As a financial coach, I aim to help clients transform how they think and feel about money. Sustainable change starts with taking the next best step in your financial journey.
In today’s episode, I discuss the importance of meeting yourself where you are with your finances. Your next best step is whatever will get you closer to a win. Every money move doesn’t have to be motivated by a huge financial goal like paying off all your debt. You must take the smaller but next-best step to get to those major wins.
If you’re in a space where you’re not sure where to go next financially, because you feel like you’re so far off from your goal this episode is for you.
On this episode you’ll learn more about:
- [02:50] Celebrating what is happening now
- [04:18] Client example: taking the next best step
- [15:55] Pitfalls of an all-or-nothing mentality
Tune into this episode of Money Files to learn how to figure the next best step in your finances.
Are you ready to start asking for help with your finances? Apply to work with me, and let’s start working towards your financial goals.
If you loved this conversation about Sustainable Change: Take the Next Best Step to Change How You Think and Feel About Money, check out my episode on How to Clean Up Your Money Mindset!
Transcript for “Sustainable Change: Take the Next Best Step to Change How You Think and Feel About Money”
Intro: Hi, and welcome to Money Files. I’m Keina Newell from Wealth Over Now. I work every day with professional women and solopreneurs to help them get out of financial overwhelm and shame so they can experience more flexibility and ease with their finances. Are you ready to gain confidence and learn to manage your finances intentionally? Tune in and grab financial tips that will help you master the way you think about and manage your finances.
Keina: Hello and welcome to an episode of Money Files. Thank you so much for tuning in today and I want to talk to you guys about taking the next best step. I think that one of the things that most of my clients worry about in working with me, is like they’re already really overwhelmed. They generally come to me and they trust that Keina’s going to help me, but they don’t want to miss out on the process. They’re like, Keina, we’re working together for five months I want to make sure that I get everything that I came for. And I always to like reassure people like, hey, I’m going to be here for you. Do not worry about you missing a step in the process, like you’re going to get what you need. But I was actually having this conversation with a client and I was telling her, I was like, I don’t need you to go behind the scenes and try to be Albert Einstein, trying to figure out your numbers.
And I know that it’s coming from a place where you feel really overwhelmed and you just want everything to be done. You want everything to be clear. And what I do for clients, especially when they’re in that state, which is just a matter of feeling really, really anxious about their finances or what might be coming up, is to reassure them and also to let them know that one, we can focus on doing the simplest thing. And I also like to focus on wins with clients. Like what is happening now that wouldn’t have happened 30 days ago? What’s happening now that wouldn’t have happened this time last year? Because that allows clients while they’re on this journey with me to be able to also have perspective. And I think perspective is really important because when you set goals for yourself, I don’t know if you notice this or not, but as you get closer to the goal, as you reach the goal, you probably don’t celebrate it that much because you’ve already reached the next goal or like not reached the next goal.
But you’ve already set another goal for yourself. And so you’re always chasing yourself when it comes to your goal setting. And that is very true with my clients. So I’m always trying to get them to slow down, celebrate what is happening because in the celebration of what’s happening and their wins, like those are the things that form the big picture and this vision that they have for themselves. So if you are listening to this podcast today and you are overwhelmed maybe about where to start with your budget or where to start right now in the financial season that you’re in, maybe you’re like, I’ve been really good with money before but I’m not really sure what’s happening right now in this financial season which could be a number of things that happen, like you are out of a job or a baby is coming or you just got married.
And so like different things can change your financial seasons or maybe you feel like life is coming at you really fast and you are afraid of getting started right now when it comes to finances, because you want to start when life is calmer. You think that if you can start when life is calmer, then you won’t lose momentum. So you just want to wait to start until things calm down. And let me just tell you, if you can do it while things are seemingly not calm, you are going to be a beast when things are calm. So don’t wait for there to be this perfect moment because there very seldom is. I want you to figure out the things that you need to figure out right now because it means it’s one more thing that you get to add to your toolkit as life begins to life.
