Money with Alpha

Frustration is something we all feel at some point in our lives. The question is, WHY are we feeling frustrated? What is the problem that's causing this feeling?

Before even answer this, get EXCITED about the fact that you're frustrated. Why? Because it means you have energy and you care enough about your life to feel like there should be changes made.

So much change in our lives is borne out of frustration. The key is to make it measured and intentional change that is aligned with where you want to go.

In this episode I take you through the framework that I use on myself and with clients, for harnessing frustration for good:

1. Talk about it. Share your frustrations with people you trust and can help you at least make sense of it or support you;
2. Be aware of and harness the energy, rather than turning everything in your life as a trigger for frustration. Be conscious and find the source of the problem;
3. Get clear. Clarity is the best way to help you move forward and use this energy for good (instead of it turning into anger);
4. Take focussed action. Once you are clear on what the problem is, develop action steps to help you move passed the frustration and into focussed action.

Investing is something we often put off because we have to get all our other "ducks in a row" - save for a house, buy a car, pay off personal loans, go on a holiday... There are any number of reasons.

Mostly, there is avoidance behind this because we are taught that investing is complex and risky.

While there is risk involved (like most things in life), it doesn't have to be risky. Nor does investing need to be complex.

In today's world, there are SO many ways you can get into investing, and it doesn't require a lot of money or complexity. What it does need though is a fundamental knowledge of investing, which I go through in this episode.

Why is investing so important? It's the ONLY way to build wealth. If you want to be financially independent, comfortable, or whatever your motivation, investing is something you need to do.

Can I invest while paying off my mortgage? Absolutely! Investing works best when you have more time, and by the time you pay off your mortgage, you will have missed out on decades of good investing years.

The time is now!

Have you ever sat back and wondered where time has gone? It seems to fly, especially after kids, and as I approach my mid-40s, it feels like the last 2 decades have just slipped by.

It makes you think about where you're headed and what it is that you want to still do. At least, I have been thinking about this lately! Many things I have done, but there are things I still want to do and I need time for them.

What this also does is it means we can get stuck in a rut of doing what we have always done, financially. This may be a good thing, but it also may not be. It's always good to have a look at your finances and check that everything is working for you, so you're headed in the direction you actually want to go.

In this episode I go through ways to get out of a financial rut, and how to challenge your current thinking in terms of how you see money and the ways in which it plays out in your life.

Travelling is meant to be fun. It is also expensive and there are lots of things that can go wrong, where the costs go up a lot more than you expect. I have been travelling my whole life. My first overseas trip was with my parents when I was 4 years old. As a grown up, I have gone overseas at least every second year, and sometimes multiple times in a year. Then, the borders closed and we couldn't go anywhere.

This year travelling overseas was back, and then came planning and the costs in a post-pandemic world. I hadn't been over to Europe in 5 years, and I really noticed how much more expensive everything was. Food, petrol, even the flights over, transport. Literally everything.

Travelling as a family also means that you need to consider how you travel, especially with a young child. So, in this episode I take you through how I tried to keep costs down, without spoiling the fun. Some of it is being patient and researching. Some of it is looking at things with a different lens and, dare I say it, mindset.

Hopefully this episode will inspire you with ideas for not only how to travel on a budget, but also to start saving and planning for a holiday - they really are necessary!

I get a bit passionate in this episode! Understanding what lifestyle YOU want and WHY is very important.

Without this clarity, it makes getting where you want to go very difficult, and take longer.

In this episode I go through what you can do to gain this clarity, and the 7 things you need to do to then achieve this lifestyle:

1. Calculate how much money do you need to make this lifestyle a reality
2. Rewire your Beliefs around money to match the person you need to be in order to have this lifestyle
3. Make changes to your money habits, so they will help you achieve the lifestyle you want
4. Understand your current Net Worth
5. Set up your Money Pie
6. Automate your Money Pie as much as you can
7. Check in regularly to track the progress you are making, and tweak where necessary.

While you probably didn't go into business to be a finance expert, there are some key numbers you need to know to help your business grow.

Numbers tell you about how your business is performing, and what levels of debt you're carrying, or how much cash you actually have. This helps you to make better decisions about how to grow or scale your business and do it in the areas that your customers and clients actually respond the most to.

Here are the top 7 most important numbers you need to know:

1. Your income goals – this will impact the products and services that you offer, the pricing of each, and how much of each that you need to sell. Once you know this, you can better plan how to run your business and the areas to focus on;

2. Profit and Loss – this will depend a bit on the accounting treatment, but basically it's – the income you make, minus all your expenses. If the number is positive, you are in Profit. If the number is negative, you are in Loss;

3. Expenses – knowing where your money is going and what you're spending it on is very important, especially for small businesses.

