Posts in Great Reads
January's Top Reads

January is a month of lists: resolutions, top movies, best books, funniest memes...you name it, someone’s listed it. And expects you to read it. You know, while you’re digging out your inbox, and dealing with rising case counts, and having your kids at home again, and...and...and...

And here’s another list in your inbox (lol sob)

The goal of this feature has always been to reduce the amount of things you need to pay attention to, by picking out a few items we found interesting from a month’s worth of articles, podcasts, and newsletters, and keep you from feeling like you have to drink from the firehose to stay informed.

So - as always - here’s a shorter than normal list of articles you may find interesting or informative.

Unlike last month, my top three pieces are about different topics: one about how daily routines free up your brain to deal with stressful situations, one about how to spot (and avoid) financial news that isn’t actually news, and one on resolving to create an estate plan as a way to show your love for the people you may leave behind.

Up next, if you need just a bit more reading, there’s a piece from our friends at Clever Girl Finance about the cost of indecision, a long-form piece on the benefits of laziness (I’m in!), one surefire trick from Downtown Josh Brown to avoid bear markets, a look back and hopeful view forward of how to persist in the ongoing fight to create a just society from Shree Paradkar, a critique of the new work-from-home tax credit from policy expert John Stapleton, and a surprisingly fun look at what would have happened if you only invested at market peaks.

Take what you want, leave the rest, and don’t stress, friends.

Pandemic-Proof Your Habits

From Kate Murphy

“The truth is that you cannot control what happens in life. But you can create a routine that gives your life a predictable rhythm and secure mooring. This frees your brain to develop perspective so you’re better able to take life’s surprises in stride.”

Read more here.

The Next Year Foretold

From Jonathan Clements

“The markets aren’t predictable—but the talking heads sure are. Like a dog with a favorite fire hydrant, financial commentators return to the same themes again and again. The silver lining: There’s no need to waste hundreds of hours in 2021 reading the business section and watching financial news channels, because we already know what the pundits will be saying next year—and probably the year after that and the year after that.”

Read more here.

New Year’s Resolutions: “creating yourself” and your estate plan in 2021

From Anne McFarlane

"Many of us will make resolutions this week in an effort to “create ourselves”; some to stick to a budget, exercise more, or read more books. These are all great goals, but what about a resolution to take care of ourselves, our loved ones, and our wealth through careful, thoughtful estate planning?

This can seem daunting, complicated, and overwhelming. Those of us in the field often forget just how much of a struggle it can be when it’s not your day-to-day life. Below is the list of some ways you can gently ease yourself into creating your estate plan this year:"

Read more here.

You can read this month's entire list below:

How Indecisiveness Affects Your Finances | Marissa Geannette

“There is always a way to recover from a bad financial decision, but if you never make one, you will never know what could be.”

The benefits of laziness: why being a lazy person can be good for you | Anne-Laure Le Cunff

“Laziness is often the other side of the productivity coin. Rather than a sign of inefficiency and unproductivity, it can be the result of smart work freeing up time for well-deserved idleness. Furthermore, it can be the trigger for smart work in and of itself.”

How to avoid bear markets | Josh Brown

“Wake up in twenty years and wonder why your portfolio is running in place. And then cry like a baby. ‘Why was I investing for minimum loss rather than for maximum return? What charlatan convinced me of that?’”

2020: A year that marked a new awakening - and reignited the last century’s battle for civil rights | Shree Paradkar

“We may be on a road many times travelled but I believe we are also at the cusp of real possibility. Backlash is inevitable. So is change. The only way ahead is to keep pushing for it, and with hope.”

New personal tax deduction wrongly favours the well-off | John Stapleton

“The people who need tax breaks of any kind are not the well to do. They are the people at the bottom who are struggling. And those struggling most during the pandemic are low income people and this new deduction is being administered smack dab in the middle.”

[VIDEO] What if you only invested at market peaks? |  The Compound

 “With a long enough time horizon, even bad decisions can be smoothed out by compound interest”

Great ReadsSandi Martin
December's Top Reads

Friends, welcome to the end of 2020. We made it! Deep breaths all around.

