I think this is the perfect time to go BACK TO BASICS!

In ALL the areas! (I’ve never been more excited about anything – for serious!)

You are getting a free once-in-a-lifetime opportunity here.

When the masses go one way, it’s time to find the opportunities and hidden gems and they are all around! If you are in good health and can use your brain and a computer, there has never been a better time to HIT PLAY on your life!

Or, if you aren’t ready to hit play, you get to hit the reset button on almost everything in your life!

Financially speaking – this is the time to get your financial basics in order.

I have 3 financial basics that I’m telling everyone to make sure they have in place right now. Mostly because you actually have time on your hands at home to get this in place!

These 3 things could possible change your family for generations to come, good or bad! Bad if you don’t have them in place.

1. A Will.
2. Life Insurance.
3. Organized Personal Office: Financials, Important Documents, Investments, Taxes & Expenses.

Yes, those 3.

Number four on the list would be to begin and establish and emergency fund and a stash of cash – if you haven’t done so already or if you haven’t organized that. Even getting started and saving $20 a week to an emergency fund if you don’t already have one! I wrote about this last week and you can read it here!

This is why I’m encouraging you to go back to basics and make sure you are covered before you can move on to bigger and better.

#1: Will

Why the will? Because you will pass away – one day. You have to come to terms with that. Seriously.

Death lost its sting for me many years ago……. doesn’t mean it’s not sad, and that we shouldn’t try to prevent it.

A Last Testament & Will and end of life instructions are the greatest gift you can give your family when you’ve passed on – plus who doesn’t like to have the last word?!

Don’t withhold peace of mind for left behind loved ones – don’t be that person.

You have no excuse! This includes single people!!!

You are stuck at home right now – PM me for a ‘get started will document’ for free or go to financialbliss.ca and sign up and get one there!

#2: Life Insurance

It still blows my mind that anyone with kids under the age of 18 or with a mortgage or any debt doesn’t have adequate life insurance.

FYI – that means own your own life insurance policy!!!!

Do not just assume having some on your mortgage or through your employer is going to cut it.

This is inexpensive and in my books life insurance is an absolute MUST for everyone (or an insurance like product if you are elderly where money can pass effortlessly to your beneficiaries upon your passing – you can ask me about this privately and you can’t find it at the banks, it’s part of a proper-well-thought-out-estate-plan. End of story!)

You can PM me for quotes (in Canada!). Life insurance and life insurance reviews are all the rage right now – okay – they aren’t – but maybe it’s time you need a review. I’m happy to help!

#3: Organized Personal Office: Financials, Important Documents, Investments, Taxes & Expenses

Your house is clean, but your papers are a MESS! You either keep everything or keep nothing and if requested, it would take you longer than 10 minutes to find something in that disaster, said my mom.

Okay, so maybe it’s not that bad. Or maybe it is.

There are a LOT of reasons to get organized at home and this is the perfect time!

Last year, I created the Wealth Spa™ Money Method!

It’s like Marie Kondo for your money.

It’s literally a way to organize and file – from paper to electronic – all your documents.

We answer all your questions as to what to keep and what to toss, what’s important and what’s not.

Tools and apps to help you while you are away from home and still need access to important info.

ALL of it is in the Money Method.

And because I feel that everyone finally has the time to get some stuff organized and make their home office a space of inviting beauty – I am offering this program at 50% off right now!

It will be the best investment you ever make in your home office!

The big why to organize?!

It’s simple.

“Clarity really does precede success. You can’t hit a target you can’t even see.”

Robin Sharma

There you have it!

3 ways to go back to basics and lay your financial foundation.

You are always given the choice.

You are the one to always choose your life.

You get to be the one who determines how you leave this earth and how to treat your loved ones in the event of your passing.

But more importantly,

You get to choose your life right now.

You get to choose to make it better or worse.

You get to choose the thoughts you think.

You get to choose healing, health & wealth.

You get to…

Live Your Legacy!

xx Lisa

Why is it prudent to keep a stash of cash?

Like everything in life, there is a fine balance and a fine art to it.

Having cash on hand is one of them.

You could go crazy and end up like that man who lived in a shack with literally millions of dollar bills hidden in behind his drywall and die a sad, lonely multi-millionaire. That’s one extreme of hoarding cash.

The other extreme is not having any on hand.

But somewhere in the middle there is smart, balanced, well-thought out, coherent plan around keeping a stash of cash at all times.

I wrote this in my book Strut and always encourage every human to have their own stash of cash that no one else knows about.

I’m now reminded of why it’s important to have for various reasons – and let me be clear only 1% of the time – yes, 1% of that reason would be the end of the world or this situation we find ourselves in. 

Timely for this to come out now, while the world seems to be in panic mode, but let me be clear, this pandemic is not the reason I would adopt this habit of keeping a stash of cash around.

First of all, how much?

I would say 2 months of expenses, maybe 3.

If you don’t have this, this should be your first financial goal.

But the real answer is whatever amount makes you feel comfortable.

AND not so much that you are worried if it gets stolen, lost or loses it’s value to inflation!! 🙂

You don’t need your entire emergency fund in cold hard cash, but some of it is a good idea.

Second, you are wondering what for? Why keep cash?

