How Systems Help You Do Better with Your Money with Alan Lazaros - 149

[00:00:00] Do you often feel overwhelmed by all the different complicated systems everyone wants

[00:00:04] you to implement?

[00:00:05] Let's keep it simple and get you started on the right foot in today's episode.

[00:00:09] Welcome to Money Talk with Skyler Fleming, where money is made simple.

[00:00:13] Let's get talking!

[00:00:15] Welcome to today's episode of Money Talk with Skyler Fleming.

[00:00:18] Joining me today we have Alan Lazaros who is all about systems and habit tracking.

[00:00:22] He brings with him years of coaching experience and trying things out for himself.

[00:00:26] He has some great tips to provide each of you listening today.

[00:00:29] But I think one thing that I can tell you now is that it's so powerful just to keep

[00:00:33] things simple and try your hardest not to overcomplicate things.

[00:00:36] Because when we make things complicated, we make it so easy to get lost and frustrated

[00:00:41] by the situation.

[00:00:42] Think about the last time you found yourself in a complicated situation.

[00:00:45] It's very tricky to stay on top of everything.

[00:00:48] You're trying to juggle everything at once, so if we do the same thing with our

[00:00:51] finances it can be really hard to balance what we want to do with what's really

[00:00:54] going on in our world.

[00:00:56] So let that be your main takeaway from today's episode.

[00:00:58] Keep it simple!

[00:01:00] The money talking points for today's episode are

[00:01:02] What area of your finances could benefit from a simple system?

[00:01:05] And two What commitment devices can you use to help your finances?

[00:01:09] With the money talking points in mind, let's get talking!

[00:01:21] Hello everybody!

[00:01:22] Welcome to today's interview on Money Talk with Skyler Fleming.

[00:01:25] Joining me today I have Alan Lazaros and I'm excited for this conversation

[00:01:29] we're going to talk keeping it simple, building systems, how you can keep it

[00:01:32] simple, tracking expenses and such.

[00:01:34] Alan would you introduce yourself for everyone?

[00:01:36] Yes, so my name is Alan Lazaros.

[00:01:38] Thank you again for having me.

[00:01:39] I started listening to podcasts nine years ago and they really helped me

[00:01:43] reorient my life.

[00:01:44] So I'm very appreciative to be here number one, number two.

[00:01:47] I respect and admire what you're doing, trying to help people

[00:01:50] create abundance and money in their life and I'm grateful to be a part of it.

[00:01:53] As far as introducing myself, over the years I've evolved quite a bit.

[00:01:57] I'm 35 now.

[00:01:58] I playfully joke.

[00:01:59] I say I'm hoping to hit puberty at 36 because I look 12 for those of you

[00:02:04] who are on video.

[00:02:05] But ultimately what I am now, even though this has been a long evolution,

[00:02:09] is I have a computer engineering background.

[00:02:11] I have a master's in business and then I went down the coaching road

[00:02:14] after corporate and now I do business coaching.

[00:02:17] I do training and I do podcasting.

[00:02:19] I also do some speaking and some writing as well, but it's mostly

[00:02:22] self-improvement space stuff and that's the shortest possible intro.

[00:02:27] I think I probably did.

[00:02:29] I guess just one of the thoughts that came to my mind is high level

[00:02:31] in all the different areas you've been in.

[00:02:33] What is some of the value of simplicity?

[00:02:35] I know it's something we were talking about before recording.

[00:02:38] How does simplicity help across the board?

[00:02:40] I actually think that life has gotten obnoxiously complex

[00:02:44] in the 21st century.

[00:02:46] I grew up, again, I'm 35.

[00:02:48] So I grew up when the very first video games that were massive

[00:02:50] multiplayer online games similar to like Diablo 2, that kind of stuff.

[00:02:54] I'm dating myself quite a bit with that.

[00:02:56] But ultimately some of my best friends in high school were

[00:02:59] actually global, which is wild.

[00:03:01] And so the cool part about that is that you and I can do this

[00:03:05] from our home offices, from across the world potentially.

[00:03:09] And we get to build these online businesses and that's really great.

[00:03:12] I have a 22-person team.

[00:03:13] Most of them I haven't even met in person, which is wild to think about.

[00:03:16] But the downside of that is that life has gotten exponentially more complex

[00:03:21] because we have 5.44 billion people on the internet.

[00:03:24] That's increasing now that Skylink is out there.

[00:03:28] And there's 8 billion people on the planet now.

[00:03:30] And so it's become an extremely, extremely, extremely complex world.

[00:03:33] And I think that when it comes to money and fitness and health

[00:03:37] and wealth and relationships, if you want to be effective,

[00:03:41] you have to try to be simple because and focus on the simple fundamentals

[00:03:45] that actually work because otherwise you'll be spread too thin

[00:03:48] trying to be good at everything and not great at anything.

[00:03:51] Yeah, I love it.

[00:03:52] I was just that was initially what came to my mind.

[00:03:55] I like the idea, keep it simple because things get too complicated.

[00:03:58] Then we get confused and lost.

[00:04:00] But let's dive into a little bit of the money aspect

[00:04:03] and maybe one of the things that maybe seems overwhelming,

[00:04:06] seems like it could be super complicated.

[00:04:08] But why is it important to track our expenses?

[00:04:11] Yeah, so I'm the CFO of the company.

[00:04:13] So I'm CEO slash CFO.

[00:04:15] So chief executive officer slash chief financial officer

[00:04:18] for those of you who aren't business owners.

[00:04:20] But ultimately, Kevin, my business partner,

[00:04:22] he was the CFO for a long time and I became CFO probably six

[00:04:26] or seven months ago.

[00:04:27] And so he tracked the finances every single day

[00:04:30] for three or four years.

