In the work Dalina and Melissa do, we uncover a lot of *stuff* about mindset – and often hear the refrain “I realized my relationship to food is kind of like my relationship to money”. Have you ever noticed this too? It’s like sometimes mindless, other times too restrictive, other times too “spendy” (aka a money binge)?
That’s why we asked Bola Sokunbi – Certified Financial Education Instructor, money expert, best-selling author, and CEO/founder of Clever Girl Finance – to talk a bit more about money mindset with us on this episode!
We answer how to measure financial health, how your parents’ relationship to money impacts you today, common money mindset roadblocks (and ways to overcome it!) and more about financial health, so you can explore this important part of your overall health.
DM us your thoughts on this episode – we’d love to hear how it inspired you!
Episode Resources:
Follow our guest on Instagram: @bolasokunbi
Join the Break the Diet Cycle Podcast Community in Instagram: @break.the.diet.pod
Connect with Melissa on Instagram: @no.more.guilt
Connect with Dalina on Instagram: @your.latina.nutritionist
Follow Break the Diet Cycle on Apple Podcasts
Follow Break the Diet Cycle on Spotify
This episode was sponsored by No More Guilt with Melissa Landry. Reminder that though we are dietitians, we’re not *YOUR* dietitian. Podcasts don’t constitute treatment. If you have concerns about your dieting behaviors, seek out guidance from a medical or mental health professional. And if you’re looking for the process, support, and focus you need to live life without food guilt apply for a coaching program from today’s sponsor. No More Guilt with Melissa Landry is currently enrolling clients into 1:1 programs, group programs, and, recently added a do-it-yourself learning format: the Ex-Dieter’s Guide to No More Guilt.
what’s your money mindset? with bola sokunbi transcript
Dalina Soto 0:02 Hola hola Chulas Melissa Landry 0:04 Hi there. We are experts in intuitive eating for on again off again chronic dieters, and we are here to help you take the guilt and stress out of eating so you can become the first in your family to break the diet cycle, just like we are in our families. Dalina Soto 0:19 We want you to be who you are without food guilt. Melissa Landry 0:22 Be sure to follow us on Instagram. No more guilt for Melissa and your Latina nutritionist for Dalina. Dalina Soto 0:29 Are you ready? Let's break the diet cycle. Melissa Landry 0:32 Hey, it's me Melissa. Before we start, I want to let you know that this episode is brought to you by no more guilt with Melissa Landry. What you're about to listen to is not a professional coaching or counseling session. Each episode is a one time conversation meant for educational purposes. Look for dieticians. But we're not your dietician. Remember that podcasts don't constitute treatment. If you have concerns about your dieting behaviors, seek out guidance from a medical or mental health professional. And if you're looking for the process, support and focus you need to live life without food guilt apply for a coaching program from today's sponsor, me. I'm currently enrolling clients into one to one programs, group programs and I recently added a do it yourself format the ex dieters guide to no more guilt apply for a program at Melissa Landry nutrition.com I hope to meet you soon. Dalina Soto 1:19 One more thing chulas we know how hard you are working to break the diet cycle out there. We appreciate that work because we know every single one of you who breaks a diet cycle is making a world where inclusive and safe for others to do the same. It's personal, we get it. That's probably why you're listening to a podcast. It's private and at your own pace. That's why if you've ever found benefit from this podcast, we want you to review and rate us there are more people like you who want the same benefit. Helping our podcast get found by women like you is the best way to help us further our mission to break the diet cycle. We literally couldn't do it without you. Will you review us after you listen to this episode. Thanks, chula. Melissa Landry 2:04 Do you ever notice your relationship to money mirrors your relationship to food? We hear this all the time in sessions people notice that if they have a restrictive mindset around food that tends to bleed over into money. And I personally have always wondered about this is there anything to it? It's a pattern I see as a Registered Dietitian. And so what we did is we brought in a personal finance expert and I am so jazzed up energized by this interview, you're about to get your mind blown to get inspired. And ultimately, we want you to listen to this for two reasons. One is health is more than weight and size and nutrition and movement. We talk about it all the time. Financial Health is an aspect of your health. So we hope this helps you think holistically about yourself in that way. And the other thing you know if you've spent any time on my page, I'm all about creating that whole new mindset that backs your intuitive eating journey. And I think that intuitive eating mindset helps us more places than we think. So without further ado, let's hop into our interview today. Can't wait for you to listen to this episode. Hello and welcome back to the pod Dalina you know, I've been looking forward to this we talk on the podcast all the time about health holistically. We talk about how finances and access impact health our ability to engage with help and so we're delighted to welcome Bola Sokunbi who is the author of choosing to prosper and CEO correct of clever girl finance. Bola 3:47 Yeah. We love that for having me. I'm so excited to chat with you ladies. Melissa Landry 3:53 I we've been doing some email interactions is our first IRL meeting. The reason why I asked you bola is YOUR Story on your website about how your mom inspired you and like my little hairs are standing up. I think that's the coolest thing when our businesses can be inspired by real life, stories and experience. So I would love for you to introduce yourself. Tell our listeners a little bit about what inspired you to create clever girl finance and then we can talk all about financial health. From your perspective. What do you think? Bola 4:21 That sounds great. So as you mentioned, my name is Bola Sokunbi. I'm the founder and CEO of clever girl finance. I'm also an author. We are an online financial education slash female empowerment media platform and we offer all of our content for free including our courses and the goal is really the reason