As a collaborator in helping clients come up with their financial life plan (using the Kinder EVOKE method as the starting point), there is one certainty that I can provide.
Ready? That's it a best-guess at best, its already out of date one day after it has been written and that your life will likely be very different.
So, if the above is true, then why go through it? Because, its the planning process that matters.
The real value is created by frequently coming back to your plan and making the changes that become necessary as life plays out. The plan itself is a mirror to show what could happen; and that has great value and that is really what your buying when you engage a financial planner. If anybody is selling one-stop financial plans, avoid them as you're wasting your money. If you are interested in purchasing that product, I would question how much thought you have really given to your life and what will and could matter over the next 20-30 years.
“It takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan.” ― Eleanor Roosevelt, former first lady of the United States
We crave certainty, it makes us feel safe and we feel we can plan around the baseline. Truth is, there is little of this in life and it can turn on a sixpence, for better or worse. "Man plans and God laughs" as they say....What clients are really after when people engage in proper financial life planning is to know "are me and my family going to be ok" and for peace of mind. An initial plan can provide some idea of this, but with ongoing adaptive and fluid planning, you can receive much better answers to these ongoing concerns.
Working with a proper life planner or coach, allows you to get more comfortable with these hard truths. It is about embracing or at least shaking hands with constant change, the lack of certainty and control you have over the life and its events. Its about making sure the values and beliefs and goals that helped created the first "Draft" of your plan, remain the focus of the rewrites unless of course the values, beliefs and goals you held are all now different. I would guess that goals change the most, values can change over time and beliefs are very deeply held and are not impossible to change but less likely too.
Lets celebrate the planning process and not the plan. Lets celebrate the life journey and not the intended destination.