wrong time.

Either way, it takes time to figure out the best workout, some people like gyms, others group activities, others work out at home or walk. There are so many options.

In the same way, most seasoned investors, against our advice, stick to one asset class that they understand. So, they only invest in bonds, collective schemes, Jamaican stocks or US stocks, and others just have a passion for real estate. Either way, they find something, and they stick to it.

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/sunday-finance/building-wealth-and-losing-weight-the-amazing-parallels_146146