How to Take Back Some Power When You’re Feeling Powerless
By Allen Davis and Lou Davis, Davis Financial Group
Published in Northampton Living (June 2025)
Harry and Sally wanted to talk about the future. It wasn’t their own future, actually. It was the country’s. They felt sick at heart about what is happening in the United States – and powerless to do anything about it. More often than ever in more than 20 years as financial planners, our clients have been expressing similar feelings.
That wasn’t why Harry and Sally originally asked to meet, however. They wanted to talk about the stock market and its potential impacts on their retirement nest egg. But before we could get to that, they couldn’t help sharing even deeper fears.
That’s when the conversation turned to legacy.
In the face of a changing and chaotic political climate, many people feel they’ve lost a sense of agency. Financial planning can restore at least some of what’s been lost. That’s because your legacy is completely under your control.
A financial planner’s job, in part, is to understand what you want your legacy to accomplish, advise you on how to maximize your resources and eventually transfer them wherever you choose – whether it’s to your children and grandchildren and/or for the welfare of the world.
EXPERT CONTRIBUTOR
Allen Davis and Lou Davis
Davis Financial Group
413 584 3098
ldavis@davisfinancialgrp.com
davisfinancialgrp.com
There are several parts to setting up a legacy plan. The first is structure: What are the “containers” (such as a trust or an insurance policy) where your legacy funds are kept? When will your beneficiaries receive them, before or after your death? A financial planner can help you determine the optimal structure for your legacy, often in consultation with your estate attorney and accountant. Once you’ve chosen that structure, it usually stays in place.
But the content of your legacy is never locked in and, more importantly, it’s completely under your control. It gives you back (at least some of) your agency by empowering you to address what you care most about. Moreover, you can change the contents of your legacy as the world or your own priorities change. Planning your legacy is a way to stay engaged in the world. It’s a statement of the values and beliefs you care most deeply about, even if they change over time. Harry and Sally took comfort in the idea that they’d be both passing on resources to their kids and grandkids, as well as assigning part of their estate to local nonprofits and the national causes they’d always care about, like Planned Parenthood and the American Cancer Society.
When you feel overwhelmed and grief-stricken by what’s happening around us today, your legacy gives you the power to assert your beliefs.
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