Financial Fitness, #110

[Unidentified voice]:

program Money is a stand in for what we value. And so to use money properly, what we need to do is align it with our values and get into valuing tremendously what it brings us. Because money is just a tool. And so yeah, when it comes to paying your bills every month, I love renaming them Invoices for Blessings Already Received. Really taking that time as you're paying those invoices for blessings already received to relive the value of the things that you have gotten. Instead of saying, ugh, I have to

[Unidentified voice]:

pay bills again, you gotta get connected to your money. If you don't understand why to save, if you don't understand why you should have some money, if you can't hold on to money, if you don't realize that it can have value beyond today or yesterday, but what can it do for you tomorrow? Then you're never going to want to have it. You're never going to want to actually own assets.

[Unidentified voice]:

So I personally was looking for a place that I would want to go to to exercise and to not make it feel like a regular gym. I wanted to go beyond just the gym environment and create something like a community where people can go and hang out after the class, get to know each other and then really generate this great energy during the class that that helps people increase their fitness level.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

This is Dr. Lisa Belisle and you are listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and podcast show number 110 Financial Fitness, airing for the first time on Sunday, October 20, 2013. Today's guests include Kate Northrup, author of A Love Story, Tom Sheppard of Shepherd Financial and Stephanie Cabot, founder, owner and cycling instructor with Rev Cycling Studio. Financial Fitness has been an important consideration for me for the past several years as I've worked through a job transition, a life transition, and a few other personal transitions. Back in 2011, I wrote the following about financial fitness and the the Low Hanging Fruit Tempting it is and probably smart to pick low hanging fruit first. This notion applies to a wide variety of situations, both literal and figurative. If one is literally confronted with a fruit laden apple tree, it makes no sense to climb over ripe produce hanging from lower branches in order to reach that which is situated closer to the top. Once the more easily accessed apples are gone, however, by necessity it is the uppermost branches which must be tackled, unless there are many other trees from which to gather fruit. If there is but a single tree, then the choice is clear. Every effort must be made to reach the top, no matter how difficult the climbing may be. This is certainly true when it comes to one's financial situation. The upward climb may be exhausting and seemingly endless. Each question begets a new question. Each financial layer peeled back reveals another financial layer, possibly previously unrealized. Some of the apples we pick may be wormy, some rotten, some are sweet. Every single apple is important. Each must be sought out and retrieved until some day that final apple on our financial tree will be picked and laid to rest in a basket amongst its lower hanging brethren. Then regrowth will begin we hope you enjoy today's show on Financial Fitness with Kate Northrup, author of A Love Story, Tom Sheppard of Shepherd Financial and Stephanie Cabot of the Rev Cycling Studio. We hope that this will cause you to think about the low hanging and not so low hanging financial fruit in your own life and how you might make efforts towards your own financial fitness. Thank you for joining us. Many of us have just say conflicted feelings about money, and we don't always think about money and love in the same sentence. But the person who's here with me today actually does think about money and love in the same sentence. And that's because she wrote this book, a love story. Or maybe she wrote this book because she thinks about money and love together. At any rate, we're talking with Kate Northrup, who is the author of A Love Story, Untangling your Financial Woes, Creating the Life youe Really Want and Living youg Purpose. Thank you for coming in and talking with us today.

[Unidentified voice]:

Thanks for having me, Kate.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

It was interesting because I was reading through this book and it came. I'm sure you're like, I am. Books always come sort of at the right time in your life. They show up and you go, oh well, this is what I needed today. And your book came just at the right time. I was sort of, I have a new job that I'm going to be starting and I have a kid in College, thinking about lots of financial things. And I start reading through your book, and I think, you know, there's some very interesting ideas, ideas here about thinking about money in an abundant way versus in a sort of fearful, I don't have enough kind of way, which is important.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah. And it's a different perspective than most financial advice or works out there that are really focused on only the nuts and bolts, only the dollars and cents. And to me, money is a lot more than that. It's so emotional for people. So we're. We don't want to leave that off the table.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You came to this conclusion that money and love are interwoven. And really, it's not that you have to be in love with money, it's just that it sort of enables you to do the things that you want to do. It's a currency. That's what it is. But you came to this after having spent quite a long time yourself talking about money with people. And I don't think that this is. I'm not saying anything disparaging when I say you were acting like the money expert going around the country lecturing, but in the meantime, you had this deep, dark secret.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah, so what happened is I kind of fell by accident into this role of teaching people about money because I built a successful business in the network marketing industry. And so I had a team of people that I was working with. And then I started giving workshops and I. My business was doing well, but I was only focused on the making money part. And I had completely ignored the part about how much you spend and what you actually do with the money once it comes in. And that's a really important part of the equation. It's at least half, if not more. And I got myself into over $20,000 worth of credit card debt. And, you know, as I've been going around telling this story and meeting people, I found out that's actually not that uncommon, which is really unfortunate. But anyway, and I. Behind the scenes, I really. My financial life was fairly chaotic, and I was certainly in avoidance around it while I was out there teaching some concepts around business and cash flow and passive and residual income, which was all good stuff. I wasn't teaching people how to get out of debt, luckily, but there was. There was a disconnect and there was kind of that frame, and it started to feel really inauthentic.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I was surprised and pleased to read about the way that you went back in your genealogy a bit and talked about your father's approach to money versus your mother's. Approach to money and how this really shaped you because your parents got divorced when you were relatively young and you had a chance to watch both of them kind of become their own individual people and have their own individual approaches. So talk to me a little bit about that, that honesty that you were able to actually, I guess, write about it in the book.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah, well, one of the things that's really important is when you tell a story in public, I feel like you have to have cleaned it up with the people ahead of time. So, you know, I did that a lot of work with both of my parents so that I felt like I could tell share this story from an open hearted place for education and to help other people, not just to, you know, tell a juicy story. And so really looking at, okay, my mom's approach to money versus my dad's approach to money shaped how I kind of fell somewhere in the middle. And watching their different approaches and being I was 16 when they got divorced and really interacting with them around money individually for the first time because up until that point, you know, it was their shared common interest. And I didn't learn as much about it with them together because both of their money views got watered down by the other one, for better or for worse. And so seeing this contrast was cool because I saw two different approaches that really worked in certain ways and didn't work in other ways. And I was able to appreciate and pick and choose some of the perspectives that I wanted to take with me. But it's really important for everybody to look at their money history and their money love story, as I call it. And I coach people to go through that in the first chapter because we are so shaped by what's modeled for us growing up, whether it's our health habits, whether it's our relationship habits or our financial habits. And the only way to make positive change is to first become aware of those things and kind of go down that road. Not you don't have to spend years of therapy or anything. I mean, maybe you do, but I'm not saying you need to do that, but just to spend a little time saying, oh yeah, that is what my mom used to say. That is what my dad used to say. This is what I witnessed. And how is that affecting my behavior now? It's a really important question to ask.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

This is a big part of what you're asking people to do. It's not just track your expenses every day for three months and set up a retirement fund. I mean, it's not just those things. It is really Dig deep, have a money love journal. Understand where you've been and where you'd like to go and where you are in the process. It's a different approach than I think a lot of financial consultant sorts have to offer.

[Unidentified voice]:

Absolutely. It is. The thing that I found in my own journey of getting myself into and then out of $20,000 worth of debt was that the nuts and bolts of it, the spreadsheets and the planning and the savings and all that stuff, I wasn't able to actually continue to do them until I figured out the emotional stuff first. So I had to rewire myself emotionally and mentally and change some of the perspectives and beliefs I had about money and myself. And then those strategies for getting out of debt, for building my savings, for increasing my income worked, and I actually stuck with them because I can't even tell you the number of times I tried starting a new financial program. Just kind of like a similar. Like a new nutrition program or new exercise program. And if you're just doing the strategies without the inner work, it doesn't stick, and it's not sustainable. And then, you know, three months later, you're on a new program. And so that's. That's the piece that I wanted to bring to the table, the emotional piece. Because when we change how we feel about something, then that really rewires our beliefs and rewires our activity, as opposed to just starting with the activity. It's. It's too far down the. Down the line and it won't stick.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I know that one of the important things for you was to finally realize your own value. In your description of your relationship with your parents. You talked about a partnership you formed, a financial partnership you formed with your mother. And you described a series of health issues that kept taking place and kept taking place and kept taking place. You couldn't figure out what was going on. And then one day you went, oh, my gosh, I know what's happening here. And it has to do with this financial relationship that's very complicated.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah. And certainly not something that most people would put together. But. So my mom is Dr. Christian Northrup. A lot of people listening, I would imagine, might be familiar with her. She wrote Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom. So as a child growing up, I really learned how our emotional lives affect our physical bodies. And so anytime I have anything going on with my body, my immediate reaction is, okay, what's going on in my life right now? What is my body trying to tell me? And. And so I knew this issue I was having was in the second chakra, which is the area that has to do with money, sex and power. It's around the reproductive organs. And I knew that it probably had something to do with it. But the thing that's funny about the body is it will manifest stress. Manifest our stress goes into our body usually when we're not ready to be aware of it mentally and consciously. That's why it goes into our body. So of course, I couldn't figure it out for a long time because I wasn't ready to. And then I was. And so what ended up happening is my mom and I worked things out and I realized I was remaining in the business with her because I felt like I wasn't enough to be out in the world doing things on my own. I felt like she had this existing brand. She had been so successful, it would be so much safer if I just didn't really have to put myself out there and if I was just behind, behind the scenes in her brand. But what was happening is my body was saying, that's not okay. And so it wasn't anything my mom did, it was something I did. And. And so after a while, I felt like that relationship, business wise, was keeping me small. And what I realized is after we had some conversations around it and unraveled things, it was also keeping her smaller, you know, than. Than she needed to be. And that's how it is in relationships. When one of us is playing small in a relationship, the other one is too, Even though the other person may not be aware of it at the time. Like, we're never serving anybody by staying when it feels constructive.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you decided to make this radical shift. You've worked through this relationship with your mom, and it's taken a while. And when I say relationship, I mean financial relationship, because it seems as though you were able to largely keep things on a positive level personally. Then you decided to kind of do 180 and sort of get rid of everything and sort of create your own, like, tour, let's go cross country, and let's do something different. So tell us about that.

