How To Improve In Any Aspect Of Your Life!

I once heard that if you are not growing, you are dying…

The many things that occur in the natural world seem to justify this law, a law embedded into every natural living organism on this Earth.

Plant’s continue to grow and change, whether that is in size, in bloom or even in shedding its leaves. Animals are constantly growing, getting rid of old cells and creating cells anew. Humans shed our skin and make new skin cells every seven days, and over the long term we are constantly evolving. Every single living organism is changing, adapting and becoming stronger, faster and more adept at facing the challenges we see in every day to day life. In fact, we became the apex predators of Earth for the very reason that we are masters of adapting, re-inventing ourselves and facing challenges head on.

Therefore, the first thing we need to do is accept that we are capable of change and truly the masters of adapting to all environments and situations.

To improve, we need to embrace the change and step outside our comfort zones, no matter whether you are introverted or extroverted, physically strong or mentally strong.

You are born to be more than just what you are now, the very fact that you were born at all is simply an amazing feat in itself, a one in one trillion chance!

Once you have accepted that you are capable, that you can change, that you are ready to be more…

You need to work out what you want to do and who you want to be. Most people stop at this part, because in all honesty, this is the most difficult part. A life long journey of trying to understand self, others around you, their nature, why they do what they do. Why you do what you do…

And the hardest part, there is no one size fits all approach, it is a path only you can really decide to walk down and only you alone can navigate. Of course, there will be people along the way to show you a way that might be easier, or others who will show you a way that will be more treacherous, however you are the only one that can truly decide on which path you can walk.

There are signposts along the way that can also make this path a little bit easier, these signposts are quite difficult to spot and you have to be aware of them for you to be able to see them. Meaning you need to be vigilant along your journey, you have to be looking out for these sign posts and be on a constant look out.

The best way to be able to recognise these sign posts that I have found, and therefore the best way to keep you growing and moving along the path of self-improvement and growth, is to understand your priorities/goals.

Your priorities and goals, much like life, will be constantly changing as well, therefore you need to be able to reflect on your life, your career, your health, your finances and more to be able to understand what you want.

A few priorities you may have:

+Children/Family

+Health/training/eating well

+Friends and socialising

+Work/business/career

+Paying bills

+Living extravagantly

+Living minimally

+Retirement

+Holidays

+You time

+Significance and fame

+Freedom/choice

The list of course can go on and on, depending on who you are, what stage of life you are in and whether you are walking the path alone currently, or with a partner/family.

To work out your most important priorities, I use to ask clients to list their top 5 priorities they have, priorities you need to make sure happens otherwise your life becomes a total mess/miserable.

Most constantly, I found that people would say #1 is children or family, #2 is work, #3 is the mortgage and paying the bills, #4 they might say holidays and #5 might be holidays/travel…

However, no one would actually say that they prioritise themselves, their growth or time for themselves either…

After that, I would ask them what their top five goals would be, and again it comes down to losing weight, going travelling, etc.

Most people would realise they are prioritising things all wrong when I asked them this, as their top five goals in life and their priorities did not match up in any way at all.

The moment when the light bulb hits, that is when I knew it would a life changing moment and they would begin to realise that they can improve in any aspect of their lives. Once they begin to prioritise their goals, living the life they need to achieve that goal every day, that is when true improvement begins.

That is what it takes to be able to improve and succeed, living your goals everyday, which means you need to prioritise them and continue instilling habits that will help you to be the best version of yourself.

Does it work though? Most people have tried "losing weight” before, or tried saving what they need to be able to go on that holiday…

However, they may not have been able to follow through, which is fine, because at least they or you have tried!
The key is to keep trying, to keep prioritising and staying disciplined enough to keep at it.

You keep thinking about what you want your life to be, what you want to improve in, what you want to achieve and prioritise that every day, that is when you will be able to achieve it. You just need to keep on keeping on!

Until next time,

Take Back Control

What To Do When Feeling Burnt Out?

Burn out, its a term that has been used consistently over the last five years especially. According to the Queensland government, burn out is a state of complete mental, physical, and emotional exhaustion.

