John Lennon said that life is what we do in between making plans.

A funny thought, nevertheless it shouldn’t discount the importance of making plans for major events in our lives. We plan where we are going to live, where our kids will go to school, what they are going to eat, what we are going to wear to work and many, many more everyday activities.

Planning takes time and effort and sometimes money. Amid the stress of everyday life, it’s easy to put off planning for those years ahead. Every week, the bills come in and we have to prioritize which are going to get paid now and which will have to wait until we have more money. Some people use a credit card for this purpose. Others wait until they have the money in the bank. Either way, that’s a lot to worry about without even looking down the road.

What is your five-year goal? What about a 10-year goal or your retirement? How much money will you need right now to live the life you want to live? How much will it cost to put your child through school? How much will you need when you’re ready to retire?

And then there are the plans we make for after we’re gone. Planning now will make things much easier for your loved ones when that time arrives. Having a burial place and other arrangements taken care of in advance lifts a great burden from a family in a time of grieving. Then there is the question of how you’ll distribute the things you leave behind. Remember that you can’t take it with you (actually you can, you just can’t spend it on anything). We make decisions every day about our lives and what we are going to do, and almost every one of those decisions is based on, “how much is that going to cost?”

It’s been said that the two things you can’t avoid in life are death and taxes. We don’t like either one, but we have to plan accordingly.