How to Create a Spending and Income Plan, Part Two

Welcome back to our series on creating a spending and income plan! This is part two, you can read part one right here. So far we have gotten clear on how much we’re spending and where the money is going, and we’ve also figured out about how much income we’re bringing in. Today, let’s get deeper into the process:

Create Your Plan

Now that you have a clear understanding of your income and expenses, it’s time to put together a plan. There are all kinds of ways to set up a spending plan. My mentor Karen McCall advocates for creating very specific categories.

In Financial Recovery, she lists categories like home, food, gifts, and business/project expenses, but she also lists categories like spiritual growth and self-care, to get you thinking about prioritizing these in both your spending and your life. With information from the previous step and some careful planning, you can create categories and estimate what your spending will be for each during the month ahead. 

Another approach that I sometimes use with people who are very focused on saving, is a set amount for flexible expenses. This method lumps all expenses that aren’t your fixed necessities (rent/mortgage, etc.) and gives you an amount of money to work with for all of them. I don’t necessarily recommend this as a long-term solution, but it can work when you’re getting started or have a savings goal to meet. 

Analyze Your Plan

With a basic plan in place, now is the time to take a look at your estimated income and make sure your plan will work for you. If there’s a shortfall, it’s time to make adjustments. 

Consider how you can alter your spending. How can you cull your spending and lower your expenses while still getting your needs met? At this step it can be valuable to reflect on your values and distinguish your needs from your wants. 

Similarly, at this stage you can ask yourself if it is possible to increase your income to cover the shortfall. This is something worth brainstorming about! 

Stick to Your Plan

Once you have created your and feel certain it will work for the month ahead, put it into action! The best way to do this is by staying in touch with your money and making sure you’re staying on track. 

I highly recommend beginning to do a weekly money check-in if you don’t already. Just 30 minutes out of your week can make a huge difference and help you stick to your carefully-crafted plan. Check out my article 3 Things to Look For During Your Weekly Money Check-In for ideas on how to stay on top of your money. 

Karen McCall also recommends doing a month-end review. During this step, you compare the spending plan you started with at the beginning of the month, to your actual spending during the entire month. Karen writes, “Comparing your planned to your actual spending and earning helps you gain clarity about how the spending-plan process works. This is an opportunity to get to know yourself better and to gain skills that will help you create your spending plans even more effectively.” 

The process outlined here is one that can be done solo or with an accountability partner. I love to work with clients through this process, and encourage you to reach out if you would like to work together! 

By |2022-08-23T14:55:08-07:00August 23rd, 2022|Categories: Financial Clarity, Personal Savings, Personal Spending|Tags: , , , , , , , |0 Comments
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How to Create a Spending and Income Plan, Part One

Planning ahead with your money is absolutely essential to leading a successful and stress-free life. Creating a spending and income plan for the month ahead can help you achieve your vision of financial freedom. Today, let’s get into the nitty gritty details of how to create a plan that will move you towards your financial goals. 

The ideas I’m going to share here are not new ones, but they are time-tested and solid. Many of my clients have worked with these processes, and I also take inspiration from my mentor Karen McCall, founder of MoneyGrit.(R). This article is part one of two, and these are the first two steps in the 5-step process. Let’s jump right in: 

Clarifying Your Spending

There are a couple ways to do this. I often recommend that my clients sit down with the past three months of their bank and/or credit card statements. (For most of us, these should be available online). Then, I ask them to go through line by line to see where money is really going. 

Karen McCall is a proponent of having people closely track their finances. She reports that the act of tracking every dollar is enough to bring a new level of mindfulness and intentionality into our spending. In her book Financial Recovery, she writes: 

“While people are hesitant to track because of what they fear they’ll have to give up, it is far more often the case that they get more of what they need and want by eliminating unconscious spending.” 

Tracking can be a longer process than simply reviewing your financial records retrospectively, but both bring great insight into where your money is going. Try both and see which works best for you! 

