Tips to get you on the path to financial success this year

Years ago, I would measure abundance by what I could see.

Time has allowed me to change how I look at it, and I believe I have an abundant approach to life.

Not necessarily because of external circumstances, although I have seen those change as a result of choices and decisions to live and think abundantly amid great challenges and pain.

I have experienced the struggle just to survive. Rejection was the norm at one point when I was building my business.

I have had my fair share of debt. I was even once rejected by an ATM! I could visualise it laughing when I tried to withdraw money, as the screen message let me know I was below the minimum withdrawal amount.

The challenges I have faced, like everybody else’s, could fill the entire newspaper.

However, receiving abundance is a result of a conviction that there is more, you are more, there are opportunities, there is wealth to be created and you have a predetermined place in it.

PERSONAL CONVICTION

Despite my circumstances, something shifted and I am hoping for this shift for you, no matter what situation you are in — debt, money issues in relationships, business barely surviving, struggling to keep up with others, et cetera.

Your circumstances have no bearing on the possibilities. I learnt this through starting a business that helps people manage their finances when I had no money.

I used to fret that clients would ask me for my portfolio and the first few conversations were quite shaky because of my own lack of confidence.

Because the world had taught me that confidence is a result of how much you have, your job title, how well you seem to be doing.

However, I discovered many conversations later that confidence is a result of the conviction you have about yourself.

Before long, I realised that what I had to say was much more important than what was in my bank account, and that is the conviction that created Centonomy (my business). Not perfect conditions.

LIST YOUR TROUBLES

To water that seed to flourish, we must learn to let go of the condemnation we place on ourselves because of what we are facing.

“It shouldn’t have happened” is the worst place to get stuck in. You can’t experience abundance if you are stuck playing victim.

Perhaps you made choices that resulted in the situation. Nobody put a gun to your head and told you to buy a car you couldn’t afford.

But sometimes it truly wasn’t your fault. For example, being retrenched, an economic situation that affected your business, or a family member who got you in debt.

Whichever way, we can’t get stuck there. We must learn to separate YOU from what is around you or happening to you.

Take a piece of paper. Divide it into half and write down all your hardships and complaints on one side, and your name on the other.

Now tear the paper into half. That’s how you should live. Understanding that there is a separation between you and what you are going through.

It is actually also healthy to list down all your “troubles” because then you stop avoiding them.

COMFORT ZONE

However, do not let them identify you. Your debt is not you, that’s why you can face it.

In fact, that’s when you will see you have a skill you can use to make money and pay off this debt. Retrenchment, retirement is not you.

Lack of savings is not you. An investment gone bad is not you. No job is not you. Challenges in business are not you.

My own challenges did not dictate what I could do. I am not the only one for whom this has worked. In my book, Making Cents, I tell the story of Douglas (an actual person) who, by understanding this, realised that he had non-financial assets (skills) that enabled him to make over Sh10 million.

Every time you are tempted to immerse yourself in your circumstances, remember this paper exercise. Do it again if you have to.

The reverse also works. You might not be in challenging circumstance as such, but you have placed a limit on yourself and settled where you are.

Sometimes it is just comfort. You earn a decent salary so you’ve never stretched your thinking beyond that.

CHANGE YOUR THINKING

If certain opportunities beyond that zone are presented to you, you default to “I can’t afford it”. Again, your salary has become your identity.

Job opportunities come and you say that you don’t have the experience to apply. Business opportunities arise but you say you are too small and don’t have the capital.

How much longer are we happy talking and idolising people who have “made it” and never jumping on the bus ourselves.

If you set goals only in line with what you know or think you can do, you are playing small.

I’ve reached a stage in my life where I don’t want to get out of bed to just do the normal, and I don’t want you to either.

It will take understanding where you have gone wrong, changing your choices and thinking.

Fear will tell you about all the things you cannot do and afford. Or how old you are.

BREAK LIMITATIONS

If you hear that in your head, you have gone back to the wrong side of the paper. I am glad to return to writing my weekly blogs as we begin this decade.

This is the year that sets the foundation and a good time to start thinking what you want the next 10 to look like.

Let’s break those limitations that have held us back. I pray that your year will be financially abundant.

Waceke’s book, Making Cents is on sale at selected bookstores and available to order on 0715085777. For queries on speaking engagements and training get in touch through [email protected]