How Indecision Is Killing Your Pocketbook

By Trilogy Financial
January 5, 2021
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Awareness is key to change, but you also need action. In fact, you need focused, decisive and immediate action to see change and to get yourself back on the road to financial independence.

There are a lot of decisions to make when forging your way to financial independence, there are also countless paths to each destination and countless solutions to each problem. Most folks are also juggling more than one financial goal: retirement, emergency funds, college education for children. How do you prioritize? How do you find the right solution for retirement or long-term care? All the decisions can be overwhelming, which causes many to check out of their own financial situation. While taking a step back when one feels overwhelmed is a natural response, refraining from taking action can ultimately do more harm than good.

Definitive action can both propel you towards financial independence and protect the traction you’ve already made. The sooner you start investing in your financial future, the more your funds can grow due to compound interest. The longer you wait to address any financial problems, the more these minor issues can snowball into larger issues, which can often be the case with debt. Also, if you haven’t taken decisive action to establish an emergency fund or invest in the proper form of insurance, an unexpected event can derail you further from your route to financial independence.

Our Advisors at Trilogy try to help you take the guesswork out of making a decision. Some of the worst indecision is born from not knowing the results of choosing Option A over Option B. However, our Advisors /Life Planners can run various scenarios for you, showing the consequences of different courses of action – helping you see which decision may be the right one for you. More importantly, they are here to support you through difficult situations, so the rest of your road to financial independence will be smooth sailing.

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By Trilogy Financial
October 13, 2025

Starting December 16, 2025, Meta will begin using what you say or ask in Meta AI chats to personalize what you see on Facebook and Instagram.

  • Example: If you ask Meta AI for hiking tips, you may start seeing more hiking posts or ads.
  • Meta says it will not use AI chats about sensitive topics such as politics, religion, or health.
  • Users will begin receiving notifications about this change in October.

 

What This Means for You

Your social media experience may start to feel more personalized, but it also means Meta will collect and analyze more information about your interests based on your AI conversations.

 

Possible Risks

  • Less Privacy: Your AI chats could influence what ads or posts you see. Even if Meta says it is not reading your full conversations, it is still learning from them.
  • Unintended Targeting: You may start seeing ads or content you did not expect, based on what you mentioned to Meta AI.
  • Misunderstandings: If the AI misinterprets what you say, it could lead to inaccurate suggestions or assumptions about your interests.
  • Data Sharing Concerns: More information about you increases the risk if Meta’s systems are ever compromised or misused.

 

What You Can Do

You do not have to stop using Meta AI, but you can take steps to control how much it learns from you.

  1. Limit what you share with Meta AI.
    Avoid asking personal or sensitive questions.
    Treat AI chats like public posts and do not share anything private.
  2. Review your ad preferences.
    Go to Settings → Ads Preferences on Facebook or Instagram.
    Adjust “Ad Topics” and “Activity Used for Ads” to limit personalization.
  3. Use the “Why am I seeing this” option.
    Tap the three dots on any ad or post to understand why it was shown and make changes.
  4. Turn off AI features where possible.
    You can skip or decline to use Meta AI in searches or chats.
  5. Stay alert for prompts.
    Meta will notify users about this update. Take a moment to read the message before clicking “Agree.”

 

Bottom Line

Meta’s AI is designed to make your social media feed feel more relevant, but it also means the company is using new kinds of data about you. If you use Meta AI, be thoughtful about what you share and take a few minutes to review your privacy settings so you stay in control.

By
Jim Young
July 21, 2022

Ok now that you’ve recovered from falling off your chair after reading the tile of this blog, let me explain.

Inflation is one of the biggest challenges in achieving, and maintaining, financial independence. The low inflation we have experienced for decades has made many of us lazy when it comes to spending.  Now is the time to put some great habits into place that will reduce your spending now and will help even more when inflation get’s back to historical norms.

Here are some tips:

  1.  The days of clipping coupons seems to be a thing of the past.  Time to resurrect this time-tested way to save money.  Now it’s done electronically.  Click here for a great article on coupon apps.
  2. Bargain shop.  The meat department is the best place to shop for deals.  Supermarkets would rather greatly reduce the price on meat than throw it away.  I’ve seen bargains at 50% off.  And not to worry, the meat is still good.
  3. Dump the name brands.  I am a big name-brand guy however that is changing.  You can save 30-50% on certain items by going with the store brand such as Kroger at Ralphs.  Just today we saved 30% on peanut butter and couldn’t tell the difference.
  4. Use those credit card miles.  If you fly Southwest use their Chase Rewards Card.  This year alone I flew two of us to Hawaii roundtrip and flew myself to NY and used my miles.  Pretty much all carriers have credit cards they use for miles.
  5. If you shop at Ralphs use their Ralph’s Reward Card.  They have a great app that shows you year to date savings.  We have saved $500 so far this year.  You also get fuel points that you can used at Shell Stations.  I’ve saved as much as $.50 per gallon!
  6. This one is real hard for me but try to walk out of restaurants with a doggie bag.  I’m the type of person that if something is real good, I’ll clean my plate (thanks mom!).  But with portion sizes so big you should have no problem making two meals out of one.  Your wallet and belly with thank you!

 

These are just a few habits to help get you through this time of high inflation that could help your plan when inflation gets back to “normal”.

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