[Unidentified voice]:

Well, what happened is I was living in New York and I was chipping away at my debt. So I was making progress, but I wasn't making progress as fast as I wanted to, you know, And I would do the projections and it was like, at this rate, you'll pay off your debt in, you know, seven years or whatever. And that just felt too long for me. It just felt like, ugh, you know, I want to do something else. And so what I did is I looked at, okay, well, I could move home to Maine and live. My mom has an apartment attached to her house. And I thought, great, okay, so I'll go move to Maine. I'll pay off all my debt really fast, because I'll have no living expenses, and I'll take care of that. But every time I thought about that and I started telling people about it, I felt really constricted, and. And almost this darkness, sort of emotional darkness, started to surround me. And so that was my sign that it probably wasn't a good idea because it didn't actually feel physically that exciting. And so all of a sudden, I just got this idea, what if I. What if we got rid of this apartment in New York? What if I sold all my stuff? And what if I bought a Prius and took off around the country, teaching workshops about creating financial freedom as I was doing it myself? And. And I'll call it the Freedom Tour, and it'll be this great adventure. And so that's what I did. And that felt, you know, back to the physical aspect. That felt really expansive. And every time I talked about it, I felt energized. And every time I talked about it, I felt really excited. And so that was my sign that it was the way to go.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And it also clearly created some sort of rise in your energy levels and what you were projecting out into the world, because somehow you end up finding this guy.

[Unidentified voice]:

I did. Well, so I had met this guy six months before in Chicago, and we had kept in touch a little bit, but nothing, you know, nothing in particular. And then all of a sudden, when I was leaving on the road trip about two weeks out, I thought to myself, I really probably shouldn't drive alone from Buffalo to San Diego in the middle of the winter when. When I've just changed my entire life and I'm feeling a little emotionally shaky. And I just got an intuition to invite this guy Mike. And I was like, that's crazy. You don't know him. And. And I did it anyway. I just, you know, I consulted a few friends. I said, is this totally nuts? Should I do this? And I sent him. Well, first I sent him a really neurotic email, which was like, you know, oh, you could. I'm inviting you on this thing, but it's okay if you can't come. And, you know, I mean, 50 million disclaimers. And luckily, I showed it to a girlfriend of mine, and she looked at it, and she said, you cannot send this. This is a crazy girl email. And she deleted it and took my phone and sent him the text. I had this really fun idea. Do you want to drive across the country with me? To which he replied, yes. And so that was two and a half years ago and we're actually getting married next summer, so. So it worked out.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Isn't that something that you have found over time, is that when you start doing things that are sort of more foundationally sound for yourself, that the right other things kind of come in to help you be more of who you already are?

[Unidentified voice]:

That is such a good point. You know, I think whether we're looking for relationship, a relationship or romantic relationship, or financial well being, there is this feeling of like, oh, I should go chase doing the quote unquote, the right things. I should go on match.com you know, I should do, do the right things. And what I found was the more I focused on taking care of my own well being and doing the things that I knew I needed to do. Absolutely. I found a great guy, I managed to reorganize my financial life. So I paid off all of my debt really soon after I left for the Freedom Tour. Things got better in my relationship with my mom. You know, all of those things started to work out when I prioritized, okay, what needs to happen to take care of you on the foundational level, like

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

you said, and you became your own, as you said, Prince Charming.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah, yeah. And that's a concept. Barbara Stani, who's been one of my mentors, wrote a great book called Prince Charming isn't Coming, which is a somewhat depressing title. However, the concept of the book is really become your own Prince Charming. And I had noticed for myself, I was kind of waiting for somebody else to take care of me, even though, I mean, I'm shocked even saying that right now. I mean, I was raised in a household with two doctors. I have an Ivy League education. I've had so many things supporting me in being all that I can be. And yet I was still kind of thinking like, well, maybe some Guy's gonna come around and take care of it for me, or maybe my mom's just gonna do it for me. And I really saw the way I would step back and not take action because I kind of hoped somebody else would do it. And so I did become my own Prince Charming. I kind of took the bull by the horns and said, you know what? I'm not going to wait for somebody else to do this. I am going off on this trip. I'm doing it by myself. And ultimately, I ended up not doing it by myself, but the intention was to do it by myself. And I'm going to create the life I want right now and not wait for something else to come along. And that was a really powerful choice.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Walk me through some of the other steps that you suggest to people and steps that people can find when they go out and buy your book.