Many reasons from electronic failures/tech glitches, to electricity power failures from storms (or minus 30 and your devices are frozen!), to having something on hand to trade if you required food or goods.

Okay, so maybe that sounds dooms day, but it’s not.

What if you lost your wallet? or it was stolen?

10 business days to a new credit card?

There is common sense in being prepared.

I also had a client that lived in a remote area and no trucks could make it in due to a storm, or another client that lived through a 6-month trucker’s strike leaving an entire city without food or goods for months because of a union!

All good reasons to use the brain God gave you to not live grocery-store-shop-to-grocery-store-shop.

I mean, we think people who live pay-cheque-to-pay-cheque crazy, but what about the above group of people?!

I think nothing wrong with having a few weeks/months supplies of basic needs stored. I also come from a place where snow covers the ground for a majority of the year and food can not be easily found outside on a tree, so there is that bias I have when it comes to storing food. I also understand tight living conditions for most of the world, which also proves my point on keeping some cash on hand.

Again, not saying to store 30-years of food in a bunker somewhere.

The same goes for money as it does food.

But, no one really thinks about the other reasons why having cash or even a proper emergency fund established is important.

I encourage all the people, single or in partnerships to have this stash of cash and not tell your partners.

NOT because you are being dishonest – I mean, you can say to your partner that you each want to have some cash hidden in case of emergency for the family. And that’s fine, but there are other things that can happen.

If you need a hotel for a month or two, your disability income or critical illness payment doesn’t get processed for a few months, or in an extreme case you require to move out – for whatever reason – and need a place to rent and require one months damage deposit plus the first months rent.

Or if someone dies and they lock down the accounts. That’s happened. (And don’t kid yourself that money can be on lock-down if someone passes and tied up for months in court!!)

Or if there is an emergency payment due for something or something breaks down, or like I said before stolen or lost. You’ll even need money to pay the insurance deductible.

You will be grateful for being prepared.

“I’m so mad I saved this money for a rainy day!” – SAID NO ONE EVER!!!

Oh, wait, you know that emergency fund that we financial planners have been preaching about for years – this is it! And this blog is basically the reason why.

I’m sure you can come up with your own reasons that pertain to your specific situation in life.

Don’t get me wrong, having a majority of your emergency fund in a bank collecting interest is great and helps ward off deflation, however, never forget that CASH IS KING.

I’ll say it again.

CASH IS STILL KING.

And I will preach ‘balance’ and using what God has given you for brains and intuition to help direct you in what you should do, but remember part of God’s help is utilizing the big set of common sense brains He gave you.

OKAY, OKAY – BUT HERE are the BIGGEST REASONS to HAVE A STASH OF CASH!

Because it feels good!

Because it will attract more money to you!

Because walking around with a few hundred dollar bills or a thousand dollars in your wallet always feels good!

Because when you do that you will attract more good feelings, more money to you!

That’s why you keep a hidden stash of cash.

Because it lowers your stress!

Because it allows you options in life!

Because it allows for greater generosity!

Because you can give more of you and your resources when you have more!

Because being financially organized is good for your soul!

Because having clarity creates confidence in your life!

Because that’s how you STRUT your stuff and your life!

Because that’s how you….

Live Your Legacy!

xx Lisa

PS. Here’s the deal. If you are stuck at home and want to tackle your financial mess, your office papers, your cluttered mind around money – this is your chance! I’m going to be running LIVE the Money Method! This is my Marie-Kondo-Style course to help you clean up and organize your entire financial life! And because you are stuck at home, and because you probably shouldn’t be out and about right now, I’m offering this course at 50% for a SUPER LOW PRICE to which you will get support from me and my team on ANY financial question you have and join us LIVE to help you organize your home office and financial life in one-week.

$97 for a limited time only, evergreen access and make sure you sign up now for the Wealth Spa™ Money Method!

There’s a reason we have secret desires written in our hearts and on our souls.

I say secret, because they are secret to everyone around you, and secret to you until you decide to answer your calling, your truest desires.

And the true desires – they are pure.

Truest desire are those that always benefit & lift all humanity and above all fill you up.

Truest desires are NOT when they only prosper and help you. Those desire are still desires, yes, but aren’t the desires that benefit your soul in the long run. They may be good for a party night, but in the long term, selfish desires of that nature will only lead to destruction. That’s the difference.

The ones that really take over everything – they are like every beautiful song ever sung and every best thing in life – LIKE THAT GOOD!

What happens when you don’t follow the blueprint that was imprinted on your soul, your life begins to look like this:

• petty and mean thoughts increase
• you find you have a plethora of useless and meaningless relationships in your life
• you have ill temper or are a pure grouch most of the time
• destructive emotions take over and lead to ill health
• discouragement at every turn – and what feels like failure
• you bear no “fruit” in your life – from the money you were meant to make to the love you were meant to give

That’s a depressing list, but true nonetheless and great sign posts to watch out for if you are wondering why your life isn’t “clicking” they way it should, most likely it’s due to one factor:

You are turning away from your calling, your life’s work.

I’ve been there. I know we all have.

And yes, there are season in our life where we are called to different things, I don’t think this is a “one calling” type of a thing, but there are times when you know your soul is screaming at you to stop this or start that and you don’t listen – that’s the stuff I’m talking about.

