Balance is B.S.

CHAPTER 12When Breadwinning Doesn't Feel Like “Winning”: How to cope with pressure and keep your financial promises

This is not a personal finance book. That's not my area of expertise, so I'm not going to give you a bunch of spreadsheets and rules for managing your money, and expect you to follow them. I don't expect you to handle your finances the same way that I do because I'm not a guru.

Your numbers will be different from the next person's numbers, and the numbers that matter to you will be different from the numbers that matter to other people. Some people just need to know that they're covering their living expenses; some people are trying to hit particular income goals to create options and freedom. Some people measure their worth by their total asset value and other people are happy if they've got plenty of cash this month. So I'm not going to give you a one-size-fits-all model for managing your money.

What I am going to talk about is what it's like to be a breadwinner and how that impacts your relationship with your partner and family. And I'll give you some very, very broad principles that I personally use to make decisions around money: how I communicate my expectations, keep my commitments, and define the numbers that matter to me.

WHEN BREADWINNING DOESN'T FEEL LIKE WINNING

I hate the term breadwinner. It assumes you're going to be winning all the time, when you're not. Why don't we called it “breadmaker”? Sometimes it's brilliant and everybody wants bread. ...