You may feel as if you are tired all of the time, or simple tasks that use to be easy actually feel extremely overwhelming. You may be feeling irritable and find yourself feeling frustrated at small things more often than not. You could even feel symptoms of anxiety and even depression due to being burnt out.

There are of course varying degrees of burn out, but sadly Australians in 2021 and beyond have been experiencing burn out more than most other countries according to a global study completed by Global Consultants McKinsey. In fact, 61% of Aussies were experiencing stages of burn out, which is the highest rate in any other country.

Now, we could blame plenty of outliers and situations that are causing said burn out, but today we want to focus on what you can do when you are feeling burnt out and what coping mechanisms you could put in place to help you in your every day to day life.

Burn Out Remedies -

1.Take it easy on yourself and stop expecting so much of yourself (You may not feel it, but to this point in time, you are truly doing an amazing job).

Admittedly, this is not so much a remedy, but just a reminder to be kind to oneself. You are doing the best you can, with the resources and skillset you have right now at this point in time. Therefore, putting more and more pressure on yourself is only going to cause more mistakes and that is when the burn out will increase significantly.

2. Take the breaks you are entitled to!

You cannot sustain long periods of constant work for months and years on end, your body and mind are actually not suited to consistently working on the one task or sitting at a desk for ten hours straight. You need to make sure that you are taking the break’s where you can, such as your lunch breaks, annual leave/holidays, sick days when you are feeling too ill to work. In Australia, we are known for always battling through, but when it gets to the point where you are battling through for years on end, your going to burn out sooner or later.

3. Go on little sabbaticals, or short-term retirements.

A weird one and not overly used in Australia, but something that is catching on a little bit more these days…

People are quitting their work and deciding to not work for 3-12 months at a time, to re-energise themselves and build up that battery that has been so depleted from working for years on end. Something that is truly worth thinking about if you can do it financially and have been burning the candle at both ends for years at a time.

4. Take up a hobby and go to the gym.

Of course, an ex-personal trainer/gym owner is going to tell me to go to the gym… I know that is what you are thinking, but truly, we all know the benefits of keeping fit and staying healthy. However, taking up a hobby and exercising your creative juices are also just as important. Now everyone has different tastes and hobbies, so if you do not have anything that you do outside of work that makes you feel good, please go out and try a few new things. You will definitely find that having an outlet is going to be a massive win against burn out.

5. Find Your WHY!

The last and probably the most important remedy to burn out comes down to simply understanding why you do what you do.

The great philosopher, Aristotle said, “Knowing thyself is the beginning of all wisdom.”

To know ones self and why you wake up each day is the simplest and most under-rated of all things that you can do to reduce burn out and increase your own success. However, it is the hardest one of them all, because most of us do not dedicate the time needed to actually understand YOU!

Finding your why and understanding yourself takes years of reflection on your values and priorities, working out your strengths and weaknesses, and even when you have done all of the work it is on going, because we are forever shifting and changing. Therefore, you have to dedicate your life to personal development and carve out time each week, or month at the very least, to STOP and REFLECT.

Burn out can have mental, physical and psychological ramifications that can be detrimental to your health and the health of your family. According to the stats, you are most likely going to be burnt out in one point in your life.

Hence, by being able to create coping mechanisms and understanding yourself, you will be able to catch it when you are starting to burn out and hopefully save yourself from going over the edge.

Truly I hope that this can help, even if one strategy above can help you get through a tough period at work or in your family life, that means that you are slightly better off and you can go out and make the world a slightly better place because of it!

Until next time,

Take Back Control

How To Deal with Life When it Throws You Curveballs!

Taking back control generally requires a level of knowledge, planning and action. However, life is not all about control, sometimes life needs to be generally about letting go of control to refresh and re-calibrate. Especially seeing as life has a knack for throwing curveballs when you least expect it. That is why today, I want to write to you about actually learning to let go, as holding on to something, and trying to control every aspect of your life is only going to land you in a depressive state or full of anxiety.