“When your energies are constructively directed to a specific end, non-essentials have a way of falling aside.” – Catherine Ponder

Things will never improve in your outer world until things change inside you first because our minds control all our outer experiences.

You are stuck because you haven’t asked for access to get out of your current “frustration” – whatever that may be.

Last week, I talked about asking for help.

Have you even asked the universe to help you uncover your purpose – especially if you don’t know it yet?

Have you asked for help to uncover what your next “big” thing is in your life?

If we live in a sea of energy, abundance of all the resources of the universe at our disposal, then wouldn’t it be petty of us to ask for small things when the universe is able to deliver whatever our minds can see and believe in?

This is the place where most of us are drifting around the harbour.

“Your ships will come in only after you have sent them out.” (Catherine Ponder wrote this and it’s brilliant! Clearly, I’m a big fan!)

You haven’t sent them out.

Or if you have, you expected them back 2 minutes later and they didn’t even have time to fill up with gas.

You get my drift here.

When we are focused on our big why, our big goal and keenly interested in it, loving every moment of the journey, you will find that all the things in your life that weren’t of benefit, like gossip, fall away.

Why?

Mostly because you finally have something better to do with your time.

You don’t have time for gossip or petty conversations, you don’t have time for things that suck the life right out of you and you don’t give your time to anything that’s not worthy of your time.

You begin to take control and step away from things that aren’t serving you.

You begin to be okay with being alone.

You begin to really love yourself and the deep knowing of your worth.

You know you were built for this dream, for this life that consumes you in the best of ways.

All the other stuff, it disappears.

Here’s another thought…

Amid the fear and stress of the world, that is when the world needs your gifts, your desire, your dreams even more than ever before.

This is the time, right here, right now to GO ALL IN.

No excuses. No turning back. Burn the ships.

Here’s the other thing about desire and money.

If you aren’t following your desires, your life will be in a constant state of struggle and turmoil!

This goes equally for your money.

Get into your life’s work and the money will flow and it will flow more freely to you!

Money always takes it’s cues from your emotions and energy!

Lisa Elle

FYI… it’s super hard to follow your desires when you are care what other people think.

So, you must get over that first and then a whole world of possibility will open up for you.

Follow your desires.

This is how you….

Live Your Legacy!

xx Lisa

PS. If you want to work with me and get the money flowing, make sure to sign up at financialbliss.ca!

Yesterday was one of those really hard days where failure & heart ache seemed to present at every turn.

I know you’ve had days like that, too many to count.

Many times in life it feels like there is no hope or that things will never go your way.

These usually fall into our 3 main categories of life: love, health & wealth.

Isn’t it just a wonder that there’s always one category that just seems off and we can never quite seem to pull off the trifecta.

Funny how that is!

And then there are the times when all 3 areas of life are just miserable for one reason or another.

I was reading the words of Catherine Ponder, a mid-century pastor, who spoke so eloquently of “failure being nothing but success trying to be born a different way.”

Brilliant.

I always know there is a lesson for me somewhere in all the frustration, stress, anger and pain.

I think that’s all part of the lesson – gaining wisdom.

And the biggest gift I think one gets from wisdom is knowing when to ask for help.

That is what wisdom really is: knowing that you really don’t know anything and asking for help to guide you in this crazy journey of life.

Crazy it is!

I think where one gets stuck so often is in the fact that there are no right answers and no wrong answers to so many questions and that all we are left with is our choices and we all so desperately seek to find the manual to life that will tell us the step-by-step instructions we need to “get it right”.

If only the step-by-step guides actually did give us guaranteed results, but we know that’s really only good for cooking or how to install a toilet.

The rest of life will never come with such an instruction manual.

But it does come with help.

And it does come with people who want to help.

I will tell you a secret.

I hate asking for help.

Why is it that so many of us hate asking for help?

I do get the fact that sometimes asking for help does come with a price tag – however on a quick side note, it’s usually ALWAYS worth it!

I try so SOOOO hard to be self-sufficient in so many areas.

Now, I must say, in my life, I’m actually pretty good at delegating and asking for help, but that’s only because I’ve had practice.

It’s a skill.

It’s a skill I’ve gotten good at AND a skill I still despise and still hate to ask for help.

I feel weak and I hate feeling weak –
HOWEVER…..

and this is a big HOWEVER….

I learned long ago that everything I ever want out of life will come from me asking for help!

It will come from me asking for HUGE amounts of help!

And yet, it is getting easier, but it’s still so uncomfortable.

Many times when you do ask for help, it will come in the most lovely and unexpected ways and you will find yourself wondering why you didn’t do this earlier.

I asked for help recently in a BIG way and I felt a HUGE weight lift off my shoulders.

I also know that I do this for clients when I help them get organized and planned out financially.

It takes a huge weight off their shoulders knowing that they don’t have to spend every waking minute worrying about their money.

(Hence, if you haven’t found a financial planner yet, then here’s your call to action!)

I don’t know why we are so programmed to resist asking for help and feeling weak because of it.

Did you know that anything great that has been accomplished has been done so by asking for help?

Did you know that asking for help is the only way you will be able to share your message, market your products, grow or even work for your company?