[00:04:32] We've been in business for seven years

[00:04:34] and I've tracked every single day.

[00:04:35] So I have two little simple sheets

[00:04:38] and this isn't necessarily the way you have to do it,

[00:04:40] but this is the way that I do it.

[00:04:41] So one is called GBD.

[00:04:43] It's called gross breakdown,

[00:04:45] which is just your the breakdown of where your income is coming.

[00:04:49] Okay, whether it's personal or business.

[00:04:51] And then I have EBD, expense breakdown.

[00:04:54] So each day I do 20 minutes a day of finance.

[00:04:58] So for me, I have a big five through it.

[00:05:00] So I do 20 minutes of WhatsApp and email,

[00:05:02] 20 minutes of finance, 20 minutes of sales,

[00:05:05] 10 minutes of mobility and then 40 minutes of exercise.

[00:05:08] But the 20 minutes of finance,

[00:05:10] I look at where we made our money that day,

[00:05:12] what money came in and from where,

[00:05:14] and then I look at what did we spend and where did it go?

[00:05:18] And that's the importance of that is essentially,

[00:05:21] it's kind of like a GPS.

[00:05:23] If the GPS has the wrong terrain,

[00:05:24] you're gonna drive into a cliff or off a cliff

[00:05:27] or into a mountain and then think something's wrong

[00:05:31] when in reality you just don't have the data.

[00:05:33] So you can't make effective decisions without accurate data.

[00:05:36] And ultimately the only way to have accurate data

[00:05:39] is to look each day because all of us

[00:05:42] have overused credit cards at times

[00:05:44] or you're on vacation, it's buy this, buy this, buy this

[00:05:48] and then all of a sudden you get home

[00:05:50] or the holidays is a good example.

[00:05:52] All of a sudden in December, you have a big month

[00:05:55] and then by January 1st, you have these New Jersey resolutions

[00:05:58] but you don't have any money

[00:06:00] because you were so generous which is so wonderful

[00:06:02] but also detrimental.

[00:06:04] And so a lot of people on January 1st

[00:06:07] actually start the year off demoralized

[00:06:09] because of how much they spent during the holidays.

[00:06:13] Yeah, and I do think maybe there's someone listening

[00:06:15] that's like that sounds great

[00:06:16] but maybe it's a little overwhelming at first

[00:06:18] like your five point system.

[00:06:20] How does someone get started

[00:06:21] simply tracking their expenses?

[00:06:24] So I have 26 clients that I work with all business owners

[00:06:27] and anywhere from 16 years old all the way to

[00:06:29] 63 years old and from, hey, I wanna start

[00:06:32] a YouTube channel all the way

[00:06:33] to I'm already a multimillionaire type of thing.

[00:06:34] So all different walks of life, all different countries.

[00:06:37] The thing that I have people start with

[00:06:39] the first step track your spending.

[00:06:42] Just start with tracking your spending

[00:06:44] because if you can get ahold of that, that's the first step.

[00:06:47] And there's really only three things I think

[00:06:50] in this simple equation and you in your intro

[00:06:52] you mentioned it's math but it's more than math

[00:06:54] cause it's also psychology.

[00:06:56] But ultimately there's how much money can you earn?

[00:06:58] And there's a lot of cool ways to earn money nowadays.

[00:07:01] There's, I mean, you can do Uber Eats, you can do,

[00:07:03] there's a lot of side hustles, you can walk dogs.

[00:07:06] There's apps now that allow you to do these things.

[00:07:09] You can be a housekeeper, whatever you need to do

[00:07:11] for extra capital you can cook for people,

[00:07:13] all kinds of cool stuff.

[00:07:15] And then there's a lot of stuff, freelance stuff online

[00:07:17] you can do so earn money, earn more is number one,

[00:07:20] number two is spend less.

[00:07:22] And then number three is invest the difference

[00:07:24] intelligently the third one typically

[00:07:25] is more scary for a beginner.

[00:07:27] So what you wanna do is focus on earning more

[00:07:30] and spending less.

[00:07:31] And if I would say what's the place to start

[00:07:34] if you haven't ever done any of this

[00:07:36] it would be track your spending.

[00:07:37] One of the habits all my clients habit track

[00:07:41] and one of the habits is no unnecessary spending.

[00:07:43] And if they didn't spend anything unnecessarily

[00:07:46] they get a check mark and they say, yes,

[00:07:49] okay that was a good effective day.

[00:07:50] If they bought that thing on Amazon that they crap

[00:07:52] I really didn't need that then they get a zero

[00:07:55] so it's a zero or a one in the spreadsheet

[00:07:57] but ultimately tracking your spending

[00:07:59] I think is the place to start.

[00:08:01] Yeah, I love that.

[00:08:02] I say that often too like so many people jump to

[00:08:04] you need to budget, you need to figure out

[00:08:06] where your income's going but if you don't actually know

[00:08:09] where you're spending the money

[00:08:10] how are you gonna know where to put it?

[00:08:12] Like you're just not gonna be realistic

[00:08:13] then you're gonna be hard on yourself

[00:08:15] because so often in budgeting people are like

[00:08:18] oh I'll spend $20 on eating out

[00:08:20] and they don't realize how much they actually spend there.

[00:08:23] So that's why it's key to start with tracking.

[00:08:26] I love that idea.

[00:08:27] Once that tracking is in place

[00:08:28] how does the system help people?

[00:08:30] Like once you figure that out

[00:08:32] where do they go from here?

[00:08:33] How does it help?

[00:08:35] Well, so I try to tell my clients this too

[00:08:38] because ultimately what is it that I'm doing?

[00:08:41] Number one someone's in your corner

[00:08:43] that's great for support but this is my mental framework

[00:08:46] and it took me seven years of coaching

[00:08:49] to kind of figure this out honestly.