4. Accounts Receivable – depending on how your business is set up, this is money you are owed from clients or customers, i.e. unpaid invoices. It will impact your cashflow;

5. Profit by client – this will help you to know which client relationships to nurture better. You can also look at ways to increase the repeat business from other clients as well;

6. Cashflow – this is how much actual cash is coming in, and what expenses you are paying out;

7. Sales per product or service - knowing what your most profitable products or services are will help you to focus on promoting these more than those that don't make as much.

Failure, as unpleasant as it is, is an important, necessary part of life. Life is about polarity – the only reason we even know what happiness is, is because we have experienced sadness and failure.

We can't always know the outcome of something before we do it, so there is always a chance of failure. That doesn't stop us giving it a go.

Just think of all the things you can do now. At some point you couldn't do them. It's highly unlikely that you did them the first time you tried them either. Even things like learning to walk, riding a bike, driving a car, writing a winning sales letter, getting a job.

What we learn from failure:

1. Experience
2. Knowledge
3. Resilience
4. Growth

Ways you can manage failure:

1. Clarity of vision/purpose
2. Language and the people you surround yourself with
3. Accept failure as necessary, and stop trying to avoid it
4. Write an action plan to keep you focused on moving towards your vision.

Remember, this failure could be one step away from success and happiness. Get clear on what will make you happy, so you can recognise it once you are there, and then celebrate!

Willpower is one of those words that most of us scringe at the thought of, but somehow think we need more of.

What is willpower? Psychologists define it as the ability to delay gratification, resisting short-term temptations in order to meet long-term goals The capacity to override an unwanted thought, feeling, or impulse The ability to employ a "cool" cognitive system of behavior rather than a "hot" emotional system.

There is evidence that while willpower is a finite resource (which means that we don't have it available to us 100% of the time), it is like a muscle that can be trained and built upon.

Here are 5 ways to build your willpower:

1. Understand yourself - what triggers you, what you want in life and why. What time of day do you have the most willpower, etc.
2. Have a goal - if you are going to forgo something in the short-term in lieu of something in the future, then it needs to be for a good reason! Otherwise it will be too easy to fall "off the wagon".
3. Remove temptation - unsubscribe from emails that tempt you to buy things. Set up your savings and investing on auto-pilot. Buy groceries online, so you minimise the "add-on" purchase temptation. Do the things you need willpower for earlier in the day, when you're more refreshed.
4. Exercise your willpower - make a commitment to yourself and then go one step further. Get used to going that extra step, and you will flex your willpower muscles. Save 11% instead of 10%, for example.
5. Plan for fun - schedule and budget fun in! Attach it to an achievement, so you are rewarding yourself for seeing through a commitment or achieving a goal you set yourself.

Sometimes we just need to do the things that we don't think we WANT or NEED to do. This is where willpower can help you to get it done!

When we are children we love to dream. Dreaming of games, far away places, new worlds, you name it. There are no boundaries to imagination when you're a child and haven't heard "you can't do that" enough times.

My daughter has some pretty big dreams, and it has made me realise that I have put some of mine on a shelf in the back of my mind, and they have gathered a lot of "dust".

Many I have actually done, but the bigger ones are either a work in progres, or I haven't even tried.

The prospect of failing at our dreams, holds us back, and then we listen to the naysayers too much, who generally talk us out of even pursuing the dream before we even start! There's no way to achieve your dream then!

In this episode I suggest some ways to reignite that "dream fire" inside you.

Do you feel like an imposter sometimes? In business and in life?

Feeling this way often shows up as fear, guilt, anxiety and confusion. Why do we experience these feelings? In a word, Conditioning.

Often things that happened in our childhood, the innate Negativity Bias that we have as humans (which is linked to our survival instinct), and then societal stereotypes impact why we experience Imposter Syndrome.

There are many ways to combat this. Here are 5 ways to get you started:

1. People - surround yourself with the right people (friends, colleagues, other business owners, clients, etc.) who will understand what you're going through. They will also cheer you on, give you honest feedback and be there to support you when you need it;
2. Purpose - remember WHY you started your business and who you want to serve. This will help motivate you when you question your bality or generally challenges arise (which they inevitably will);
3. Gratitude - Write down 3 things you are grateful for in your business and life. Keep emails and notes that clients have sent you saying thank you , and look back on these to remind yourself how wonderful you are and how you are truly helping others.;
4. Systems - Using systems and processes help your business run smoothly, so you have the headspace, time and energy to devote to what will make your business money - you! This will make you appear more professional and then also allow you to scale easier and faster;
5. Failure - What a great teacher failure is! It provides you with a wealth of information and experience, which you can use in your business. It's also the fastest way to learn - fail fast, as the saying goes.

Here is a great quote by Oprah Winfrey: "Create the highest, grandest vision possible for your life, because you become what you believe".

There's not much else to say :-)