When is the last time that you jumped in your car and hit the road with no direction or destination in mind? Perhaps you’ve done it recently, and perhaps you ended up somewhere really great. But, more often than not, when we get in our cars we know our intended destination and the direction we need to go. The spontaneous types may argue that having too strict of plan (or any plan at all) doesn’t allow for the potential of a great experience that can arise from not having a plan. The more “A” type personalities would likely counter this statement, arguing that lack of plan will result in an inefficient use of time and high probability of stress.

Let’s take, as an example, a situation many of us may have found ourselves in at some point in our life ~ trying to decide on a restaurant to eat at while on a vacation in an unknown place. Our spontaneous types will venture out for this dinner with no plan at all, trusting that the right place will appear and a great time will be had. Yes, you may get lucky and hit the top spot in the city just by chance. Or, you may wander aimlessly around the streets of this unknown place while hunger sets in and you begin to like your spouse or travel partner less and less. The “A” type group will have a restaurant chosen for each night of the trip before they even set foot at their destination. While this approach helps avoid the aimless wandering, it leaves little room for deviation or spontaneity. The lesson here is that having no plan may work out, but often will waste a lot of time and opportunity. Having too rigid of a plan may also work out, but, again, often results in a loss of opportunity and experience.

Your wealth and estate planning follows a similar parallel. Moving through your life with no plan may end up with a really lucky break and things working out better than you could have imagined. Or, more likely, it will result in a lot of missed opportunities and wishing that you would have done more planning a lot sooner in life. On the contrary, having a plan that is too rigid does not necessarily leave you in a better place. While you would have committed to achieving a set of goals that you established at some point in your life, does the plan give you the ability to be flexible with the many curveballs life throws at you? Does being so committed to a fixed goal put the blinders on and force you to miss opportunities that are being presented to you?

As with many things in life, the solution lies in the balance. Having a roadmap that commits you to planning for the things that can or will happen in life (death, disability, retirement and your legacy) helps ensure you are at least heading in an intentional direction. Once the roadmap is created, it must be monitored, evaluated and re-evaluated often to make sure it is changing with your life.

It’s never too early or too late to set the direction on your compass or realize it’s time to take a turn in the road.