09 Jan 2025 On Waiting

Waiting has been on my mind a lot over the holiday season. There’s the waiting of children as they see their presents under the Christmas tree, but have to wait to see what’s inside. There’s seemingly waiting everywhere you go this time of year – to the store, stuck in traffic, for a table at a restaurant, at Target because only 1 of the 14 lanes is open. For me personally, my wife has been waiting on a major surgery she will have in February. This has involved waiting on the surgery itself and waiting on other planned areas in life. 

Whenever waiting pops up in my mind, it seems to have a negative connotation. That seems to be the prevailing notion in our culture of hustle, why wait? I’m reminded of the old commercial from J.G. Wentworth, “it’s my money and I need it now!” (I’m so sorry if their jingle gets stuck in your head now). There is also a WSJ article that mentions “impatience is our modern curse” due to technology offering constant stimulation. 

In general, the American consumer is not one that wants to wait on anything. Why wait to buy that new phone when you can just finance it? Why wait on that fancy car when you can take out a loan over a decade? With a swipe of a card, you can put almost anything on a credit card. Americans pay about $14 billion just in late fees! It seems that no matter what you are buying these days, whether it is $10 or $10,000, you can finance it and delay having to pay the actual cost (there are, of course, times when it makes sense to finance – a Brief for another day). 

Fight Club infamously sums it up well for a lot of people, “we buy things we don’t need, with money we don’t have, to impress people we don’t like.” Or as Mark Vroegop sums up in his book Waiting Isn’t a Waste, “In our fast-paced, instant-answer, and quick-results culture, less waiting is a benchmark for success. It’s a status symbol… How many seconds are you willing to wait for a website or video to load before you click somewhere else? Our patience for the “buffering wheel” is decreasing. Efficiency and immediacy are the hallmarks of success in our society. Time is money, right?” 

So when it comes to your personal finances, is it possible for waiting to be a positive force? I think that it is. I believe you can grow a greater appreciation for your situation and the things that you do have by waiting on things you want but cannot afford yet. 

There are a lot of reasons that waiting can be a positive force – a major one being that you are less stressed or anxious about finances being tight. The less you spend, the more you live below your means, and the increased flexibility you have. If your mindset shifts to waiting and not needing as many new things, then that is less money that you will need to retire. If you need less money to retire, you may be able to retire earlier. People often unknowingly delay their retirement because they increased their spending on things they do not really want. 

Another reason is that waiting can make you reconsider a purchase. With credit cards and pay over time apps (like Affirm), making impulse purchases has never been easier. You can never leave your couch and rack up thousands in financing from buy now pay later features – and maybe even have it delivered that same day! With it being this easy, you barely have time to process if it is even something you want, you just buy it because it seems so cheap now. Waiting will help you know if a purchase is really worth it.

So as the New Year begins, join me in reconsidering waiting to be something that has positive elements to it. Waiting and being patient when it comes to your personal finances can impact you in more ways than just your balance sheet. It is a mindset shift to reorient you to the things most important in your life. 

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