[00:08:50] The best way to describe this is video games.

[00:08:52] So for anyone out there who's ever played a video game

[00:08:55] or sports will do video games or sports

[00:08:59] imagine playing basketball where there's no score

[00:09:03] there's no metrics, there's no statistics

[00:09:06] there's no assists, no rebounds, no three point shots

[00:09:08] no one point shots.

[00:09:10] It would be just people running around with a ball

[00:09:12] there would be no point.

[00:09:14] And so the analogy that I use

[00:09:16] I used to play a game called Call of Duty

[00:09:18] and I had a there's something called a kill to death ratio

[00:09:21] in that first person shooter game.

[00:09:22] Okay, so imagine a first person shooter

[00:09:24] and you're trying to get a higher kill to death ratio

[00:09:27] it means you need to get more kills than you do deaths.

[00:09:30] A lot of my friends would just go for most kills

[00:09:32] I wanted to have a higher kill to death ratio.

[00:09:35] So what you track changes the way you play the game

[00:09:38] I had to play far more strategically

[00:09:40] because I was going for a different metric.

[00:09:42] And so I tell my clients that

[00:09:44] what you track dictates where you put your time and effort

[00:09:48] where you put your time and effort

[00:09:50] dictates the results you get

[00:09:51] and that's the simplest possible way

[00:09:53] that I can think of it is

[00:09:54] if you start tracking your spending

[00:09:57] and you really do consistently track it

[00:10:00] you will start spending differently.

[00:10:02] You just will that's the human condition

[00:10:05] what we focus on we feel

[00:10:06] and what we feel changes what we do

[00:10:08] and what we do dictates the results

[00:10:11] and the outcomes that we get in life.

[00:10:12] So the first step really is tracking

[00:10:15] and that's the thing that's upstream stream

[00:10:17] that leads to the benefits downstream.

[00:10:20] Yeah, that's a fantastic way to put it

[00:10:21] and I love the love the video game reference

[00:10:23] that hits close to home.

[00:10:24] So that's a good one.

[00:10:25] Okay, cool.

[00:10:26] But it makes sense that if you're tracking it

[00:10:29] that's the only way you're gonna make those changes

[00:10:31] and they're gonna naturally happen

[00:10:32] have you seen that happen with maybe some of your clients

[00:10:35] where they are maybe a little skeptical

[00:10:36] but as soon as you start tracking things line up.

[00:10:39] You know what's fascinating I've got

[00:10:42] my goal in life one of my sneaky goals

[00:10:45] for lack of a better phrasing

[00:10:46] and when I say sneaky

[00:10:47] I'm just embarrassed to share it cause I'm scared

[00:10:49] but I would like to eventually get more people

[00:10:52] habit tracking than anyone in history

[00:10:53] and it's kind of a bold statement

[00:10:55] and so people think I'm arrogant, whatever.

[00:10:56] The point is I have hundreds of people at this point

[00:10:58] that are habit tracking

[00:11:00] and we have a little habit tracking app and all stuff.

[00:11:01] It's actually kind of down right now.

[00:11:03] So don't ask me about it.

[00:11:05] But the point is, is we all use Google Sheets

[00:11:07] and we all have a little system of success.

[00:11:09] We call it peak performance tracking

[00:11:11] and my clients when they first come to me

[00:11:15] they're very skeptical because I in the beginning

[00:11:19] I didn't do this, I needed clients

[00:11:20] so I just dealt with people who didn't want to track

[00:11:23] track habits.

[00:11:24] Now I actually say I don't really want to coach you.

[00:11:27] I've been coaching for a long time now.

[00:11:29] I'm coming up on my 8,000th hour of podcasting

[00:11:31] speaking coaching training and writing

[00:11:33] and I don't want to coach you unless you're gonna track

[00:11:39] and the reason why is I don't feel like

[00:11:41] I can succeed at my job

[00:11:43] which is helping you be more successful

[00:11:45] unless you are willing to track

[00:11:46] and so when they first come to me

[00:11:48] they see my spreadsheet

[00:11:50] and my spreadsheet has seven metrics

[00:11:52] and 22 habits

[00:11:54] and they're seeing where I am now

[00:11:55] but they're not seeing where I started

[00:11:57] which is this little notebooks that I used to carry around

[00:11:59] where I had meditation and 30 minutes of exercise

[00:12:02] that I used to check off.

[00:12:04] And so they're very skeptical at first

[00:12:06] because it looks overwhelming

[00:12:07] and it looks caging

[00:12:08] and it looks like too much structure.

[00:12:12] Then, and so at the beginning

[00:12:13] why would anyone ever do that?

[00:12:16] Eventually years in

[00:12:18] they say I can't believe I didn't track.

[00:12:21] I can't believe I used to wing it.

[00:12:23] I can't believe I used to just

[00:12:26] not track my actions or my habits.

[00:12:28] So habit tracking is one of those weird things

[00:12:30] where the people who do it long enough

[00:12:32] they get hooked on it

[00:12:33] and they can't imagine a world where they don't

[00:12:36] but in the beginning there's a lot of

[00:12:39] I would never do that, I don't want to do that.

[00:12:41] And so my business partner, Kavi came to me once

[00:12:43] he had five habits that he started tracking

[00:12:45] and at the beginning he didn't want to do it at all

[00:12:48] and now he swears by it.

[00:12:50] I mean, now he has 20 habits plus

[00:12:52] and he's been tracking habits for years

[00:12:54] and now he's more successful.

[00:12:55] And so in the beginning

[00:12:57] it's usually met with skepticism

[00:13:00] couple months in when you start feeling momentum

[00:13:03] because all habit tracking really is

[00:13:04] is I'm going to keep the small promises

[00:13:06] I make to myself.

