Resources for Your Intentional Life

What do you think of when you hear the word resource? Natural resource? Money?

A resource can be anything used to bring benefit to the user.

Your list of intentional resources is short. You have money, time, and people.

The people category is not using people. I’ll explain more below.

In this post you determine what you want, then this post I showed the basic tactic to achieve it. If you don’t have a good picture of what you want or how to get it, please go to these posts first. I’ll meet you right back here when you are ready.

Now let’s talk tools.

Money – Ok this one is an obvious resource. Everyone considers money a resource; businesses, families, churches on and on. For intentional living, money is a tool we use to help accomplish our goals not just to achieve more or acquire more. When we are living intentionally, there is no greed involved with money. It’s simply a tool to get us from point A to point B.

Depending on your intentional goals, the importance and the level of usage of this tool could vary.

My family views money simply, money is used to buy, to save, and to give.

To buy – we use money to buy food, housing, gas, cars, clothes and other essentials. Of course, we use a budget to help us out. That way to know how much money we need to actually have a house, food, etc. Otherwise, we overspend and we don’t have enough of this resource left.

To save – we save for emergencies, big purchases, and retirement. We have several ways that we achieve this but the principle is the same and pretty basic. You receive the money but you don’t spend it or give it away.

To give – we believe that God established the art of giving and wants us to practice it through tithing. A tithe is 10% to the church you are affiliated with. If you can give more, do it. You won’t regret it.

Once you have determined if money is an essential tool, you need then you need to decide the amount you’ll need to get to your goal. An example, perhaps you want to start your own business but you want enough savings to cushion for an extended period of time. Let’s say 6 months. Now you calculate what your basic expenses are for that time and you save like crazy. Maybe you need $20,000 for this fund but your budget is so tight you can’t even pay all your bills. This would be a good opportunity to freshen your budget and get an idea of how much you are spending. Maybe you simply need to shop less or maybe you need some more income. Find out what you need. This is different for everyone. Feel free to email me if you need some more guidance.

Ultimately, it’s your responsibility find out what you need.

Mindset about money and stuff is also important. You need to convince yourself that joy doesn’t come from our money. It can’t come from our stuff either. Stuff only makes us want more stuff. You must conquer this beast before you can use money as intended, a tool.

Time – I think you’d agree that time flies by. Yep, it flies by. We consider time a resource because like money, you can only spend it once. If you spend it wisely, you’ll reap lots of benefits from it.

Again, the best way to approach our time bank is to think of it simply. We have a defined amount of minutes per day. Those minutes pass whether we focus on how we use them or not. If you put the covers over your head, the minutes still pass. Unlike money where we have to put forth effort to use it, wisely or not. Time gets spent whether you put in effort or not. To live a life with no regrets, you need to decide what you want to spend your time on and with who. At that point, decisions become very easy. If you know your daughter’s birthday is coming up but you get invited to an event on the same day, which will you choose? Once you decide your priorities, the no’s become easier to say.

I suggest you spend some time on the posts mentioned above to find out what you want and how to get it.

People – Like I said above, this is not using people. I do not suggest in anyway that using people is ok. It’s not, however, people are in our lives. As we go through life we either invest in our people or not. The fact is, you want to be close to anyone, but you can’t be close to everyone. There isn’t enough time for that.

Think about the people most important to you. So who is on your list? Let me tell you who is the three most important for me – 1)my husband, 2)my kids, and 3)my parents. Granted I don’t see my parents as often as my husband and kids but I know that I want to be connected with them. So I intentionally make time to go see them. There are many more on my list that I love and spend time with frequently. But I physically can not spend time with everyone. Who is the most important on your list? Is there someone you need to spend more time with or someone you need to spend less time with?

People can fill or drain you and you can fill or drain them. This is why I list people as a resource. People are important. How will you invest in relationships with the people you love?

In its purest form our resources are valuable and finite. To live a life with no regrets, we need to spend our resources very wisely. We need to be a Godly steward of the resources we have.

If you want to discuss anything further, please leave a comment below or send me an email. You can use the form on the Contact page.

Life is a grand total of our choices. What do you choose today?

Progress through purpose, change through choice!!