How I Finally Stopped Letting Open Loops Hold My Finances Back
- Jeannette Fennel
- Jun 16
- 4 min read
A few weeks ago, I looked around my house and realized it looked like a project graveyard.
There was laundry that needed to be put away. A bathroom that was 90% clean. Just not quite done. A packet of carrot seeds I bought weeks ago, still sitting on the counter, nowhere near the ground. A digital stack of social media posts in progress that were all part of the same series, half-drafted and waiting. Those little registration tab stickers for my Tacoma? Still sitting in the envelope. My license plate was almost expired.
None of these things were emergencies. But all of them were open loops.
I have a ChFC exam coming up that I needed to study for. Every time I walked past one of those unfinished things, it quietly tugged at my attention. Finish me. Don’t forget about me. Why haven’t you dealt with me yet? It was like my house was nagging me. I couldn’t fully focus until I cleared the mental clutter.
So I spent a couple afternoons closing loops. Laundry away. Bathroom done. Seeds in the ground. Posts finished and scheduled. Tabs on the truck. One by one, each small thing got handled. With each one, I felt something settle. A quiet kind of closure. By the time I sat down to study, my brain wasn’t being pulled in five directions. I could actually focus.
Here’s the thing: I’ve noticed the exact same pattern with my finances.
A $50 bill from a doctor’s appointment I kept meaning to pay. An $1,000 emergency fund I knew needed more in it, but I kept telling myself I’d get to it. Even after I paid off my consumer debt, I dragged my feet for months before I finally connected with a financial advisor to discuss retirement investment options. The hard work was done. I just couldn’t seem to close the loop.
Those open financial loops did the same thing as the laundry and the seeds: they sat in the background and quietly drained my energy. They reminded me, at inconvenient moments, that I hadn’t finished what I started. As long as they stayed open, my finances felt stuck. Even when things were technically going okay.
Once I finally closed them? Things started to move forward. Not because some magic happened. Because I stopped spending mental energy on things I was avoiding. I started actually making progress.
Here’s the Framework I Used
No complicated system. Just three things I worked through one loop at a time.
Step 1: I Named Every Open Loop
I sat down and got it all out of my head. Every financial thing I was avoiding, every task I’d been meaning to do for weeks. The unpaid bill. The emergency fund that needed more in it. The budget I never finished. The subscriptions I kept meaning to cancel. The insurance I hadn’t looked at in years.
I wrote them all down without filtering or judging. Just named them.
Step 2: I Picked One and Made It Smaller
Looking at the whole list at once was a fast track to doing nothing. So I picked one loop.
Just one. Then I broke it into steps small enough to actually act on.
Canceling subscriptions, for example, became:
Pull up my bank statement
Identify every recurring charge
Decide which ones to keep
Cancel the rest
Suddenly it wasn’t a project. It was four tasks I could knock out in one sitting.
Step 3: I Did the Steps
Obvious? Yes. Easy to skip? Also yes. I scheduled a block of time, set a timer, and worked through it. One step at a time.
That little exhale after each completed step (clicking “submit,” crossing something off) was real. That was mental energy being released. Energy I could finally put toward actually moving my finances forward.
What I Learned on the Other Side
Every single loop on my list got opened because I made a decision. To sign up, to start, to try. That wasn’t failure. That was just life in motion. My loops didn’t mean I was behind. They meant I was human.
My goal wasn’t to close every loop overnight. It was to stop letting them silently drain me. To stop walking past the financial equivalent of the laundry pile and pretending I didn’t see it. To pick one thing and see it through to done.
That feeling on the other side? Worth it. Not just because my finances were in better shape. Because I proved to myself that I could follow through. That kind of momentum is its own reward.
➡️ What’s one open financial loop you’ve been carrying around? Drop it in the comments. Sometimes just naming it out loud is the first step to closing it.
Hi! I’m Jeannette and I help professionals ditch debt without the overwhelm and build wealth without the stress.
📞 Contact me to schedule a FREE 15 minute phone call and start to make a plan with your money.
Friendly reminder: The information shared is for educational purposes only and isn’t a substitute for financial, legal, tax, or mental health advice. Please consult a qualified professional for guidance specific to your situation.
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