So I just want to dive in and tell you a little bit of a client story of a coaching session that I had that made me think about I need to share with you, that I want you to take the next best step. And so with my client, we’ve been working together for a couple weeks now and her perspective is that there are a lot of things that need to change. She’s like, I need to get my husband on board and we need to pay off this debt. We need to pay our back taxes. We also have these family vacations coming up. I don’t feel like I have a plan for it. So she has this long list, like a scroll of things that need to be done. And she’s focused on all of these big things that she’s missed the little pieces that are going to help her create her vision.
And I don’t actually expect her to know about the little pieces, that’s why she’s hired me. But as her coach, one of my superpowers is to be that mirror to be able to reflect for her, hey, guess what? These are all the things that you’ve done and it’s actually okay that you are exactly where you are because it’s going to prime you for the next step. And on our coaching call, I was able to hold up that mirror for her and celebrate like you just made your estimated tax payment for 2024. You actually have been transferring money to a separate account for your estimated taxes. Like those are things that we’ve done together and you’ve started to identify your expenses and putting them all in one place so we know when and how money is leaving your account. Those are all really, really important things when we think about the big picture.
But in order to support her on this coaching call and to really identify what was her next best step and to also keep it simple and simple in a time in her life where she just feels like she has a lot going on, we identified two things that are making her feel overwhelmed right now. One of the things that was making her feel overwhelmed is she’s like, I feel like I’m still just spending money going out to eat or like buying some crumble cookies because I just feel really overwhelmed and I don’t feel like I have a really good handle on my day-to-day finances and I don’t want to be buying things when I have food at home to cook. So that was one of the things. The second thing is that she has a lot of birthdays this summer and she also has vacations.
And so like that’s her reality. She’s like, we have vacations. She’s like, Keina, we’re going on the vacations and like I’m celebrating the birthdays. Great, let’s do it. And she was telling me that when it comes to the birthdays and the vacations, the things that get her create this overwhelmed is that she gets caught up in the emotions of it. And so sometimes she ends up swiping her credit card more than she would like because she ends up being in the emotional part of her decision making because she actually has no plan. So on our call we determine like what is your next best step and how do we keep things simple, I don’t need you judging yourself, I don’t need you having a guilt trip or any of those things. But how can I help her have a win in understanding her day-to-day expenses and also in planning her birthday parties and planning her vacations.
And so for the first one and actually looking at her day-to-day expenses, she’s like, I need to track everything. And I’m like, what if we don’t have to track everything? Do we need to know that you spent $9.22 cents at Target? Is that the goal? Or do you actually just want to feel more in control of whether or not you know that you’re going to have a dinner that night that you bought outside of the house and you’re not cooking and you want to know that maybe you didn’t waste groceries that you bought at the grocery store and they’re not just like rotting in your refrigerator because you actually want to eat out this week. And so what I ask her to do is I said, I want you to look at your calendar for the next 10 days that are left in the month.
And I want you to think ahead, like you have children, you have your husband, you know your husband is really busy at work, you know your kids different schedules and where they are. I want you to think about, since we were talking about food, like I want you to think about what are the nights that you just aren’t going to want to cook dinner or you already have an event on your calendar and so you know that you’re not even going to be home to cook dinner because that just isn’t in the schedule anyways. So just looking at the next 10 days of your calendar can help you actually feel like you’re more in control of that day-to-day spending. It may mean that you don’t order the InstaCart, you don’t order the grocery pickup because you know in the next 10 days we’re not actually going to be at home.
So I don’t need to do my normal grocery shopping. I’m actually going to shift my grocery shopping and repurpose that money to actually use that money for eating out. Like I know we’re going to be grabbing Chipotle. Another night, we might go to a nice restaurant, but just wanting her to slow down and to be in control of her spending for 10 days. And so she has a challenge for me to look at her calendar, like I said. But then also the goal is to stay under $1,600 for her spending because that’s the number that we’ve identified in terms of like her spending account, her drama free spending that she has available. But we were able to actually keep it simple. There’s no, we need to track everything. But what I really want her to do is more so build the habit and the awareness of being able to even look at her schedule and to be able to think ahead because looking at your schedule and thinking ahead is important when it comes to budgeting and managing your money. Because there are some weeks where you realize like, oh my goodness, I’m just outside every single night.