Clarify Your Income

Often when I say this, people immediately think specifically about the money they earn from their job. While this is definitely in the category of “income”, it’s likely not the only thing. Total up all your estimated income from various sources, like selling used items or rental property income. If you need to, you can go back and review all your income information that your bank statements provided you and use that to make an educated guess. 

If you are self-employed or in another situation where your income varies month-to-month, it’s still very important to complete this step. Make a conservative estimate of your income to avoid coming up short, or go through the process of setting up a money system and a solopreneur paycheck for yourself! See my article “How to Create Your Own Paycheck Using a Money System.”

Stay tuned for Part II – and make sure you take breaks and pace yourself through this process.

If you liked this article, you’ll probably love my e-Book, 9 Secrets to Financial Self Care. Get your free copy here!

By |2022-08-19T11:15:30-07:00August 19th, 2022|Categories: Financial Clarity, Money Mindset, Personal Spending|Tags: , , , , , , , , |0 Comments
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Why Planning Ahead is Key to Financial Success

How many times have you looked at your financial decisions only in hindsight? People often relate to their money that way – only examining their spending once the money’s been spent. While reflection is all well and good, planning ahead can make a big difference.

This month, we’re talking about creating a proactive plan for your spending and income. This plan is meant to orient you towards the future. Making decisions about where your money will go in the time ahead can be impactful for several reasons. Let’s talk about why this technique is so key to financial success!

Avoid Missteps Before They Happen

Sometimes we look over the money we spent in the past month, or check in with our income, and realize we made a couple missteps. We might have been living above our means, or spent a lot of money on something that didn’t really matter to us. These things might prevent us from having the finances and life that we want to have.

For example, unintentionally spending big in one place might result in us not being able to pay down a debt later in the month. Or, we might be unable to get a friend a birthday present. We might have overestimated our income for the month and find ourselves with less than we need.

Planning ahead and sticking to our spending and income plans can help us avoid these situations.

Anticipate Big Expenses

Rather than checking in on your money only when you fall short or have a big expense, planning ahead can help prevent this situation entirely. Here’s a great quote from my mentor Karen McCall, founder of MoneyGrit. (R):

While driving, no one would keep her eyes only on the rearview mirror, never looking through the windshield at the road ahead. To be fully mindful about your money, you have to look forward too.

When you have a spending plan in place, you’re able to relate to large upcoming expenses as things to plan for, rather than things to freak out about. This is a game changer and can help you think about the rest of your spending and income, and how it will be affected by the expense or situation.

Less Stress & More Intention

At the end of the day, creating a spending and income plan is really about is being good to yourself. The more you can make relaxed, proactive decisions about money, the more you can eliminate financial stress from your life. When you create a plan for your spending and income that’s based on creating a life you love, that money and how you spend it become more fulfilling for you.

Planning ahead can create financial stability, and it can also create greater life satisfaction. Isn’t that really what financial success looks like for most of us?

If you enjoyed this article, you’d probably enjoy my free e-Book, 9 Secrets to Financial Self Care. Click below to download your free copy!

By |2022-08-11T12:42:55-07:00August 11th, 2022|Categories: Financial Clarity, Personal Savings, Personal Spending|Tags: , , , , |0 Comments
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How to Bring More Meaning Into Your Life With Money

I am not in favor of making money for money’s sake. In my mind, financial goals that aren’t grounded in the reality of what you need and want in life will not fulfill you. However, money can absolutely help you build a meaningful life!

It all has to do with staying checked in with yourself throughout your financial journey. Here are three ideas that can help serve as guideposts for you to transform the role of money in your life.

Money Is An Energy

Like water, money is a resource meant to flow from place to place. When you water a plant, it grows. When you spend money on something, you expand its role in your life.

Remembering that money is an energy can help us think more intentionally about what we want to expand in our lives. This might affect our smaller spending choices, like what we purchase at the grocery store. Or it might push us to make bigger money moves, like purchasing a vacation or beginning a retirement plan.

So, take some time to consider, what in your life do you want to expand, and what do you want to cull? How can the way you handle your money aid you in this process?

