#76 December 23rd, 2022
Blake Carroll, CPA
PwC People Team - Manager | Helping Aspiring CPAs Navigate the CPA Exam with Confidence
CPA tip of the week: News flash for CPA studiers: you DO NOT have to watch every Becker video lecture. I think often, without even realizing it, people can box themselves into getting through every video lecture regardless of how helpful it is for them. There can be a sense of obligation, maybe your firm provided the study materials so you think you have to do it. There can be pressure coming from “it’s just what you do.” It’s easy to assume that’s how everyone studies, and so it must be the best way.
But not everyone learns most effectively through video lectures, that certainly was the case for me. If you feel like the audio is going in one ear and out the other, or you feel like you’re just highlighting the book because you were told to, that is not moving you towards your goal of passing. Are you actually learning the material and how to apply it? Your time is limited, so you should spend it studying in a way that is most effective for you. Simply finding time to study is often the biggest constraint and difficulty people face when trying to get their CPA. You are not wrong or bad if you learn better by reading, practice questions, flashcards, or some other method. The goal is not to watch all of the videos, the goal is to be able to pass the four sections. You owe it to yourself to figure out the best way for you individually to do that!
Do you struggle with listening to respond rather than understand? Do you give unsolicited advice too often? This article could be a big help to you. It’s easy to respond right away to a persons problem with recommendations and advice. You have the perfect book or podcast episode in mind, or maybe you launch into a story from your own life where you figured out something similar. But how frustrating is that when we are trying to talk about our problems and someone just turns it back to themselves and their problems? It feels like they’re making it about them. If you find yourself wanting to give advice it’s probably better in almost every case to talk less rather than talk more. Most of the time people just want someone to listen, not someone to give them advice. Giving them that space can often help them come to the solution themselves, which also will probably be more effective than you offering a solution. Maybe you could even ask some questions to help them along that path of discovery. The most important thing is probably making sure you’re not making it about you because that will just really annoy the other person. As the saying goes we have two ears and one mouth for a reason: listen twice as much as you talk.?
This article talks about some of the common mistakes people may run into as they try to monetize or scale up their passions into a business. Sometimes you can get so caught up in the business aspect that you lose sight of why you got into it in the first place: doing something that you enjoy. Don’t put so much attention on the profit and loss statement that you no longer get to be creative or do the parts of the business that give you energy. It’s also easy for people to get caught up in worrying about what others will think about your product or service, but if you feel good about it and are coming from a genuine place of trying to create value then eventually that persistence will pay off. If you’re creating from a place of fear of judgment you will not produce your best work. The Internet allows such a high degree of connectivity today that why would you not at least try to share what you’re passionate about and see if it enables you to make an impact on others? Fear and internal pressure are really the main things holding us back from being creators.?
What’s the difference between a dream and a fantasy? A fantasy is some lofty future where there are no problems and life is always perfect and happy. It’s some thing that society or others might try to sell you in order to get you to buy a product or buy into an idea. Dreams are something you can actually attain if you work for them. They are more about who you become on the journey to getting them because of the work you have to put in and the obstacles you have to overcome in order to reach the dream. It really is about the journey more than a destination. Dreams are realistic, fantasies are not. Dreams take work, fantasies make promises that they cannot keep. Make sure you are pursuing real dreams and not a future that you cannot get and would not even want.?
This article could be distilled?down to follow the golden rule to treat others as you would want to be treated. Has someone in your life, a family or friend or even your partner, wronged you in a way and you feel so irritated and think that they must do something to make it right? But then if you ever do something wrong toward them wouldn’t you want forgiveness and mercy right away? That double standard is a funny thing. We should extend the same grace and forgiveness towards others that we would want them to extend to us. We all are human and we all mess up at times. In the vast majority of cases people have pure intentions and do not mean to upset or hurt one another. If we truly appreciate that generalization, then it becomes much easier to forgive the types of relational mistakes that we all make at times. Relationships are not about keeping score and making people pay for their mistakes. That would be so unhealthy to keep a track record of wrongs and who has the upper hand. Your relationship needs to be more important than your need to feel right.
Finances are an extremely important part of any relationship, and unfortunately they can be a source of great stress if not handled well. It’s pretty crazy to see examples in this article of how some spouses/partners hid huge financial issues from each other. It could shake your relationship to the core to realize there’s thousands of dollars of debt you didn’t know about. The article has great advice on how to avoid financial secrets like that, and most of the solution is simply having regular open and honest conversations with each other. Have a recurring meeting where you asses your current financial situation, what is or isn’t working. Trust each other to spend reasonably but also have rules and guidelines in place.?
This article really made a strong impact on me. I’m sure most of us probably have goals, dreams and visions about our futures and what we want to do. But what happens if we only get parts of that future or our expectations aren’t met? What if that makes us miss out on the miracles we are experiencing each day because we are too focused on what we don’t have? I believe that life generally has a way of turning out for the best, just not in the exact way that we may have pictured initially. We need to make sure to look around and appreciate the things we currently have that were once just a dream. Miracles still happen all the time, they just may be paired with some pain or difficulties as well. But those difficulties should not make us blind to what we have achieved. It reminds me of Benjamin Hardy‘s book on the gap versus the gain. We need to choose to focus on what we have gained, not how far we still have to go. I bet your past self would be overjoyed to learn of everything you have going on right now. Similarly, your future self will probably have blessings that would be amazing to hear about today. It’s so empowering to believe that we are living our dream lives right now.?