Flow Financial Planning, LLC

06/16/2026

If you're feeling anxious about your life or finances, I find that an excellent way to tamp that down is to build in more room for error.

Yes, this often results in making choices with your money that aren't optimized. And I am—and think you should be—100% okay with that. Money isn't the point, after all. Life is.

A blog post:

While planning for the unexpected is always good advice, with the recent economic turmoil, creating even more margin is wise and practical.

06/14/2026

Seems a good time to remind everyone that "minimize taxes" isn't a good goal.

Sure, minimizing taxes can be a *tactic* to achieve an overarching life or financial goal, but it shouldn't be the goal itself.

Think about that when you're, say, making decisions about company stock or your investment portfolio. If you're prioritizing "minimize taxes" over "get closer to this life I want," take a step back.

A blog post:

How to prepare for your company's IPO regarding handling taxes and, more importantly, what you want your LIFE to look like.

06/12/2026

I just helped a client exercise and immediately sell a bunch of Incentive Stock Options (in a public company).

In doing so, she lost *all* the tax juju that ISOs can offer.

What did she get in return for that loss? She eliminated all risk of losing money on the stock.

I thought I'd remind you that it's okay to not take advantage of the tax goodness of ISOs. Tax goodness often comes with a downside.

A blog post :

A description of ISOs, their tax benefits, and how to make decisions about how to--or whether to--take advantage of the tax benefits.

06/04/2026

The longer I work as a financial planner, the more I realize that a big important role I play in my clients' lives is to advise them to NOT anything new to their financial lives.

DON'T add a new account. DON'T invest in that seemingly promising thing. DON'T move your cash to another bank. DON'T buy a second home. DON'T hold that company stock.

We just don't understand how powerfully wonderful simplicity is until we don't have it anymore.

And the modern world is out to stomp your financial simplicity into the *ground* if you aren't constantly on guard (or work with a financial planner whom you trust and who has enough cynicism to share).

05/28/2026

A few months ago I spoke with a women in her 30s, single, living in NYC, an attorney, smart, educated, accomplished, killing it. She was interested in working together. I told her I wasn't taking on new clients at the moment.

She said that she was disappointed that we couldn't work together, but she was happy for me that my business was growing so quickly I didn't have space to take on new clients.

I explained that I wasn't taking on new clients kinda for the opposite reason: I wasn't growing at all. I'd reached Enough and stopped there.

For a moment, she kinda just stared at me. Then said something like, that is amazing, I love it. It had never even occurred to me that you could do that. Just stop. Have Enough.

And with that RIVETING TALE, I am pleased to announce that I, along with Kaleb Paddock and Brian Thompson, will be speaking at XY Planning Network's annual conference, about "The Business of Enough." https://live.xyplanningnetwork.com/speakers

We 3 have all run our own financial planning firms. We've all reached Enough. We've all decided to stop growing, at least for now. (Our "Enough" stories are all slightly different.)

Did you know that you don't HAVE to keep on growing, earning more, serving more clients, hiring people, building a bigger business? It's true! Ferreal!

(And of course, obvious applications to life outside of business ownership.)

Discover the lineup of keynote speakers for the upcoming 2026 XYPN LIVE

05/21/2026

Lots of people in tech (though still the vast minority) are coming into $MM via tech company equity, meanwhile massive layoffs and uncertainty about the future of the tech industry plague everyone else.

If you feel rotten about your career and your life and your finances, I think there are two approaches you can take, and a good choice is probably a balance of the two:

1) Change your career, life, or finances
2) Change who you hang around with

I don't think we take #2 seriously enough.

05/13/2026

Most of my clients (people 30-50ish) need estate planning documents (or to update wildly out of date ones). They also need to get private life insurance and disability insurance. I make these recommendations clear.

Some clients are just the "you give me an order, I will execute it" types and they git 'er done despite the administrative hassle.

Some clients...languish.

And then a parent develops rapid-onset dementia or have a debilitating fall. Or a close friend who's a parent of young child dies unexpectedly. Or a co-worker gets in an accident and their recovery prognosis is long and uncertain.

And THEN those clients are all "Tell me what I need to do and I will do it YESTERDAY."

It'd be nice to accomplish all this stuff without having such tragic events be the motivation, but hey, as long as we get it done before the tragedy hits YOU, it's all good.

05/12/2026

"...gender issues are often power issues." -- from this episode of the Money for Couples" podcast

Suuuuch a good point. In both my personal life and in observing clients' lives, what we think of as typical "men" behavior is often just the behavior of the sole/higher wage earner. And that sole/higher wage earner can easily be a woman (👋 ) nowadays.

Ramit Sethi of I Will Teach You To Be Rich talks to Nicole and Shane, an engaged couple in their forties getting married in just 11 days. Together they earn $241,000 a year, have a net worth of $588…

05/09/2026

Flow turns 10 today. Whut. That's crazy.

Here are my reflections on the last decade.

What I've learned about running a (tiny) financial planning business, about being a financial planner, a quick update about where Flow is now, thoughts about the profession, and looking forward.

Reflections on the 10-year anniversary of Flow Financial Planning. Lessons about business and on being a financial planner.

05/07/2026

If you have been lucky+disciplined+smart enough to build up a lot of wealth at an early age...

Take advantage of that fact!

That early wealth means you can focus less on building wealth going forward. Which means you can be more open to sabbaticals or changing to more-satisfying jobs or saving less/spending more/donating more or retiring earlier.

If you have more wealth at 35 than most people have at 50, YOU GET TO MAKE DIFFERENT CHOICES.

Past You has given Now You and Future You a gift. Use it.