Over the past week, in fact, over the past two months, I have had to let go of a whole heap of things, including an identity I had built up for the past nine years. Which is not something that is easy to let go of, and moving towards the unknown can bring up all sorts of emotions, emotions that generally you are not able to control. As emotions are primordial, they are connected to our flight and fight, where ten-thousand years ago, it was either run away from a sabre tooth tiger or protect your young children from a stalking predator.

Unfortunately, if you are not emotionally intelligent, it is hard to discern and make out what is fear, what is anxiety, what is stress or what is nerves, excitement or a mix of all. I will save emotional intelligence for another article, because I could go on a whole tangent about that, in fact I may write a series about emotional intelligence.

But what I want you to understand is that you have to learn to be able to let go of many things in life, including emotions, identities, relationships, businesses, careers, money etc.

Letting go is difficult though, as it is a sign of quitting, you could be afraid that you may be seen as someone who didn’t leave everything on the table, you could be shunned from social circles for letting go of a relationship that was harmful…

The list could go on, letting go, can sometimes be harder than holding on to the remnants of the known!

Especially in our modern day where GRIT and Hard Work, or HUSTLE, have become buzz words that the media throws out to make us feel something, generally to make us feel bad for not working harder.

You listen to a motivational speaker and they will throw out these words quite often, but not many westernised speakers or thinkers have given enough credit to being able to let go and just go with the flow of life. Due to the fact that it is the opposite of their own philosophy, the very opposite of what they are trying to sell you, because for you to be motivated, you need to work hard and not quit.

You need to be the one to work from dawn to dusk and hustle hard, so that you can get a semblance of control back in your life, so you can beat the system or “the rat race.”

However, letting go requires you to stop, it requires you to reflect and look backwards at memories that can sometimes be truly traumatising. Some memories could bring up that flight or fight response, it is so powerful it could leave you paralysed with fear!

When it gets to that point, you may not be able to do it alone, and that is when a councillor or psychiatrist may be able to help, as you just might not be able to let go of the past without strategies to do so. We are not taught how to let things go, not really, we are actually taught to keep moving forward, to suck it up and get on with your day.

Which is why I wanted to talk about how I have been able to learn to let go of things from my past, which has helped me to move forward and become a much more emotionally intelligent and less stressed individual. Not to say that I don’t feel stress, we need stress to keep us moving forward and for change, but letting go helps you to manage your stress so that anxiety and depression is not a constant in your life.

1. Write down your memories, whether they have been brought up from something happening in your life or maybe it has just happened to you. Journal about how you feel about the experience, what made it traumatic and put yourself in the other persons shoes if there was someone that brought on that experience. Ask WHY?

2. Talk to someone about it, someone who is a family member or friend. Being able to talk it over, may shed some new light on the scenario or the experience. It may make it seem less daunting.

3. STOP! Just be in the now, stop what you are doing right now, take in five deep breaths and with each breath out, expel all of the air until you have none left. Another way is to actually take in your surroundings, rather than just pass things by, be curious about the things around you.

4. Which leads to my last point, BE CURIOUS and let wonder enter your mind on a daily basis! Children, especially young children, are generally always happy and worry free. Due to the fact that they see everything in a different light. They do not just see a tree on the footpath, they see a place to climb and play. They see the flowers blossoming in spring, they see a fantastical world, full of new things and adventure. The spark of adventure and curiosity is what can keep your mind young, which means you will need to STOP to allow your adult filter to stop running, because who can be curious if you are thinking about the next thing all the time.

I am sure there are multiple other strategies that can help you to let go, but I have found these to be the best and healthiest way to do so.

I truly hope that this has helped in some way, it has helped me in my life up until now, but if you have something else you use as a strategy, please I would love to hear about it.

Until next time,

Take Back Control

(I am no psychologist or psychiatrist, I am no doctor, but I have a good level of general knowledge from having a curious mind and from being taught through many mentors in life and through reading books. I just wish to pass on my knowledge, so I hope this can help you as it has helped me.)

The Number One Secret to Becoming Financially Secure…

Getting Ahead of the Curve: Part 1

Pay Yourself FIRST!

To actually pay yourself first, it requires a few things, the first being a mental shift, a shift in consciousness or a shift in perspective. If this blog can help you to have a light bulb moment, a flick of the switch whereby you take action and start paying yourself first, my job would be part way complete.