My final Top Reads is meant specifically for those of us who are burnt out and in desperate need of a rest. While there are some great articles around retirement, investing, and financial management, the ones I don’t want you to miss are all from coaches who specialize in transformation. I don’t know about you, but even a little transformation here and there would be very welcome.

I recommend you begin with “Your Surge Capacity is Depleted - It’s Why You Feel Awful” from Tara Haelle for a reminder of all the reasons you’re probably not okay right now. Follow it up with “Shot, But Too Stubborn to Fall Down” from Dr. Moira Somers for permission to rest, dammit.

When you’re good and rested, read “Envisioning a Future When Anything Could Happen”, by Marcia Reyolds, and then get to work on appreciating everything you (yes, YOU) did to get yourself to today so you can start getting yourself to a tomorrow you’re happy about by reading “The Truth About Results: It’s Largely in What You Can’t See” by Jacquette Timmons.

If you read nothing else, read those, and in that order.

Those of you with energy to spare and time to spend it on reading can get into Meg Bartelt’s post about making financial decisions when the future is (always) unknowable, and another post from Jacquette Timmons about the fundamental difference between giving financial advice and asking good questions (Yes, she’s on almost every list and yes, I love her). You can also take an intimate look at how “Covid long-haulers” are seeing their symptoms written off as subjective, and just how maddening and isolating that is.

For the retirement-minded, there are a pair of articles from the team at Your Retirement Researcher, including the following:

Rounding out the list are articles from Dan Mikulskis and Robin Powell about investing at all-time highs (it happens more often than you probably realize), what your job as an investor actually is (hint: it’s not outperforming), and - for any parents with the bandwidth to think about...anything, really - a video from Hadriana Leo about why you pay an allowance to your kids and how to ensure the delivery is consistent with the reason you’re doing it in the first place.

Your 'Surge Capacity' Is Depleted - It's Why You Feel Awful

From Tara Haelle

"I might have intellectually accepted back in March that the next two years (or more?) are going to be nothing like normal, and not even predictable in how they won’t be normal. But cognitively recognizing and accepting that fact and emotionally incorporating that reality into everyday life isn’t the same."

Read more here.

Shot, But Too Stubborn to Fall Down

From Dr. Moira Somers

“So here’s my best advice to you: Fall down, dammit. Fall down, and stay there for a while. Do it voluntarily, preemptively, proactively, before your mind and/or your body remove all choice from you. Step away from the desk; put down the tools; turn off the phone and computer.”

Read more here.

Envisioning A Future When Anything Could Happen

From Marcia Reynolds

“Visions are still vital. I also believe they need to be regularly assessed based on shifts in both daily life and personal desires. Innovation is opening doors while world events are shutting some. This doesn’t mean opportunities are decreasing. As the adage says, ‘One door closes, another one opens.’ Even a crisis can both narrow and expand possibilities. You don’t want to give up on the dream you’ve worked hard to achieve but how you live out your dream might be expanding or changing over time.”

Read more here.

The Truth About Results: It's Largely in What You Can't See

From Jacquette Timmons

“When you celebrate your wins, you know you’re not just celebrating the result. You’re also showing appreciation for what is invisible to others, but that you know was critical to your success.”

Read more here.

You can read this month's entire list below:

Reasonable but Arbitrary: The Best You Can Do with Many Financial Decisions | Meg Bartelt

“Embrace the unknowability of it all. Realize that personal finance—whether you’re doing it yourself or working with a professional or reading books—is both science and art. That art part is where the “reasonable but arbitrary” comes in. You have to get comfortable with the fact that you will not, can not, know the answers. No one can. And don’t believe anyone who says they do.”

Here Are the Money Questions I Wished People Asked | Jacquette Timmons

“Questions like these herein can help you deepen your relationship with money from all sides. It can help you understand the relationship you’ve had with it; the one you currently have with it; and what you can do to shape your future relationship with it. All questions serve a purpose. So technically no question is “bad.” It’s just that some are “better” than others. These are the ones that invite you to go deep and learn more about yourself – and those around you.”

