Hi, and welcome to this week's episode of Money with Alpha. This one's going to be a bit of a reflection and probably a bit of a quicker one, but it's There's some recurring themes I've seen happening in the world, life in general. Even though we are now in March and so technically only two months into the year, I feel like there's a lot of distraction and a lot of upheaval that's surrounding us. And I know I've certainly experienced this recently, not just in my, in my family, but the world around, too. I've had a few things happen that sort of shaken the, the regular sort of programming, so to speak, of my world over the. Over the last month. And I've just found it's really easy to get distracted by all the things now. Energy gets scattered. So I wanted to. To kind of share how I sort of re. Ground myself and how I manage to kind of keep on top of stuff even when things around me are crumbling is probably bit of an exaggeration, but shaky. So one of the things I talk about a lot. So I'm going to be consolidating some things I've spoken about in other podcasts, just sort of bringing them together. So first of all is clarity, purpose, systems, automation and boundaries. Now, I'm saying this as much to myself as to you, and it might be something that you need to hear right now, and it's nothing that's overly new, but I find it's really good to be reminded of things like this. Its just you. Yes, there's. I, I try not to read the news very often, but it's. It's been a little bit difficult lately because there's so much going on in Brisbane, where I live at the moment. There's even a cyclone warning that's out right now. I'm seeing blue skies, but the Bureau of Meteorology is saying that we are going to hit or have a cyclone hit our coastline in the next 24 to 48 hours. So we'll see how that actually transpires. I've not lived through one. The last one apparently was like 50 years ago. And I'm not that old yet. So Yeah, so we'll. But we'll see. It's. It's looking nice. So there's. But there's still the energy around it, the buzz. Things are closing, like, you know, our fairies have stopped working. Events have been postponed. Public transport elsewhere is also starting. So there's that energy of freneticness. And I have to admit, it's a little bit reminding me a little bit of what happened during the COVID period. So it's not exactly great memories and energy to be surrounded by. So having all of that. And then, like I said, I had some family stuff going on as well, and just trying to stay on track just from an energetic perspective, let alone anything else. So I'll go through clarity first. And by that I mean clarity of vision. What is it? The life that you want? And this is not just lifestyle in terms of, you know, what kind of stuff do you like? Kind of car, what kind of house? It's. What sort of feel of life do you want? Do you want a calm life? Do you want a frenetic life? I know, because it sounds silly to say, do you like the drama? But in some. Some cases, people actually feed off that energy, and that's okay. None of this is good or bad or otherwise. It's just being clear with yourself what kind of life you actually like and what you enjoy, how you enjoy operating. And the thing is, is that that will change. Our seasons of life vary. So I know my life was a lot more. Well, to be honest, I've always been a bit of a You know, I've always been that person who likes to just, like, sit on the couch on a Sunday night and read a book or have a good friend. I'll watch a great movie. Just. I've never Not that I'm an introvert necessarily. I'm more of an ambivert, but I don't particularly enjoy crowds and really loud music and noises. I tend to retreat into my shell in those environments. But seasons of life do change. So I was probably a little bit better at coping with that in my 20s. In my 30s, probably. All right. But as soon as I hit my 40s and I, you know, my daughter was getting a bit older, I was just like, you know what? I like the. I like the quiet life. And it's so funny. I kind of. I feel like I'm one of those people now who go, oh, back in my day, which is what I always used to chuckle whenever my grandmother used to say that. And I'm not even that age, so the vision. All I'm saying really, is that it will change with your seasons of life. And I do find that there are different decades of our lives where things kind of feel a bit differently. It's also what's going on in the world. I feel like you know, because we're so more connected, we also are more disconnected somehow as a result. Because with all this connectivity, it's so superficial. You know, we have like, you know, certain number of characters that we can put in a message or, you know, we have to get people's attention in like what, three seconds or even one second. Like, there's so much scatteredness. So having. Being clear on what it is that you actually really want for your life and how it's to feel is important. And having that clarity before things go a little bit over the top or pear shaped or scattered is it makes it easier to get back there and have that vision, sort of keep you going on a day where things get a little bit out of hand or periods of time. Second one is purpose. And when I talk about purpose, not just a life purpose, because this is, this is a money podcast, I'm going to be talking about the purpose you have for your money. So rather than, you know, I've seen a lot of people like going out and, you know, buying extra supplies. It's a little bit like the toilet paper rush during COVID You know, and we don't, we didn't know then what was going to happen. Even in our scenario with the cyclone, we don't know what's going to happen it. But it's just sort of having a, you know, making sure that you've got like, we've. My My daughter was like, mama, do we need to go out and buy more food? You know, we need to go and prepare for like a month's worth of food. I was like, just settle down. We have plenty of everything. I can make bread, I can do like whatever we need. If we can't go and buy it, I will make it. So it's just having that. So I'm already not prepared for disaster in that way. But I like making things. So I've got a pantry full of dried beans and I don't really have tin stuff, but I have dried things which I can reinvigorate. Ive got flour to make things. You know, it's, it's There's a certain preparedness, I suppose, in that way, but that's just the life. That's how I like to lead my life. Anyway but then with your money, rather than just going and buying all sorts of