A mentor once told me, “the reason you are still broke is because you are paying everyone else first, you are paying your bills, you are paying the local cafe, you are paying the supermarkets all first. You need to shift your mindset from paying everyone else first, to paying yourself first!”

When it comes to finances, you have to think of yourself, you and your partner, your family, as a corporation or business.

That is the another bit of advise I was given by my mentor a long time ago, which has helped me to truly get ahead and I hope will be able to help you to follow in my footsteps by truly taking the first step to becoming financially secure and potentially even wealthy!

That one bit of advise was what gave me my light bulb moment, because in business the number one rule to being an owner is to pay yourself first. However, it takes a lot of strong will and discipline to keep paying yourself first week in, week out.

I use the athlete analogy quite often, as I am a personal trainer, CrossFit Coach and love sport, but it is probably the best analogy to use as well, because athletes have such great discipline. Much more than the general population, like you or I.

Athletes need to be disciplined in their training schedules, their eating habits, the lifestyles they live, especially seeing as they are in the spotlight and looked up to as role models. The sacrifices they make, for the love of their sport, it is truly inspirational. That discipline is but an iota of what you and I need, because all you have to think about is sitting down every week, fortnight or month, depending on how you get paid, and transferring a small percentage of what you get paid into a savings account you do not touch. Which probably takes 15 minutes, whereas athletes commit to 40-100 hours a week, cooking, eating, training, sleeping and doing everything right.

But, just like an athlete, you can have speed bumps in the plan and process, where an athlete may get injured, you may have things happen that you were not expecting…

What happens when you get those unexpected speeding fines? Or you are seeing fuel prices soar?

Food is getting more expensive, inflation is going up and will only go higher, so how do you keep to paying yourself first, when you need more money to live and get the necessities?

You will need this discipline to stop yourself from reaching into the account you should be leaving alone, and the best thing to do here is to have a strong reason WHY you should not touch that account.

Having a goal for saving is just another tool in your arsenal to help you remain strong willed and disciplined.

Having a goal or reason to pay yourself first will be the only thing that will keep you going when times get tough. It could be as simple as saving for that holiday to Fiji or it could be more complex, such as achieving financial freedom and retiring when you are 45 years old.

Having that goal is great, but it needs to be anchored to strong emotions, that are linked to pain and pleasure. For an example, you may want to retire by 45 years old, but you need to have a really strong reason as to why you want to retire by that age. Is it because you truly dislike your job? Do you want to be able to spend more time with family? Do you want to give back to your community and you believe retiring early will give you the time and money to do so?

Your goal is of your own making, if you need help with regards to creating your own vision of your life, check out my first ever blog!

Other than strong will and discipline, you also need a sound plan, a process that you follow, week in, week out. Only a strong process will keep you from falling back into old habits.

Going back to treating yourself, your family, as a business, what do all good businesses have, all successful businesses anyhow? They have a strong process and systems to keep the business running.

Which is what you will need, and I am going to share with you the process I use every fortnight and month to be able to keep paying ourselves first (My wife and I, plus our dog too, he is apart of the family).

1. The hardest part is starting, and you need to figure out how much you would like to save/pay yourself first, as well as how much you need to live. That is why creating a budget to start is a great way to understand where you are at, to take the next step forward in your finances. You can follow my budget process right here, just click that link and follow it step by step.

2. Once you have complete your budget, you need to agree upon a number that you will save each week, fortnight or month that you can commit to for the whole year. (This number will vary on your circumstances, hence why it is necessary to complete a budget.)

3. You need to carve out 5-20 minutes each week or fortnight to commit to paying yourself first. Simply, once you get paid, take out the amount that you have agreed upon, with yourself, your partner or family, and transfer it to an account that you will not take from. Or you can invest it, but I will go through this later on.

4. It is best to also have another savings account, whereby you can commit a small proportion to big expenses that may come up out of nowhere. I call it an emergency savings account, where any fines or big expenses that pop up out of the blue get paid from this account.

5. Repeat the process and review your budget every year, as life gets more expensive, or your wage increases, the number you can pay yourself first will change!