[Unidentified voice]:

So one of the things that you can do is honesty and telling the truth are just such a key aspect to, I think, living a wholehearted life, but also getting your finances together. And I was living in financial avoidance, as I mentioned. I mean, literally, I wasn't opening my credit card bills and I sat down. I avoided doing this for so long, but when I finally sat down and added up everything I spent, added up everything I made, added up everything I owed and to whom and by when and what the APR rate was, the energy that I got from doing that exercise and telling the truth was tremendous. I mean, I felt like a superhero. I felt like I could do anything. Because in order to know where we want to go, in order to get the directions for where we want to go, like you're typing it into a gps, you have to know your current location first. And I was living in La la land around my current location. And I have found in talking to people, that's a common scenario, that there's like a lot of vagueness around money. And so if you cut the vagueness and get honest, then you can set about creating the financial reality that you really want. But you can't do that unless you know where you're starting from. So that's. Tell the truth is really one of the most important steps that I find. And it also, when you tell the truth, it also diminishes a lot of the shame surrounding money. Money is such a. Can be such a source of shame in our lives, and one of the best ways to alleviate shame is to talk about it. And that immediately lightens the emotional load. And so telling the truth to yourself, but then also finding somebody you Trust, you know, who loves you unconditionally. To tell the truth to as well can be incredibly healing.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You also talk about, I don't think you call it payments, but blessings already received. Yeah, which is an interesting way to look at. I guess we would call them our. Some people would call them debts or invoices or. Yeah, but you're looking at it as, you know, this is money that I am paying for the chance to have made a lot of texts to people I love last month. So I'm going to thank AT&T for that chance. So is it reframing also that is useful as people are going through this process?

[Unidentified voice]:

I think it's hugely useful because money is, we just made up money as humans. I mean it doesn't exist. And so it really has a very strong, energetic component. And some people would say money just is just energy. I like to shy away from that slightly just because it's a little too woo woo for some people. But really it is. Money is a stand in for what we value. And so to use money properly, what we need to do is align it with our values and get into valuing tremendously what it brings us. Because money is just a tool to create certain experiences, to buy certain things, to invest in certain things, to grow certain things. And so yeah, when it comes to paying your bills every month, I love renaming them Invoices for Blessings Already received. And that just changes the whole energy of it. I mean, yesterday I was paying some invoices and one of them was for my assistant, one of them was for some food and, and one of them was for some video editing. And I took a moment as I was writing checks to get into a place of how awesome is it that I now have these five beautifully edited videos that I can put out to the world. Thank you, Stuart, for that. How great is it that I had two weeks of help from Jessie who helped me out? I mean, she's awesome. And how awesome is it that I had this incredible food from Jenny and a great birthday cake for my fiance? I mean, really taking that time as you're paying those invoices for blessings already received to relive the value of the things that you have gotten instead of saying, ugh, I have to pay bills again. I mean that's just an awful way of going through life. You're gonna have to pay bills for the rest of your life. So why not make it a fun, like juicy, joyful, grateful experience.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And you also approach, I guess, spending and buying things the same way where it's you know, that. I mean, all of us know that we need to cut, quote, unquote, cut our expenses if we're going to try and save money and put it towards our debts or put it towards our invoices for blessings already received. But you talk about it in a way that makes it more palatable. If I save this money, then it's more money for me. Yeah.

[Unidentified voice]:

So there's this concept of a Money for Me account. And you can open it as a free savings account online, or, you know, you could stash it in a tin coffee can or whatever you want to do. But the idea is, when you are spending money, to ask yourself, would it feel better to spend it and have this thing I'm about to buy, or would it feel better to essentially pay myself and put this money in the Money for Me account? So every time you have unexpected income, every time you ask for a fee to be taken off your credit card or your bank account, every time you were about to spend money but you decide not to, every time you have a captured expense, like a child who's in daycare but then is going to kindergarten, which is free, take the $800 or whatever and put it in the Money for Me account every month. Otherwise it just gets lost in your financial, in your family's expenses. And at the end of the month, you can look at that Money for Me account and see and really feel how good it feels to pay yourself instead of buying stuff. And then you can do what you want with it. You can put it in savings, you can put it towards paying off debt. You can, you know, put it in your child's college, college fund, whatever it is. But. But what you've begun to do is rewire yourself so that saving money and paying yourself begins to feel more abundant than spending money. And so it's actually creating a different emotional experience. And you're kind of training yourself like Pavlov's dog.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And how much time do you suggest people spend on, I guess, understanding their money and setting up plans? And how long does it usually take before people get into a place where things are looking good again?