why behind that is really to give everybody access to financial wellness. A lot of people will say, Well, if somebody's spending money on XYZ, somebody can afford to do this vacation and go out to eat than they should be paying for financial wellness. But I feel that sometimes people get to the point where they need help. They need support and they may have made the money mistakes, and that's fine. And there shouldn't be a paywall in front of them being able to receive that support, even if they've made mistakes, even if they went out to eat dinner 10 times last month, right. And they learned so my mom is definitely inspirational to the why behind my business when I started my business, but really just going through my own experiences, learning how to manage my money, learning how to invest and just realizing that there wasn't a lot out there for women or even women of color. I remember coming graduating from college and getting my first job and wanting to just really do well, with managing the salary I was getting paid. And for some reason, I wanted to find a personal finance book for women. And I remember walking into the bookstore and I couldn't find anything for women, there was something on wills and trust by Suze Orman there was you know, and then there was one book on personal finance for women. And it was a New York Times bestseller was the only book but it was written by a white man. And I thought it was so odd. But I bought it anyway. Melissa Landry 6:04 Gotta start somewhere. Bola 6:06 And the book was based on his grandmother's story, it's an excellent book, but I was like, where's our perspective, where's our personal insight, and at the time starting my business was nowhere in my realm of view or vision, but it planted a seed that, you know, when I started talking to my friends, and then colleagues, and then I had a personal blog, talking about life, but then also money, I realized that we needed as women, our own space to talk about money, where we're not shamed, where we're not having all of our success, attribute it to a man, where we don't have to feel embarrassed if we don't know certain things where it's not a boys club, where it's like, oh, who has the most money, you know, who can, it can drive the fastest in the sports car, like we're not like that. And you know, this is nothing against that's your thing, or favorite guys out there. I love my husband and I have a son. It's about like representative representation. Yeah, it's about being able to find a relatable perspective, being able to, to be proud of who you are and not be ashamed and not be embarrassed and to make money in normal conversation for women. And the reason why I say normal conversation is because if you look back generationally look at your mother's generation, or your grandmother's generation, depending on your age, the age of your listener, even your great grandma's generation back, then I'm gonna stereotype a little bit, but back then, the idea was the mom is the homemaker, right? You can go to college, you can have your little career, but you are a homemaker, you're going to take care of your family and raise your kids and your husband's job is to go out and make money, right. And if you're a single woman, well, too bad for you. Because guess what, you cannot buy a house, you cannot open a bank account, you cannot get a loan, this is way back then, unless you have a man. So either you find a husband or you get a brother, you get a sponsor to come sign these accounts for you, because you cannot do it yourself. And so a lot of us, we have great recipes from our grandmother's from our great grandmother's passed down to us. But we don't necessarily have that generational financial knowledge passed down. It's not because they didn't want to it was because there was something that was deemed a woman's place back then. And they did the best that they could with what was deemed their place. Fast forward to this generation. Now, we're in a world where there is the gender pay gap, which is incredibly impactful to women being able to build wealth, but we're making more money on average, and our mothers and our grandmothers that more women are in the workforce that our mothers and our grandmothers, a lot more women are a single household earners, breadwinners single mothers sole household earners. And we're now in this position where we need to know how to manage our money. We need to be able to empower our children, both our sons and our daughters about financial wellness. And so we need that education now that we are creating our own seat at the table. And so that's part of well, mostly the inspiration behind what I do what, why I do what I do. So very, very long answer. Melissa Landry 9:05 I'm inspired as all hell right now. You can talk as long as you want on this. Dalina, it reminds me of like a lot of what we talk about the generational diet. We talk more obviously about dieting and nutrition but like our mothers were not privy to a lot of access to information the way that the Internet has allowed now and so it sounds like that's a similar thing for you. Like you wanted to get that in front of people where they maybe historically have not had access. Bola 9:31 Yeah, you know, it's it's personal to me too, because my mom was, was part of that expectation. She got married when she was 19. She had a high school diploma. And it was great if she wanted to go to college, but it was more important for you to find a husband that that especially from the culture I come from, and so she got married young, my dad was older and she was fine with it, right? This is what all her friends were doing was normal life. And then as she started to get older In her marriage, she started seeing things happening with her friends that she just did not like she was seeing friends who are unable to leave abusive relationships because they had no idea of family finances, she was seeing friends who unfortunately lose a spouse, and the family would come in and take over everything because the husband never involved them, or put their name on any family assets. And she was seeing women who just did not have any options in her friends group because they didn't have any money. And I remember a few times I was a little girl, I'd be in the corner of my living room, and my mom would be consoling her friends who has nowhere to go tonight, because she doesn't want to go back home because her husband is being that type of thing. So my mom was like, wow, I need to figure out how to, to be able to stand on my own feet. If God