Fiction Over Fact? The Unexpected Wisdom That Can Reshape Financial Planning

Forbes

15-06-2025

I didn't read for pleasure until after college—when I could, for the first time, choose what I read. Even then, the work of financial planning required so much compulsory reading, and time is so limited, that for many (many) years, I read no fiction.
Which one is more realistic?
Why would I spend time with a made-up story when the world offers so many true ones that are informative, instructive, and, well, real? It was an immature thought, I know. I've since concluded that much of what's presented as fact ought to be questioned, while fiction can offer answers we once believed were beyond our literal—and literary—grasp.
As a financial advisor, I've had the privilege of hearing—and even entering—scores of stories that could only be labeled as stranger than fiction, not because the characters, themselves, were abnormal, but because life, itself, is so predictably unpredictable. Now I believe that our lives are so uniquely shaped that we sometimes have to step beyond the real to see what is most true.
Life is not linear, so our financial planning shouldn't be either, I believe.
One of the authors whose fiction first captivated me is writer, poet, and farmer, Wendell Berry; and one of his characters whose journey spoke so deeply to me was Jayber Crow—the young minister who walks away from organized religion and into Port William, Kentucky, where he accepts the vocational commission of town barber.
Jayber's life is interesting enough to make him the protagonist of what many would suggest is Berry's finest work, but what makes him such a compelling character is his cultivation of a sub-community—the barber shop—the home of so many of the town's individual stories that it becomes a major character in Port William's broader narrative.
And it is as Jayber considers the confluence of these stories, including his own meandering path, that he delivers an observation that is, I believe, as prescient as it is beautifully written:
As much as this nonfiction author is tempted to offer a prescriptive takeaway, I'll instead invite you to reread Jayber's musing—and draw whatever meaning you will.