[00:13:07] Yeah, that's all it is.

[00:13:08] If you had a friend who broke as many promises

[00:13:10] to you as you've broken to yourself

[00:13:11] how much would you value that friendship?

[00:13:13] You wouldn't.

[00:13:14] So if you want self-esteem and self-worth

[00:13:16] you have to keep the promises you make to yourself

[00:13:19] and that means doing the small things each day

[00:13:21] that really are going to lead to your goals and dreams.

[00:13:25] I think so many times we just look at the end goal we want

[00:13:28] and then we don't take the steps to get there

[00:13:30] that are kind of more realistic like tracking

[00:13:33] is a great one.

[00:13:34] For example, if you just start taking those steps

[00:13:36] to track the in between where I want to be

[00:13:38] and where I am and you figure out this

[00:13:40] things that you need to track between there

[00:13:41] that's how you can almost make the change

[00:13:43] more natural like you're saying

[00:13:45] it's going to just begin to come

[00:13:47] you're just going to begin to see the different places

[00:13:49] you can save your money.

[00:13:50] But is it difficult to implement these systems?

[00:13:53] Is it hard to get going?

[00:13:55] So we have a group coaching program that we do every quarter.

[00:13:58] This is our 15th group, all groups of 10.

[00:14:00] And we start with three habits.

[00:14:03] So we set three goals with there's six sessions.

[00:14:06] It's a 12 week by week program.

[00:14:07] And and we start with only three habits.

[00:14:09] We used to way back when we were naive.

[00:14:11] We used to start with 12 and people were falling off

[00:14:14] and nobody did it and all that stuff.

[00:14:15] So I'd rather you start really small and build than try to.

[00:14:19] It's kind of like why New Year's resolutions don't work

[00:14:21] is you shoot for this huge goal and then you stumble

[00:14:26] when in reality, if you actually started small

[00:14:28] and then built, you'd be pleasantly surprised

[00:14:31] with how far you came.

[00:14:33] So the yes, it's difficult to implement,

[00:14:35] but if you start small, it isn't.

[00:14:37] So you can start with one habit.

[00:14:39] I had someone reach out yesterday.

[00:14:40] Her name is Caitlin.

[00:14:41] She's in group coaching and she reached out in WhatsApp

[00:14:43] and she said, Hey, I'm having a really hard time

[00:14:45] staying consistent.

[00:14:46] Do you have any advice?

[00:14:47] That was literally her question.

[00:14:49] And I said, you could try what's called a commitment device.

[00:14:52] Have you ever heard of a commitment device?

[00:14:54] No. OK, a commitment device is.

[00:14:58] Human beings, there's there's a cognitive bias

[00:15:01] called pain avoidance

[00:15:03] and essentially will do more to avoid pain than we will to gain.

[00:15:07] It's almost like if someone were to come to your house

[00:15:09] and steal 100 bucks, you would you would do anything

[00:15:12] to you'd call the cops and it would be a whole thing.

[00:15:16] But yet you could easily go make 100 bucks

[00:15:18] and you don't put that much effort into it, right?

[00:15:21] And that's just human nature, right?

[00:15:23] That's human nature.

[00:15:23] So the commitment device brings the pain in advance.

[00:15:27] So I have a client his name is Cole.

[00:15:29] I said, I'm going to charge you twice for this session

[00:15:32] and that's going to pay for your next session

[00:15:34] if you track all your habits.

[00:15:37] So if you keep the promise to yourself

[00:15:39] and keep the promise to me,

[00:15:41] it will pay for your next session.

[00:15:42] You don't lose the money.

[00:15:43] If you can't stay consistent and you don't track

[00:15:47] that money goes, he has been 100 percent consistent.

[00:15:51] And then every single week because he's a weekly client,

[00:15:54] he says, I say, do you want this?

[00:15:57] Do you want the commitment device to pay for your session?

[00:15:59] He says, no, let's keep it going.

[00:16:00] Let's keep it going. Let's keep it going.

[00:16:01] So I keep charging him.

[00:16:02] And so I still keep that little deposit.

[00:16:04] This is why people ask for a deposit when

[00:16:06] when a venue when you go to have a wedding,

[00:16:09] a venue asks for a deposit

[00:16:10] because it's a commitment device.

[00:16:12] It's saying, listen, I'm going to hold this venue for you,

[00:16:14] but you're going to lose this money

[00:16:16] if you don't follow through with this wedding

[00:16:19] or you don't follow through with this marathon

[00:16:20] or you don't follow through with this whatever it is.

[00:16:22] And so the commitment devices are a really good way

[00:16:24] to hold ourselves accountable because we don't want to lose.

[00:16:27] We'll do more not to lose than we will to win.

[00:16:29] It's just human nature.

[00:16:31] Yeah, that's really interesting.

[00:16:32] And once you recognize it,

[00:16:33] there's so many things that different guests

[00:16:35] keep coming on here and explaining.

[00:16:37] And just once you recognize it,

[00:16:38] then you're able to implement it

[00:16:39] just in little small ways into your life.

[00:16:42] And that's how you can really get that ball rolling for you.

[00:16:45] Another thought that I had is maybe people feel worried

[00:16:48] about implementing too many systems.

[00:16:50] Maybe it takes out the free flow nature of life

[00:16:53] or just the creativity, maybe a little bit.

[00:16:56] Does building all these systems turn us into robots,

[00:16:59] so to speak?

[00:17:01] No, not at all.

[00:17:02] I so it can.

[00:17:04] I had one client who went too far with it.

[00:17:06] He had like 45 habits a day and I said, brother.

[00:17:09] You're that's not doing it.

[00:17:11] And by the way, if you have 45 habits,

[00:17:14] you're obviously not focused on the important ones enough

[00:17:16] because there's not 45 important things every day

[00:17:18] that needs to happen.

