Comfort with Money Discomfort and Habit Formation
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[00:00:00] Hi, and welcome to this week's episode of Money With Alpha. This week I wanted to talk about a topic that has come up quite a bit, when I've, you know, when you're a mom and, and you know, different lessons and guidance tends to come in. And one of the, the topics that's come up quite regularly over the last, uh, at least few months anyway, has been how to become comfortable with discomfort.
Um, and you sort of don't realize as an adult, I, I guess, you know, we're, we're always on a learning curve, but when you're a. Child. There's just so many things that you're having to learn, like all at once, and there's knowledge and there's, you know, emotions and skills and learning to ride a bike without training wheels, learning to swim, learning to read and write, and how to, you know, function and socialize and society and like, there's so many things that kind of come your way.
So there's a lot of discomfort there. And I remember when I was a kid and it's, it sort of makes you reflect as a, as a [00:01:00] parent, what, what, what was I like? I remember there was something that I used to say all the time, which was, I know which. I think it was a bit of a protection thing because it was like, if I say I know, then I am feeling a little bit more like confident in myself that I actually know something, uh, when in fact you actually don't.
So then it almost feels worse because you know that you really don't know, but you just don't wanna admit that you don't know. So you just say, I know and hope that ends the conversation. Um, so I see this happening with my daughter and there's, there's a lot of similarities. I have to make sure I, I keep reminding myself, she is not me.
She still has her own personality and there asked. Still her, um, beautiful uniquenesses, but I can still see a lot of me in her. So whenever my husband gets frustrated with things, I was like, well, that was me At the same age, I can see so much of myself in her. Um, so I have a little bit more patience and tolerance for that, and probably empathy because I've been through it myself.
Whereas my husband didn't experience the same [00:02:00] concerns and, and difficulties with learning. Like I, you know, learning didn't na come naturally to me. I really had to work at it, especially sort of spelling and writing and things like that that did actually develop over time. Um, but they weren't like instantly there, they weren't something that I just was this natural, you know, scholar at all.
So, um, so the concept of becoming comfortable with discomfort. Is something that, um, has come up. And I thought, and I was thinking about it in relation to, to money too, because I've had to become very comfortable with discomfort in building my app. I'm actually ironically wearing, um, a prosperous shirt. Um, today, if you are watching the video, you'll, you'll see it popping up every now and then.
Um, but the techie side, it was incredibly uncomfortable and still is because there's a lot that I don't know. And I don't know what I don't know until I hit something. I dunno. And then I'm like, oh my gosh. Something else I have to learn. So I've had to learn to lean into it and just to kind of be comfortable with the fact that I [00:03:00] will generally have to go and find the answers.
I don't just know them, which having worked in the space with money and finance and. And numbers for so long. Um, there's still a learning journey, but there's a lot of knowledge that I've built up and a lot of experience that I personally have from doing investments and, and like managing and creating systems and doing all these things myself.
But when it comes to technology, that's a very different story. But then I watch my friend who's been helping me, who's a software who used to be a software developer, and he's just like, click, click, click, click is doing all the things and I'm watching, trying to keep up going, whoa, I have no idea what you're doing right now.
But then I know some of my clients can sometimes feel that way when I'm like, click, click. Clicking around. I'm doing things in previously Excel and then now in prosperous because I've been in it and I've been using it and I've been, um, making, um, adjustments and tweaks and improvements to it as I've been using it.
So I've transitioned all of my spreadsheets now into prosperous and I'm loving it. So, [00:04:00] um, and I'm getting good feedback from people once they're using it as well, so. So that discomfort, when you move beyond it and you not master something, but you become a bit more comfortable in one area, it feels amazing.
So it's just remembering that and remembering that it's okay to feel that discomfort, um, because it's part of the journey. Um, so there's a couple of things I wanted to, to cover off today, and one of them is when do you feel the discomfort? It's kind of actually becoming aware of it as well, because I think so often we're used to being at least competent or in control of a situation that when we do actually have to lean into feeling a bit more uncomfortable in a, in an area that we don't know about or we've been avoiding, um, that we've, we just kind of get.
A bit narky or we, we start to react or we feel a bit early, icky, you know, so it's, it's one of, it's that sort of thing, like how, how to actually like, take a step back and go, okay, what's [00:05:00] going on here? Why am I feeling this way? Um, and recognizing what is happening. If it's, if it's discomfort around, you know, you're upleveling or something else is going on, then to acknowledge it and go, okay.
All right. I need to just realize that this is what's happening and figure out how to work through it, and this is where habits can help. So having sort of like a daily check-in with yourself, doing a bit of meditation, having the habit of, and this is something which I try to do and I, I normally succeed at, but um, I did have a situation this week where I did not, which is when something happens and it's annoys you for some in summary or something triggers you essentially that you.