Stay Checked In With your Values

This idea is foundational to my work with clients and goes hand in hand with the first point. The more clear you are on what you value in life, the more valuable your life will feel to you as you bring those good things in.

Really take stock of what you value, and keep yourself checked in with that whenever you’re making a financial decision. Here are a couple articles that can help:

Working Smarter and Living Happier

Sometimes the ways that money can make room for more meaning in your life seem a little mundane. Consider ways that money can save you time and energy so you can do more of what you love. Perhaps you might like to hire a cleaner, or sign up for a grocery delivery service.

Taking on an expense like this can ultimately allow you to spend more of your own time and energy doing what you value and enjoy most.

If you liked these thoughts, you’ll probably also enjoy my free e-Book, Reach Your Life Goals! A Business Owner’s Guide. Click here to download:

By |2022-07-22T14:11:22-07:00July 22nd, 2022|Categories: Financial Clarity, Money Mindset|Tags: , , , , , |0 Comments
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The Secret to Motivating Yourself to Learn About Finances

If you have a poor relationship with money, it’s going to be hard to talk yourself into how to manage it. Whether you view money as boring or you have a hostile relationship with it, getting financial education is probably one of the last things you’ll want to do.

It’s difficult to be motivated to learn about money if you don’t see how it can bring meaning into your life. Here are a couple of my tips for changing your mindset to see how money can be a positive force for life satisfaction:

Get Honest About Your Relationship With Money

First off, it’s important to get a clear idea of your relationship with money. So, how do you feel about it? What are some beliefs you hold about it? Here’s an excerpt from my article “How Your Relationship With Money Affects Your Finances (and What You Can Do About It)”:

If you want to get a quick pulse on your relationship with money, think about money or say “Money,” out loud to yourself, and then keep track of what emotions come up. More than likely, there will be several that come up in a quick succession: anxiety, avoidance, excitement, compulsion or repulsion, etc.

The goal with this exercise is not to suppress or judge any of the feelings as good or bad. Simply take note of them as they come up. Try this several times to get a full emotional picture.

Once you’ve tried this out, reflect on how your current feelings about money can give you insight into how to improve your relationship with it. I list a couple ideas for doing this in the article mentioned above. 

Brainstorm Your Life Goals

Think about your goals for a moment. What are the most meaningful things you can dream of doing? Maybe you dream of supporting yourself as an artist, building a beautiful home, or going on the adventure of a lifetime.

Those dreams are possible, and they are financeable. Your income can be the financial engine that brings those dreams to life! By reflecting more deeply on your goals and connecting them to your finances, you can begin to more clearly see the equation between money and life satisfaction. 

Get Inspired

Many people are able to do amazing things with money. This is where finding your “money crush” comes in. What’s a money crush? Someone you know, or know of, who handles their finances in a way you admire. This could be somebody you know personally who has the kind of financial setup you want. It could be someone who writes or speaks about money in a way that inspires you. A money crush is essentially somebody who models the things you want for your own financial life.

Try thinking about the most generous people you know. Imagine being able to give like they do, from a place of abundance. One of my personal money crushes and favorite resources on this topic is Lynne Twist’s book, The Soul of Money. Check out my book review if you want more inspiration to improve your relationship with money.

If you enjoyed this article and you want regular tips and insights about doing money in a way that feels meaningful, you’ll probably enjoy being on my newsletter list. Click below to subscribe! 

By |2022-07-07T15:57:16-07:00July 7th, 2022|Categories: Financial Clarity, Money Mindset|Tags: , , , , , , |0 Comments
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My Top Resources to Learn About Money Around the Internet

There are a lot of places to seek out financial advice on the internet. Which is great news!  Many of us don’t receive good education on finances when we are younger. When we become adults, we either don’t seek or don’t find the information we need to have healthy finances.

One of the main ways to fix this problem is very simple: self-education! Once you start learning about money and start paying attention to your own financial matter, the hardest part is over. And thanks to the Internet, that is easier than ever.