[Unidentified voice]:

That's a great question. I mean, studies have shown that it takes 21 days about to form a new habit, but then those new habits have to take hold so that your reality shifts. I think that, you know, actually I had somebody who's reading the book right now. I have a Facebook group for people who are reading the book. And anybody can join in on that. And she just did the first chapter, which is telling her own money love story. And she said that she actually didn't have the money in her on her credit card to buy the book, and she had to wait a few days to put together the $10 to buy the book. So, I mean, we're talking she was in a serious financial pickle. And she said within a few days of doing some of the exercises and shifting her energy, she had a $2,500 windfall and now is able to pay her overdue electricity bill, pay her mortgage, and have a little breathing room this month. And to me, I mean, that was. She only did chapter one. She's only, you know, she's just getting started. And the shift in energy can be fast and profound. And I really invite people to have a quantum shift like that and to say, you know, it is possible to change things fast. It doesn't have to take years, it doesn't have to be hard.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, that last part is important. And in fact, you addressed this, that even as you're saving money, you don't want to throw it all towards your past debts, because that can be very disheartening.

[Unidentified voice]:

Absolutely. A lot of people will go from getting into debt to getting into deprivation and feeling like, oh my gosh, I've been bad and therefore I need to punish myself by not allowing myself to eat out, by never buying anything that's not absolutely necessary, by, you know, keeping my house freezing cold, which would be awful in Maine, and things like that. And then, and then they spend years kind of suffering as a way of quote unquote, atoning for their sins of going into debt. And the reality is, you know, you made the decisions you made in the past and you were a different person then. We all have things that we wish we had not done in our past, but beating ourselves up for it in the present doesn't actually help us change, because beating ourselves up in the present for things we did in the past just makes us feel bad. And when you feel bad, you don't make great decisions. And so the idea is, allow yourself to enjoy the process today of digging yourself out of debt, of living abundantly no matter what. So how can you get that feeling of abundance from not spending very much money? And that can be a really fun game. Is it doing an at home manicure and pedicure with your daughters, which would not cost you more than a bottle of nail polish? You know, is it taking a bubble bath, which it turns out is free? All those different things can really create that consciousness of abundance without needing to spend a lot of money.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

As a physical. As a physician and small business owner, I rely on Marcy Booth from Booth, Maine to help me with my own business and to help me live my own life fully. Here are a few thoughts from Marcy the numbers never lie. It's a phrase we've all heard hundreds, if not thousands of times. But as trite as it may be, it really is one of the golden truths of business and personal finance. And while it takes discipline to keep your eye on the numbers, to look at what are sometimes difficult truths, when you do it regularly, two things happen. It becomes easier over time and you truly start to understand what the numbers actually mean and how you can make your life better. I'm Marci Booth. Let's talk about the changes you need. Boothmain.com

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Where do people find out more about your book? About it sounds like you've got some DVDs coming out and I know that you have a very strong online community. So what's the best place for people to go to?

[Unidentified voice]:

If you go to katenorthrup.com, you can find all of that. I do a series on Fridays called Financial Freedom Friday and those videos come out over email. And there's all sorts of free content on my website, including a quiz about what your relationship with money says about you that you can take for free.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And what are your favorite things to do when you're not thinking about your career and the book that you wrote and you're not planning your wedding. And what do you like to do?

[Unidentified voice]:

I love to be on the water in Maine. I just can't imagine living somewhere not on the water. So paddle boarding, sailing, just sitting on the beach. I love that. I love to dance. So whether it's a classic Casco Bay movers or just heading over to Zumba, I just those are my favorite things. And then I practice a lot of yoga as well, and I love to practice yoga.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Do you think that the time that you spent with Julia Littlefield in her drama camp in Yarmouth, Maine, do you think that that has contributed positively to your life now?

[Unidentified voice]:

Absolutely, absolutely. I mean, it's so funny. I spent a lot of time doing theater and performance growing up with Annie. I'm sorry, with Lynn Erkonen and the Playmakers and all these different things. And I do. It's funny. I feel like now some of what I do is a little bit it's not a performance because it's real life, but it's also like you're standing in front of people speaking or whatever. And I'm so glad I had that training to practice.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So in some interesting way, everything has sort of led up to the person that you are now and to what you're doing right now.

[Unidentified voice]:

Absolutely, yeah.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, we've been speaking with Kate Northrup, who is the author of A Love Story and she's also so much more. So I really encourage people to go and spend some time on her website and also pick up her book and give it a look. And I really appreciate your coming in and talking to us today.

[Unidentified voice]:

Kate, thank you so much. This was a lot of fun.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

From the very beginning of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour, we have spoken about the importance of financial fitness in addition to being to physical fitness and emotional fitness. And also from the beginning, Tom shepherd from Shepherd Financial has been one of our biggest supporters and he happens to be one of my biggest personal supporters and someone who helps me with my own financial fitness. So, Tom, we're getting into the end of the year and I know people are thinking about their finances and what things are going to look like as we close out 2013, head into 2014. What kinds of things do you talk to your clients about?

