So you’re stuck between a rock and a hard spot.  You want to improve your finances but you’re not sure when is the best time to get started.

You may have a million things on your plate to take care of…

• Family vacation
• Work
• Spending time with your kids
• Cleaning your house
• Mowing the lawn
• Cooking Supper
• Watching the latest episode of Pawn Stars

OK maybe the last one isn’t to important but you get the point.

When Is The Best Time To Improve Your Finances

So when is the best time to start improving your finances?

Right Now!

Yup that’s right, their is no better time than right now to start improving your finances.  Don’t wait for things to work themselves out because they won’t.

If you want to live a fruitful financial life you need to take action as soon as you can.  The great thing about taking action right now is that it sets things in motion and something in motion is a lot easier keep moving forward than something that is always continually stopping and starting.

So why is it so damn hard to get started?

The Arrival Fallacy

One of the big problems why we don’t improve their finances is because of one financial trap called the arrival fallacy.

This is where we have this belief in our minds that we can’t start something until we reach some other milestone in our life. For example…

• I’ll start to improve my finances once I get things organized around my house.

• I’ll start to improve my finances once my kids are back in school.

• I’ll start to improve my finances once this year is over.

• I’ll start to improve my finances once I get my next raise.

• I’ll start to improve my finances once I’m not so busy.

The problem with all of these excuses is that they are  preventing you from moving forward.

The truth is if you really wanted to improve your finances you would have already done it.  The reason you haven’t is because you are to busy making excuses and pushing it off.

The more important question you need to be asking yourself is why are you pushing things off?  Usually this is due to some sort of mental barrier that you are facing. Once you dig deep down into these metal barriers it’s where you will find the real reason you haven’t started.

Fear Is Controlling You

When it comes down to it fear is what is really controlling you.  Maybe you have a fear of failure, and that everything you’ve every done has almost certainly failed.

Or maybe you have a fear of success.  Yup that’s right, maybe having financial success scares you.  In fact you may have never had much money in your life before and you think that being rich means that your are a bad person.

One fear I am dealing with is a fear of what other people will think of me. When I was younger I use to spend money on whatever I felt like.  However when I decided to clean up my finances I knew I would have to cut out some of my entertainment expenses in order to fix things.

This caused other people around me to ask questions and wonder why I was selling my stuff off.  I’ll have to admit it was  a bit painful at first but once I saw how much money I could really save it changed my whole perception.

So if you haven’t started yet you need to answer this question first, because if fear is causing you to not start, then how can you ever expect to persevere and improve your finances.

Start With Step One

Chris Guillebeau has a great quote that I like.

If Plan A Fails, Remember There Are 25 More Letters. – Chris Guillebeau

I love this quote because Chris makes the valid point that if you fail the first time don’t worry because you can just try again, and the only time you truly will fail is when you quit.

This also means that you don’t need to know the entire plan and that you really only need to know is step one.  Knowing the first step you have to take is all you need to get started.

Once you’ve completed step one then figure out step two.  Just take action now and get things in motion.

Start Now

To finish up this article take a moment and figure out what is really holding you back from improving your finances right now.  Then figure out what step one is, and finally take action right now.

The worst thing you can do is nothing.

So what is holding you back from improving your finances?  Share your thoughts and comments below.