like, things, you know, we need this extra gadget or we need, you know, this batteries for these torches or whatever it is just to sort of take a step back and say what is actually really, really necessary at the moment. And in general, having a purpose for your money is a good idea because it's so easy to have things distract you and to, to kind of get pulled into whatever events are going on around. You know, if there's things that happen in your budget, say for instance, the, the washing machine breaks or whatever, but you've got an emergency fund set aside to pay for those sorts of things so you don't have to put on a credit card and then pay interest. So again, it's, it's that kind of thing, having that purpose. And that also leads into number three, which is the system having a system for, for your money. And it, having all of these things creates more calm because you can sit down and go, you know what? I'm prepared. Not that I'm preparing for, you know, doomsday or anything terrible. I'm just generally feeling calm about life. I have all the things around me that I need right now and they will sustain and whatever doesn't, there'll be an answer to whatever the need happens to be at that given moment. So it's that sort of level of peace and calm and trust that you have as a result of having all your ducks in a row as well as having just that general sense of understanding yourself and having that clarity. So all of these things build on each other so that the system I was talking about is how you manage your money. Having money set aside for potential emergencies. I mean, we don't even know if this, this weather system is really going to turn into that. Who knows? Its mother Nature unpredictable and life in general unpredictable. So having that system to allow for things to, to potentially go off track so that you can deal with that at the time, but you've got the system going and the latitude to be able to deal with whatever comes your way because everything else is sort of taken care of. And that then also leads to having a certain level of automation. If you've got a lot of your systems working and so you've, you know, at the end of every month once you, you get your, if you're a business owner, you have your, your profit and loss or you've got your cash flow statement, you've account statements there and you know, what money you've got left over, you've got your budget and your cash management system sorted and then you can see, okay, well I'm going to put this here this month, or like for instance, myself, we're going overseas. So I've been putting a little Bit extra in my travel fund for the last six months just to be able to pay for the flights or the various things that happen up front, which for the most part in our case is flights. But then also having some spending money. We're off to Europe so our dollar is not great against the euro. So I'm putting a bit of extra aside because things have also gone up. The last time we were over there visiting family, I was quite surprised at how much things had even gone up in euros, which then made it even more expensive once you translated it back into Australian dollars. So it's sort of having a little bit of a forward thinking view of what's coming up and the things that you might want to do. You know, do you want to be able to, to take advantage of certain things? Are you looking like. For instance, I've started to, to squirrel away a little bit more for my daughter's secondary education because I'm not entirely sure where she's going to go. But I just want to feel a bit more prepared to have some more money aside for school fees plus the school that she's at, the fees go up too. So it's, it's trying to have a little bit of that. And you update your system to account for that, which then means you update whatever automations you have in place. If you can have certain amounts go into certain savings account every sing. Or do you like to do those transfers manually? It's again no right or wrong, it's what works for you. I have a system but I like to do the transfers manually partly because I like to go, okay, well if there's a little bit extra in the account this month, I might just move it there. So I have the, have the freedom of choice which is what money gives you. It gives you freedom to choose to do things on your terms, in your way, with a certain degree of purpose and intention and clarity behind it. So once you have all of that to start with, it makes the decision making process so much easier. If somebody were to say, oh, I'm going to give you $10,000, would you know where to put it? A lot of people are just like, oh I chuck it on my mortgage. And then I'd be like, well, is that really the best place for it? What is, what interest rate do you want? What could you get? You like there's, there's other facets to it, maybe that is the right choice, but you don't know unless you actually have some idea of what your other options and choices could be and what you actually want to do with your life and money. So automation is a really big one. And automation also in terms of like, I've got a couple of micro investing accounts. Those ones I do actually have money just transitioning into those accounts each month and I don't. I barely even notice. I get, I get an email saying, oh, you know, we've just, we're about to do the transfer. And another one saying, oh, we've done the transfer. I was like, oh, oh cool. And then I'll get a statement at the end of every quarter, I do my own little performance report. And so I have a look. I was like, oh, cool. That's what's in there now. Yay. What's the, what's the return doing? And one of them at the moment, I'm actually reconsidering because I was like, well, that return's not particularly great. It's not really anywhere near what they said it could be. So maybe I could put my money elsewhere and make more. So then you start to. That. That's when you start that they're the sorts of the decisions you come to. It's not where do I put it and, you know, how do I, you know, buy groceries this week? It's like, well, which investment vehicle do I actually think will work the best? So your decisions start to change as you start to become a bit more comfortable how you're managing your money. And that's where you want to be understanding what you want and what choices you have as a result of that. And then your knowledge grows little by little. I didn't just suddenly start doing all this. It was a little, it was a, it was a progression. I went share trading courses and property