Accounting for your actions, assets or situation is a principal as well as a good practice. This is a concept taught in the Bible, business school and practically any formal education that enjoys successful students. Without an accounting, how do you know where you stand on any given day?

Crystallized examples of failure due to an unwillingness or inability to make an accounting surround us. Whether it's the family struggling with their finances who can't tell you the exact amount that could solve their problems or the unhealthy person complaining that they just can't seem to figure out how to improve their condition. The ignorance about the challenges paralyze us. When adequately weighed and measured, our problems can be met with a plan of action. Otherwise, it's just a depressing spiral of failure and empty wishes.

Many of us aren't as ignorant. It's not that we don't have problems. But, we tend to know exactly what it would take to solve those problems. Knowing you can't pay your bills isn't very empowering. Knowing you need an extra $300 a month makes it a problem you can solve.

Now, we can't have a conversation about making an accounting for our situation without addressing attitude. Here's mine: I don't care. While talking to a friend about my income requirements, he said innocently "You know Jason, there's not many people who earn that kind of money around here." I don't care. That's what I need to settle my debts. It is of no consequence that someone else feels the number is justified or reasonable. The number is the number, regardless.

This problem of reasonable numbers is part of why people fail to make an accounting of their situations, especially when it comes to financial data. The numbers seem too large, or perhaps they realize that major problems are born from numbers that are far too small to justify the pain they cause. It's not relevant. What is relevant is that once you have the numbers, once you have measured the costs, you can work to solve the challenges associated with those numbers. Until then, you have no goals. Wishes are cheap and numerous. Goals have potential positive outcome. They are far more valuable to the person who chooses to direct his own life.

Sometimes we don't have the data to make a good accounting. For example, self-employed people often don't know how much money they earn. they have a general idea of how much money they bring in, but no idea what that translates to in net income. They may be surprised when their accountants tally up the totals. Deciding to take a job, a new client or push a new service is like rolling the dice without the hard numbers to identify good versus bad choices.