I'm hesitant to identify myself as a Covid-19 long-hauler | Pooja Yerramilli

“We have not discussed how we will approach their prolonged debilitation; the financial and equity implications of their inability to work; and the psychological sequelae of feeling sick and cast aside. If we continue to reject that their symptoms warrant investigation and treatment simply because they are not understood, these people will inevitably be alienated from the medical establishment and forced, like other “NOS” patients, to seek compassion and care only from each other.”

Advice for investing at all-time highs | Dan Mikulskis

“Competing narratives abound in markets all the time, but never more so than at a new high. Smart-sounding people have, and always will make headlines with compelling sounding arguments for bubbles, euphoria and over-valuation (a secret: fear sells). The most valuable advice you might ever read is to ignore them.”

Not Your Job | Robin Powell

“Your real benchmark isn’t beating the stock market. Instead, it’s how you’re performing relative to the goals that you’ve set. This approach may not sound as heroic and sexy as the image of the individual investor bravely second-guessing the market. But it will almost certainly yield superior long-term results.”

What If The 4% Rule For Retirement Withdrawals is Now the 5% Rule? | Ben Carlson

 “You also have to consider no one actually lives their life in a spreadsheet. Something like the 4% rule is a rough guide that assumes a fairly linear path of spending. Every financial plan should be open-ended because the whole point of the planning process is making corrections as reality meets your built-in expectations.”

Your Retirement Number is Meaningless | Bob French

"There’s no right answer here. And that’s the point. Everyone’s different. And that means everyone’s retirement plans should be different. Anyone talking about retirement numbers is missing the point, and probably trying to make it easier for their sales folks to sell you something."

How does assisted dying impact survivor pensions? | Jason Heath

“I am 84 and in poor health, suffering from two cancers. I currently receive a public service pension from the federal government and my Canada Pension Plan benefits. If I should decide to have assisted suicide, would that affect the pensions my wife would receive?”

Does your retirement plan account for your own cognitive decline? | Wade Pfau

"Declining abilities to do financial calculations and other types of cognitive impairment make it increasingly difficult to manage a complex investment and withdrawal strategy as you age."

[Video] Thinking of Giving an Allowance? 4 Considerations | Hadriana Leo

"Make sure you're very clear about why you're issuing the allowance...If we're to teach our children about money, they need to have it to spend. Are you issuing an allowance to teach money lessons? Or as a reward for work done?"

Great ReadsSandi Martin
October's Top Reads

Here we are, well into fall...already? What even is time, anyway? Next thing you know it’ll be 2021 and all this will be over, right? RIGHT?

The amount of creative energy we’re all using just to get through life these days is enormous, and you may not have much leftover for reading All The Things, which is exactly why I compile this list every month. I read the things so you don’t have to (unless you want to, obviously), and share the few that resonated with me.

To start you off easy, I have a great read that’s not a read at all! The Money on the Table video series from Julien and Kiersten Saunders is a must-watch for anyone with parents who are or may become financially dependent on them. Spend 40 minutes with them and Julien’s mother in episode three, and then do yourself a favour and watch the other episodes too.

Next up, I have an article from our favourite Bitches getting Riches about how using your post-secondary studies to learn key skills like “managing people, priorities, time, data, and (most importantly) yourself” can be more valuable than technical industry know-how. Finally, I found an article for all you new to the working from home scene on what WFH expenses you can and can’t deduct from your income come next year’s tax filing season, and the supporting information you may need to request from your employer to do so.

As always, I’ve got more than just three great reads for you. If you have time, check out the following:

Happy Reading!

[VIDEO] Money on the Table: Talking to Mom About Money

From Julien & Kiersten Saunders

If you haven’t been watching this series of real-life conversations about money from Julien & Kiersten Saunders of Rich & Regular, you’ve been missing out (I mean, the food is dreamy, for one thing).

This conversation with Julien’s mom Sybil, about her childhood growing up in Jamaica, her experience as an immigrant coming to the US, and the role money played in her life is a perfect example of the kind of conversations to have with your own parents. (This episode of Because Money is another example)

As Julien & Kiersten explain, this important conversation allows you to understand how your parents’ life experience shaped how you were raised to think about money.