If you can continue to complete these 5 steps, paying yourself first will be full proof, now of course, some of these steps may not suit your situation, or you may not like numbers. That is where having someone else look over your circumstances and budget might be a good idea.

The last step comes down to figuring out how to achieve your goal, which comes down to understanding the investment vehicles, and the complexities of risk.

Understanding the markets and understanding where your money should go to get the best outcome for you is truly a minefield, that is when having a great Financial Advisor by your side would help significantly. They know the ins and outs of the markets, they have been taught the complexities of financial products and have the processes to help you achieve your goals.

I will delve into how to look out for a great financial advisor in a new blog after this series, so look out for that.

However, I will also be going through the investments vehicles you can use to help you achieve your goals and dreams in part III of Getting Ahead of the Curve.

But next week, I will be taking you through what to expect of your tax this year and some truly simple ways in which you are entitled to minimise that tax bill or receive more of a refund from the tax you have paid in Part II.

Until next time,

Take Back Control

How To Be Wealthy and Change Your Life Right Now!

We all wish we could wake up one morning and all our problems would be gone, (I don’t, how boring would life be then…) however unless winning the lotto, a 1 in 8 billion chance, there is nothing that can significantly change fortunes over night.

Therefore, rather leaving life to chance, I have drawn on learnings from some of the wealthiest people in the world, from Jim Rohn, Anthony Robbins, Elon Musk, Warren Buffet and Jeff Bezos, to share with you how you can take action on changing your wealth right now!

The only difference between the women and men who are significantly better off than you right now is simply their mindset and how they look at the world differently.

Let me tell you a quick story on how someone was able to change their fortunes over a year and going from being in $11,400 in debt to paying down that debt and owning a house within the next four years.

The catalyst for that person came down to two things, one of which was the shame of seeing -$0.07 in their bank account and two, being unable to help a friend start a venture and supporting that friend.

So what changed? What changed from that person spending $12,000 per year on eating out, partying and getting themselves into $11,400 into debt, to owning their own home and successfully taking a step on the path to greater wealth?

Simply, it was a mindset shift, a shift from being the victim to being a person who took responsibility for their lives, their income and spending.

(If you have not guessed it, that person from above was myself, I got into a few car accidents that accrued nearly $5,400 in debt from the insurance companies and then also borrowed $6,000 from a family member to start a business.)

The difference between the wealthy and the poor is simply their mindset, yes other factors do come into play, such as where you grew up and the family environment. However, if you are stuck in a scarcity mindset, you will never be able to move into a mindset that can handle one of abundance.

Therefore, here are the top 3 mindset shifts and belief systems that you need to work on, to start changing your life, improve your wealth and your lifestyle;

Pay Yourself First!

That seems like a pretty simple one, but you would be astonished at how many people tend to pay the big fashion companies, or shoes stores, or car companies first…

As soon as you get paid, you should be paying yourself first, meaning taking a percentage of your wage and transferring it into a savings account or investing it for the future.

You just need to do a little bit of math, work out how much you roughly need to pay out in debts, food, bills, etc. And what you have leftover, pay into a savings account that you cannot touch. Becoming wealthy is just a mindset shift from being a consumer, to being a creator, a creator of your own wealth through self-discipline and giving back to your community.

Take Back Your Time!

Every day, you should be prioritising your time towards tasks and activities that will take you closer to your goals and ambitions. Not only that, but also delegating tasks and activities that is below your hourly rate. The rich get richer because they delegate roles and responsibilities that need to be done, to free up their time for the tasks and activities that are more important.

For example, you could be working full-time, however, you do not earn enough from your full-time job and therefore want to start a side-hustle or sole trader business. But, you have a family, two kids, a partner that also works full-time and house chores that need to be done.

If you could earn $100 per hour from your side-hustle, why would you not just pay a cleaner $35 per hour to clean your house?

You are still up $65 per hour!!

Therefore, take back your time, by delegating roles and responsibilities, if you are worth $300 per hour, don’t waste your time on tasks that you hate doing that are worth much less!

