Your Energy, Your Money

We often hear that what we put our energy and focus on, grows!

This is very true when it comes to your money.

We spend a lot of time in our businesses taking care of #allthethings from communication to marketing plans, to doing client work, and more.

Realistically, this can and should take up most of our time and effort. But what I see happen often, is that the work needed to make a business successful financially sometimes gets put on the back burner. Not because we don’t want money – but because we spend most of our day doing those other tasks. And there’s no energy left to carve out time to sit down and analyze our spending decisions, ensure that everyone is paying us, and that our systems are in order.

Think of tidying up your finances like doing the laundry, or washing the dishes.

It might not be a fun task per se, in fact, you might consider it downright drudgery, but you DO like eating from clean plates don’t you? And you DO like sleeping in clean sheets, right? 

Where we put our energy and focus really does indeed grow! And that includes your financial management, and “doing the dishes” in your financial house.

When all of your i’s are dotted and t’s are crossed in terms of record-keeping, – making sure you’re up to date on your bills, and no one owes you any money- everything runs more smoothly.

The best way to ensure this happens, is to establish a repeatable system. 

I suggest creating a specific time and day of the week that you sit down and dedicate your energy to completing these tasks. Schedule a money date just like you would a date with your spouse. You can keep the relationship between you and money strong by spending time with it! 

To start, carve out 15-30 minutes a week that you can consistently stick to and make a habit around. For example, every Friday at 10am, you’re:

1. Checking in on your cash accounts
2. Checking to make sure your invoices are going out on time
3. Making sure you haven’t dropped the ball on anyone to whom you owe money

When you schedule it on your calendar, it’s more likely to happen. And when we get into our groove and a solid routine with these tasks, it doesn’t have to take a lot of time! 

When you regularly tackle these tasks each week, three things will happen: 

1. You’ll reduce the time that you spend scrambling at the end of the year… and, ahem…tax season is coming!
2. You’ll be intimately aware of the overall money flow in your business.
3. You’ll have a much better handle on how your business is doing, how healthy it is, and how much you have to pay yourself. Which is why we’re doing all this, right? 

On a monthly basis, be sure to put a date on your calendar to reconcile your accounts (or make sure your bookkeeper is doing that for you). You can also use this time to focus even more deeply by creating a monthly budget, looking to see which extraneous expenses you can cut out, and that your pricing is set properly, as well as that your team is operating efficiently. 

At the very least, and as a small step, I encourage you to put a weekly date on your calendar. Make sure you are looking at your finances regularly and you will see that with just a little energy invested every week, the financial health of your business will improve! 

Give it a try, make it a new habit for just thirty days.

This is enough time to help us create systems that stick and can get you to a point where you are doing this so regularly that nothing comes as a surprise.

And you will be thrilled with your energy level to take on all the pieces in your business, once your finances are under control.

If you need a starting point – think checklists and excel sheets that you can fill in on a weekly basis – check out the Zen Money Accelerator Advantage. This kit gives you access to 5 resources from the Zen Money vault to jumpstart you closer to your version of Zen Money!