I mean, by all means, continue on the DO-IT-YOURSELF method, but don’t be alarmed when you don’t really get the results you desire.

I think we were created for community.

I think we were all created with these amazing special gifts and connect effortlessly like puzzle pieces and I think there are areas in our life we are not asking for help.

When you do tune in to your higher power many times it’s so clear that there’s someone staring us right in the face that can help us with our problems.

Never underestimate that you are God’s hands and feet to another soul and that someone else is that to you.

This is what growing and wisdom looks like – allowing for help.

Receiving help.

Receiving money.

Receiving love.

Receiving healing.

It’s all available to us in abundance.

Maybe we are just not asking for help – period.

or

Maybe we are just not asking big enough trying to put the universe in a small little box and only ask for our daily needs.

Maybe, just maybe, there is something greater in works for you and maybe it’s time to trust yourself, wise up, and

ASK FOR HELP.

Wisdom is knowing that.

When you ask for help you….

Live Your Legacy.

xx Lisa

PS. Want to put the FUN in your FUNds? Make sure to sign up at financialbliss.ca to unlock your free goodies.

You’ve seen those commercials that basically say your financial advisor is robbing you of 30% of your wealth?!

Fees.

The topic of conversation.

What do you value your money at?

It’s not a rhetorical question but rather one that literally you answer everyday by the representation of the goods and services you purchase and you put value on.

Here’s the deal.

When it comes to investing, you can do it yourself.

And sure, you can pay less.

HOWEVER, studies, and massive amount of studies have proven that investors with advice were found to accumulate 290% or 3.9 times more than people working without an advisor over a 15-year period. (The Gamma Factor and the Value of Financial Advice, 2016 Study.)

This makes sense for obvious reasons, one of which is: anyone on the planet who is trying to better themselves seeks help. You go to university to get a degree, you go to a doctor to get better, you go to a financial advisor to get financial help.

OBVI.

There’s more to a financial advisor than just helping you with choosing an investment, more importantly, as I’ve always said – ‘who cares if you made 100% but were taxes 100% on your investment!’ Point being made that taxes are a HUGE consideration when investing and being able to create a current and long term plan on how you wish to one day draw down those assets or to distribute them according to your will.

Tax planning is a huge consideration.

Financial professionals also help with guidance, planning, documents and reporting/tracking, research, goal setting, administration, education, and estate planning to name a few.

All which you are welcome to do on your own.

I know that the people who read this blog are actually the happy ones who know that they receive value and are happy to pay for services that they value.

That’s feminine energy. (Again, not referring to females but the energy type.)

The opposite is true.

I understand being fee conscious! I am fee conscious for all my clients and I monitor that, however, there is something to be said about relationships.

Did you ever read my Huffington Post article called, “Are you treating your investments like a one-night stand?” (Go read it!)

That article illustrates that being in relationship long-term with a financial professional will actually have your greatest positive financial impact, meaning, they know you, your family, your situation, your goals.

Going in once a year for a quickie tax return and a 2-minute RRSP into a GIC at your bank with a new bank employee every time you walk in is probably not the relationship that will benefit your wealth long term.

Having a relationship with someone you can text, email and call directly (not a call center!) is huge. I know I value being able to talk to someone who knows who I am.

I tell clients this. At most (and I do mean most) financial institutions, you are paying the same fees as if you go directly with an independent advisor, so for the same price, you may as well get some value from it.

And those commercials?

Well, if you really want to get into the nitty-gritty of Q-Trade commercials, I have had colleagues run the numbers and you can email me for the results – seriously, you already know what they are going to say – it’s all fake news.

What makes it worse is that hard-working people will see those commercials and think that financial advice is to expensive or worse, they will do nothing, and that is not helpful!

When it comes to investing, these are your options, my love, these are all your options (!!) :

• Invest nowhere, do nothing
• Invest at Big Large Institution (Bank)
• Invest with work (group RRSPs/Pensions/etc. you don’t have much choice, mandatory for the most part)
• Invest online with a brokerage account (DIY)
• Invest with a financial planner (Independent for the most part)

Those are really your options.

Review them carefully.

Also note, most people have money in all of these things! I encourage my clients to have a DIY stock account – not tied up with the whole of their wealth, but it’s a great way to learn about the markets.

Plus, most of my clients also have some form of a work plan and on that note, we use banks for banking so many people may have some high interest savings accounts etc.

There is no right or wrong way to invest.

A full financial planner will look at the entire financial picture and explain to you how each fits in and each has their place and do a full tax planning review on ALL your investments and real estate and show you the best way to pay the least amount of tax.

Doing full financial planning is sometimes an added benefit you get when investing with a independent investment advisor, however, not all the time.

Ask a lot of questions and get a LOT of answers. (I think I said that every week for the last 6 weeks of this investment series.)

And when you are worried about fees, just remember when looking at various investment options:

Returns in Canada are posted net of fees (or at a least they are supposed to be! Read the fine print).

Did you know that?

Price and fees are only ever a consideration without value being there.

Hey, I like my nice purse and car and pay for that service and better quality product and I LOVE IT! (Be careful when being “cheap” to note if that is a scarcity/lack issue and thoughts that there is not enough money or if it is in fact something you don’t value at this point in time! No wrong answers here, just awareness.)

