Nov 11, 2017 | Personal Development, Wealth & Money
I must admit I like to read but I rarely make myself enough time to get lost in a novel 🙁
I do, however, enjoy a magazine regularly.
Over the course of the years, family members have gifted me subscriptions to magazines, such as Better Homes and Gardens, Gourmet Traveller, Women’s Weekly and a few recipe/food magazines. Once the subscription was over, sometimes I continued it myself or just bought the magazine from the supermarket.
One day it dawned on me that magazines are EXPENSIVE!! and are probably not very environmentally friendly with all that gloss paper, toxic inks and disposal after a very short time.
I found that our library had a good range of magazines, but they were often months behind, even the digital versions were sometimes 2 or 3 months behind the current issue 🙁
I did subscribe to some of my favourites with iSubscribe. For a while, this was a good option that saw current editions land on my iPad regularly. While there are good savings to be made, it is still a luxury.
Today my reading prayers have been answered!! Groupon has a fantastic deal that will see me with as many digital magazines as I can possibly digest in one year for just $29.99
I had not heard of this company, Magzter, before but I am super impressed with the range of titles, there are 1000’s of them.
I have signed up, downloaded the app to my iPad and might spend the rest of the weekend, “flipping” through magazines.
Oct 23, 2017 | Free Resource, Personal Development, Vision Board
In today’s busy world, I see so much written about passion and having to find your passion or purpose in life to get ahead and be successful.
Sadly, we see this “requirement” as early as high school when 13-year-olds are expected to know exactly what courses they are going to do to set themselves up for the rest of their lives.
How many of you are in jobs professions or businesses that align with your 13-year-old self? .. my guess is not many ☹
My 13-year-old self had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up and to be perfectly honest I still don’t.
With the help of teachers and my parents my high school education was quite broad with a number of different subjects that would cover most jobs that were available for an 18-year-old girl that didn’t want to go to university.
In my last year of high school I was sent to a large photographic lab for work experience. While there I met people that would become longtime friends and eventually business associates, but it was not really a passion.
A few years later, I was offered the opportunity to purchase my own store and so my business ownership career began.
When I sold my stores in the early 2000’s I spent a lot of time and even more money trying to decide what I really wanted to do with my life.
In the early 2000’s the internet was most certainly not what it is today and there was not a lot of easily accessible information. The library had a number of books that I greedily read hoping to find the answer.
Over and over I read the “Secret to Success” is to carve out a niche. I became more and more frustrated with this concept. What is my niche? What is my purpose? I would start blogs, Facebook groups and even businesses based on what I thought was my “greatest passion”. Sadly, I quickly became bored or distracted and moved on to find the next “greatest passion”
After reading and reading and reading and even more reading, I finally determined that I do not have just one passion, and you know what…
THAT IS OK !!!
I have many things that interest me and fire my determination to do more.
Often these things seem to be at odds with each other.
For example –
- I love helping business owners expand their businesses to create more profitable outcomes. I have a knack for being able to spot lost opportunities and can create a solid plan to implement these opportunities within the business with the least amount of cost and upset to current operations
So, it would appear that my passion in that regard is to create more money for spending BUT
- One of my other passions is almost making a game of how far I can stretch my money.
This does NOT mean being a scrooge or miserly. Money is meant to be circulated, it does not serve anybody by being trapped in a savings account.
- Another great passion is food after all who doesn’t love the satisfaction gained from the deliciousness of a perfectly cooked and presented meal? I love gleaning inspiration from café and restaurant menus and creating equally gorgeous meals for my own table and enjoyment.
Sadly though, I do NOT have a passion for exercise, so I do need to keep my food passion in check somewhat.
Perhaps my greatest passion is learning about myself. How do I really think and how can I make myself better?
I truly believe that our greatest gift to ourselves must be a positive mindset, without that positivity nothing else can come to pass.
Whether you call it the “Power of Positive thinking”, “The Secret”, Mindset or just Blind Faith you must believe that you CAN. (no matter what your niche or passion)
I hope I can share each of my passions with you. In my Free Resource Library, I have a growing list of freebies relating to each niche.
Please keep checking back regularly..
Sep 25, 2017 | Home and Environment, Personal Development, Vision Board
My husband suspects I might be just ever so slightly totally bonkers. (In the nicest possible way of course). After 20 years, he is used to my sometimes crazy purchases.
One of the “secrets” to living my perfect life, is to visualise what that life looks like in minute details. Then I choose an area that is less than perfect and upgrade it closer to my vision. Of course, some things are not possible to jump from level 1 straight up to level 10, but for the many little things in life that we “make do,” it can be an easy low-cost upgrade.