forbid, my own marriage doesn't work, or I want to create options, I want to pursue one of my own dreams, right. So my mom decided to go back to school to get her degree. And I went with her to her college classes. But that was her opening, that was her pathway to be able to be able to become financially independent, and contribute to our household finances. My parents are still married, they've been married for I think, at this point over 50 years, like 51 years 52. But she wanted to have those that option for herself. And eventually my mom became the breadwinner of our family when my dad went through a financial downturn. So it is it's so important for women to, especially in today's world, to have a handle on our money. Dalina Soto 11:30 I love this. And I love this, just like I about you know how this podcast or like what we talk about when it comes to health and wellness and all of this. But a lot of the times when we don't think that we're enough, right, we, you know, try to not take up space, right? Like, there's so much when it comes to like the workforce and finance and making money as a woman that is also tied to diet culture and how we're perceived. You know, if you make too much, you are too much, if you brag, you're a bitch, if you take up space, right? Like, you'd have to be quiet because this is a man's role, right? Or even like when we hear women tell us well, I'm in a bigger body. I can't be a CEO, right? Because I don't get taken serious because I look like XYZ, right? So there's so much time and energy spent on shrinking ourselves. And also, not taking up too much room. Metaphorically and also like financially, like not making more like like, I think I saw something like a meme that was like women are afraid to make more than their husbands. It's like, No, we're not. Bola 12:37 Oh my God, Everything you said, I have a whole chapter in my book, choosing to prosper on this particular topic. And it's us not wanting to take up space but other people getting mad when we do start to take. Yeah, like you people will see a successful woman. And automatically there is a reason as to why she has that success. People will see a successful man and he's a stand alone successful man. Nobody really talks about the fact that his father gave him a small gift of $1 million weakness they talked about the fact that his wife was one hustling behind the scenes to make him empire. But when it's a woman who is successful, she's rarely allowed to have a standalone success. It's always Oh yeah, she must have a rich boyfriend. Oh, she's sleeping around. Oh, it's because she's divorced and she got a divorce settlement is because she is because she's single and she has no kids or husband to worry about that's why she can do that. It's because she's this is because she's that because her dad is this like there's always a reason and that I have first hand stories on this. I know one of my popular stories from media stories from building credible financials me sharing my $100,000 Savings story. When I first came out of college, new college graduate, young girl single, I managed to save $100,000 Over a half years. And then I got featured in the Money Magazine article. And at the very end of the article, it said something like bola lives in New Jersey with her husband, with her twins and husband who is a physician. And all of a sudden people started making Instagram pages about me. Oh my God, the only reason she was able to save $100,000 Because she's married to a physician. That's the only reason why she can even talk about financial illness because her husband is finished. What part of the article did you not read that said new college graduate single? Melissa Landry 14:33 Yeah, right. Right. So there's, it's the jump to conclusion. Bola 14:38 Not wanting to take up space sometimes, us being afraid to take up space because the perception of other people and then other people who are so used to this idea of why women should not take up space now then just not allowing us or wanting us to take up space or making it difficult for us to feel confident about the space that we're taking up. So, financial wellness, but if you add a plus sign to it for women Plus Financial confidence is incredibly important because you will find that as you become more financially successful in your own right, people are going to find ways to bring you down just be just by virtue of you being female or identifying as female. Right? And it could be strangers, it could be people closest to you. Like I once had a friend who told me they can never marry someone like me, because I'm too ambitious. And I'm like, You should absolutely want to marry someone like me. Because what I bring to this to the team, yes, you know what I bring? I'm your VIP player. Are you looking like what a limited mindset that you're gonna find a woman who is not as ambitious as you, like, you know, who doesn't take up space? Because what she's meant to see it has the potential to make more money than you. Right? How about you, you'll be happy that you have someone contributing so much to your team efforts. So I couldn't agree with you more generally. Melissa Landry 16:00 Well it's this feeling of like, cheering people on in the success. There's like a scarcity around, well, if they have it, well, I not have it. I joke around with my friends a lot. I call it quote, community assets. I'm like, I want you to get a vacation home, because there's a community asset in our inner circle. Now, I want you to get it like that, to think about, you know, our ability as a collective as a community to hold each other up and support each other. We all benefit from that, in a way you know. And that's, that's your attitude is like, Look, I am able to support others in my life because of this quality of me of being ambitious and being organized and being disciplined. I think that that's a really great point we forget about a lot. Bola 16:43 Yeah, and you should want to have friends that are crazy, ambitious and crazy successful because there's motivate the hell out of you. It's, it's, it goes back to that saying, oh, show me your friends. And I'll show you who you are. And also you are the average of the five people you hang around with. I want to be the average of the best of the best not the average of unambitious you know, no life goals. bitter and hateful pity parties are not the things that you want, right? You don't want to be the average of that. So you want to see your friends when so that you can be motivated and excited and inspired to go out and