Living A Life Of Financial Purpose

by Jeffery A. Keill, CFP, CIM, FMA, FCSI, CEA

If you want to avoid mismanagement of your money, have a purpose for every dollar and every dollar has a purpose.

Money that lacks purpose is like a life that lacks direction. You wander aimlessly without thought, where time gets wasted and dreams- if there are any at all- get dashed. You and your money will arrive somewhere, surely, but most likely it will be where you wanted to go the least. 

There is an old method of financial budgeting that requires using physical jars or envelopes. It is also affectionately known as Cash Stuffing. This Cash Stuffing method was a fairly popular concept in the first half of the 20th century, when we lived in a cash-based society. This approach still appears in different forms among today’s generation as it has been passed down from our ancestors, much like Granny’s Bran Muffin recipe.

On each envelope one would write the purpose for the cash, and in each one of these one would stuff the cash required for the month’s purpose. For example, rent would have an envelope, groceries another, and entertainment had its own envelope as well. Of course, there would be numerous other expenditures we all have in life, each with it's own envelope. As the month progressed, money would be used from each envelope for that singular purpose until the envelope was empty. If the ‘ entertainment’ or ‘dinning out’ envelope became empty, one would know there is nothing left to spend in the budget until next month. Simple in theory, hard in practice. I will give you that.

What makes this approach successful is that each dollar is allocated a purpose. A reason for being. There are no wandering dollars to be squandered. As people adjust to their purposeful spending, a new and exciting envelope always appears: ‘savings’. This purposeful envelope is part of the evolution of financial maturity. Having attained financial control over today allows for the inevitable idea of financial control into the future. Of course, this too will continue to evolve and that ‘savings’ envelope will lead to an ‘investment’ envelope. This is natural, as you will desperately want to direct your savings into something that will retain, and most importantly appreciate in value. This is when you reap the rewards of a purposeful financial life.

Truly gone are the days of the “cash” society, as we now live in the digital age with credit cards, debit cards, e-transfers, and even cryptocurrencies This transformation of how we get paid and payout our cash flow does not change the timeless Cash Stuffing approach Granny taught us. We still need “envelopes” in our financial life.

You want to increase your chances of financial success? I challenge you to have a purpose for every dollar and a dollar for every purpose.

Posted on October 15, 2025