Watch the full video here.

Your College Major May Not Prepare You for Your Job—but It Can Prepare You for Life What Does "Good Trouble" Look Like in Your Life?

From Kitty

“You bring great value to your job role just by being you, regardless of what you studied in school or learned in internships. In my observation, technical know-how and industry experience are far less important than the “soft skills” of managing people, priorities, time, data, and (most importantly) yourself."

Read the full article here.

2020 Income Tax: What you can’t—and can—claim for your work-from-home office during the COVID-19 pandemic

From Renee Sylvestre-Williams

“You furnished a functional home office, you’ve got face masks ready by the door for when you need to run an errand, and you bought sanitizer (so many bottles of sanitizer). You’ve done your part to stay home and help flatten the coronavirus curve. The question now is: Can you write off working from home during the pandemic and any of these things you bought because of COVID on your taxes?”

Read the full article here.

You can read this month's entire list below:

From the Diary of: Laurel Gillespie, Director of Advanced Care Planning in Canada | Amanda Levine

“Advance care planning (ACP) is about planning for your future health care needs, not just about end-of-life. Think of it more as being about how you want to live, should you become unwell and what you want your care to look and feel like—whether that’s tomorrow or years from now. Because let’s face it, we don’t know what’s coming. Not one person has ever said: 'The next time I die…”

I LOVE Abstract Conversations About Money; Do You? | Jacquette Timmons

“It is so much better to follow the spirit of a financial tactic and find what’s suitable for your current circumstances than it is to unquestionably follow a financial rule. Strategic adaptation is key and is what will set you up for success”

Losing Strength | Chris Enns

“Building that buffer is a priority, no matter what you’re trying to do. It’s really hard to pay off debt, save for a big thing, build a home or business while playing jump rope with zero.”

Abundance Mindset is About More than Money | K. Wright

“How many times do we hold on tightly to an unhealthy friendship, partnership, or job because we fear we’ll never find anything else comparable? Although it might seem like keeping that connection is what we need, the longer we hold onto it even when we know it no longer serves us, the longer we limit ourselves from other opportunities.”

[VIDEO] Making the Best of New Beginnings | Hadriana Leo

“Stop planning and start already.”

The names are never the same | Larry Swedroe

“When she asked him to provide the list of recommended funds from five years ago, he stared at her with the look of a deer caught in the headlights. He had gone through A.G. Jones’ intensive sales program. The training program had taught him to ask questions like ‘You don’t want to be average, do you?’ But it had not prepared him for this question. He was taught to sell, and obfuscate, but not to answer questions like this.”

8 Ways To Feel Financially Secure | Owen Winkelmolen

“When talking about financial security, it’s important to differentiate between BEING financially secure and actually FEELING financially secure. It’s possible to BE financially secure but not FEEL that way. It’s possible to be in a great financial position but without the right knowledge, routines and plans, it may not actually feel that way.”

Investing Experts on an Earlier Version of the World | Ben Carlson

“The world of finance is littered with people who are experts on an earlier version of the world. They rely exclusively on specific backtests, formulas and strategies that would have worked wonderfully in the past.”

Guide to inflation: Price changes, the pandemic, and your pocketbook | Alexandra MacQueen

“Canadians’ lived experience of rising costs may be inadequately captured in the official measurement of inflation.”

Great ReadsSandi Martin
August Top Reads

I hope every single one of you is finding a (safe) way to enjoy the summer. Hopefully on, in, or beside the water, with a book in your hand and a drink within easy reaching distance. And since you’re staying two metres away from everyone else, and prefer reading to shouted conversations (just me?) here’s a selection of interesting, informative, or inspirational reads: 

If these three great reads aren’t quite enough for you, check out:

Still reading? How about:

Happy Reading!

What Does "Good Trouble" Look Like in Your Life?

From Jacquette Timmons

“The people who tend to leave the greatest legacy often never set out to do that. They were just doing what they felt called to do."

Read the full article here.