[Unidentified voice]:

Well, it's funny because now that we've reached sort of the fall season and we're all sort of winding down our summer activities, it's almost like in Maine the work season has begun because the play season is over. So a lot of times what we're doing is really trying to check in with people and make sure that they're on track for their year end goals and so checking in with them this time of year, there's often a lot of stuff that hasn't been addressed for several months and in some cases maybe several years if it's somebody who's new. So the first thing that we always try and do is get reconnected to just the fundamentals, the basics, the foundation of what it means to prepare your life financially, to grow and develop the way you want it to. So one of the first exercises we'd be doing with people right now is to just try and get it all out of their head, get it all down on a piece of paper. Whether it's the numbers or the emotions or the goals that you have for yourself, the things that you want to spend money on right now. That's where we're really trying to help people get connected to their money and feel like it's empowering them to sort of power through to the end of the year. Because we know that come the holiday season, we'll all get busy and be focused on other things. So now's a really good time to sort of buckle down and get back to the basics.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you provide some sort of tools to the people that come in to see you.

[Unidentified voice]:

We have a great tool called Emoney. It's an aggregation system. So if you've got account numbers and user IDs and passwords to other accounts, your credit cards, your brokerage statements, your 401k plan, all that stuff, you can actually get it so that it's all connected in one place. And then from that, we don't have to spend time gathering information. We can instead start to look at it. And that's the second thing that we really help people to do, is put things into a format so that you can better be able to see what it is that's in front of you. Because if you get it out of your head and then you can actually look at it, it's often easier to see the big picture, the truth. And that's sort of the second thing that we would recommend that people do this time of year, is really try to get connected to how your money fluctuates. It ebbs and flows. Maybe the summer was all about spending your money and spending your time. And the fall sometimes really needs to be a different season to look at how you spent it and to think about how you'd like to do that again next year, which is one of the things we talked about in a spot on one of your previous shows.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Okay, so we get it out of our heads and we get it into a system that enables us to look at it differently, and then what do we do with it?

[Unidentified voice]:

So the biggest thing that I think we get stuck on is our incomes don't always align with our expenses. And so if we've had a great month in terms of earnings, Maybe we're a commission salesperson and yay me, I get to go celebrate. And so sometimes we go off the deep end, spend too much money, not realizing that there were three or four big bills coming up that we forgot we were going to have to pay. And then the downtime, you end up with less money. So that's kind of a fluctuating income. So we try and encourage people to look and calendar. Why is it a surprise every year that I have to spend $160 at the Cumberland Fair? That's, that's going to happen every single year. We do not escrow our real estate taxes. I know that I have to prepare for that. Christmas happens the same day every year, and yet so many people are surprised. And so the next thing we do is really take a look at how do you bridge those gaps. Are you somebody who relies on credit, or do you build your own credit, your own source of income, your own savings to try and get you through those expense periods where you have fluctuation.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you're talking about really longer term planning. You're talking about looking at something that could be helpful to somebody in more than a year's time.

[Unidentified voice]:

We're talking about looking ahead rather than just looking at your current statements. In this electronic age, it's really easy to know how much is in your account. And you can even maybe program the two checks that you wrote that haven't processed yet. But what we're talking about is take that a step deeper because it's all just electronic. It's all sort of invisible. We never handle money anymore. So we have to do things to help us get it out on paper, black and white, look at it, see it, understand what that needs to do to alter our behavior so we're actually prepared for the future. We need to look ahead. And most people, you know, really don't. And so doing that, looking ahead, saving that money leads us to then have money and then what do we do with that money? That's sort of the next step.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

All right, well, tell us about that next step.

[Unidentified voice]:

So if we don't have enough and we're not going to use other people's money, then we need to start looking around to try and identify how we can create value. I was reading Kate Northrup's book, and in it she tells a story about how a friend comes to you and says, I need to borrow some money to make it to two weeks from now and I'll pay you back then. And she talks about your decision about saying yes or no to that is there something you could help that person to do that's not giving them the thousand dollars? Could you help them sit down, look at their resources, and figure out how to create the value they need to make it through the next two weeks? So if you teach somebody to fish, they'll fish for the rest of their life. But if you just give them a loan of $1,000, then you're just going to be stressed out about the fact you just loaned a friend $1,000. They're going to be stressed out about it. It's all going to be this, this burden, this chain. And that's sort of what debt has created for people. And we like to do that work to try and help them figure out how to get beyond that. The trick there, though, is to do that in a way that doesn't make them feel like getting out of debt has to be the sole reason for their existence.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you have another tip for us in this area.