[00:17:19] Right? So so it is possible to have it go too far.

[00:17:24] But I mean, I've been helping people track habits for seven years.

[00:17:29] And I've seen it go too far once, maybe twice.

[00:17:32] And here's what you do.

[00:17:33] You can always dial it back.

[00:17:35] So if you have 12 habits and you feel caged

[00:17:37] and you feel like you're on a mouse wheel of your own making

[00:17:40] and you're on the treadmill and it's speeding up,

[00:17:42] you can always just turn down the treadmill.

[00:17:44] But but don't get off the treadmill completely.

[00:17:48] Just redesign the treadmill.

[00:17:50] Right? A lot of people don't want life to feel like a treadmill.

[00:17:53] They don't want it to feel like a race.

[00:17:54] They don't want it to feel challenging.

[00:17:56] But the truth of the matter is, is no matter what your goals are,

[00:17:59] there's going to be some level of monotony.

[00:18:02] There's going to be some level of boring

[00:18:04] and it's much better than being broke.

[00:18:06] Right? It's much better than getting divorced.

[00:18:09] It's much better than going bankrupt.

[00:18:11] And so to me, I try to say this, I say, Alan, OK,

[00:18:14] it all goes to zero at midnight.

[00:18:15] You wake up in the morning.

[00:18:17] I want you to play like you're poor.

[00:18:20] I want you to work like you're poor.

[00:18:21] And if you work like you're poor and you track like you're poor

[00:18:24] and you stay level 10 humble, you will actually be wealthy

[00:18:27] and not wealthy in some yacht or billionaire thing.

[00:18:30] I mean wealthy in terms of I will have more money

[00:18:33] than that comes in, then goes out.

[00:18:36] And that's ultimately what wealth is.

[00:18:38] It's it's having more that comes in and goes out.

[00:18:41] And same with health, having more energy than what you spend.

[00:18:45] It's an abundance.

[00:18:47] And so some months are down, some months are up.

[00:18:49] But ultimately, as long as you're in the green

[00:18:51] more times than you're in the red,

[00:18:52] you are on your way to a wealthier, healthier,

[00:18:57] less scarce life.

[00:18:59] But ironically and paradoxically,

[00:19:00] the only way to do that is to cage yourself a little bit

[00:19:04] with these disciplines.

[00:19:05] Yeah, I like that.

[00:19:07] You kind of you build the boundaries that will direct you

[00:19:10] to where you want to go and then you can live freely within them.

[00:19:12] Like you can like who cares where you're spending your money

[00:19:15] if you're tracking is in line

[00:19:16] and you're making more than your spending sort of thing.

[00:19:19] Like then go and have some freedom and fun.

[00:19:22] Yep, exactly, exactly.

[00:19:23] But if you're not tracking it and you're not in line

[00:19:27] and you're not making more than you're spending,

[00:19:29] the freedom and fun goes very quickly.

[00:19:32] Right? Yeah, then you can experience it

[00:19:35] and you're frustrated, you feel like you're not doing well with money.

[00:19:38] But and then you shame yourself and just devolves.

[00:19:42] But if you can set up a little bit of these boundaries

[00:19:44] that we're talking about and I know it can it can seem difficult at the beginning.

[00:19:47] But if you, like you said, just start simple, start small.

[00:19:50] And that was on a previous episode,

[00:19:52] I talked about rules of thumb because there's so many different ones

[00:19:54] that were constantly being told to follow and things like that.

[00:19:58] And that gets suggested, just choose one and stick to it.

[00:20:00] So like if that's if that's what you need to get started,

[00:20:02] just pick one little area and stick to it for a little while

[00:20:06] and see the change come in your life.

[00:20:09] And then when you master that one, here's when you know it becomes a habit.

[00:20:14] When you get to a place where it's harder not to do it than it is to do it.

[00:20:18] That's when it's a habit.

[00:20:20] And when you get to that place, now you can go to the next one.

[00:20:24] And then you can go to the next one

[00:20:25] and then you can go to the next one.

[00:20:26] What I don't want anyone to do is try to do for it once

[00:20:30] and then fail and then shame yourself for it and then say, Hey, this doesn't work

[00:20:35] because ultimately it does work.

[00:20:37] You just didn't do it and you tried too much too quickly.

[00:20:40] And I think it takes humility to start small.

[00:20:43] I think humility is where right?

[00:20:45] Because if you if you start the year with humility, you say, you know what?

[00:20:49] I'm not going to try to set the world on fire.

[00:20:51] I'm not going to try to go to the gym six days a week for two hours at a time.

[00:20:54] I'm going to do a half an hour a day and walking counts.

[00:20:57] You'll be more consistent and then you'll build more belief.

[00:21:00] And that's what Emilia and I did.

[00:21:02] My girlfriend and I, we started really small

[00:21:04] and we've been exercising consistently, but you better believe we never could have done it

[00:21:08] if we were trying to do two hours a day.

[00:21:11] And the same goes for your money that if you're trying to invest $2,000 a month,

[00:21:16] but you really don't know where that money is going to come from,

[00:21:19] you're going to them feel like I can't invest money.

[00:21:21] It's just not for me.

[00:21:22] I'm just going to work forever and hope social security is there.

[00:21:26] So that's why if you start small, start with $50 being invested and slowly grow that.

[00:21:30] It's going to make it a whole lot easier on you.

[00:21:32] I have a client.

[00:21:33] His name is Matt and I'm so proud of him.

[00:21:36] He's an AP calculus teacher and he's a multimillionaire.

[00:21:40] And I'll keep it anonymous.

[00:21:42] I always use first names only, but he saves 20 bucks at a time,

[00:21:47] even though he's already owned six properties and he makes almost six figures as an AP calculus

[00:21:53] teacher.