Your financial professional will make sure you are well diversified, hold your hand when you are scared, force you at times to make the right decision when all you want to do is give up, and be there to encourage you to keep going.

You and your advisor may have to hire new money managers from time to time when circumstantial changes happen, or when unsystematic risk (risk that can be reduced through diversification) is not dealt with. When systematic risk occurs (this is the risk that you can’t diversify your way out of, the unpredictable events that effect everything, such as a huge earthquake, virus, or war or terrorism), then it’s not time for a manager change. It’s just bad luck for everyone left holding the bag at that point and best to wait it out if you can.

This too shall pass.

And if you’ve been following me for any length of time you know that I always talk about and believe that humanity was made for increase, so that includes the stock market and it will eventually go up and surpass it’s previous high.

It will. It can’t not.

Humanity will fight. We aren’t about to just shrivel up and die. We will always increase, create, procreate, etc. That’s all part of the divine plan.

Anything past that you can’t control anyways, so, don’t let it worry you!

What you can do today is what you can do to….

Live Your Legacy!

xx Lisa

Many times as we invest we forget about the “real” risks involved with investing.

I want to walk you through the biggest risks you need to consider when investing.

One of the biggest risks is not even planning, saving or investing to begin with!

As it has been said in the investment world for years, “It’s not timing the markets; it’s time in the markets.”

This means you better just get in. There really is no good time and you’ll never really be able to time the bottoms of the markets (aka – the best time to invest), I mean you may be able to guess, but you’ll only really know years later if it was a good call or not!

It’s like waiting for a good time to have kids!

Hahaha—anyone who has kids knows there is no good time to have kids! You just go for it, and jump in with both feet, and don’t look back!

Timing is never good for anything really, so you just have to take a leap of faith every time you do!

Now, it’s time for a closer look at the main risks you need to be aware of in relationship to your investment portfolio. Here is a list of risks your money faces when you invest in almost anything:

Inflation Risk: the goal is to outpace inflation. (Hint: At the time of
writing this, most GICs in Canada do not outpace inflation right now,
meaning you are technically getting a negative return on your money.)

Currency Risk: be aware when you are buying a stock in another currency, even if the stock goes up, you can still lose money if the currency
is devaluing against yours.

Interest Rate Risk: the goal is to reduce the risk of changing interest
rates, in either direction, which can affect the value of your investment,
depending on what you are investing in.

Volatility Risk: this is the risk of your investments fluctuating
dramatically.

Liquidity Risk: this is how easily you can sell your investment, or you
are locked in for a long time, or it takes a while to find a buyer for
your investment.

Political Risk: this includes the government’s control over a change in
legislation that impacts your investment.

This is by no means an extensive list!

You have to know the risks involved, and know your risk tolerance.

Don’t forget the golden rule of investing, which is essentially do your due diligence, or better phrased, ask a LOT of questions and get a LOT of answers before you put your money into something.

One way to protect against inflation is to hold stocks of publicly
traded companies (equities). As an economy grows and expands,
inflation increases, which means the costs of goods go up in price,
which typically means the value of the business also increases (note
that I didn’t necessarily say “profits,” although that can happen, too).

When you hold and own quality stocks in your portfolio, this will help protect your purchasing power over the long term.

Besides having a great financial planner, understanding that the only constant is change, diversifying your portfolio, dollar-cost averaging, understanding the main risks to your portfolio, and making sure to disclose your full financial picture to your coach, is there anything else you need to know?

No.

The answer for today’s lesson on investment 101 is no, you don’t need to know everything when it comes to investing, in fact – everything else is probably noise or a deterrent.

You can build a solid investment plan on these principles.

If you listen to your financial planner, dollar-cost average into your investments where possible, stay diversified, and create a plan and stick with it through annual reviews (note: I’m not saying just talk once a year—obviously life happens when life happens, so plan for and commit to a yearly review and goals with your financial planner), then providence will move with you.

You have to believe in your plan as well.

I really believe this, and I have seen it time and time again with my clients.

Okay, there is actually a lot more to say about this topic and millions of books to read; however, for the purposes of this conversation, I’m going to say this is what you need to know to get started.

You will learn everything else over time, and even if you dislike this topic, this 6-week investment series should be enough knowledge to at least point you in the right direction. {go back and read the past weeks posts at ellementsgroup.com}

Now, do you really want to know what the biggest risk is to you in investing?

The biggest risk is not doing anything, as I’ve alluded to already.

The biggest risk to your financial health is not investing at all!

Life will move on with or without you.

Not doing anything is like sitting in the middle of a sample sale or Boxing Day sale and looking at your perfect pair of shoes, in your size, at 50 percent off, and not being sure if they are going to drop lower in price, so you wait.

Meanwhile, the pushy redhead next to you grabs them and gets the deal of her life.

You waited, you let the opportunity pass you by, and ultimately, you are sitting there paralyzed in the middle of Nordstrom’s left behind, all alone, without your new fave shoes. End Scene. (I just shed a tear—please don’t let this be you!)

You need to take a chance and yes, it won’t always work in your favor, but more times than not, it will.

You gotta try, as doing nothing will get you nothing. That’s guaranteed.