[Unidentified voice]:

You got to get connected to your money. If you don't understand why to save, if you don't understand why you should have some money, if you can't hold on to money, if you don't realize that it can have value beyond today or yesterday, but what can it do for you tomorrow? Then you're never going to want to have it. You're never going to want to actually own assets. And that's the biggest thing that we try to do with people, is make sure that when they evaluate your expenses and you look at your incomes and you figure out how to actually have some savings, that that savings should do three things for you. The first thing it should do is protect your budget. So if you're going to invest money, you want to make sure you're investing in things that are going to do well when your budget is being impacted in a negative sense. So if we can get you to a neutral place, then you can look at creating a second income. What's the second income for? The second income is supposed to help make your life easier. It's supposed to help you pay down the credit cards. It's supposed to help you make your mortgage payments. It's supposed to help you do things that make life easier. And if you do those two things, it also, interestingly enough, will lead you to the opportunities that having money and investing it can create for you, which is the growth that most people are looking for out of their money. But sometimes it can come to you because you're taking care of your foundation first. So if energy costs were $30 a barrel in 2008 when the crisis happened, and now they're $100. Well, protecting yourself from that increase through some kind of an investment plan actually created the income, maybe to help offset the fact that you put gas in your car and heat your home. But it also creates an opportunity for you to have growth and appreciation as well.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, Tom, I know that you have, well, a wealth of information to offer to people and that people certainly should give you a call to find out more about what you've been discussing with us. But we also hope that you'll come in for future shows and offer some more of these tips. So people who are listening today will want to listen to next week's show and the show after that and the show after that. Because you're going to expand on this for us, aren't you?

[Unidentified voice]:

We try to expand on it every single week, and there's a pattern to the way that we actually go about it. And those patterns are depicted in the pictures that we have on our website. The last piece I would leave you with is that if you're going to do this work, you gotta celebrate the small victories. You have to be grateful for whatever successes you do have, because those are the things that keep you coming back for doing this more and more and more. You know, use your money is just as important as saving it. Using it, but using it in a way that actually empowers you and keeps you wanting to do it more and more and more.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Tom, thank you for helping us be more financially fit here on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and podcast. Also, thank you for helping me be more financially fit and for all the things that you've taught me over the last few years. I appreciate your being part of my world, and I know that the people who are listening appreciate your being part of their world as well.

[Unidentified voice]:

Well, they probably don't know that you are my financial coach for two years as well. So what goes around comes around, and I thank you for that.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Tom, what's the best way for people to reach you?

[Unidentified voice]:

The best way to reach me is just to send me an email@tommshepherdfinancialmain.com if you want to just get some exposure to the seven steps that people need to go through in order to be successful with their money, and they need to repeat them over and over and over again. You can go to shepherdfinancialmain.com which is our website.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

All right. Thanks, Tom.

[Unidentified voice]:

Thank you.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

The goal of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour is to help make connections between the health of the individual and the health of the community. The goal of Ted Carter Inspired Landscapes is to deepen our appreciation for the natural world. Here to speak with us today is Ted Carter.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

We at the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour know that our listeners understand the importance of the health of the mind, body and spirit. Here to talk about the health of the body is Travis Boyer of Premier Sports Health, a division of Black Bear Medical.

[Unidentified voice]:

At Black Bear Medical, we want to help people who want to stay in their homes but can't access it due to a mobility deficit. Our Home Accessibility department has some great solutions that allow people to get everywhere in their home. We have ramps and wheelchair elevators for negotiating entrance stairs and stairway lifts that will help people access upstairs rooms when climbing the stairs becomes unsafe. Our product experts will come to your house, offer advice and a free home accessibility quote. We can even accommodate temporary needs with our rental program. We even take it a step further with products that can help people transport their wheelchairs and scooters in or on their vehicles. Stay safe in your home and go

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

where you want to go.

[Unidentified voice]:

With Black Bear Medical and our Home Accessibility Geeks. Visit our locations in Portland and bangor. Or visit blackbearmedical.com for more.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

For those of us who grew up in the sort of television era, we always think about the commercial that goes, two great tastes that taste great together, chocolate and peanut butter. Now, I don't think that Stephanie Cabot is old enough to really remember this commercial. It's about a chocolate bar. She's doing the opposite thing. She's bringing two great things together. And this would be yoga and cycling. Stephanie Cabot is the owner, founder and cycling instructor at Rev Cycling Studio, which is right here in Portland. And I think it's pretty interesting that you've managed to do yoga and cycling both in a short space of time in your brand new studio. And I wanted to bring you in to talk to you about this.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah. So Rev just opened two months ago and the cycling and yoga component is taking off. So what it is, is it's 45 minutes of cycling in a room that's dimly lit, has energizing music, motivating teachers, and then you transition in a span of like 3 to 5 minutes. Give you time to actually take a few breaths, decompose, and go right into the yoga studio where you follow it up with a 32 hour long yoga class where you come out feeling like a new person.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And you yourself, you went to Bates, you played field hockey and squash, you began cycling as part of your training in the off season.

[Unidentified voice]:

I did. So I originally got into cycling or spinning going into my sophomore year of college. And I used it as a training regime because I had a stress fracture in my foot and I found I couldn't run or I couldn't do any of the training that I'd previously done. So I could hop on the bike and do interval work. And that's how I originally fell in love with cycling.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

On the other side of it is yoga. Now we know that in order to be strong and fast, we have to be able to work on our endurance and our strength. But then there's the flexibility piece and the flexibility not only of body, but of mind that yoga brings.