Before you react, you pause. Take a breath, maybe walk away from the situation. In this particular situation, I was already outside so I couldn't go outside, but there was some behavior in a play sort of area that was just incredibly unfair. And I'm watching the unfairness [00:06:00] unfold and it just like boiled up inside of me and there's like anger came out to just like stand up for the kids who needed to be well, I felt needed to be stood up for.
But in, you know, reflection, I should have just like walked away and just taken a breath and just, yeah. So it's interesting. So we, we all have these, so, but my normal habit is to pause, breathe, and either remove myself from the room or the situation and then just gain a little bit of perspective. So the same thing goes with money as well, and I'm noticing at the moment.
So we're going through a bit of a situation where, um, sort of. Helping, helping my mom kind of move into a, a different sort of dwelling. Um, and rather than just getting like very go, go, go, 'cause I'm, I've got so many things on my list. So rather than doing all that, like sitting back and going, okay, what is really the right thing here?
Is this really the right. Action to take. And if it is, then okay, well let's just do one thing. So trying to be a bit more measured. [00:07:00] So I suppose when it comes to making decisions, especially around money, rather than avoiding the decision, recognize that, recognizing that discomfort. And then giving yourself that, that space, having a habit of, of reflection and time and space to be able to contemplate and really, really think about what it is and feel into it as well about what is the right sort of step to take next.
And when we kind of get to that point, sometimes it could be a knowledge. Or an information, um, gap that's required. So just as an example with this, this whole thing with my, with my mom in the house, bringing in a real estate agent to give us an idea of, well, what could my, you know, what, what sort of, what kind of price range we looking at?
Um, because that then informs. What sort of pri, what sort of money are we looking at to be able to then buy another place? 'cause at the moment things are going so quickly, you really need to have that information at your fingertips so that you can be looking at the right sort of properties and being able to [00:08:00] offer the right kinds of prices.
Um, already had an experience where we definitely under, um, offered, although. The market is just crazy. So, and it hasn't worked. It didn't work this way when I bought my home. So it was, it's, you know, acknowledging how things changed. There was a knowledge gap, there was information missing. So it's understanding is that what's also part of the situation with yourself and money?
Do you need to, to uplevel? Like do you need to understand something a bit more? Do you need to maybe, you know, do a little bit of a course? 'cause there's lots of courses around at the moment, but you could see like, do you need to learn a bit more about property? Um, and maybe have a chat to, to some real, like if there's a real estate agent in your realm who can kind of explain what's going on to you.
Um, listen to some podcasts. There's some really good podcasts around our property. I was actually listening to an episode, um, this morning around rent vesting. I have to admit. Coming from my tax background, there were a few things that they were talking about and like, yeah, but you're not considering the tax consequences there.
But then, you know, that's, that's just sort of my, my filter. [00:09:00] Um, but it was at least really interesting to hear the process broken down. Um, and then, you know, is there, you know, from a share ingesting perspective, again, really, really great podcasts. Lots of really good free information out there. Um, if you want some recommendations on some of these, let me know because there's, um, there's equity mates is one I've been listening to.
They're mainly about shares, but they did do an episode about rent vesting, um, and then. Australian investors. I think it's the, um, Owen RAs, um, podcast. His is also very good from a, just an overall investing kind of perspective and financial sort of management. Um, so there might be some knowledge gaps to, to fill there that might help you feel a little bit less.
Discomfort when it comes to money. Um, and then it's like, it's practice over procrastination. And this is, again, something I've, um, I'm gonna try not to put too much of my mum voice on, but, um, like that with my daughter, I was like, if you wanna get better at reading and writing, you've gotta actually practice it.
The more you procrastinate, the worse you [00:10:00] feel, and then you don't actually get the practice, which means you're not gonna feel as confident and then you don't do it because you don't feel confident. And so it, this cycle then continues. But the same thing happens for grownups in different areas. So if it's to do with money, you might be procrastinating because, and partly it could just be because you just don't have enough information, like the right information or enough knowledge.
And so therefore we, we focus on the procrastination rather than taking that. Step prior to it, which is understanding that, and then the step prior to that, which is looking at your habits, and then you go beyond that and actually understand that you're sitting in that discomfort and that's what's driving your procrastination.
So it's really important to, to sort of go through this process. To actually then go, okay, well what's driving that procrastination and that avoidance around looking at money and finances and then to start the practicing process. And by that I mean, you know, practice getting, like looking at your bank statements when they come in, like, um, I mean I'm gonna, I'm gonna sort of tweak my app here [00:11:00] again.
But that gives you a lot of visibility and it, it starts, it, it's a practicing process as well too because you start to see it and you start to see your own spending behavior and it's really interesting. Like I, I'm looking at, at mine 'cause I see it all, um, categorized and I was like, ah, yep, I can, I can see the spikes when, you know, I can see, oh yep, there's school fees.
Yep. School fees come in there and they come in there in between. I do spend quite a bit of groceries, um, but less on eating out. So I'm happy with that because I see a lot of clients where they've got, you know, they spend a lot of groceries but they also spend a lot on eating out. And you're like, well, one should really balance out the other.