Confessions of a Former 'FIRE' Skeptic

From Christine Benz

“I’ve concluded that the “retire early” part of FIRE is a bit of a distraction from the really important part of the movement: the value of mindfully allocating our precious time and money in a way that aligns with our values, life goals, and joys. From that standpoint, even those of us who don’t plan to retire early can learn something from FIRE, and young investors with their whole lives ahead of them can learn even more.”

Read the full article here.

Let Yourself Be Unproductive. At Least for a Little While.

From Peter Bregman

“Feel the sadness, the loss, the change. Sink into the discomfort of not moving forward, not getting things done. In a strange way, not progressing may be its own form of productivity. Something fruitful is happening, we’re just not controlling it.”

Read the full article here.

You can read this month's entire list below:

My (private) company is doing a tender offer. Should I participate? | Meg Bartelt

“So, if you want to stay concentrated in your company stock, it’s not necessarily a bad idea. You in fact kind of have to do that to have a chance of a big windfall. But you also have to understand that this (very) probably won’t happen, and you’re more likely to have less money in the end than you would have had you sold the stock and invested in the “low-cost, broadly diversified portfolio” that we financial planners are always nattering on about.”

Financial aid guide for university and college students in Canada | Cameron Yee

“If you’re overwhelmed by the thought of student debt, this student financial aid guide can help you understand your options, how the programs work, and how to apply and qualify for them, too. Remember, you have nothing to lose from applying!”

Budgeting doesn’t mean spending less on things | Chris Enns

“Budgeting is about doing money on purpose.”

The CERB clawback summer reader| John Stapleton

“No surprise here. If you have more RGI housing, more social assistance recipients and more low-income seniors, you also have the greatest number of clawbacks and people therefore have less money to spend in their local communities. Double whammy!”

A Simple Trick to Avoid Overthinking | Tiffany Aliche

“Become a paper towel person.”

In Stressful Times, Make Stress Work for You | Kari Leibowitz and Alia Crum

“those who had the highest levels of stress were 43 percent more likely to die only if they also believed that stress was bad for their health. In contrast, those who experienced high stress but didn’t view it as harmful were the least likely to die.”

Road Testing your Incapacity Plan - All About Estates | Suzanna Walter

“Not having a plan or having one which is inadequate can be a costly and contentious matter and can lead to family discord.”

Great ReadsSandi Martin
Your Financial Wellness Plan

The purpose of my regular Great Reads feature has always been to reduce the mind-boggling number of smart and interesting articles, blog posts, podcasts (and occasional comic strips) produced in a given month to a manageable selection that might be of help or interest to my clients, friends, and colleagues. 

I’ve been curating this list since 2013, and that means it’s always been a reflection of what happens to strike my fancy or get me riled up...which means that it’s too-narrowly informed by my view of the world and the many biases I carry, both consciously and unconsciously. 

For years, I’ve told myself that I’m trying hard to find diverse perspectives to fill this list. I have actually done a terrible job of it. This is the first month in seven years the list is full of Black, Latinx, and Indigenous women and it wasn’t that hard to find them, which means I could have been doing a better job of amplifying black and brown voices for years and just...didn’t. Because racism. I don’t intend to go back to the old, comfortable, white-centered way of putting my reading list together, but when I slip up, you should call me on it. 

This month, there is much brilliance to share, including:

In addition to these articles, there’s: 

What Do You Do When Things Fall Apart?

From Jaquette Timmons

“I’ve come to view managing stress in the same way: Oftentimes, where and how the stress reveals itself is not the source of the stress.

“Unfortunately, conflating these two points can cause you and me to make a critical mistake when it comes to effectively managing stress. This happens when you seek immediate relief from the stress, but don’t invest the effort and time to identify the root cause of the stress…

“Overwhelmed with debt, so you focus on cutting expenses. This is logical and certainly provides immediate relief. But the root could be that you need to earn more money...

"With regards to this week’s events, it’s akin to looking just for the quickest, shortest way to alleviate the physical, emotional and financial pain of racism, but without wanting to admit systemic racism permeates our society.”

Read the full article here.

