Women + Profit + Love.
This month, in Members Club we are exploring our money habits. This is a broad view of how we treat money not just in our businesses, but also in our personal lives.
I have never met a client who is amazing with their business finances and terrible with their personal money management or a budget queen personally, and a rogue money manager in their business.
Our personal money habits and beliefs flavour and shape how we treat our business money management. So, with that in mind, I want us to explore what money habits, good or bad we bring into our businesses. I want you to identify what beliefs and habits you have, and who around you is affecting or influencing the way you appreciate, utilise and treat money.
If you’re someone who lives week to week, which a massive percentage of people do then it can hard to see a way out of that cycle. When we think of people who live week to week, for me, the first thing that comes to mind is living on noodles and hoping the power doesn’t get turned off but that’s not reality.
There are plenty of people who drive gorgeous cars, live in beautiful homes, appear to be financially abundant yet still live week to week.
The week to week money trap happens at all levels of income and is so common, it has its own name! It’s called Parkinsons Law, and it’s one of the most important laws of money and wealth accumulation. The law states that no matter how much people earn, they tend to spend the entire amount and a little bit more.
Yes, you heard that correctly, a little bit more.
No matter how much people make, there is never quite enough. This leaves most people in a small amount of consistent money pain, they’re not going broke but they’re always stretched.
You have likely heard Parkinsons Law referred to by time management experts, where the tasks you have expand to fit the time you have, well this is the same law applied to money. Your expenses expand to fit the money you have.
If we can break this law, and flip our mindset to one of always having more than enough then we can completely change our financial future. Now when I went on the hunt for practical ways to overcome this law the advice was very predicably cut your expenses, stop spending on take out and trips to the coffee shop and start saving.
I say screw that, because as business owners we can increase our earnings instead of having to cut costs because we are on fixed incomes like employees. It’s truly my favourite part of self-employment, I decide how much I want to earn and I am only limited by my own behaviours.
I already save, but I am sure if I handed my finances over to a budgeting expert they would have me living in a smaller home, they would cut my weekly food budget probably by half, they would stop my Uber Eats and my meal delivery services and suggest I sell my Audi.
They might even take a look through my wardrobe and bathroom cabinets and put an end to my love of expensive dresses and face products.
And poor Piggy, well he sees the best groomer money can buy so he might find himself visiting dollar doggy cuts.
But here is the thing … I don’t buy lotto tickets, I don’t have credit cards, car loans or personal loans.
I visit my hairdresser far less than I should, I drink cheap wine, I rarely eat at fancy restaurants and even though I love expensive clothing I only ever buy a few pieces.
If you do spend on lotto tickets, and car loans and fancy wine because that’s what brings you joy then why cut it out? I don’t want to cut my meal delivery or live in a smaller home.
I want to spend money on things I love.
So, our Profit Lovers focus is about leveling up our income and spending money on things we love. It’s not about being wasteful or stupidly spendy with our money, it’s about conscious thought and decisions on what truly brings us joy.
It’s about loving and enjoying every cent we earn because of the freedom it provides and the future it can create. So while we are not going to be cutting out the stuff we love, we will be looking at how we respect and use the money we have.
While I was on my information quest to understand more about our money habits, I noticed a lot of the big names in money management, personal finance and budgeting are;
- old white men
- fun police
- they talk about actions, not emotions, beliefs or feelings.
Those emotions, beliefs or feelings are what truly drive our love or hate of money, our respect or disrespect of how we treat it and our approach to managing it daily.
Without having a dig around in our past, uncovering sometimes generational beliefs and paying attention to the messaging of those around us, we’re never going to stick to a long term healthy money approach.
We can all budget, we can all take the advice of an old rich white dude money expert and start cutting our expenses and saving our coins. Our likelihood of sticking to those habits for the long game has got to be less than zero.
If you have an inner voice; one that constantly tells you you’re not worthy, that you have no right or ability to be a wealthy woman, that rich people are bad people, and money makes you evil you’re money beliefs are at direct odds to accumulating wealth.
You might stick to that money stashing approach for a few months or even a few years, but you will likely at some point self-sabotage by blowing your savings on something silly, lending it out to others or making a bad investment. I think we all know where my cash would go!
Now it’s time to jump in and start this process of uncovering our money mindset, habits and beliefs so we can figure out the best money management strategy for our goals. We can also create our own new money narrative that is louder than any old limiting beliefs and shapes our financial success in a new and exciting way.
So, for our Members Club Profit Lovers, head on over to your members-only Facebook group or login to the Profit Lovers learning site to start this months money challenge, and to dive into the Money + Love video in the Money Kit.
Don’t forget to download your Money Bingo card too, it’s going to be a fun way to see how many good money habits you have.
If you’re not in Members Club, you can join the waitlist by heading to www.theprofitlovers.com/waitlist
I will be jumping on to Instagram Live during the week to share my favourite money books, so if you’re not already following search for the profit lovers, you will also find a link in my bio to jump onto the Member Club waitlist.