Thinking about reading Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence by Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez? Want to find out a bit more about the book so you can make an informed decision about whether to buy a copy for yourself? If so, keep on reading as I will be sharing what you will find inside, as well as a few of my own thoughts about the book.

 

 

This page includes affiliate links, which means that if you choose to make a purchase, I may earn a commission. This commission comes at no additional cost to you. 

 

 

In the online marketing and entrepreneurship world, two phrases that are mentioned all the time are “financial freedom” and “financial independence”. They are classed as the holy grail and the ultimate level of success. I felt as if some people were using the terms interchangeably when I didn’t believe they were so I decided to do some research. I wanted to discover exactly what the definition for financial freedom and financial independence was, and at the same time work out the difference between the two. During this research, I came across the FIRE movement. FIRE stands for Financially Independent & Retire Early and this whole movement was inspired by the book Your Money or Your Life so of course, I had to read the book.

 

Your Money or Your Life is split into 9 chapters:

Chapter 1 – The Money Trap: The Old Road Map For Money

Chapter 2 – Money Ain’t What It Used To Be – And It Never Was

Chapter 3 – Where Is It All Going?

Chapter 4 – How Much Is Enough? The Quest for Happiness?

Chapter 5 – Getting It Out In The Open

Chapter 6 – The American Dream – On A Shoestring

Chapter 7 – For Love or Money: Valuing Your Life Energy – Work and Income

Chapter 8 – Catching Fire: The Crossover Point

Chapter 9 – Where to Stash Your Cash for Long-term Financial Freedom

 

CHAPTER 1 – THE MONEY TRAP: THE OLD ROAD MAP FOR MONEY

This chapter examines the traditional way of working. It talks about how work takes up the majority of our time and we then spend the money we work so hard for moments of enjoyment at the weekend, on holidays and eventually in retirement. Vicki and Joe state that “We are sacrificing our lives for money, but it’s happening so slowly that we barely notice”.

This book is designed to help you notice. It will help you to examine your current life, work and relationship with money. You are introduced to The Fulfilment Curve and encouraged to define your own version of ENOUGH.

 

 

CHAPTER 2 – MONEY AIN’T WHAT IT USED TO BE – AND IT NEVER WAS

The focus of Chapter 2 is really understanding what money is. They explore what money is from a material, psychological, cultural and life energy perspective. They also share their definition of financial independence and state that “the old notion of financial independence as being rich forever is not achievable”.

 

 

CHAPTER 3 – WHERE IS IT ALL GOING?

Now that you truly understand what money is it is time to take a close look at your expenditure and create a budget. They are both very aware that lots of people will find this step hard and they encourage readers to embrace a “No shame, no blame” motto. At this stage, the most important thing you can do is be honest. If you want to transform your relationship with money you need to be honest about your current situation so you can change going forward.

 

 

CHAPTER 4 – HOW MUCH IS ENOUGH? THE QUEST FOR HAPPINESS

Chapter 4 builds on the concept of enough, which was introduced in Chapter 1 through The Fulfilment Curve. Of all the chapters this one requires you to do some soul-searching. You are given a number of questions to ask yourself to help you identify what is important to you and how you truly want to spend your life.

 

 

CHAPTER 5 – GETTING IT OUT IN THE OPEN

This chapter focuses on turning numbers into something visual. There are three key numbers that you need to focus on: income, expenditure and savings. Rather than keeping them as numbers you are shown how to start charting. By charting, you can see month on month the variances in your income, expenditure and savings.

 

 

CHAPTER 6 – THE AMERICAN DREAM – ON A SHOESTRING

Joe and Vicki both lived in the United States of America (USA). For many people achieving the American dream means spending – big cars, big homes and lots of luxuries. However, the book suggests you focus on frugality instead. Frugality will help you to increase your savings and ultimately achieve financial independence sooner. This chapter ends with giving you 10 ways to save money.

 

 

CHAPTER 7 – FOR LOVE OR MONEY: VALUING YOUR LIFE ENERGY- WORK AND INCOME

Most people make their money by working. However, whilst we may say we work for money, it actually more complicated than that for most people. Work can serve a number of purposes including:

• Earning money
• A sense of security
• Tradition
• Service
• Learning
• Power
• Socialising
• Time structuring

The chapter then explores redefining work and breaking the link between work and wages.

 

 

CHAPTER 8 – CATCHING FIRE: THE CROSSOVER POINT

The Crossover Point is where your monthly investment income equals your expenditure. This means that technically you could stop working. For the purposes of the book, The Crossover Point marks financial independence.

 

 

CHAPTER 9 – WHERE TO STASH YOUR CASH FOR LONG-TERM FINANCIAL FREEDOM

Having cash isn’t the way to achieve financial freedom. You need to be investing. When Your Money or Your Life was originally published the economic state was different with considerably better interest rates. Negative reviews of the book often mentioned it was written for a different time and unachievable in the 21^st century. However, in this revised version Vicki actively examines through Joe’s Treasury Bond plan and gives you strategies that could work in today’s world.

 

FINAL THOUGHTS FROM CHARELLE

I absolutely loved Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence by Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez. When I first read the book in 2018 I absolutely fell in love. I’ve read a number of books about personal finances, but the reason why this book stands out is because it isn’t like a lot of other books I have read. It isn’t focused on your money mindset and it isn’t purely focused on the tactics of building your wealth. It really wants to help you look at your relationship with money. I thought the tasks in the book were really insightful, especially the ‘How much are you trading your life energy for?’. After reading this book I value money in a different way and has really made me think about the relationship between my money and my life.

It is definitely one of my favourite books about money. I can clearly understand why it has been a personal finance classic for many years and it is great that a revised edition was published in 2018.

 

 

WHO WOULD I RECOMMEND READS YOUR MONEY OR YOUR LIFE

As you can tell from the title Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence has been created to help those who want to achieve financial independence. However, even if you don’t want to achieve financial independence I still think this is a great money book (which is why I choose it to be Book of the Month for PropelHer’s Book Club in November 2019). The book is great for anyone who is currently dissatisfied with their money situation and wants to spend some time focusing on their relationship with money and figuring out what is important to them. This book is great for anyone who:

• feels like they have no money left at the end of the month
• is earning good money and not building your net worth
• has been constantly increasing their earnings but never feels like they have enough
• has disposable income but feels as if they never have enough time to enjoy it
• wants to start living a more frugal life

 

If you like the sound of you by Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence can buy a copy for yourself by clicking here.