The last time I put out a resource list on financial education was 2018, and while those resources are all still wonderful, I thought it might be time for an update. So, without further ado, here are my current top resources to learn about money around the internet (plus a few books).

Business Finance Resources

Profit Boss Radio by Hilary Hendershott is a great resource on both business and personal finance topics. She focuses on financially empowering women to be financially successful business owners.

Hadassah Damien of Ride Free Fearless Money has become an inspiration of mine over the last few years. Her content is a mix of business and personal resources. She has an excellent blog, Diva is a Hustler, and a great podcast, Bottom Lines, Top Dollars.

Mikelann Valterra is an awesome money coach who has lots of great content that can apply to both personal and business/professional sides of finance. She has a blog and a whole tab of free resources. 

Personal Finance Resources

Afford Anything is Paula Pant’s podcast, chock-full of useful personal finance info and advice. She makes a lot of content specifically about investing and retirement.

The Bad With Money Podcast with Gaby Dunn is a great resource covering mostly personal finance topics that’s excellent for younger generations and queer folks who feel alienated by other finance resources. Gaby’s tagline say it all: “I’m a money podcast but I’m not scary.”

Karen McCall, creator of MoneyGrit (R), which is an excellent money management tool that I recommend for both personal and business finances, writes an excellent blog too! Her recent series on clothing deprivation and refreshing your wardrobe in a money-conscious way is a great resource.

Stacking Benjamins is a wonderful podcast I’ve been listening to for years. They provide great insights for overall financial learning and offer a lot of resources and interviews.

While we’re talking resources, I should probably mention that the At Peace With Money newsletter is a great free resource to subscribe to.

Subscribers receive my weekly blog posts straight to their inbox, plus a monthly tailored newsletter with customized financial tips. They also receive free access to my full library of e-Books! Click below to join us, it’s a good place to be!

By |2022-06-22T10:56:32-07:00June 22nd, 2022|Categories: Financial Clarity, Money Mindset, Small Business, solopreneurs|Tags: , , , , |0 Comments
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Why Getting Financial Education is Key to Success

 

Managing your finances, whether business or personal, is a skill. It’s something we need to hone, not just something we might be naturally good at. To grow this skill, we need education!

Financial education has so many benefits to our financial lives. Here are my top 3 for you:

Increasing Your Longterm Wealth

When we hear the phrase “return on investment”, this is the first thing most of us probably think of. Financial education does indeed have a great financial return, especially in the longterm. No matter what type of financial education you pursue, if you implement what you learn, you will increase your longterm wealth.

The knowledge you apply to your financial life will change and improve how you handle money. You may find yourself more capable of making decisions around saving, spending, and investing. Over time this can have compounding positive effects.

This is true both in the case of business and personal finances, by the way! Even just the way that financial education can make you more aware of your money tends to have positive effects on both areas. When you pay more attention to your money, it’s more likely to flourish.

Acquiring Relevant Skills

The skills you learn when you invest in financial education will always be relevant to your life. As far as I know, most of us need to manage our money throughout the course of our lives.

If you are a business owner, the money skills you acquire will be helpful not only to your business, but may also be helpful to your business peers and any people you want to hire or mentor in the future. Money skills really do keep on giving!

A Sense of Peace with Money

In my opinion, this one may be the best of all the benefits. The peace of mind and clarity that come along with getting the financial skills you need to manage your money well are absolutely amazing.

I’ve witnessed many clients experience a great reduction in their stress levels after a few sessions together. Money is one of the leading causes of stress in the U.S. Especially for those managing debt, gaining the financial skills to recover and surmount it can be deeply emotionally healing.

Where Can I Get Financial Education?

In this article, the term “financial education” refers to any resource that helps you better understand your finances. Whether this is a podcast, a YouTube channel, a workshop or class series, or working with a coach or bookkeeper, anything you find helpful in this arena counts!

