The most common piece of personal finance advice out there is to “know your net worth”—the number that represents your assets minus your liabilities. As a money nerd supporting a family in an expensive city, for years I viewed that number as a measure of how well we were doing.

It’s easy to make a number more important than it is. When the number went up, I felt good. When it went down, I felt bad. Eventually, I realized: this game is meaningless. It’s putting points on the most boring scoreboard in the world. That’s why my favorite idea in Bill Perkins’ book Die with Zero is prioritizing net fulfillment over net worth.

Spent what felt like a dumb amount of time looking at money stuff at the start of the year, summing up what we spent in 2024 and on what, and making what basically everyone calls a “budget” for 2025.

Boy do I hate that word.