win for yourself too. Melissa Landry 17:20 Yeah, in whatever value that is. And I think some people are more motivated by money. Some people are more motivated by other things. And so we talk a lot in this program, but like, figure out who you are, what's your values? What is it that you want, and your circle should reflect that your support should reflect that all the rest. So let's talk a little bit about this idea of financial health. Something just came to mind as you were talking about these comparisons we make about what sort of jumpstarts people got or did not get compared to their like financial wellness. Now, we see this a lot happened with health too, right? There's a genetic component to health. Some people live in cities where they have great access to health care, some people have familial understanding of nutrition or health that carries in and that does give them a leg up when it when it comes to experiencing health. And it sounds like that's also true in various forms around finances. Some people have conditions that might put them, you know, in the 25-50-75 yard line, when it comes to financial health. There are also our behaviors, our attitudes and what we do with that yard line we are on. So one Do you agree with that? Is that a similar thing with finances as we think about it with our you know, physical, mental, emotional, mental health? And then how do we measure financial health? Like what does it even mean to be financially healthy Bola? Bola 18:44 Yeah, so I do agree with that. Finances and health are very, very similar. And, you know, like you said, there are some people who are who are not raised around healthy eating or like balanced eating. But that does not mean that it's impossible, if something is not inherent to you something is if it's something if you were not raised with something doesn't mean that it's not possible for you to do it. But it's totally possible for you to do it. Like, No, I wasn't raised eating a lot of fruit. I mean, we ate a lot of vegetables, not necessarily fruit, like my parents are not food eaters. But I intentionally give my kids fruit with every meal to the point where if we go out to dinner, though, they will ask for fruit first, right? So just because I wasn't raised that way, this is just a random example. Just because I wasn't raised that way doesn't mean that I can't learn to eat that way. Or raise my kids though. And the same applies to money, right? You may come from a background where your parents are incredibly irresponsible with finances, but that could be the motivator that wants you to do better with your money. Some sort of a background where your parents absolutely never talked about money. But then as you've made your own mistakes, you're like, wait a minute, there is value in teaching my own children, my own family members, my own friends I was talking to them about money, because this is what I didn't understand. And this is what I now know. And I now know, it's so important to share this knowledge. So other people, you know, have a different experience. So there are very many similarities. But at the same time, as you guys already know, it's not it, it's not a sentence that you can anybody can do well, financially, as long as you are committed, right? You could have been, you could have made financial mistakes, all your life come from a background where you come from a background of poverty come from a background of financial responsibility. It doesn't, you know, you don't have to continue that cycle, you can break that cycle. And in terms of what does financial health mean, it's independent to each individual, right? Personal Finance is personal, for you determine what's most important to you. And what's most important to you is tied to your own personal core values, right? So there's a lot of confusion there, because in today's today's world, especially with the pressures of social media, and as always, pressures of family, people have these expectations and goals for their lives that they really didn't set for themselves. It was their friends and their family on social media that said this for you, you should have this amount of money by this age, you should be married by this age, you should have this many kids by this age, you should live in this city, you should wear these clothes, carry this bag, wear this shoe, otherwise, you are a failure. But do you really care about that kind of stuff. What is the thing that truly matters to you? What is what is integral to your own happiness, right? And the money is a tool to help you achieve that. So financial health is really you getting clear on your core values, what truly matters you what's gonna make you happy? Is it saving a million dollars great is it being able to travel around the world and afford to do it comfortably? Great, is it you want to go to stop the Empire State Building and use a money blaster to blast off a million dollars, great, if that's important to you. And that is what it's not the expectations of social media and your family, it's what's truly going to make you happy, right. And when you are clear on your core values, then you know how to set your goals, and plan your finances to pursue that value of saving your million dollars of being able to take your annual vacation of being able to retire at whatever age 25, 35, 45 to Costa Rica. That's how you're able to leverage money to create your dream life. Dream Life is not being a billionaire, right? You can go on CNN right now Twitter right now and see all the miserable billionaires posting your life's woes every 15 seconds. Or you know, because because I can, I'm so bored. And I have so much money. And I don't want Twitter to ever block me. So guess what I'm gonna buy it. Be a billionaire, does that make you happy? If it's an aspiration for you, that's incredible. As long as that's the value that's truly meaningful to you. So financial health is personal. Don't let anybody help you decide what is financial success to you, it might be $500,000, it may be having $10,000 saved in your bank account, you may be having a billion dollars, it's entirely up to you. So you draw the line in the sand as to this is my definition of success. Forget about everybody on social media and everybody who's telling you who you should be where you should be all that kind of stuff and just focus on what truly makes you happy. And that will help you achieve not just financial success, but your overall wellness. Melissa Landry 23:28 I love that it goes back to values again. And those values once you kind