People, money and ...

A further consideration for Lent from a secular source. At one level, nothing new. However, it does endorse the wisdom of 'plotting against yourself' as my former college principal once called the discipline of planning to bypass or work round our worst tendencies.

left to our own devices, he said, many of us would spend all of the money each month, and not exercise the self-control it takes to invest it ourselves.
Thus, we commit to a monthly payroll withdrawal because we intuitively understand our tendency to discount. We know that we are likely to take a smaller, immediate reward rather than wait for the larger, long-term reward that comes from saving for retirement.
The researchers' work helps in understanding the factors that influence choices involving certificates of deposit, retirement plans, health-club annual memberships, Social Security, automatic investments and so on, and also helps in the identification of weaknesses in people's decision-making processes.
The researchers suggest that such understanding may enable people to make better choices — those that lead to greater benefits in the long run.

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