If you’d like some ideas about finding financial education resources that meet your personal needs, I have a couple articles on finding the best financial education resources for you:

And of course, if you liked this article, you’ll probably love my e-Book, 9 Secrets of Financial Self Care! It walks you through 9 different ways to upgrade your financial life and add self care to your routine. Download it free here.

This post was originally published in July 2021.

By |2022-06-15T09:14:06-07:00June 15th, 2022|Categories: Financial Clarity, Money Mindset|Tags: , , , , , |0 Comments
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4 Quick Tips to Get Your Finances Back on Track

Post tax-season, a lot of us are looking to do better on our finances. Maybe you got a big tax bill and are now wondering where your earnings went. Perhaps you were a little less organized than you would have liked.

Whatever the case, mid-points like this are great times to give your finances a makeover! Here are my top 4 tips for getting your finances on track again, whether that’s in your business, or your personal finances.

Review Your Goals

After a big financial event like tax season, the financial goals you set earlier in the year deserve a revisit. Check in with them and ask yourself if they still fit. If not, give your goals a nice update! Make sure what you’re aiming towards is relevant to you. You can check out my article on doing a mid-year review of your finances right here.

If you don’t have any financial goals, now is the time to set them. Harness whatever financial fervor tax season (or whatever other financial situation brought you to this post) has instilled in you.

What are your ideal financial conditions? Dream them up, write them down, and come up with a plan. If you need some pointers, here’s my article “4 Strategies for Setting Doable Financial Goals.”

Set Up a Weekly Money Check-In

So much of creating the life you want is about habits. One of the best habits to adopt, in my opinion, is regular “money time”. Find time each week to check in with your finances. Start with a short chunk, to make it feel more manageable. Fifteen to thirty minutes should suffice.

Use this time to check in with your expenses, upcoming bills, IOU’s, and more as needed. Here are my suggestions on what to look for during your weekly money check-in.

Make a Plan to Stay on Top of Your Books

Especially if organization was an issue this tax round and you run a business, making a plan to stay organized until next tax time is a great thing to do right now. Ask yourself what you need to be able to do this.

Do you need to work with a bookkeeper? Do you need to get some training on how to do your bookkeeping yourself? Identify your needs and take some steps to set yourself on the right path.

Find a Money Buddy

It’s my personal belief that anything can go better when you have an accountability buddy. Find someone in your circle who has a financial goal they’re working on too, and join forces! This might be a fellow business owner, or someone from your church, or another mom from a play group.

“Why You Need a Money Buddy”

Once you’ve found your money buddy, establish the terms of your accountability partnership. How often do you want to meet? How do you want to do check ins? Do you want to learn about finances together, or just trade tips on goals?

These 4 tips will help set you on the right path. If you’re a small business owner looking for more ideas, you might like my free eBook, the Cash Flow Reboot Guide: A Guide to Thriving in Uncertain Times. Click below and get your free copy.

By |2022-05-12T14:30:34-07:00May 12th, 2022|Categories: Financial Clarity, Money Mindset, Personal Savings, Personal Spending, Small Business|Tags: , , , , , , , , |0 Comments
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Why Your Payment Processing Software Is Only Telling You Half the Story

Payment processing softwares – like Square or Stripe – are a very important tool for any small business owner who does business online. But they’re not telling you everything you need to know about your business finances. Check in with your business’s money system, and make sure you’re getting the full picture by looking beyond your payment processing reports.

Only Half the Story

Payment processing software is an incredibly useful tool. Your payment processing landing page might also be a place you visit often. Perhaps you check in once a week as part of your weekly money check-in. It’s fun to see the money roll in!

However, checking those numbers is not all you need to do. When you see the income your business is making as its reported by your payment processor, it’s important to remember that your profit and your personal paycheck are going to be different numbers altogether. Why is this? Because although your payment processor does a great job reporting your income, it shows you nothing about your expenses.

Get Clear on Your Expenses

Instead of stopping after looking at your income every week, the next step is to get clear on your expenses. I’d like to add that both your savings for taxes and your operating expenses are important to account for during this step, as they are both things you’ll want to put some of that income towards.