Finally, the most important mindset shift: You MUST Become Obsessed with Improving Your Income Streams

The really wealthy do not become wealthy just by doing one job well, they diversify the risks of losing said job or failing said business by putting earning their money from different streams.

Starting with your job or business!!

First, if you need to earn more money, look to asking for a pay rise or if in business, look to set some targets to grow the business more efficiently. Once you have developed this income stream, to the point where it has no more growth apart from inflation, you should look elsewhere for a second income stream.

The key is knowing when to do this, if you have a business, it may take a bit longer to grow your income, or it could grow really quickly, depending on the type of business, consumer sentiment and many other factors. If you have a job, it is as simple as asking for that pay rise and either getting it or not.

Once you develop a second, third, fourth and maybe even fifth income stream, you go back to the first mindset shift of paying yourself first.

Hopefully that has given you a few things to think about, as it sure changed my life and helped me to Take Back Control!

So until next time,

Take Back Control

How to Change Your Thinking and Mindset to Achieve anything!

Within the previous blog, raising standards and deciding to choose your own fate was the most important factors to being able to Take Back Control…

Before you can do that though, you do need to be able to change how you think and your mindset!!

One of the book’s I have read in the past that drummed into me that mindset is key, would be “Think and Grow Rich,” by Napoleon Hill.

With such a simple message that is pounded into you from the very title, it truly opened my eyes to the fact that anything is possible, if you just think about it and obsess over it enough!

There are a few factors that led to the change in my mindset to be more successful and to work on achieving what is truly valuable to myself and my family.

These factors are completely transferrable to yourself, most importantly, if you work on them everyday, you will be able to create a bulletproof mindset!

These factors come down to;

• Getting clear on who you want to be as a person, what your strengths/weaknesses are and knowing the lifestyle you want to live, including career, business, relationships etc. (The journey you need to walk)

• Surrounding yourself with people who want to be achievers, growing a network and just being able to challenge each other. (Environment and relationships are pivotal to change)

• Moving away from pain or heading towards pleasure (Having a make or break moment in your life)

Let me run through what pushed me on the path of change to being more successful, in the hope that my story can help you to also change your thinking and mindset!

Starting with a make or break moment, a time in your life where you have either had enough of something or you are challenged to the point where it becomes necessity to survive.

For my moment, it was both!!

The moment for me was when I was asked by a friend to join him in a business venture when I was 18 years old, at the time, I was running my own sole trader business and working casually as well as going to university.

Unfortunately, the timing was just not right for me, because at that point in time, I was broke…

In fact, I remember having -$7.03 in my bank account at that exact moment, I was utterly distraught and the feeling of shame, disappointment, and even a little fear of missing out, was crushing.

That was the moment I knew I had to change, I needed to change and push myself further than I had ever done so before!

From there, I knew I had to move away from the emotional pain and setback, and move towards the person I wanted to become.

I didn’t truly know who that was until I started surrounding myself with people who wanted even more success in life than myself. I started paying a business coach to help me create a better Personal Training business, I pretty much spent all of my spare time working towards never being broke ever again!

The idea of not having the money to afford fuel to just get to work weighed on my mind…

It drove me to be better and to change my mindset, I stopped spending money for myself and put everything I had back into paying down the rent, business coaching and just being better!

The moment is what made my mindset shift, which drove me to change my environment and relationships and in the end has led me to get clear on who I am as a person.

The thing is, you don’t need a moment of pain to help you decide on what you want to do or who you want to be.

No, I was young and pretty naïve at the time, but I know you can be better, I believe that you can be more.

All you have to do is decide right here and now to prioritise what you stand for as a person!!

You just need to want it more than anyone else, you just need to learn to sacrifice a little bit now for long term gains later.

Once you have decided to do something, set out small actions to take and help you to achieve your bigger goals.

I went from -$7 to owning our first home with my wife within ten years from that moment, we have also now brought our second home, our dream home which we will live in for the next 20-30 years.

Which is where we will hopefully start a new journey, where we can build our own family and strive for heights we didn’t think was possible ten years ago.

It just goes to show, if I can go from -$7.03 in my account to being a home owner in ten years and running a business, plus buying our dream home…

You can do it too!!

Until next time,

Take Back Control