One of my upgrades this month has been to buy matching coat hangers for our wardrobe.
This was my side of our wardrobe before….
And this is the after…
It just makes me smile with joy every time I look into the wardrobe now. My wardrobe looks “10/10 ” to me, and it was not a huge expense.
I got these coathangers off eBay I chose the one with clips on them so they are useable for any type of clothing.
Sep 14, 2017 | Courses, Personal Development, Vision Board
The whole concept of “Sunshine Cash” is the total opposite of “Saving for a Rainy Day” It is, of course, important to save an emergency fund for unforeseen events, but (in my opinion) to have money in the bank for money’s sake is just not necessary. In no way would I EVER advocate spending more than you have, but cash is there to be spent. ALWAYS pay your bills first, then allow funds for savings and general “adulting” then allow some “Sunshine Cash” for just having fun.
Some call it “Fun Money” or “Splash Cash” or”Splurge Money”
We all work very hard for our money, and yes!! you DO deserve to enjoy some of it. I am sure you have relished the joy of a fun purchase bought with no guilt.
Spending is not greedy or wasteful, money is meant to be circulated. Your purchase means the cashier has a job, the store owner makes a profit and the whole circle of cash continues. In accounting terms it is even called cash FLOW…cash needs to flow or everything stops.
My greatest ability to have money seemingly rain down is a positive attitude and a good eye for a bargain. The Power of Positive Thinking, The Secret, The Law of Attraction, Manifesting, Mind Powers and a heap of other “brand names” for a positive mindset are not “Woo Woo” rubbish. Our minds ability to manifest what it truly wants has been shown over and over again throughout centuries of Human existence. A simple example of the power of the Law of Attraction is the example that almost everybody has had when looking for a new car. You decide to buy a red VW Beetle and all of a sudden it seems that every second car on the street is a red Beetle.
The Universe will rarely give you money for the sake of money. Money in itself is just random pieces of paper and metal. What you CAN manifest is the ability to be able to buy the things you desire. You might get a pay rise or promotion that gives you the amount needed to fund the monthly payment on your red VW Beetle, or the local dealer might be having a great runout sale and you snap up your Beetle at a fraction of the price you originally budgeted for. This happens so often to me and many of my friends, cannot be simply LUCK.
The other side of keeping a positive mindset about your money is the inevitable blocks we all have around wealth and money in general. How often have you heard terms like..
- Filthy Rich
- Dirt Poor
- Rich Bitch
- Greedy Capitalist
- Gold Digger
- Sugar Daddy
Many people have a real block around attracting wealth for fear that their friends will not like them anymore, or worse, that their friends will resent them.
I have spent quite a bit of time over the years practising my money language. Instead of saying “I can’t afford that” I will say “I have different priorities right now” or Instead of “OMG That is SOOOO expensive” I might think “Hmmm I wonder how I can achieve that”
Let’s get into action and manifest more Sunshine Cash!!
Let me know how you go.
Oct 10, 2016 | Personal Development, Wealth & Money
One really simple way to save money and create your champagne lifestyle is to look at your spending habits and make some quality changes.
Some ideas might be:
Coffee.
Nearly every savings blog or site you see always puts coffee at the top of the list. Certainly, your daily (or three) cafe coffee can leave a huge dent in your wallet, but life is way too short for bad coffee. in keeping with the champagne lifestyle, I am not going to suggest you drink instant 🙂 Look for alternatives.
Have a coffee machine installed at work. If you work in a large-ish office, there are many businesses that will supply a coffee machine free to your workplace, the business just pays for the coffee used. The price per cup is usually less than $1.00.
If a “proper” coffee machine is deemed too much hard work, what about a pod machine? You can buy any number of coffee flavours as well as hot chocolate. Again the cost per cup is far less than cafe coffee.
Don’t have the capacity for a machine at all? Have a look at single cup options like the good old French Press
Once you have your coffee making apparatus, ask your favourite coffee if they sell beans to take home.
Gym:
Look for cheaper options for fitness. Many local councils run free fitness classes. Check out the MeetUp site. Search for Sports and Fitness groups near you. Who knows you might even find some new friends and get fit at the same time.
Entertainment: Borrow books, magazines and DVDs from the library. If you have not seen the inside of your local library since high school, you might be in for a surprise. Far from the boring stuffy places of your youth, modern libraries have a great range of books, magazines, DVDs and music. Many libraries have collections ready to download onto tablet devices and you don’t even need to go to the library. My library offers a huge range of magazines that I download to my iPad. Most months I cannot read all that I subscribe to. All these magazines are ones I used to actually pay money for and still did not read them all. If I see a particular recipe or article I really want to keep, I just screen grab the page and either email it to myself to store in my Google drive or print it out. Or join Magzter for online magazines.