of sort that out, you can have multiple they can change in Priority through seasons of your life, I can tell you what I valued at 23 is different than now it will probably be different 10 years from now, like having that understanding of your values means no matter what domain of health you're working on, you can figure out what you what you need to be doing what you need to be working on overall. Yeah, it's making me think of like lottery winners whenever you hear those like sad stories, or like, they win and then like their lives kind of get destroyed. You know, Dalina Soto 24:00 Have you watched that show? There's a show on it. Like it's like, I saw it. I don't know why I was watching this, but it's like the curse of like the lottery winner. It talks about like how like these people win the lottery, but then they like lose the money as quickly as they, they want it because they just like don't understand financial literacy. Right? So they just like, blow through it and or think that again, just to like, think about it just as like a first generation right Dominican into the US like my parents were not thinking about generational wealth. They were not survival. Yeah, there was no survival, right? We often talk about the hierarchy of needs, like they were just meeting their most basic needs and sending money back to the Dominican Republic to their family there and that's what we learned. But that doesn't mean that we can't move up right. And it ties that ties into like taking care of ourselves and taking care of our health and our financial like There's so much there's, there's so much guilt around it as well. Like, I experience a lot of guilt around it and like being like, Well, why? Why can I do this, but other people can't? Right? Like, how come like, you know, I can get paid this, you know, for XYZ things, but then other people, you know are out there struggling I think also that as like a first generation person also, it's like such a struggle when you're like, Oh, I'm finally making a little bit of money, but then you're like, Oh crap, Am I worthy of making this money because there's other people suffering in the world. And I saw my parents. Like, it's such a like, it's such a struggle, Bola 25:38 I know, migrant struggle, I can definitely relate to that. I'm an immigrant as well. And it's the the challenge is different, right? Because everything. For most immigrants who come here, your reason why you're coming here is not because you're bored, is because you're bored of your country, because you're coming here for a better life, which means wherever wherever you came from, you had struggle, right. And then you come to a country like this, where a lot of things are taking for granted, and you have this opportunity, even though to a lot of people, it doesn't even seem like an opportunity. But to you, it's like, wow, this is from where I'm coming from. And your goal is to survive, but also to bring your people with you, right? And that's where the sending money back home comes from. That's where you start to feel the guilt of well, as opposed to doing this, nobody could do this for my family, or wow, you know, my family has struggled so much, who am I to be CEO? Can I even accomplish it knowing that I come from struggle? And I think there's a lot of scarcity mindset associated to that. Because our parents are all about, well, you have an extra money, let's let's use it to pay electric bill because I don't know, we're never going to have more money, let's send it back to send it back home, let's pay a medical bill, let's do this, you know, wow, I can't believe you bought those shoes for $100. You know, what I can do with $100 by convert it to our local currency, like, we did that mindset and embrace abundance and know that it's okay to have an also to give, right, but I was wondering about what you said about the curse of the lottery winner. A lot of times when people hear that they detach themselves from that, because it's like, yeah, they want a million dollars, and they're so responsible, but I think it's a curse of everybody. Because if you don't have a good financial basis, you don't have the financial literacy, I can give you $10 Right now, and it was slipped through your fingers immediately because you do not know how to manage that $10 I can give you $500 right now and it'll disappear by tomorrow on nonsense even though you had bills to pay that you could have used that $500 For so there's a say my dad would always tell me penny wise pound foolish and it basically means that if you have not learnt right, and this is your responsibility responsibility to learn this if you're listening to this, you're here for a reason, right? It is no longer your mother's fault or your father's fault at this point. Now this is your future going forward. So you owe it to yourself to learn how to manage your money so you know it's the same basically says if you have a penny and you do not know how to manage this penny, I can give you a billion $2 billion and you're not going to know how to manage this you know and it goes back to the idea of people waiting to make more before they see it before they invest before they pay off debts. No you can wait to make more and make more but if you haven't figured it your plan out now the more you make is really going to be more to spend lifestyle creep oh I need the better bad day the better shoes I need the better car. Oh I need to take an extra vacation. Oh well. You know what I cannot travel economy class anymore. It's only business for me right now. Oh my god. Targets I'm going straight to Neiman Marcus. Like it just happens like that and the money just slips through your fingers Melissa Landry 28:53 Will always show up at Target she was like that's not a problem for me. She should be working for the Isla Dalina Soto 28:58 I just bought some T shirts at Target is the basic Melissa Landry 29:01 staple everyday Everyday everyday they know her there. Yeah, no, that's this is really interesting, right? Because we kind of think about when when when this like future imaginary state we will change our relationship to money when it could happen now. I'm reminded of a story when I was in my right after college, I carry a lot of student debt. Glenn and I talked about this sometimes like student debt is a beast for a lot of people of our generation. And you know in the beginning as dietitians our salaries are pretty meager we you know you don't become a dietitian to make a lot of money we like to help and I remember at that time really being avoidant