Prototype Your Way to Financial Freedom

Judgment can be the enemy of creativity. Our culture obsesses over perfect performance, optimization, and getting it right the first time. We hate to swing and miss. We loathe waste. So, we judge our ideas to the point that we narrow it down to one great idea. Then, we try it and it sucks. We’re stuck. #fail

Stuck can be a good place if you use it to imagine lots of new ways forward. Instead of chasing that one great idea, the perfect plan, you decide to shrink the risk and the fear of failure and you prototype several ideas. You try them for a bit and if they fail, oh well–nobody expects prototypes to work. But, you’ve learned something. Rinse. Revise. Repeat. You can always say, “Hey, it was only a test.”

What’s one small thing you can do today that will advance you toward your financial dreams? Without betting the farm on it, get unstuck by trying that small idea. Maybe someone actually will buy your peanut-free granola bars. Maybe the world is waiting on your delectable double layer chocolate cake. Try that yard sale that will help you get rid of one credit card payment, even though it won’t eradicate the entirety of your debt.  Write that article that, if accepted, will generate a few hundred extra dollars. See if there’s a market for that old bike in the corner, and then buy another and sell it, and then another (I paid my way through graduate school doing exactly this).

This isn’t about having financial acumen. People say that to me and they’re dead wrong. It’s about desire. We call it hustle. Get after it. Be smart. Use wisdom. Go!

Give up hopes of the perfect plan. Prototype your way to financial freedom.