And if you know that you’re outside every single night, it may shift what you do the week before or even what you do the week after. It may shift what you buy at the grocery store. It may shift what you say yes to or what you say no to. But building that awareness is going to help you not just in the challenge that I gave her in the last 10 days of this month. But it’s also going to help you next month. It’s going to help you the month after that in being able to understand your own financial patterns and your own spending habits and how money does move day to day for you. So that was the first thing. And then the second thing we talked about was that her daughter actually had a birthday party coming up.
She’s like, in the past when I was planning for birthday parties, I just spent a lot of money because my emotions get in the way. And I said, okay, well we don’t have her whole budget up and running just yet because there are some conversations that we’re still having in between her and her husband and some decisions that are going to be made. I said, even with us not having a budget, you can actually decide how much you want to spend on this birthday party. And she was like looking at me, I was like, even if you “spend money you don’t have” or you go over budget, I want you to go in with a plan for how much you want to spend.
Because if you go in with a plan, even if you overspend, you’re going to overspend less than if you didn’t go in with a plan. And so I walk through and I ask her to tell me, tell me about your daughter’s birthday party. Tell me about what gifts you want to buy her and what is that overall experience for her on that day? And so we were actually able to talk about the birthday party and then we also talked about the gifts that she wanted to buy her daughter. And so we came up with a $2,000 number. And so she wants to spend $2,000 for her daughter’s birthday party. That’s her goal. That is the next best step is that she starts planning around this birthday party and she’s spending $2,000. You might be like thinking, oh my goodness, Keina, but what if she goes over budget or whatever. What if that’s over budget? I’m actually okay with it being over budget because it’s an exercise in getting her to think through her expenses before she actually makes the purchases.
Even if she spends $2,200, she’s still going to be able to say, oh, I only went over by $200, whereas last year I would’ve probably gone over, I wouldn’t even known what I’ve gone over because I would’ve just spiked everything on my credit card and spent another $4,000, $5,000 because I was caught up in that moment. But us actually building a plan just in even detailing the numbers, helped her experience a wealth of relief on our coaching call and being able to keep things simple. It’s also this skill that she’s going to be able to use towards her vacation that she’s planning for July. And being able to say, okay, you’re going into the vacation, like how much do you want to spend per day on food? Or how much do you want to spend and give the kids for spending money while you’re there?
And so just helping her think more intentionally about how money is moving instead of her emotions catching her and just causing her to spend. With those two exercises, she’s going to build her financial awareness. Like I said, even if she goes over budget, it’s important that she does these two things for herself because she’s not going to feel like her finances are just happening to her. Like she’s not going to just be laying in the road like she’s roadkill. She is actually going to be an active participant in the conversation she has in the next 10 days and at her daughter’s birthday party about what she wants to spend. We actually had a great conversation because she was telling me about the things that her daughter wants to do for her birthday and she’s like, oh, she like wants to get her hair done, she wants to get her nails done, she wants to get like her brows done.
And so she starts naming these things and I was asking her like, well what do you want to do for her? And I actually gave her the suggestion. I said, what if this is actually an opportunity for even your daughter to learn something about money? And you could tell her you have $500 to spend however you want to spend for your birthday. That’s the gift that your dad and I are giving you. And here are the things you’ve told me that you want to do, like let’s research the prices and you decide what do you want to spend your $500 on. She was like, oh my goodness, Keina, that’s like such a great idea because I know right now if you’re listening to me and you have kids, your kids will just run you ragged and you will spend whatever money they ask, some of you’ll.