[Unidentified voice]:

Right, Right. So the great component about Rev is during the cycling classes, you kind of are in a dark environment. It allows you not to be competitive with other people in the room. You kind of focus in on your own kind of performance. And then the same goes with the yoga component. Afterwards, you really are intern reflecting on everything you've just accomplished. As well as in cycling, you're compressing your muscles and then in this form of yoga, we're really working to, like, open up the chest, kind of elongate our leg muscles, everything to make it so that you can stay healthy and keep living a very active lifestyle.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Why do this in Portland, Maine? You're originally from, I believe, outside of Boston?

[Unidentified voice]:

That's a great question. So I came to Portland a little over a year ago after graduating from Bates. I took a little span of traveling time. And since coming back, when I originally decided to open up Rev, there wasn't an indoor cycling studio, especially one with a yoga component. And Portland is such a cool city. It has so much going on, so many great activities, but there are some cold months. So I personally was looking for a place that I would want to go to to exercise and. And to not make it feel like a regular gym. I wanted to go beyond just the gym environment and create something. Something like a community where people can go and kind of hang out after the class, get to know each other, and then really generate this great energy during the class that helps people increase their fitness level.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And how's that working out for you? How is your community coming along?

[Unidentified voice]:

It's going surprisingly well. I am very impressed, especially since it's so young. It's a new concept, but people just keep coming in, and it's fabulous. I get to meet a ton of very interesting people. And the Reverend community is definitely growing, which is great.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Now you're a relatively recent BATES graduate, taking a big chance and opening a new studio in, what's for you, a new city. Not necessarily a new state, but not your home state.

[Unidentified voice]:

Right.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

This takes some determination and some bravery. How do you kind of keep showing up every day and kind of digging deep so that you can move this forward, something that you really believe in?

[Unidentified voice]:

I really find that I show up every day to see the people. I know people are depending on me. I know they're very interested in what we do at the studio, using that inspirational music to motivate people. We're trying to kind of work together to accomplish a set goal. And just seeing people so excited about coming in and leaving so energized, that keeps me coming back and keeps me energized. And then there's also my dog, who's always waiting outside, who, whatever he's doing, he always brings light to the situation.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You have a background also? I believe in art history. Is that right?

[Unidentified voice]:

I do, yes. I was an art history major.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So how has that been brought into the mix as you're moving forward in the creation of your new business?

[Unidentified voice]:

Well, that was actually. I focused more on architecture. So architecture, interior design, that type of thing. So when I actually built out the space, I could put a lot of those tools into the mix. So I had a fabulous time kind of designing, working with another Bates Group graduate, a local contractor in the area. And we got to make a very kind of Zen space that you wouldn't think of as your normal gym space, which was great, which is fabulous. I had a great time doing that.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Have there been any challenges that you've encountered along the way?

[Unidentified voice]:

Definitely. Marketing. I did not anticipate how difficult. I kind of expected all the put up the sign, put up the little blackboard outside and people will just flood in. That's not the case. As a small business there. It boggles my mind how people succeed and just keep. You have to be so determined and you just have to get out there. Marketing was definitely something I'm constantly working on every day, whether it's social media, whether it's print, whether it's anything. It's been a big eye opener.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you have this great product and now you need people to know about it, really.

[Unidentified voice]:

Exactly, exactly. And that takes time, I think. I think word of mouth is big. But for right now, we've got a great core community, a lot of regulars and that's fabulous.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So do you have a website or.

[Unidentified voice]:

We do have a website and Facebook page, Instagram, Pinterest, We've got it. All the website sites, RevCyclingStudio.com and it's very easy to use, user friendly and it's got a great signup system where you can reserve a class seven days in advance and cancel up to 12 hours before the class. So we want to make it super easy for people to either just walk in and show up or sign up online if they know their schedule.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Stephanie, I wish you all the best. You have great energy. I know that you're very enthusiastic about the Revolution Cycling Studio and it sounds like a place where people can get many of their needs met all at the same time. Community and some endurance and strength and aerobic workout and also the yoga, flexibility and breathing. So I encourage people to go to your website or drop in and meet you. We've been speaking with Stephanie Cabot, who's the owner, founder and cycling instructor at Rev Cycling Studio.

[Unidentified voice]:

Thank you. It was great to be here.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You have been listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and podcast show number 110, Financial Fitness. Our guests today have included Kate Northrup, Tom shepherd and Stephanie Cabot. For more information on our guests and extended interviews, visit drlisabelisle.com. the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is downloadable for free on itunes. For For a preview of each week's show, sign up for our e. Newsletter and like our Dr. Lisa Facebook page. Follow me on Twitter and Pinterest and read my take on health and well being on the Bountiful blog. We love to hear from you, so please let us know what you think of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour. We welcome your suggestions for future shows. Also let our sponsors know that you have heard about them here. We are privileged that they enable us to bring the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour to you each week. This is Dr. Lisa Belisle. I hope that you have enjoyed our financial fitness show. I also hope that you take a moment to think about the low hanging and maybe not so low hanging financial fruit in your life. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your day. May you have a bountiful life.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Sam.