I feel like I’ve been running into a similar conversation a lot with clients lately. It usually goes something like this:

Me: I see you have a goal of buying a house.

You: Yeah…

Me: That’s great, are you planning to stay where you are now for a while?

You: Well, I’m not really sure yet. I could see myself here for at least another year.

Me: Okay, what makes you want to buy a house here?

You: Aren’t I just throwing away money by paying rent? Also, I have friends who’ve told me it’s a great investment. Isn’t that what you do when you’re an adult? This is the next step, right?

Record scratch. Pause. Hold the phone.

We can talk about how to decide if you should buy a house or not another time. Here’s the real conversation we need to have. Your next financial step is yours. It’s nobody else’s. You’re not behind or ahead of any timeline or benchmark you’re “supposed” to hit. Focusing on this kind of financial peer pressure can start to get in the way of what you really want your life to look like.

So how do you ignore financial peer pressure? Just like you ignore any other kind of peer pressure. Know who you really are and know what you really want. Need some help figuring that out? Start with these three questions:

1. What do you love about your life right now that you would want to keep, even if you had a million dollars tomorrow?
2. What do you have or do in your life that you feel like is really for someone else?
3. What makes you smile when you think about the future you want to build? (Feel free to close your eyes for this one.)