But one, it’s a money conversation you get to have with your child. And two, it’s you also being able to have that agency for what you want to spend on your child’s birthday. It doesn’t just have be something that happens. And of course you can have like the special moments that you want to create with your children and all of those things, but you still get to be in control of it. And her being even able to set like a, hey, here’s your limit for your birthday, that’s the next best step. Does it look like, oh my goodness, your budget is at zero and you’ve paid out all your debt? Like no it doesn’t, but that conversation is going to give her so much agency to get all of the other things done.
It’s going to be a win for her. It’s going to be a win for their family and it’s going to be a win that she gets to build upon that’s going to lead to more wins on her financial journey. So if you’re listening to this and you’re like, Keina, this sounds really great, but this isn’t enough for me. I want to make sure I get to pay off all my debt or I want to save $10,000. You actually got to participate in some of the next best steps in order to get to the next step. The reason why you haven’t been successful budgeting is because you have this all or nothing mentality. And so you go really hard at your debt and you go really hard at savings and you don’t know what to do when you don’t have a plan. You don’t know what to do when you’re overwhelmed. You don’t know what to do when you’re anxious about your money because the only thing you have created for yourself is this opportunity to either do all the saving or to do all the paying off of debt.
And so when you aren’t able to do those two things, you don’t know where to go next. And so this will lead to you either giving up or it maybe is leading to you even not getting started because you feel like everything needs to change and it needs to change immediately or it’s not going to be worth it. But for me as a financial coach, it is so important for me to meet clients where they are and to help them identify the next best step so that they don’t invite guilt and they’re not inviting shame into the process, but I want them to invite kindness and I want them to invite Grace and I want them to be able to invite celebration into this process because that’s what’s going to make this financial journey sustainable.
And I want this to be something that is sustainable for you. And if you have listened to any of my client testimonials, any of those episodes or you see me post on social media, like my clients, they work with me for five months, but they come back a year, they come back two years from now or like even interviewed my first client, Amanda, and she worked with me almost six years ago now, and she’s like, Keina, here are all of the things that I’ve done. And it’s because she learned how to take the next best step in her financial journey. She was able to pay off, I want to say 20, $30,000 worth of credit card debt because she was okay taking the next best step. And this is a skill that you can actually develop. I mean with my client, I was able to help her identify like where are you overwhelmed right now and how can you take care of yourself in the most simplest way?
I don’t need you to draw up a big spreadsheet, I don’t need you to do a crazy math problem. Let’s actually just look at the next 10 days of your expenses and let’s set a budget for what you want your daughter’s birthday party to be. And I can continue to use this process with my client over and over again until all of her other wins are accomplished because we’re going to keep it simple. We’re going to layer on what she wants to learn and we’re going to layer on the skills that she needs to learn. But because we’re doing it in a way where I’m meeting her where she is, she’s also going to be able to take this knowledge with her and create a greater capacity for her to do this work even without me. My whole thing is for my clients to be able to transform how they think and feel about money and not just have a get rich quick kind of scheme going on when it comes to their finances.
So I just wanted to share that client story with you, especially if you, like I said are someone who feels really overwhelmed about where to start with your finances or maybe you aren’t starting because you feel like life is coming at you really, really fast. You don’t want to lose momentum and so therefore you’re not asking for help even though you know you need help, any of those things. If that’s the case, then I am letting you know that my calendar is open and you can apply to work with me for five months and I will help you identify like what is the next best step even that you can take next week. Your process in working with me doesn’t have to take a long time. And also, like I told my client, I don’t need you to be Albert Einstein. I don’t need you making up math problems because I’m going to be there to tell you like, hey, here’s what I hear you saying, and here’s the plan that we’re going to implement.
And it doesn’t even have to look exactly like what my client and I talked about because my process is individualized for what you need because I want you to be successful. So if you are that person, you’re like, yes, Keina, I know I need to work with you and I want to be able to spend money drama free, go to the link in the show notes, you can apply to work with me or you can go to www.wealthovernow.com/appointment and I’ll be excited to help you. So I look forward to hearing from you. And until next time, have a great week.
Outro: Thank you so much for listening to Money Files. If you’re ready to take the next step to reach your financial goals, head to www.wealthovernow.com/appointment and let’s get started.