[00:21:54] He's in his mid late 30s.

[00:21:56] He has two kids.

[00:21:57] It's so cool to see someone who's already quote unquote wealthy still saving 20 bucks at a time.

[00:22:05] Right?

[00:22:06] It's like, that's why he's wealthy because he started doing that and just never stopped.

[00:22:11] Right?

[00:22:12] And so it compounds pretty quickly.

[00:22:14] Well, I guess I shouldn't say quickly, but over the years it does compound when you have these

[00:22:19] little habits that you stick with.

[00:22:20] So I find it fascinating how there's people that have very little money that spend constantly

[00:22:26] on these big things they don't save.

[00:22:28] And then I have him who's already wealthy who's still saving 20 bucks at a time and

[00:22:33] putting it in a separate account.

[00:22:35] It's an indicator, right?

[00:22:37] So well, it's not you've mastered this one habit.

[00:22:39] It's harder for him to probably stop that.

[00:22:41] That he's like, how do I even cancel that auto payment?

[00:22:43] It just keeps running in the background and he's mastered it because that's what he's grown on.

[00:22:48] What are some maybe other financial systems that people can look at and potentially implement?

[00:22:52] Do you have any other that come to mind as we're wrapping up here?

[00:22:56] Yeah, well, so in the effort of keeping it simple, I think I started out of the gate

[00:23:00] a little bit complex with the GBD and EBD.

[00:23:02] GBD was gross breakdown.

[00:23:04] EBD was expense breakdown.

[00:23:05] And honestly, so our company we're hoping and again, we're projected for potentially

[00:23:11] a half million this year in gross.

[00:23:13] In gross, we're not keeping all that.

[00:23:16] I need to say that but the low end would be $400,000.

[00:23:20] The high end would be a half million.

[00:23:22] We did not start there.

[00:23:23] We bootstrapped and we started from zero.

[00:23:25] I mean, we made no money the first year.

[00:23:27] We've been in business for seven years.

[00:23:29] So expenses get really high when you're running a business and you have a big team.

[00:23:34] So I didn't want to complexify it.

[00:23:35] But what I do do for my clients that have smaller businesses

[00:23:38] is a simple, simple, simple, simple spreadsheet.

[00:23:42] You can do this Google Sheets.

[00:23:43] You can do this for free.

[00:23:45] Go into Google Sheets, create three columns, four columns.

[00:23:50] Okay, the first one's the date.

[00:23:51] Okay, so four columns.

[00:23:52] The first one's the date.

[00:23:54] Then you do one column is total in which is gross in.

[00:23:59] Then you do cash on hand and then you do total out, which is expenses out.

[00:24:05] Okay.

[00:24:06] If you have money coming in, I think of it like the aqueducts in Rome.

[00:24:10] I'm kind of a nerd.

[00:24:11] All right, you think of the waters coming down from the mountains

[00:24:13] and it's pooling in the cash on hand and then where is the money going?

[00:24:18] And if you, what fruit?

[00:24:20] Strawberries and blueberries and farming and whatever, right?

[00:24:23] So the idea is not don't spend or don't earn or the idea is start getting an

[00:24:30] awareness and start tracking.

[00:24:31] Where's your money coming from?

[00:24:35] Where is it pooling?

[00:24:37] How much is pooling?

[00:24:38] How much cash available do you have and then where are you putting it?

[00:24:41] And that includes investments.

[00:24:43] That includes home, that includes food and all that kind of stuff.

[00:24:47] But at the end of the day, what came in day to day, what came in,

[00:24:50] what pooled and then or how much do you have in your bank account?

[00:24:53] And then where did it go?

[00:24:55] And that if you were to do just that one habit, I can almost guarantee,

[00:25:00] I can guarantee you'd be better off.

[00:25:02] No one can guarantee you're going to be a multimillionaire.

[00:25:04] No one can guarantee you're going to be a billionaire,

[00:25:06] but we can guarantee if you actually do that habit and stick with it,

[00:25:11] he'll definitely be better off because you'll just make better money choices.

[00:25:15] Yeah.

[00:25:15] And if you stick to that habit for a little while,

[00:25:17] you're going to probably see a few days where there's nothing going out

[00:25:20] because in personal finances, there's not as much money moving around as business.

[00:25:23] But you might see a couple of days where you're like, wow, go me.

[00:25:26] I didn't spend any money for three or four days when you never realized you

[00:25:30] could accomplish things like that before.

[00:25:31] So just by tracking it, you're going to begin to see,

[00:25:34] oh, here's where I need to clean it up a little bit.

[00:25:35] Here's where I'm already doing well and that can motivate you.

[00:25:38] There's a whole lot of great things that come from that.

[00:25:40] So thanks for sharing that little short, simple system

[00:25:42] that someone can go and implement right after this episode.

[00:25:45] So you're so very welcome.

[00:25:47] Yes.

[00:25:48] As we're coming to the end here, got a couple of questions.

[00:25:50] The first one is going to be how can people find you online?

[00:25:52] And then the second one to give you a second to think about it

[00:25:54] is what's one thing you wish you would have known sooner when it comes to money?

[00:25:58] But first, how can people find you online?

[00:25:59] So you can find me online.

[00:26:02] We have a website called nextleveluniverse.com,

[00:26:06] spelled just like it sounds.

[00:26:08] We have a podcast called Next Level University,

[00:26:12] spelled just like it sounds.

[00:26:14] We do an episode a day every day, 1% improvement,

[00:26:17] holistic self-improvement, health, wealth, life and love,

[00:26:20] mentors in your pocket every day from anywhere on the planet,

[00:26:23] completely free.

[00:26:24] And it's the idea is just get a little bit better,

[00:26:27] a little bit better, a little bit better.