Why We Can't Talk About Money Without Talking About Culture

From Rianka Dorsainvil

“The truth is every aspect of your finances is directly impacted by your identity and culture. If cultural background is ignored, you’re less likely to step into making positive and impactful financial decisions for your life. Every culture has different ways of viewing personal finances. Even within one culture, you might find that there are different ways that money is discussed or used.”

Read the full article here.

Your Financial Wellness Plan

From Eugenié George

“We forget how our habits, beliefs, ancestry, gender, and societal circumstances create our habits consciously and unconsciously. From interviewing 40 Women of Color. It was clear that many of our ideas are still generated by our ancestry.

“But for some reason, most of us separate every category in our lives: Health, wealth, relationships, career, etc. And most of us exclude how money plays a role in our mental health and wellness.”

Read the full article here.

You can read this month's entire list below:

Banking While Brown: Indigenous People and Structural Racism in Canada | Nikki Sanchez

“Although we are in an era of so-called 'reconciliation,' the colonial practices that were first enacted in order to clear and claim a country have never ended. These practices include (but are not limited to), resource extraction, predatory capitalism, patriarchy, hetero-hormativity, and assimilation into European cultural norms, also known as white supremacy.

“While Indigenous resistance challenges each of these processes, they change forms through settler colonial time.

“As an example, while compulsory residential school attendance officially ended with amendments to the Indian Act in 1951, it transformed into the Sixties Scoop. The mass apprehension of Indigenous children from their families to white foster care and adoption that lasted into the mid-1980s and continues today.

"There are many more examples of this shape-shifting. Continued economic disenfranchisement, racially motivated violence, overrepresentation in prisons, under funding of Indigenous students per capita, and of course, racial profiling, are the modern manifestation of everything from the Doctrine of Discovery to the Indian Act."

Do You Have "All the Time in the World," But Are Unmotivated? | Jacquette Timmons

“Look, there’s no one way to go through this or any crisis. And, I suspect we may need to continue to recalibrate as the reverberations of this continue to unfold. In the process, if you find yourself experiencing time differently from those around you; if you find yourself with “all the time in the world,” but feeling unmotivated, come back to this post and choose to do one thing. It may be the thing that helps you move the needle.”

What You (Yes, You) Can Do to Support the Black Lives Matter Movement| Lara Buchar

“We know it’s easy to feel helpless in the wake of these traumatic and violent events, but if the weekend’s protests have taught us anything, it’s that now is the time to take action. We’ve rounded up the many ways that you can amplify forces for change in Canada right now, from making a donation to signing a petition and more.”

How the Personal Finance Sphere Upholds Systemic Racism | Tanja Hester

“Remember that words mean things, even if they don’t mean those things to you. Learn to spot language of oppression, leave it out of talks of money and personal finance, and don’t put the burden on those already oppressed to point this stuff out to you. Do the work yourself.”

How can you protect yourself from financial abuse? | Erin Pepler

“Often, it can be hard for individuals to identify financial abuse because of patriarchal societal norms. ‘A lot of survivors discuss this grey area,’ says Docherty. ‘They’ve been socialized to believe that [men controlling the household] is normal behaviour in a relationship, so when does it blur into abusive behaviour?’”

Does talking about racism make you uncomfortable? Too bad | Nam Kiwanuka

“Discomfort should not mean silence. Looking away won’t change the real-life consequences that others experience. So the next time you feel uncomfortable and would rather look away, ask yourself: Why is your discomfort more important than the very real wounds that are being inflicted on others?”

Defunding The Police Will Save Black And Indigenous Lives In Canada | Sandy Hudson

“Instead of relying on police, we could rely on well-trained social workers, sociologists, forensic scientists, doctors, researchers and other well-trained individuals to fulfill our needs when violent crimes take place. In the event that intervention is required while a violent crime is ongoing, a service that provides expert specialized rapid response does not need to be connected to an institution of policing that fails in every other respect. Such a specific tactical service does not require the billions of dollars we waste in ineffective policing from year to year.”

Can A Broken System Be Fixed? | Audrey Miller

“Our entire approach to aging, living and dying need to be re examined.”

Great ReadsSandi Martin