Brandon Coppernoll Web content management, internet marketing and social media in Indiana

Cashflow 101: Like cracking open an old book

I've been a big fan of Robert Kiyosaki's "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" for a long time. I think the invaluable lessons he teaches about money and the idea of money are great. I can only hope that the lessons I've learned and steps I'm currently taking with our finances really "pay off" (pun-intended), and that I can teach my children the things I only wish I knew before I graduated high school.

Robert's company, CASHFLOW Technologies, Inc. not only sponsors many books about the subjects of money, real estate and business, but the company also created two board games that I do find enjoyable and until recently I have not played them for a long time. I recently tried my hand at CASHFLOW 101. There is a CASHFLOW 202 game as well, but I am so rusty I'm not ready to try that out again.

When I was really into reading the books and playing the games, I think I had a more conscious idea of what I was doing with my money. I spent less on frivolous items, and I tried to spend more in areas to better my bottom line and hopefully increase my monthly income. I've made some mistakes and done some things I probably shouldn't have, and then I fell by the wayside and stopped holding to the lessons I have learned.

I'm going to get back to doing what I was doing financially and apply some of the following lessons:

• Understand the difference between needs and wants;
• Saving is almost pointless when the interest you earn from saving is outweighed by the debt you're paying on;
• No more bad debt;
• Find a way to eliminate bad debt;
• Most individuals can be completely (bad) debt free in less than seven years.

Personally I've lost sight of some of these lessons for some time. I am going to spend more time reading the books once again as well as playing the game to sharpen my mind and spending habits. I balanced my checkbook this morning and realized I've been spending a crazy amount of money in areas I didn't spend it two years ago. I need to reapply the lessons I've learned, and there is no better time to start than now.

Note: I'm not saying for you to go buy his books or games or anything. This is a personal decision of mine, and I believe there are strong lessons in these books if you have an open mind. He doesn't tell you what to do rather than tell a story and allows you to apply a lesson from them.

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