“Losses aren’t guaranteed, wins aren’t guaranteed, but doing nothing guarantees you won’t win.” – Lisa Elle

Yes, I totally just quoted my self, but feel free to re-quote that!

Step out in fear or step out in faith – either way, step out! (By golly, another good Lisa Elle quote – BAM!)

and

Live Your Legacy!

xx Lisa

PS. If you want to join me for my Investment Planning Training then make sure you sign up at financialbliss.ca to get the Investment Planner {a beautiful investment workbook I created just for you!} and join the Money Makeover Facebook Group where I will walk you through how to plan your investments. The training is already in the Facebook group – waiting for you!

Looking forward to seeing you there!

Figuring out the value of any investment is one of the great keys to investing.

This is week four of my investment series and I’m bringing up creating value because it’s so important that we first remind ourselves that value is created in the eye of the beholder first and then we talk about how we trade that value in exchanges.

Follow me here…

We create the value as humans – right?

For all the things, we produce, mine, pick, pluck, print, research, draw, data mine, play, create – we create all the value in the physical world.

And more importantly, as humans we also place the meaning on what’s valuable and what’s not.

We are meaning making machines in our brains desperate to determine value.

Any investment is only as good as what the people around it think it is
worth, or what value it has to them. It’s all perceived value.

Actual market value is the price someone will actually pay for something.

Take your home, for example.

You need to keep warm, and you need a place over your head.

So on average, your house is worth more than your car because we value it more. We, as society, created that, and we created the meaning behind the value the house adds.

It is funny; we create the value of things, but things at the end of the day are just things or services.

Why do we value diamonds over, say, Styrofoam?

Imagine if everyone thought Styrofoam was special—crazy, right?

But follow me here…

Everything at some point in time was a raw material from our lovely planet Earth that man converted/combined/ transformed into something else, which our blood, sweat, and tears went into, and we gave it value.

It’s bizarre sometimes what we as humans decided what was of high value and what is “worth” something.

I tell you this because nothing is intimidating about the investment world; it’s just something else that we give meaning to.

The stock markets came together like any market did, as a place of
trade. And that’s all it really is.

Don’t let it intimidate you from exploring it further.

Here’s the other point I want to make regarding this topic of value.

For every transaction, there is a buyer and a seller.

If there is no buyer, then the seller is out of luck, and whatever he is selling is worthless.

Remember the tulip and bulb craze & crash of 1637 in Holland? (It’s okay if you don’t, you weren’t alive then—you can Google it!)

In her fantastic book Practically Investing, Coreen T. Sol sums this phenomenon up so nicely that I couldn’t have said it better myself:

“For every transaction, there is someone willing to buy and
someone willing to sell at an agreed price, both believing that
it’s good value and that the counter-party is a little crazy. […]
That’s what’s fun about this. The differences of opinion are what
keep markets humming and prices continually adjusting to find
the fair value. It’s been said that it’s only a fair trade when both
parties consider the other to have received the better deal.”

Coreen T. Sol, Author of Practically Investing

This is why we need to figure out our why and know our value positions.

Knowing what we think our investments are worth is a game. You need to always be guessing at what price you think the buyers will be buying at.

Now, regulated markets make this game more straightforward than say buying or selling something off of Craig’s List or Kijiji.

Nonetheless, knowing and remembering that there are always two-sides to every trade and watching what other trades in the recent past have been listed at may help you figure out value.

Creating value really only comes once a trade is in place, whether monetary or otherwise, and is completed.

That’s the only time you really know for sure what something is worth.

The rest is fake, for lack of a better word or perceived value until it materializes.

Creating value in your investments really only happens after you’ve “sold” – now whether you do that and make money or lose money is a different story.

If you haven’t lost money investing at some point, I would argue that you aren’t really trying hard enough or you really aren’t investing. 🙂

I think the bottom line is that you have to look at the big picture, take a macro view while keeping your pulse on the micro view – aka. your own personal goals and what you want to get out of the deal.

This is why we always must hold our vision, intentions and goals before us.

When you do, you….

Live Your Legacy!

xx Lisa

PS. If you want to join me for my Investment Planning Training then make sure you sign up at financialbliss.ca to get the Investment Planner {a beautiful investment workbook I created just for you!} and join the Money Makeover Facebook Group where I will walk you through how to plan your investments. The training is already in the Facebook group – waiting for you!

Looking forward to seeing you there!

You’ve all heard that your habits will determine your success.

The same goes with investing.

If you are seriously doing it to “get rich quick” – you will fail at investing, only because you lack patience.

Investing incrementally, strategically, methodically will not guarantee you success, however, it offers more success than throwing your money into something and waiting for the big jackpot payout! (Been there, done that – still waiting – 15 years later!)

The truth is you need to “go in slow” – meaning take your time to plan out what you are investing in, how this fits with your goals and lifestyle (do you need to be up at 6:30am to be doing trading?!)

Going in slow also means doing your research and knowing your end game.

Like I’ve mentioned in the past few weeks, you have to know your why – if you don’t know that, you don’t know what you are doing. (This goes for all of your LIFE too!)

Getting out when you’ve decided you should instead of just letting it ride a little longer, a little longer, a little longer. The greed will be the end of you only because virtually no one can time the top or the bottom of the market – better to get 80% of the gains than lose it all.