[00:26:29] And then nextleveluniverse.com is the website where we have

[00:26:33] meetups in a book club and we've like we mentioned the app,

[00:26:36] which is currently down so not going to mention the app.

[00:26:39] But like we have a bunch of other things that help people get on track

[00:26:42] and stay on track, coaching and podcasting all kinds of stuff.

[00:26:46] Okay. As for the second question, what's the piece of advice?

[00:26:50] Yeah, what would you tell yourself 10, 15 years ago about money?

[00:26:58] Um, what I would tell myself is most of the people in your life,

[00:27:04] and this might not apply to other people listening,

[00:27:06] I don't know, but most of the people in your life

[00:27:08] don't really know much about money.

[00:27:10] And they try to act like they do.

[00:27:12] Yeah, they try to act like they do.

[00:27:14] And so I grew up in an environment that was a lot of people acting

[00:27:19] like they knew it all when in reality they knew very little.

[00:27:22] And there was very little humility from my perspective

[00:27:26] in terms of the people I was around growing up.

[00:27:29] And so I think humility, what I would tell my younger self is

[00:27:34] Alan humility is a superpower.

[00:27:35] You already believe in yourself.

[00:27:37] Okay.

[00:27:38] And if you believe in yourself at level 10,

[00:27:40] you need level 10 humility in the other direction

[00:27:42] in order to stay centered.

[00:27:43] And it takes humility to track because people who don't have

[00:27:48] humility think they can wing it and still win.

[00:27:51] And that would have been my problem.

[00:27:52] So if you want to stay on track, you have to track.

[00:27:56] That's what I would tell myself.

[00:27:58] And I would say Alan, humility is a superpower.

[00:28:00] You just don't know it yet.

[00:28:01] And it's going to take a lot of pain and suffering

[00:28:03] for you to get the humility that you need

[00:28:04] to actually go succeed.

[00:28:06] Awesome.

[00:28:07] That's fantastic.

[00:28:08] That was a couple of great pieces of advice

[00:28:10] that anyone listening that's younger than us

[00:28:12] can kind of start implementing those small things

[00:28:14] and get them going in the right direction.

[00:28:16] So Alan, thank you so much for joining.

[00:28:17] This has been a great conversation.

[00:28:19] Thank you for having me.

[00:28:20] It has been a great conversation.

[00:28:21] And keep doing what you're doing because, quite frankly,

[00:28:24] a lot of pain and suffering will be solved.

[00:28:27] And there'll be a lot more fulfilled people

[00:28:29] who learn these things young because I think

[00:28:31] fulfilled people don't hurt people.

[00:28:34] And if you don't have abundance in your finances

[00:28:37] and in your life, it's very hard to be fulfilled.

[00:28:40] So keep doing the work you're doing.

[00:28:42] That's why I'm here.

[00:28:43] That's why you're here.

[00:28:44] And it's very clear.

[00:28:45] So I appreciate it.

[00:28:46] Awesome.

[00:28:47] Thank you everyone for listening

[00:28:48] and go have a money talk based on what you heard today.

[00:28:59] Thank you so much to Alan for coming on today's episode.

[00:29:02] How are you going to be impacted by this episode?

[00:29:04] Well, ultimately it's up to you.

[00:29:06] And one of the greatest ways to find impact

[00:29:07] from any of these episodes is to share with a friend

[00:29:09] and have a money talk about the episode.

[00:29:12] But one of the main takeaways,

[00:29:13] and you'll hear me say this all the time,

[00:29:15] is start tracking things before you start changing things.

[00:29:17] It makes it so much easier to figure out what you want to do,

[00:29:21] figure out how you need to change,

[00:29:22] especially when it comes to money.

[00:29:24] It can be so hard to budget,

[00:29:25] but that's because you don't know

[00:29:26] what you're budgeting for or with

[00:29:28] because you may not be tracking your income or expenses.

[00:29:31] It's like throwing darts blindfolded

[00:29:32] and then being frustrated that you didn't hit anything

[00:29:34] or that your score wasn't that great.

[00:29:36] So stop throwing blindfolded darts at your budget

[00:29:39] and start tracking so that you know that scoreboard.

[00:29:42] Like Alan said, the example about sports

[00:29:44] without stats or scores, what's the point?

[00:29:46] What's the point of a budget if there's no stats or scores?

[00:29:49] You need to be keeping track of those numbers.

[00:29:51] So start tracking today.

[00:29:52] That will have the biggest impact on you.

[00:29:55] And remember that with any of your habits

[00:29:56] that you're trying to track,

[00:29:58] it becomes a true habit when it's harder to not do it

[00:30:01] than it is to do it.

[00:30:02] So start tracking today

[00:30:03] and that's how you're really gonna feel

[00:30:04] the big impact on your life.

[00:30:06] But let's talk about the money talking points.

[00:30:18] The first money talking point

[00:30:19] is what area of your finances

[00:30:21] could benefit from a simple system?

[00:30:23] And I honestly need to get a better

[00:30:24] simpler system for tracking our investments.

[00:30:26] I'm writing down numbers in too many different places.

[00:30:29] I have a pretty bare bones one,

[00:30:30] but it's easy for me to lose track of

[00:30:31] what we're trying to do.

[00:30:33] And then it confuses me later down the road

[00:30:34] when the numbers are slightly off

[00:30:36] and I forgot to log one little thing.

[00:30:38] So maybe building out a better simpler system,

[00:30:41] I think it could prove very beneficial

[00:30:43] for our long-term financial goals.

[00:30:45] What about you?

[00:30:46] What areas of your finances could use a simple system?

[00:30:49] Could tracking expenses use a simple system?

