Make 2015 the year you start Making Big Financial Improvements. I have just finished my 2015 medical insurance choice which brings some monthly savings. But there are unknown impacts to coverage payments for our routine Doctor visits and blood tests for our prescription renewals. My plan no longer offers a PPO with $25 co-pays. Now we will be on an 80/20 thingy with a HRA (like HSA but for retirement benefit plan). They say so we are more involved and engaged in the costs of our medical care.

I couldn’t believe they wrote that. It smells a lot like BS but what can you do? I will be saving about $100 a month over the 2014 payment. I then thought I should go through my budget and look at areas that I can possibly make some cuts and adjustments. But it just hit me. Why not do more than just that and go bigger? I mean look at the whole financial picture from lifestyle costs to investments.

Making Big Financial Improvements Starts with Hard Assessments

It is time that I do a complete re-evaluation of what we spend money on. What it is that truly adds happiness to our lives. This isn’t something new to us. But I think it is important to do occasional total assessments.

That’s because sometimes we do things or have things that we considered having a high happiness rank. But years later our interest change and we keep doing things out of habit. Sometimes we get a good deal and then they creep costs up slowly. We sit in the water like fat happy frogs as the water slowly warms to a boil and you know what happens to the frogs in this scenario. That isn’t a hot-tub you are relaxing in soup-frog.

I have learned that there are three main components to being successful in reaching my financial independence goals.

1. Be deliberate and decisive about the actions to take.
2. Commit, commit, and then commit. Make a great plan and stick to it. I think it is important to also write it down and post it somewhere visible as a constant reminder. Time to clear some of the grand-kid’s drawings and paintings from the fridge to make room for “THE 2015 PLAN”.
3. Finally something I have only come to find and understand in the past several months. Connect and network with like-minded people to help you do it through shared ideas, new approaches, and adding an element of accountability.

The first and second components are obviously super important. But the third has been a total surprise to me. I have been successful in my financial independence journey but I have had my eyes opened up by connecting with and following many very good FI bloggers out there.

Expanding FI Knowledge

I believe that there are a lot of great new and diverse ways to see things even though the articles being written may be by someone at a different stage of financial independence, in a different generation, or having different feelings about early retirement. One of my passions is to always expand my perspective and for anyone looking to make 2015 the year you start making big financial improvements you can’t go wrong getting as much help as you can.

I do hope you find some occasional wisdom and motivation on this Leisure Freak site but as I said there are some very talented bloggers out there that have great financial independence insights and ideas. By connecting with the financially like-minded and reading about their journeys to reach their goals and still live awesome lives, exposing their struggles, success, failures, ideas, and plans is part of the third component to help meet our own goals.

Here is a short list of some FI bloggers I have enjoyed reading

I hope you pay a visit to their sites and check them out sometime.

More Than Just Money, Kassandra, striving to live life beyond what money can buy.

debt debs  Personal Debt Wrangler – Had my money head in the sand – but no more!

FinancialSamurai.com, Slicing through Money’s Mysteries.

MrMoneyMustache.com, Financial Freedom Through Badassity.

SimpleCheapMom.com  A millennial housewife keeping things easy on a budget.

TheBrokeandBeautifulLife.com. By Stefanie, your quintessential “broke girl” living in New York City.

Dividendmantra.com Dividend Investing, Frugality, and Financial Independence.

ClubThrifty.com Where we encourage you to “Stop spending. Start living.”

No Pension Will Travel  Our journey to “Free at 55” – traveling the planet without it costing the world.

untemplater.com   By Sydney, Save time and money by doing things differently

These are just a few sites that I read and get inspiration and new ideas from. There are many more.

Do you agree that it is important to network and connect with like-minded people to reach your goals?