I believe that self-determination and self-education go hand-in-hand.  The quest to improve my life was driven by opening my mind and learning as much as possible.  I highly advocate reading a wide breadth of material with a critical eye.  Small shifts in knowledge and perception lead to the big changes that seem to happen overnight.

I still think about reading Get a Financial Life years ago, and learning about the Job-Related Expense.  There’s a lot of wise information in that book, but the concept of the JRE opened my eyes to a new way of looking at things.  I hadn’t considered the expenses involved with having a specific job aside from commuting – money spent on uniforms (ie suits & ties), eating out, socializing.  I eventually applied this thinking to other areas, like living in X neighborhood vs Y (where one was wealthier with a greater likelihood of an expensive lifestyle).  Like a bird building its nest, big changes happen bit by bit.

Over the years I’ve found some websites and blogs that consistently give great information and provide more of these shifts in perception than I might find by just shooting in the dark.  Here they are, in simple alphabetical order:

Picture by NYRB Classics