Investing is one of those things where you have to realize you’ll never truly win in the sense of looking back and timing it to get in at the right time and get out at the right time. NO ONE CAN DO THAT!

Yet, we judge ourselves and our adviors or portfolio management team on that, when it’s a fallacy.

Is there money to be made in investing – OH HECK YA!

Are the trades ever perfect – OH HECK NO!

But money can be made and will be made, from those who know how to take their gains and move on.

Important habits to create around investing:

• know what you are wanting your specific outcome to be (obviously, this doesn’t always happen the way we want it to, but it keeps your eye on the prize and helps when you have a set back.)
• research, research, research – intimacy with your investments isn’t a bad thing, otherwise you can just chalk up your investment game to doubling down on red. (or get your advisor or trusted financial guru to do the research and explain to you in simple terms – trust me, that’s better if you don’t have time to take this step!)
• plan your in and your out
• always check on any tax implications of your investments (this is where you need a great CFP or CPA to work with if you aren’t intimate with the tax code!)
• saving/investing at the same time each week, month or year really helps to keep your plan on track and builds that habit so you don’t end up spending the money allocated to your future!
• have a set amount of money allocated to your future – decide and stick with it. Even if you are starting at 1% and increasing it from there!
• try to automate payments if you haven’t – I know it’s so hard if you are self-employed or get paid random commission or starting a business
• know what type of return you are looking for – is it yield, dividend type growth, or is it capital appreciation, capital gain type of growth, or maybe just interest? (In other words, are you investing in equities or maybe some debt instruments? How does your portfolio mix fit in with your risk tolerance?)
• Try to take the emotion out when investing, but don’t take the emotion out of the dreams you are working to fund

That is not an extensive list, but it’s a great start!

The key is to get started – period.

The biggest hindrance to growing your wealth is not deciding to grow your wealth.

The next is not taking action.

Here’s the real deal.

You WILL lose some.

Listen up – hear me on this –

“LOSS” in investing means you are trying!

Ask any great investor what they learned by taking a loss or a big hit.

Loss is the tuition of investing.

It will be your greatest teacher!

You won’t always lose, but let me tell you that if you haven’t failed even once when it comes to investing, it just means you probably aren’t trying hard enough or playing it too safe to really get the growth you are looking for.

Obviously, I’m not talking to a retired or senior here, I’m talking to my younger folk.

There are always times you need to play it safer and preserve capital and cash flow.

But for you starting out, chances are you can afford in your timeline a bit of “live and learn”.

And so that’s exactly what you do.

You live and learn and…

Live Your Legacy!

xx Lisa

PS. If you want to join me for my Investment Planning Livestream then make sure you sign up at financialbliss.ca to get the Investment Planner {a beautiful investment workbook I created just for you!} and join the Money Makeover Facebook Group where I will walk you through how to plan your investments LIVE on Friday February 7th at 10am MST, 9am PST, 12pm EST!

Looking forward to seeing you there!

This needs to be made clear.

Don’t go chasing investment returns.

Don’t go picking the funds based on returns.

And please for the love of designer handbags, don’t go comparing your shoes, handbags or investment account returns to your neighbours!!

Two accounts will never look the same even if they both have the same amount of initial money invested and they are both invested in the exact same mutual fund, stock, ETF (exchange traded funds), or other liquid assets if they are invested at different times.

This is where the problem comes in.

You talk to your neighbor or you read the annual returns for your investment and it looks nothing like the returns that you received in your personal account – good or bad!

You see, the day you entered the market will make your market returns completely unique to you!

Comparing to your neighbour will be useless,

Over time this conundrum solves itself, but only after staying invested for years (like quite a few years) will your returns begin to reflect those of your neighbour and even then it depends on if you are buying or selling units in the interim.

The thing is this.

You don’t know if you bought at the top or the trough.

But that all aside, you look at your neighbour or your return on your statement and see you only did 3% when your neighbour actually did 10%+ for the year and you want to jump ship even if you were both invested in the exact same fund.

This happened to me when, a year and a half ago, I moved both my daughters RESPs from one institution to another institution, from the same funds to the same funds.

Even though the paperwork and trades were submitted on the same day, they 2 accounts came over to the new institution 2 weeks apart.

Funny enough, one account was invested at the peak of the market that year and one was invested in the pits a few weeks later.

A year later these 2 accounts had a return difference of 10.8%!!!

One account on the date I checked it was -2.6% and one was 8.2%!

Keep in mind, these 2 accounts are showing up on my dashboard right beside each other and have had the exact same amount of money put into them and always held the same underlying investments.

This isn’t even me comparing to my neighbour or other clients, this is me comparing me to me!!

Needless to say, only one of my daughters is allowed to go to an IVY league university! HA!

But, all kidding aside, I didn’t run out and change my investment – you see…

The investment is still a good investment. The fund is still a good fund.

The underlying investment is still good even if one of my account showed a negative return for the year – that had to do with timing – nothing else.

So, my message to you for week two of this investment series is this:

DON’T GO CHASING RETURNS!

Once you know you have good fund managers, a good investment – don’t sell because one year was bad.

On that note, maybe you lucked out and killed it with 18% your first year – congrats, but then don’t expect that to be the norm.

