If you’re like most people, it’s about this time when you’ll be thinking about how you’d like 2024 to look.

What you might do differently versus 2023.

What habits you might like to replace or add.

You might even make a New Year’s resolution – a promise to yourself – to keep those changes going through 2024.

I’m agnostic on New Year’s Resolutions. I’ve made and broken enough of them in my 41 years to not bother resolving anymore.

I’m personally not into having a word of the year either. Or an in/out list. And you certainly won’t catch the word ‘manifesting’ crossing my lips.

Instead, I do a simple activity using my favourite quality of life gauge: the Shit-to-Gold (StG) ratio.

I wrote about it in Money School, and it was a hit when I presented it at the FI Freedom Retreat in Bali in September.

For example, one of my fellow presenters is a podcaster churning out multiple segments on current affairs every week. He lamented being unable to take a break when travelling because of the relentless nature of such content production.

Doing the StG activity was enough for him to have a lightbulb moment on how he could fix it so he could finally enjoy travelling without the production schedule hanging over his head. Hurrah!

Some of the attendees still write to me about their StGs, and have even set up accountability groups to check in with each other on how they’re going with it. 

I think it’s so effective because it’s simple, it doesn’t matter where you’re at financially, and you can do as much or as little as you like to tweak the ratio.

I hope it’ll work for you too.

Without further ado, here’s what the StG ratio is and the activity you can use to apply it.

The Shit-to-Gold ratio

Your life is filled with things you do that fit into one of three categories with some overlap:

• Stuff you love to do - the gold

• Stuff you hate to do - the shit

• Stuff you need do - the unavoidable, non-negotiable stuff (e.g. hygiene)

Whenever I talk to people who aren’t content - and that includes people who’ve reached FI - it’s generally because they feel time poor.

In other words, their shit outweighs their gold, like this:

If you want to be happy in the day-to-day of life, you’ll have better luck if you aim to reduce the shit and maximise the gold, like this:

» Working out your StG ratio

Map out your personal ratio as follows:

Step 1: Draw a table

Draw up a table with three columns, like so:

It can be electronic, on a piece of paper, whatever suits you.

Next you’re going to fill it in.

Tip: if an activity is in the area of the Venn diagram that overlaps with the Needs columns, put it in Needs - you’re going to have to do it anyway, so whether it’s shit or gold is irrelevant.

Step 2: Review your calendar

Pull out your calendar or diary from the last year.

Flick through it and work out where the stuff you’ve been doing sits.

Step 3: Review your weekly routine

Plenty of the things you spend time doing don’t make it onto the calendar (unless you are a time-blocking wizard, in which case: hats off to you).

So, now it’s time to think about a typical week in your life.

Think about what you do on an average day - all the nitty gritty stuff. Driving kids to school, cooking dinner, grocery shopping, all of it.

Pop those activities into the Shit, Needs and Gold columns per how you feel about them.

Now you should have a fairly complete picture of how you spend your time.

Next comes the important bit…

» Improving your StG ratio

Now is your chance to make yourself feel more time rich.

Step 4: Reduce the shit

First, it’s time to go through the shit list to work out:

• What you can get rid of entirely,

• What you could reduce - for example, by outsourcing, and

• What you just have to live with.

Pick a handful of things you could get rid of or reduce, then work out how and when you can do that.

Write those down as actions.

Tip: Accept the things you can’t get rid of. Having some shit is inevitable, and often serves as contrast to make the gold even more special, so don’t expect to get this list down to zero.

If you can’t shift much off this list, don’t worry - the next step can still help lessen its impact:

Step 5: Dial up the gold

This is the stuff that you want to do more of, or make the most of while you’re doing it.

Look through the list to work out what you’d like to do more of. Decide how and when you can do that, and write those down as actions.

Now comes the bit that’s more of a stretch…

Step 6: What’s missing?

Sometimes, our lack of contentment can be down to not having the right kind of gold.

If you’re still not feeling like the actions you’ve written down will help you feel time rich, put your mind to what activities you might add to the gold side:

• Is there a hobby you used to love that has dropped off?

• Is there something you’ve always wanted to learn or do, but haven’t tried yet?

• Have you got activities that connect you with community in there? Meaningful relationships with friends and family have a massive return in emotional wellbeing. If in doubt, volunteer somewhere.

Finally, the magic ingredient

» Do the actions!

This activity only works if you actually implement the things you’ve decided to do.

Schedule them in your calendar, or if they’re quick to do, get them done now.

For those you can’t schedule, you might benefit from a reminder instead of a specific action. I put sticky notes on my desk (preferably the full-stick ones like these as those babies last for aaaaaages). Here’s one of mine, given free speaking gigs are in my ‘do less of’ pile:

A message on the home screen of your phone or the background of your computer could work too.

There you have it, folks! Hope the StG ratio is useful for you and helps you feel more time rich in 2024.

Feel free to let me know how you go with the activity in the comments :)

About Money School

If you’re new here, welcome! Delighted to have you 😁

This is the blog for Money School, an Australian financial education company.

The main site is at https://www.moneyschool.org.au, but I keep our articles over here on beehiiv.

Everything on the main site and this blog is for educational purposes only. I’m not a financial adviser, nor do I play one on Netflix. I aim to help you learn about money so you can ‘choose your own adventure’.

Money School was co-founded in 2010 by me (Lacey Filipich) and my mother, Fran White. Money School offers workshops, online courses and have an international award-winning book, published with Penguin Life in 2020.

I’m also a regular media commentator on all things personal finance. If you’ve got 16 minutes to spare, you might like to check out my TEDx talk (over 1m views!) on financial independence and mini-retirements.