development courses and workshops and networking and I studied financial planning and I did all these things to try and educate myself. And in the end it was a lot simpler because I got clear because I also, alongside of that was doing personal development. I worked with a lady who helped me understand what my values are and like, draw it, help draw it out of me. Because we all know it's just having the, the space and the time. Which brings me to my last point, which is boundaries and the space energetically, as well as the time to be able to go, oh, what is it that I want? Who am I? How do I want to live? What sort of lifestyle do I want? And that then helps give you the clarity of vision which then filters through everything else. But you've got to have that space and that's something that I'm probably the most focused on at the moment is the boundaries aspect. Because like I said, over the last month I've had stuff happen where my boundaries have been pushed. And I understand why they've been pushed because there's been a few incidents that have happened in my family that have made that occur. But I wanted to make sure that it's temporary. Those boundary pushing is only because there's a specific situation right now. Once that resort, once that as resolved as it can be, then I need to go back to actually enforcing my boundaries again and going, no, no, this time is now mine. I need some white space. We all need empty space. Rather than jam packing our calendars. Like even I've noticed a couple of times there's been Monday mornings where both my daughter and I are exhausted. I was like, the weekend was meant to be a replenishing, not, you know, from, from the busyness of the week rather than your busy weekend into a busy week. And then you just end up constantly exhausted, which then usually leads to illness because your body at some point will shut down and go, nope, I'm gonna force you to take it easy. So before that happens, I'm already on alert going, oh, I need to make sure that we calm it down a bit. So this, this weekend in particular, there is, there's an event that we could go to, but I'm like, no, we don't need to. We are going to just rest and do jigsaw puzzles and, you know, do some crafting and do some baking and just sit on the couch, read. Oh my goodness. To read during the day where I'm not gonna. That sounds like a real treat. So there's, there's the boundaries aspect of it as well. What are you doing for you? Are you actually enjoying yourself? What is it that you love to do? Is there an activity that you love? Do you love to go dancing? Do you love to go kayaking? Do you like to rollerblade? Do you like to go jogging? Not just for exercise, but do you like, you know, some people actually enjoy it. Do you like to go bushwalking? What is it that you want to do? And make sure you make the time to put it in your calendar and do it. Don't let someone else's urgency or event or something stamp into that time. And that's, I get sometimes, like I said, it's happened to me recently where it's kind of overridden some things, but not on a long term basis. Nothing Is that urgent that some people cannot wait? That's one of the reasons why I like to go out to exercise. I don't like going to the gym. That's not really my thing. But I like to go for bike rides. I used to jog. My knees started hurting too much, so I switched to bike riding. But I find when I try and exercise at home. Oh, my goodness. Oh, where is this? And what's this? Oh, I just wanted to tell you this. I'm going. Oh, my goodness. If I'm out on my bike, you guys all just manage to just deal with it until I get back. So that's why I often find I need to be out of the house. I try not to bring my phone, or if I do, I don't actually look at it. I literally just have it there in case, you know, like For instance, my bike gets flat tire or something happens and I need to. I need. I need it. Not someone else needs it for me. So I have it there for that purpose only. Or sometimes it's my shopping list as well. So that's. That's why it's really, really important. And all of these collectively, because money is just the tool we use to live our lives. It's the, the facilitator, the wheel greaser, whatever you want to call it, that actually helps us give us the choices to live our life. But we have to know the rest of the things so that we're clear on what we want money to do. It's a little bit trying to give instructions to somebody to teach them a dance, and you're not really telling them what to do, and they're staying there going, where do you want my arm? You want. We want my leg to do what? We would never even think about not having that as clear. We'd have a dance or if building a house, you would have plans. There's no way you would ever be able to build a house without having some sort of a plan. And the thing that goes down first, the foundations. So having that clarity of vision and that purpose for your money, they're your foundations. The systems and the automation that go alongside that consistent. That align with those foundations and those plans are then the facilitators to actually help you achieve the thing that you wanted to achieve, which is in your vision and part of your purpose. And then the boundaries that you set are the. The frameworks around it. Like, it's the time, it's the scheduling that you put into it. So if we, we put as much thought and consideration into building like a physical property to building our lives. Oh my goodness. It would be so much easier and simpler and things would just flow better. Even though my word for the year isn't flow, I kind of feel like it should be because it's come up a lot lately. So I think just, just create flow, not just go with the flow which means just go with everything but create the world and the energy around you to be allow you to tap into a flow state so that you're clear on your vision, you're purposeful with your money, your systems and your automations align with those and that you've got the boundaries in place to make sure they happen so that flow can exist. So that's, that's what I wanted to share with you today. I hope it's resonated with you in some way. If it has, please let me know. Because this is always, you know, I'm talking at a screen and imagining you listening on the other side. So please provide some feedback or if it resonated with you and if you would like to please share because then others can, can benefit from, from this as well. So with that I will leave you to ponder and enjoy the rest of your day and have a love.