I do do a lot of cooking, um, and my husband likes to cook a bit as well, so seeing one of those higher is, is okay, but I still need to make sure that we're not like overspending on the groceries because then you also get waste and you get duplication. Um, I came back from Costco one time and I bought some tomato paste or a tray.
'cause you don't buy just one, you buy a tray of like, I think 12 little tins. And um, I already had a tray. In the, [00:12:00] in the pantry. And I thought I'd looked beforehand, but clearly I hadn't. So now I have two trays. Thankfully they're in tins and they will last a while, but I still didn't need to spend on that extra tray.
I will eventually use it, so it's okay. But if it was perishable, then I'd be like, oh my gosh, I'm probably gonna not be able to eat that before it expires. So, so it's, it's reducing waste. As well and duplication. So that's where the, the practice part, you know, you sort of start to practice looking at your money.
Uh, you can practice with investing, you can look in your super. Even just being able to log into your super and looking at that once a month is probably a good place to, to start and to practice that. To be able to even know how to log in to see your bank accounts. 'cause there's quite a few people I know who, or clients especially who don't have, they dunno what their interest rate is.
How do they get what their current balance is? Um. And then just look at some of the, like for instance, in prosperous, I've got a, a debt repay or a loan repayment calculator. Have a bit of a play with that. See what you can do in terms of paying back your home loan [00:13:00] and how that could be, you know, even maybe an extra a hundred dollars a month.
What difference is that gonna make over time? And then suddenly you're more motivated to try and find that extra a hundred dollars because you're like, oh my gosh, that's gonna take like two or three years of my loan and you know, maybe $20,000. I mean, I could. Definitely do with the $20,000, the bank does not need it.
So it's things like that get into the practice of just looking at that, doing some micro investing and starting to, you know, test the waters in that way and realize it's not that scary. So little by little. So that then becomes like chunking down the actions. Um, and then the practice. Becomes a repetition of that, of what, what actions do you need to take?
And then to practice those again and again, and you can set it up. I, I was writing some notes before and something, maybe literally as I'm writing this, I get like a, a notification on my phone, um, from Joy Lingo. 'cause I haven't done my, my joy lingo. Um, learning for today. Um, and it's, you know, it's the afternoon, so it's like, you know, you're gonna need to do your Duolingo, which as soon as I finish this [00:14:00] podcast episode, I will do my Duolingo because he gets really annoying.
That little green bird gets really annoying if you don't do your daily lesson. But it's good, it's kind of gamified it a bit in the way, like bit in the way, in way in ways, because I've been doing it now. I think I'm on a 10 day streak, so of course I don't wanna undo that. Um. So I wanna keep going to keep my streak going so you don't wanna let yourself down.
So if you can treat your money a little bit like joy lingo and regularly do your practice and regularly take little actions and, and not procrastinate because you will feel better. And then you'll have these regular sort of streaks of, of looking at your money and going, wow, this is actually not as scary as I thought.
I don't know what I've been avoiding for so long. Like, it's actually quite simple and it can be easy, especially the more you do it. This is definitely like exercise. The more you do it, the easier it gets. Your money muscle will really just [00:15:00] become stronger and, and you'll start to really, really lean into it.
So it's, it's definitely worthwhile to start and stop procrastinating on. Um, but yeah, so I'll just, I'll just go through that, those things again that I spoke about in terms of, um, becoming comfortable with the discomfort is firstly identifying the discomfort and acknowledging it. Secondly is what are the habits that you can use to help?
So, helping habits for, um, recognizing and then moving beyond the discomfort. And then knowledge gaps or information lack of, or little, you know, requiring more information where you might be lacking in information and a knowledge gap might be there as well. So identify which one it is and figure out how to fill that.
And then practice over procrastination. And that leads to like, you're chunking down your actions. So you have identify your little actions and then practice and keep going again and again, be consistent. Um, and then finally treat it like Duolingo is nudging you [00:16:00] every day or once a week or once a month depending on what, um, frequency you wanna do it.
And, and just. Like, move through it because it is worth it and you can do it. Uh, and it just takes, I mean, like my drilling goes 10 minutes a day. Again, that's the beauty of something. Having something like prosperous, you can literally do it in, you can actually do this in less than 10 minutes a day. Um, once you start, once you get it all set up and, and humming, um, you don't even need to spend that much time.
You could maybe spend 10 minutes a week. So you can definitely, if ua, if you can do 10 minutes a day on Duolingo, you can definitely spend 10 minutes a week on your finances and then you can focus on something else in your life. There'll be other things that you can give your attention to. Um, and then let, make sure that you're getting your money set up and it's humming along and then you can just enjoy life.
Doesn't that sound great? So I'll leave you with that to this week and have a wonderful week. And um, yeah, let me know how you go. I'd love to hear stories. Okay. Have a good one.
