If you have read any literature on retirement planning or have received advice from a financial professional, chances are you were presented with the 70% rule, the one that suggests that retirees will need between 70 and 80% of their pre-retirement income in order to maintain their standard of living.

A will is the foundation of your estate plan and it is essential if your financial affairs are to be settled in accordance with your wishes. If you die without a will, or “intestate” as the law refers to it, essentially the state becomes your executor and your property will be distributed according to its laws.

Have you made up your mind on just about everything, even before you know what it is? For instance, when you meet someone, is your opinion of the person formed from the first impression? Or, when you hear a political argument from the other side, is your mind opened or closed? Are you able to concede the “good points” the other side make, or do you dismiss the whole argument?

All investors – be they conservative, moderate or aggressive – need to understand that the level of returns they expect to generate is directly related to the amount of risk they are willing to assume – the higher the return, the higher the amount of risk one needs to take.

Chances are good that if you turn on the prime time news on any given day or pull up your favorite newspaper on your iPad one of the top stories will relate to emerging risks around the world.

One of the first lessons of finance we are taught, by our parents or through some basic personal finance course, is to make creating an emergency fund our top priority. Having a reserve of cash equivalent to six to 12 month’s worth of living expenses is considered the most fundamental principal of financial security.

Most people would argue that living in a digital world, with instant access to an endless stream of information has made us smarter and more self-empowered than past generations. Investors believe that it has “leveled the playing field”, enabling them to make investment decisions based on the same information once only available to the investment pros.

After several years of wallowing in financial upheaval caused by a severe recession and financial crisis, Americans are, once again, looking to the future. A renewed confidence has many people setting their sights on long term goals that, just a few years ago, may have seemed out of reach.

If given the choice, most people would choose financial freedom over financial servitude. Who doesn’t want to be financially independent where their money is working for them as opposed to them working for money?

Think back to those early days in life when it seemed like everything in the candy aisle was free if you begged your parents hard enough. Not a fleeting thought was given to the expenses of a vacation or the copay costs at the doctor. There’s something beautifully unburdened in the way which children experience the world: recklessly present and innocently ambivalent.