of looking at my money because it was so scary for me like I didn't want to look at it because I'm like I don't even have an extra penny to work with and that made me feel really hopeless and sad and so I just did it. That being said to be honest at the same time was I traveling Yes Was I buy and so that mindset thing really resonates with me were like the the fear caused of avoidance, and I'm behaving in a way, but it wasn't really planful or choice driven. It was sort of like a fear based relationship to my money, where it finally one day me and my husband sat down, I remember in tears, like, does this mean I'm not gonna be able to buy my hair products anymore because you know, we got these curls, they need a lot of they need a lot of scrunching. And just, it sounds silly, but like, these are the things that make I think, make it really hard for people to imagine, particularly if you carry debt, or you didn't get a lot of help from parents. That mindset of like, it's their fault. I'm stuck here causes avoidance. So tell us a little bit about like, mindset. What are some of the roadblocks on mindset that you see? And how do we overcome those? Bola 30:43 a lot of roadblocks have been we create our own roadblocks? To be honest, I mean, for the most part, not everybody creates a robot, sometimes Roblox happened to you. But a lot of times we create our own roadblocks, like, you know, for example, not wanting to look at your finances, there's nothing there's no barrier, there's no fine. If you look at it, you're just looking at it, right. And then you do the irrational thinking or if I look at my finances, I cannot buy the shampoo, but you already buy the chef. And the shampoo is not the reason why you have to get loans, right. So there's irrational also that that's the thing I'm holding on to Yeah, like that's so relevant. Take my shampoo is our mind. And I'm listening. I've struggled with this as well, like I will, you know, I, I have all this again, it's that scarcity mindset from my like upbringing that I also have to learn how to let go right? I will get to a point where I want to buy something, and maybe it's beyond my budget, or it's going to take my account below a certain level. And I will spend so much time thinking about this thing and how I don't have money to buy and how this summer, but aren't you getting paid tomorrow, but I cannot see tomorrow? Because it's like, it's so far away to two hours until 1am. Tomorrow is like 17 years in my head and I'm like, oh my god, I can't buy this. I have no money, how am I going to buy this? So we all do that. So roadblocks are mental roadblocks. The Circle of Influence roadblocks, so mental roadblocks are the things that we tell ourselves? Nobody. My family has done this. I can never do this. Why? Why should I ever do this? But have you tried, right? No one is no one your family has done this. But you are not everybody in your family. You are you right? The self doubt, right? What are people going to think of me? They were always going to think something of you, right? You have to stop caring. So I talked about mental roadblocks or something I talked about was I'm blanking now. Melissa Landry 32:32 You said circle of influence? What does influence mean? Bola 32:34 So Circle of Influence roadblock is the people that you surround yourself with, you know, my husband came out of med school with multi six figures of student loans. And they will tell you, Oh my God, you can never pay that off other physician to tell him I'm never I'm 65 years old. And I still have $150,000 If you choose to have $100,000 in loans, especially since you've had the income to support paying it off. So circle of influence are the people you surround yourself with that will throw you the pity party to make sure you stay in pity. Girl, you can't pay it off. Me too. We're both going to be broke forever. That's just how it's meant to be. We can never do it. You have me. Let's get our wine, our favorite drink and woe is us. And then tomorrow. Do you call them call? Do you know what happened? You know, I got paid today. And then my tire went flat. I had to spend half of my paycheck fixing my tire. And she's like, You know what, that's what happens because we're just never meant to succeed. We're never ever going to succeed. That is a circle of influence, roadblock that is somebody, right? That is not helping you succeed. That is also limiting your mindset. And it's just a roadblock. Right? The kind of person that helps eliminate this roadblock is Hey, girl, I got a flat tire I just got made, I had to spend all this money, I plan for this, fixing the flat tire, the friend you want as a friend, I will say Oh, wow, that happened to me too. But guess what, what you can do is open up a bank account where you put sinking funds, right for unexpected expenses so that the next time this happens, because you've been putting a little bit of money there, you now have the $500 to fix your tire. That's the friend that you want. So there's those two things. And then there is there are, you know, and circle of influence is also the people that we allow to place those roadblocks on us, right? Maybe sometimes if you have a goal, something that that's really important to you, and you're you you're not sure if you can do it because we all have that self doubt. Maybe you don't share it with those people who are going to kill your goal or throw the pity party. Maybe you keep it close to you right until you feel more confident. Once you've made progress to being able to share your goal. Think about it like when you first plant, put seeds in the ground to plant something plant a tree, plant a flower, right? If people walk all over where you planted that seed, they're gonna kick it out of the dirt and it's never going to grow. But if you allow it to take root and get firm in the ground, right? Once it grows, that trunk doesn't matter how people how hard people push against it, it's not going to break, it's not going to die, right? But you have to worry. And you have to take care of it in order for it to build that strong trunk. So think about your goals that way. Not everybody needs to know your goals. And, you know, sometimes it's people in your family who are your circle of influence, roadblock, right? And it's not because of you, it has nothing to do with you, when they tell you you can never succeed. It may not have anything to do with you. It's based on their own personal experiences and their own limited mindset, but universally that way. So no, so those are the two, the two