How Unique Is Your Financial Ability?

“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” – Howard Thurman

“The only way to have a life you love is to do meaningful work.” – Steve Jobs

What Makes You Come Alive?

Henry David Thoreau once said, “Wealth is the ability to fully experience life.”

What parts of your life make you come alive? Your family? Your work? What about your hobbies, or spending time with friends, or in your community? What do you do where time just flies?

It’s in those activities, when you get into that state of “flow”, and time just disappears that you are “fully experiencing life”. As you structure your life for more of that and less of what creates the opposite effect, the wealthier you become.

I think we’d all agree with that statement if we’re talking about wealth in terms of enjoying the life you lead. But the argument I want to make is that it’s equally true in terms of financial wealth.

Unique Ability

Dan Sullivan, founder of The Strategic Coach program, introduced me to a concept he calls Unique Ability. In essence, everything we have to do in life falls somewhere in a grid with two spectrums:

1. How much we enjoy doing it.
2. How good we are at doing it.

Let’s start in Quadrant 4.

Quadrant 4: Those activities you dislike and are bad at, you must delegate. The work will be done better by someone else and you’ll enjoy your life more.

Quadrant 3: The world has a name for those activities you enjoy but are not good at: hobbies. These are great things to do for fun but you likely wouldn’t want to handle an important activity in this category yourself since it can be done better by someone else.

Quadrant 2: Those activities you dislike but are quite good at are some of the last things you should delegate. Don’t worry about delegating these activities until you’ve delegated everything in quadrant 4 and everything important in quadrant 3.

Ultimately, you want to get to the point where you do delegate everything in Quadrant 2 as well. You’ll enjoy your life more and you simply do not have as high of a ceiling on things you dislike. If you dislike it, you won’t be able to dedicate the time, energy, and focus it takes to be truly excellent at those activities.

Quadrant 1: These are the activities where you come alive. This is where you will be able to “fully experience life” and be wealthy in the sense of enjoying your life. Many, if not most, of these activities also have the potential to make you financially wealthy as well.

These are activities where you are likely naturally talented and you enjoy them so much, you’re willing to, and even enjoy, putting in the dedicated work it takes over years and years to become extremely skilled, perhaps even world class.

The most productive and financially wealthy people in the world have tapped into their Unique Ability at work. They deeply enjoy what they do and it is rewarding both personally and financially.

The more time you spend on activities in Quadrant 1, the richer your life will be.

Applying Unique Ability to Your Financial Life

Managing your financial life well takes work. The more successful you become, the more time, energy, and focus must be dedicated to intelligently managing your financial life. Should that time, energy, and focus come from you? Where does managing your financial life fall in the Unique Ability grid for you?

Is it in Quadrant 4 where you dislike it and you’re not naturally good at it? Is it Quadrant 3 where you do enjoy it but you don’t have the time, energy, or focus to manage it as well as it should be managed? Is it Quadrant 2 where you dislike it but you’re good at it? Or is it Quadrant 1 and you should be managing wealth for a living?

The true cost of anything is what you have to give up, or what you forego, to have it.

What wealth do you forego when you take on decisions and tasks that could be handled, and often handled better, by others? Is it the time that could be spent on your unique contribution to the world? The money that could be earned by spending that time on your unique contribution? Or is it time that could be spent with the people you love the most?

The world needs you to spend your time on your greatest contribution. Your greatest contribution is what you enjoy the most and have the unique ability to provide.

Is it possible that your time could be better spent elsewhere? Is it possible you could be “wealthier” in both senses if it was?

We’d love to help you answer all of these questions.

We Come Alive When You Come Alive

At Tumwater, doing money right for families makes us come alive. Being trusted as the stewards of your family’s wealth for generations to come is the ultimate privilege. Giving you the ability to spend more time doing the things you love, with the people you love, is the greatest value proposition we have to offer.

That is what financial planning is for. That is what the mindset of investment success is for. That is what our tactics, fundamentals, and constant study of the stock market is for.

It’s to set people like you free to fully experience life, spending less time on the management of your wealth, and more time on the projects, with the people, and in the places you love most.

Get started on your own financial journey today by checking out some of our great financial resources: download a free copy of our eBook, “How to Retire with Confidence and Clarity” and sign up for our Retirement Income Academy course!