[00:30:51] Could tracking your income,

[00:30:52] tracking your budget,

[00:30:53] tracking your credit card rewards,

[00:30:54] maybe staying on top of your credit card debt

[00:30:56] could use a simple system

[00:30:58] to help you get motivated

[00:30:58] and get going towards paying off all your debt.

[00:31:01] What about tracking your different bank accounts?

[00:31:02] Have you found yourself

[00:31:03] after the last couple years

[00:31:04] with a bunch of different accounts open all over the place?

[00:31:07] How are you keeping track of all of that?

[00:31:09] I would highly recommend keeping it simple

[00:31:11] and getting rid of a bunch of them

[00:31:12] and simplifying it down to one or two accounts.

[00:31:15] But make sure you have some sort of system in place

[00:31:16] to keep it simple and track it simply

[00:31:19] so you know everything is in one place,

[00:31:21] at least that it's being tracked in one place.

[00:31:23] The second money talking point

[00:31:24] is what commitment devices can you use

[00:31:26] to help with your finances?

[00:31:27] Like was mentioned in the interview,

[00:31:29] deposits are a great way

[00:31:30] that people keep each other committed to things.

[00:31:32] How can you use a deposit in your own life?

[00:31:35] What can you do to bring a little bit of pain

[00:31:37] into your choices to help you stay on track?

[00:31:39] That's what a commitment device is.

[00:31:41] Can you send your friends some money as a deposit

[00:31:43] that they get to keep

[00:31:44] if you don't meet a certain goal

[00:31:46] or a habit tracking process?

[00:31:48] That might really help motivate your friend

[00:31:49] to help you stay accountable

[00:31:50] because maybe they do want to give you your money back,

[00:31:53] but also I'm sure they'd be happy to keep your money

[00:31:55] if you don't meet your goal

[00:31:56] and there's your bit of pain.

[00:31:58] Money seems like an easy commitment device

[00:31:59] so what are some other ones you can use?

[00:32:01] Well, you can continue to use money

[00:32:03] in the form of maybe a locked savings account

[00:32:05] or you change the password

[00:32:06] or your friend changes the password

[00:32:08] and then you don't know the password

[00:32:10] and they do and they tell you later down the road

[00:32:12] so you can get access to your money.

[00:32:13] Maybe there's a physical contract you can sign

[00:32:16] that you need to stay on top of

[00:32:18] or else maybe money gets involved.

[00:32:19] But let's also bring up

[00:32:20] accountability partners aka money buddies.

[00:32:24] I love money buddies.

[00:32:24] Money buddies are a great way

[00:32:25] to stay on top of your money

[00:32:27] to involve people in your money

[00:32:29] and helping and having more money talks.

[00:32:31] It's a great way to stay accountable.

[00:32:32] Another way to get around commitment devices

[00:32:34] is to make things automatically happen for you.

[00:32:36] Maybe it's easier to stay on top of it

[00:32:38] when you remove the behavior and automate it

[00:32:41] so consider how automation

[00:32:42] might make things happen for you automatically

[00:32:45] and also maybe consider limiting access to something.

[00:32:47] I recently heard on a podcast

[00:32:48] that people are using timed locked cookie jars

[00:32:52] and putting your phone in it

[00:32:53] or whatever habit you're trying to build.

[00:32:55] If you put your phone in it

[00:32:56] because you're trying to stay off your phone as much

[00:32:57] and then it only unlocks at specific times

[00:33:01] things like that can be a great way to limit your access

[00:33:03] to something that you're trying to change

[00:33:04] or do better at.

[00:33:06] So consider how commitment devices

[00:33:07] can help you in your finances.

[00:33:09] But again, thank you to Alan for coming on this episode.

[00:33:11] Let's wrap it all up next.

[00:33:22] Keep it simple.

[00:33:23] You've all heard everybody say this.

[00:33:26] Simple wins the race.

[00:33:27] Honestly, if there was a tortoise and a hare

[00:33:29] and then there was someone that just kept it simple

[00:33:31] someone keeping it simple would probably win

[00:33:32] by a landslide.

[00:33:34] Keep everything simple.

[00:33:35] And thank you to Alan for coming on this episode.

[00:33:37] I think that was a really great conversation

[00:33:39] and I hope you were able to take something away from it

[00:33:41] and enjoyed it as much as I did.

[00:33:43] And guess what?

[00:33:44] I'm going to be in FinCon in about two months.

[00:33:46] I just booked my flight

[00:33:47] and so if you're planning on going to FinCon

[00:33:49] please reach out and let me know.

[00:33:51] I'd love to connect with anyone who's there

[00:33:53] and I'm actually very excited to go.

[00:33:55] It's going to be a fun conference to attend.

[00:33:56] I'm looking to learn more about how to grow my podcast

[00:33:59] and do better with this whole

[00:34:00] entire content machine that I'm trying to create.

[00:34:03] But now we're here at the end

[00:34:04] and the time has come for me to ask

[00:34:05] is always for you to share this podcast

[00:34:07] with a friend and go and have a money talk.

[00:34:09] The best way to do better with money is to talk about it.

[00:34:12] So take action on this episode.

[00:34:14] Take something you learned,

[00:34:15] share it with a friend and have a money talk.

[00:34:17] And remember, you can find my contact information

[00:34:19] and the website as well as any other links mentioned

[00:34:21] in today's episode in the show notes.

[00:34:24] Thank you for listening to Money Talk with Skylar Fleming.

[00:34:26] I'm your host Skylar Fleming.

[00:34:27] Have a great week.

[00:34:28] Thank you for listening to Money Talk with Skylar Fleming.

[00:34:31] This show is provided for informational

[00:34:33] and entertainment purposes

[00:34:34] and may not be specific to your unique situation.

[00:34:37] Please be sure to do additional research

[00:34:39] before making any financial decisions.