For more ideas about thinking more holistically about your money as a system and getting clear on how much money your business is really making, I’d recommend reading my series on money mapping. You can start here.

If you enjoyed this article, sign up for my newsletter so you never miss a post. Along with weekly blog updates, you’ll also receive my special monthly tailored newsletter. Click below to join us, it’s a good place to be.

By |2022-04-21T19:15:26-07:00April 21st, 2022|Categories: Cash Flow, Financial Clarity, Small Business|Tags: , , , |0 Comments
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Book Review: It’s Not Your Money by Tosha Silver

I’m curious, what feelings come up for you when you read the title of Tosha Silver’s book, It’s Not Your Money? Do you scoff or disapprove? Are you intrigued? Perhaps something else entirely comes up for you, or a mix of both. Today’s book review is focusing on a book that deals with a popular topic on this blog: money mindset.

However, Tosha Silver’s background is not as a money coach or bookkeeper (like myself). Her works originated from her love for and desire to share yogic philosophy. Her unique background gives this book a powerful spiritual charge. This book was an excellent and insightful read. Here are my top three takeaways:

#1: We’re Not In Charge

The title of this book is central to its philosophy. Throughout, Tosha tries to communicate that we alone are not in charge of what happens. She encourages the reader to “release doership,” embrace surrender, and give everything over to Love. Specifically, she speaks of Divine Love, her vision of a higher power. She suggest surrendering over to this power.

Now, if you’re reading this and raising your eyebrows, I get it. Surrender is nice and all, but applying it to your money in our competitive and driven world is no small feat. However, this book makes a wonderful case and provides a clear framework for doing just that. Much like Lyne Twist’s The Soul of Money, this book encourages us to see money like water – just a part of the flow in the universe.

This piece of the book was interesting for me to read. It reminded me of some other money mindset work that I have read and written about, which emphasizes the importance of releasing financial anxiety and other money baggage. Surrendering the care of our money and our wellbeing over to Divine Love is also, probably not coincidentally, a great way to release financial anxiety.

#2: Language Matters

During the book, Tosha outlines a 5 step process. One of these places great emphasis on the language we use around money. Specifically, she encourages us to examine the language we use around our financial situations. Another piece of this process also delves into working with prayers and affirmations. She introduces “Change Me Prayers,” which are meant to help the reader give up who they used to be to the Divine, in order to allow for change. Here’s one of these prayers below:

“Change me, Divine Beloved, into one who fully trusts that all true needs are always met through your bounty. Let me surrender and allow You to be my Source for All. Let me breathe, relax, and let you lead. I am safe. I am peaceful. All needs will abundantly be met. I am Yours completely.”

Isn’t that prayer beautiful? Definitely not your typical money mindset work! As a fellow lover of affirmations and an appreciator of words, I deeply resonated with these elements of her approach.

#3: Make Space

Another piece of this 5-step process is decluttering. Tosha invites the reader to “let what needs to go, go, so that what needs to come, can come.” This is an exercise in detachment, another theme running throughout the book. She writes, “Detachment is not that should own nothing, but that nothing should own you.”

As a Marie Kondo fan, this was not necessarily a new concept for me, but an exciting one nonetheless. In the past, I’ve talked about reviewing and refreshing your finances occasionally. The idea of incorporating an emphasis on decluttering and detachment is exciting and something I just might try out!

In sum, this book was an excellent book about money mindset work with a deep spiritual emphasis. I’d recommend this book not only for folks interested in money, but also for those less interested, too! The spiritual emphasis makes it inviting for those who tend to eschew material focus.

If you enjoyed this book review, you’ll probably like being on my newsletter! Click here to subscribe and receive my monthly tailored newsletter full of important financial conversations, and my weekly blog updates.

By |2022-02-17T13:01:42-08:00February 17th, 2022|Categories: Financial Clarity, Money Mindset|Tags: , , , , , , , |0 Comments
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