main roadblocks because when it comes to financial wellness, everything else is is really a skill set. It's stuff you can learn the same way you learn how to ride a bike, if you ride a bike, learn how to swim, learn how to walk, you can learn about personal finance, management and achieving financial wellness. There's that saying, you know, and I think you guys see this in health as well with money. It's it's 20% skill set and 80% getting past those roadblocks and mindset limitations around the people around you Around the way you think of yourself. So, yeah, Melissa Landry 36:09 100% Well, it's funny because I remember when I told people delete it, this is gonna happen to you too. And like I'm gonna go into my own I'm gonna make a private practice. And out of the blue, like, even that close to me, we're like, good luck with that. That's going to be hard. You think how are you going to do that? And constantly people asking me, like how many clients you have? How's it going? It's like these people are waiting for you. Bola 36:32 Yes, yeah, mind, in their mind, they can never imagine why you would ever be successful because they have not been able to do it. I could mean that number one they didn't want it bad enough. Or number two, they were too focused on what people like you are doing to focus on building their own success. Or three they were getting caught up in social media and having their circle of influence roadblocks throw them pity parties. Whoa, is all of us, let's cry together. Yeah, then we're not spending time focusing on what can I do to achieve this business growth. This is how people always say, I don't have the opportunity. I've never had the opportunity. I don't get opportunities, but the opportunities come you're only able to identify the opportunities if you adjusted your mindset to receive them. Right. So going back to the friend I talked about, who said she had a flat tire tattooed her paycheck to cover it right? She missed she would miss the opportunity to create a plan for next time by surrounding herself with the people who tell her that's how it's supposed to be because then at this point, she's never going to create a plan she's never going to think about oh, how much of my next paycheck can I put towards this new sinking fund account so I can start saving what unexpected expenses opportunities if your mindset is not open to receiving them will pass you by opportunities to meet the right people opportunities to build your business opportunities to pay down your debt right? You might be so caught up in the fact that you owe $10,000 That you're like I can never pay this off and as you think that the interest continues to compound and the balance continues to go when right in front of you in your kitchen you have 17 appliances that you can sell today on Facebook marketplace and get $1,500 for and knock off a significant amount of your debt that's an opportunity that's staring at the face but you can't see it because there's so caught up in the woe is me the negative prepay etc so that person who was like oh hey Peter business blah blah blah not the right Circle of Influence Melissa Landry 38:33 Dalina and I both in our services offer circles of influence that put people more in line with the approach we use called intuitive eating and so Dalina it has the chula club I have been no more guilt community and one of the things that we hear people say all the time is like I don't have anyone in my life who gets what I'm trying to do they don't support me and hear you Melissa have these communities that are so amazing that it nurture and I want to do it but what do you hear delete it like what's the what's always Dalina Soto 39:04 the but is or I can't afford it or it's just my price point right now and I'm gonna just say yeah, I can get mad at me but yeah be paying $500 For Herbalife and yeah we paid I mean I had I had a toilet like this is not common knowledge it's all my page she shared with me she paid $1,400 To do a weight loss program for one meal kits or whatever on month Yeah $1,400 And then the lady that she went to Puerto Rico the lady was like, Oh, you left to Puerto Rico you're not gonna lose weight so I'm gonna give me your money back she Bola 39:40 is that is very common with personal finance as well. Everything you said like the books I want to do this but nobody my family but then I have a counter for every excuse that you have. And a lot of people unfortunately, it's hard to deal with health and money. It's not yes, you need to get out Your Comfort Zone if you want to succeed, and it's not going to be easy, but people are so caught up in, get rich quick do this fast based on what we see on social media. My business made $17 million in two days. Yeah. 50 pounds in 10 days like, those are not realistic stories, right? Those are not the person who lost the 50 pounds in 10 days probably went on an insane crash diet that is not sustainable, that is terrible for their health, and then go visit them at the aftermath of those 10 days and see what happens. The person who said they've made $17 million in five days on their business probably spent $16.999 million running Facebook ads, yeah. And their break even Soller, we feed it Dalina Soto 40:44 all the time in the dietetic community, nothing, Bola 40:48 nothing comes easy. Nothing comes without hard work. But the rewards are incredible. You just have to stick with it. There's no quick scheme to getting rich to becoming healthy, it takes time it takes discipline because when you do that, that pursuit, speed, speed rush approach to building wealth or to improving your health. What happens is that you get to a point where you just crash and burn, right? It's like the cycle of dieting, and I have a friend who she dies all the time. And she's like, Dude, I would die it and lose weight. And again, the back of the diet, she's she's right over here. Yeah, don't get caught up in in the skins and the sensational stuff on social media. Take your house, okay, take your time and understand, you're gonna have to get out of your comfort zone. Yeah, that's what sells but it's the person that it's making rich, it's not you Melissa Landry 41:42 and noticing labeling it. Like, I think this day and age in general, businesses are accountable to sharing their values. And you should be looking for for providers. Clever Girl finance, if what bolas talking about like value aligns with you, she's probably the type of educator for you. And same thing with me and Delena. And one of the things Glen and I are both committed to