NOISE encompasses the financial press right now. It can be deafening and immobilizing. The NOISE is so addicting that it keeps you glued to the TV, dominates your thoughts, affects your sleep patterns, and it’s the topic of conversation all over town. Emotions are running high and people can’t cope. So please, before you read the rest of this article I want you to do me a favor. Take a moment to clear your head of this NOISE for two minutes. This article will be right here when you get back.

Welcome back. So here’s what works. A great wealth management plan will help you plan for your personal circumstances — when to sell an investment, when to buy an investment, what to do in good times, in bad times, in high tax times, and will help you figure out the exit plan that’s best for you and your family. You still have to survive the emotional swings and you must be able to change your plans when the rules change.

But the headline noise is so addicting, so polarizing, so motivating and so emotional that it’s hard to find reality. It’s difficult for you to get back to making rational and thoughtful investment decisions. So, allow me to share something with you that I’ve been talking about for years now.

What the current headlines fail to mention are the slow-moving demographics of consumer spending in our country. These demographics have had many positive effects over the last 25 years and have helped us climb the ultimate economic mountain. We have just about reached the top of this mountain called consumer spending. We’ve become the nation that’s the envy of the world in economic freedom and productivity. Yet, for the past three decades, this mountain has been built on the continual year after year increase in consumer spending. This continual and steady increase in consumer spending has helped us spend our way out of wars, dire economic problems, terrorist attacks, hurricanes, and it will help us weather this current credit crisis.

As we approach the apex of this mountain, we must be careful as to what lies ahead. We must understand that consumer spending drives GDP, that GDP drives profits, that profits drive earnings, and earnings drive stock prices. When you begin to reduce consumer spending, which makes up over 70 percent of the money spent in America, you will create some serious problems in our economy and stock markets. This is exactly what we are doing as we approach the downward slope of “Mount Consumer Spending.”

The big storm is the change in consumer behavior patterns. During this time it is your wealth management plan that will help you to understand what you own, why you own it, and how you plan to use it. The knowledge will help to provide the shelter we all need to help navigate this economic storm.

Joseph “Big Joe” Clark is a certified financial planner and managing partner of the Financial Enhancement Group, LLC. Securities and Investment Advisory Services offered through World Equity Group, member NASD/SIPC. Clark can be reached at bigjoe@yourlifeafterwork.com, or (765) 640-1524.