Dining out with friends. Have a My Kitchen Rules month with your friends. Take it in turn to create your own “pop up restaurants” at each other’s homes. Add the extra challenge of setting a budget per person. $20- $25 per person is actually easily doable if you think about your menu carefully.
Embrace the “Pot Luck Dinner” – task each diner to bring a course.
Rotate the course each time you hold the event. eg:
Event 1: Tom & Jan bring a starter, Jack & Tracey bring the main, Rick and Ash bring dessert, James & Fiona bring wine
Event 2: Tom & Jan bring main, Jack & Tracey bring dessert, Rick and Ash bring wine, James & Fiona bring starter
Event 3: Tom & Jan bring dessert, Jack & Tracey bring wine, Rick and Ash bring a starter, James & Fiona bring the main
Event 4: Tom & Jan bring wine, Jack & Tracey bring a starter, Rick and Ash bring main, James & Fiona bring dessert
Alcohol: Have a cocktail party at home. Grab some cocktail recipes and try some of those $15 cocktails you can never afford when you are out 🙂 (Dan Murphys have heaps here)
Spending: Lock up your credit card for a month. Pay everything in cash. It might surprise you have it feel to actually hand over cold hard cash.
Give the gift of TIME: Rather than forking out big dollars for gifts, give yourself. If you have a hectic, busy life you no doubt rarely spend quality time with your family or friends.
Set aside time to visit with your family member or friend for a full morning (or day), it will cost you a few hours, but it will be priceless to your recipient.
Check your bank statements: Internet banking makes it super easy to check purchases online. Make note of any “unknown” purchases. Do you need to do a claim through your credit card provider? One other nifty little saving trick is to “save your cents”. While in your online banking have a look at your debt balance, and top up the balance to the next $1.00 ( or $5 or $10) eg if your balance is $xxx,x23.68, you might add 32c to bring up to the next $, or add $1.32 to bring to $xxx,x25.00 or even $76.32 bring it up to the next $100.
What are your simple methods for saving?
Oct 6, 2016 | Home and Environment, Personal Development
Unless you have been living under a rock for the past year or so, you will have heard about the KonMari method of decluttering. Through her best selling book, The Life Changing Magic of Tidying: A Simple, Effective Way To Banish Clutter Forever, Japanese author, Marie Kondo promises to transform your life one empty closet at a time.
Like many people, I took all this with a grain of salt. The book and I admit, a bit of peer group pressure 🙂 did spur me on to do a decent declutter of our home. Given that we live in a fairly small one bedroom apartment, i really did not think I would have much to “declutter”. Well I was WRONG!!!
Fairly ruthlessly, I decluttered wardrobes, shoe rack, book cases, kitchen cupboards and the pantry.
The KonMari book recommends you get rid of anything that “no longer brings joy to your life” That box of “one day I will fit into them” clothes most certainly did NOT bring joy, so listed on eBay they went. Clothes, shoes, books and heaps of tupperware that we have not used in ages all got listed on eBay. Over the course of about 8 weeks or so, my total “declutter wage” was just over $500!!!
The pantry declutter, left two groups…One small one of out of date foodstuffs that went in the bin 🙁 and a larger group of “stuff” we had bought for a long forgotten recipe, or had been given as gifts (jams, sauces, biscuits and relishes etc from hampers). These were all still perfectly fine and useable and a lot of them quite Gourmet (White Truffle infused oil ). I really did NOT want to waste these and have to throw out some substantial value. Looking at each product, I decided to roughly menu plan some uses for them.
We had some “interesting” dishes over the course of the few weeks until they were gone. Who knew that Mediterranean Tomato Chutney would make a truly delicious pizza sauce in place of regular tomato paste? or that Almond Butter in place of Peanut Butter is really good in satay sauce on chicken.
I do find, now that I have decluttered, the apartment is a lot easier to stay tidy. The bookcase/wall unit especially looks much more open without every shelf stuffed full of books. I have even managed to dig out some ornaments for display.
There are loads of stories on the internet of people who have found all sorts of “hidden treasure” through the act of decluttering. I did not find much actual cash ( no more than a few coins in the bottom of an old handbag) but people have found cash in pockets, old purses, and of course in the couch.
So get to it…start decluttering now. Just start with one place and do it well. List what you can on eBay, Gumtree, Facebook or Craigslist and let me know in the comments how much your “declutter wage” comes to.