is like working with people. So if you say hell, yes, I want to do this. But the finances aren't there. We've got stuff at affordable price points, we do, at least for myself, like we do offer financing for our higher ticket items, like a monthly payment schedule. So I want to encourage people to because I think before I was in business, I would have been very embarrassed and shy to say I want to do this, but I actually here's my budget. Sometimes when you're working with certain providers, they'll hear you out and they'll point you to a service, that's gonna be right for you at that budget point, you're still gonna lean into the discomfort. But sometimes we don't even ask like, what are the options, we just assume it's going to be too expensive and too scary. And we stopped before we've even been told yes, it will be it. So I just want to say that, especially if you've been thinking about working with me or Dalina have that conversation with us will point you to the level of service that you want. And I know like Delena is in particular worked really hard at affordability in her brand. Bola 43:04 And I would just say going back to what I mentioned on your core values, ask yourself, How bad do you want this? Is this something that's really going to make you happy, right? Because by the time you add up the small amounts are spending on things that don't really matter, even the big amounts that are not meaningful to you, you would have bought your program. So how bad do you want this? How important is this for you? And if you absolutely cannot afford it, you know, you can ask Hey, Melissa, hey, Dalina, what free resources do you have right now that I can leverage and just be part of the community, you're sharing on social media, you have this podcast, there are already resources that you don't have to pay a dime for until you can actually afford to but you stay in the community, you stay on your focus of achieving your goal, right? A lot of people use money as the excuse as to why they're not doing something. But the truth is that you didn't want to do it in the first place. You're not ready. And so you better be ready. Right? You have to be and going back the one roadblock I missed I remember going back to the roadblock is sometimes people want to do something right. And they use money as the excuse or time as the excuse or their family or whatever the excuse. But sometimes it's really that you haven't, you haven't had a clear conversation with yourself deep thinking to yourself to reflect on why you are here. Why do you want to change this thing you want to change? And if it's something that you feel, you are personally responsible for being here, forgiving yourself for that a lot of people don't forgive themselves for mistakes that they have made, or things that they have allowed to influence them that they can't look past it to being able to do better or achieve their goals because they think they're always going to feel this is always going to hang over their heads. They're always you know, they were so so foolish to have made that mistake. But the truth is look at anybody you admire who has achieved the success that you want famous or not. They have made ridiculous mistakes, hilarious mistakes. I have made expensive mistakes, but it's about learning from your mistakes and leveraging what you learn to motivate you forgiving yourself and then throwing the rest of it away, right? The self doubt the self judgment that I cannot do this. And instead, you know what, I really need to figure out how to do this. And what is it going to take? Yeah, how bad building Melissa Landry 45:16 right like building on those experiences if they were negative or positive, it's all coming with you. There's no such thing as failure, really a timeline. The timeline is ongoing, as we grow as people. So I think that's a beautiful philosophy to end with Ebola. I feel energized, I feel energized. Tell us a little bit about your your resources. How can our listeners engage with clever girl finances and what you're offering? Bola 45:44 Yeah, so we have talked to they'll stop by clevergirlfinance.com, we have over 30 plus completely free courses, we have over 40 plus completely free worksheets. We have a blog that gets updated multiple times a day with articles, we have a clever Arsenal podcast. And of course, there are the clever well financed books that you can find at your local library or wherever you buy your books as an e book, audio book and physical book. And I have my new book coming out this summer called choosing to prosper. It's all about triumphing over adversity, pursuing your life and money goals and achieving your dreams. And it's based on my personal story of building my business and adjusting my own mindset. And a lot of what we talked about here on the podcast, I'd love for you guys to check it out. Melissa Landry 46:27 Amazing. I'm so happy we got to get to know you you're in our little circle now. I want to be around people like bola I don't know about your Dalina you are so ready, your your your skills are really valuable. But also your presence bola is like that way of being that you have is really awesome. So thank you for sharing that with us and with our listeners today. Bola 46:47 Thank you so much for having me. I'm honored. Melissa Landry 46:49 All right, take a carry, buddy. Bye bye. So what did you think of Bola in her expertise, I am so excited and blown away by her story and her energy. It just goes to show that sphere of influence that she talks about can make all the difference. And so if you are somewhere in your life right now, where you're feeling completely alone in your pursuit to find food freedom, maybe because your doctors or your family members just don't get it. And you need that process and support to really dig deep and find those parts of your journey that need attention. I want to invite you to apply for coaching. Right now I'm enrolling clients into one to one but periodically I offer workshops and flash sales and group coaching. And so the best thing to do is to DM me and ask what's going on Melissa? It's one of my favorite things when we message each other to just listen to your story. hear a little bit about what you're trying and help point you in the right direction. So if you are benefiting from the podcast and have always wondered, should I just call the podcast lady. This is your invitation to do so. Thank you very much for being here and being who you are. Dalina Soto 48:08 Peace, love and break the diet cycle. Transcribed by https://otter.ai