Markets will do market things and carry with them lots of volatility – more ups and downs than your toddler or teenage daughter!

You have to go with the flow.

This goes back to choosing your investments with the best of your knowledge, doing a quick gut check, make a plan and then releasing it to do its thing.

Chasing returns is going to get you killed in the world of investing.

Chasing returns will just cause you stress and leave you totally unsatisfied.

Don’t do it!

You could be throwing out the baby with the bath water.

I didn’t even get deep into regular withdrawals and deposits made into your account which can drastically reduce or increase your return as well.

Honestly, there are so many factors that you really just need not compare to anyone else, because it will either make you feel smart or stupid – neither is usually the case when it comes to investing because there is the element that no one can control, call it luck, or just call it the market.

The phrase “you do you” becomes even more important when it comes to investing!

That’s why my catch phrase at the end of every blog is Live Your Legacy and not, live your neighbours legacy…

you can’t.

Don’t try to copy them, it will probably end up bad for you.

Like picking stocks at the water-cooler at work or over BBQ wieners at the family reunion –

it rarely ends well.

And now you know….

Live Your Legacy!

xx Lisa

PS. If you haven’t yet signed up go to FINANCIALBLISS.CA and unlock your free content now!

This is where you must start if you want to be successful in investing.

This is before you learn anything technical or even do any research!

There are 2 things that I think need to happen first, but I see don’t happen most of the time.

1. You need a specific aim/goal for your money.
2. You need a specific aim and once the goal is reached, you still need a specific aim – or refreshed focus for your money.

So, in other words, you need to be crystal clear as to your ‘why’ at all times when investing.

Most people don’t have this, or if they do, their aim is WAY TOO VAGUE and they are setting themselves up for disaster before they even put their money anywhere.

I know this. I’ve done it. Many times – but now I know better!

Before we start talking about aim complacency, I need to talk about aim confusion.

Aim confusion comes first before you even have achieved your goal.

You have to know your end goal.

You have to know your why.

You have to know your purpose.

If you don’t, then you are about as good as a ship without a rudder and all the millions of metaphors I could use right now.

Useless.

And yes, that’s harsh, but you want to make money, right?

So, get serious about it and pick the end in mind.

You have to know your end point!

You can change it along the way, but you need to start with a goal or you are not going anywhere fast.

I’ve been watching clients invest for 20 years now and I can tell you this, anyone who knows exactly what they want, even if it’s 45 years down the road, has more success with their investment accounts than those trying to accumulate ‘as much as they can’ without specifics or planning for a vague word like ‘retirement’.

I can’t explain most of this phenomenon (I can explain some of it, but there’s definitely some unseen aspect to it!) except for the fact that some clients were so specific in their goals and others weren’t, and yet lots of them were in the exact same investment!

That’s the biggest difference between the 2 groups of clients. I’ve asked my colleagues as well, most of them agree.

“Accumulate as much as you can” is an arbitrary thing.

The money gods don’t like that. I joke, but it’s true. The universe, nature – GOD wants to give you what your hearts desire, but when you are vague, the universe will deliver you a bowl of mixed-nuts and like only 2 macadamia nuts in the whole bowl. Ughhhh……

That never works.

What do you want the money for?

What do you want this specific pot of money, this investment account for?

Even if you say $1,000,000 for retirement (whoever came up with that amount?!) is better than just saying you want your money to grow.

Money is energy.

That energy needs to be put to work in a specific way otherwise it will manifest itself out in crazy ways!

Direct the energy and money will follow that route.

Okay, now, you are fair to say, but I can’t control the stock market or any other investment or private equity, etc. etc.

Correct, that is outside of your control.

However, this is where the magic happens.

You make your plans, set your goals and providence moves with you.

I’m not going to explain it – because I can’t – maybe some quantum physics scientist hottie can, but this is where faith comes into play.

Set it and hold your intentions.

Yes, there will be ups and downs and market corrections, but when you hold the space for exactly what you want, life has a funny way of giving you exactly that.

You need to be in control of the aim.

You need to keep your aim ahead of you at all times.

Aim confusion will be your downfall when it comes to successful investing – especially if you go chasing returns or the “hottest” stock!

Buying stocks? You need to take the emotion out of it and determine your end point before you even buy the company in the first place.

Make sense?

I’ve seen so many people say, “oh, I’ll just ride it all the way up” and usually end up losing money. We humans are very good at emotional ties, FOMO, and when it comes to our money, that’s all amplified.

You are rarely going to get the timing right when buying and selling stocks or anything to be sure!

If you are planning for retirement, you will have to set a goal for an amount you wish to have as a monthly income in retirement and then figure out how big that pot of money needs to be when you want to retire, make sure to take into account inflation and work the numbers backwards. (If you need help, talk to a financial planner.)

Make sure you don’t have AIM CONFUSION in regards to your investments.

Now, aim complacency is aim confusion’s wicked annoyingly rich step-sister.

AIM COMPLACENCY is when you are all smug that you did “well” with your investments, or that your investment accounts are all “up” in value and you think it’s time to coast or that you hit the last decade of growth in the stock market and think that this is going to happen for the next 10 years and beyond!

You have jumped on the 1980s yacht, it’s sailing, the martini’s are flowing freely and you think you have arrived but you don’t see that soon you will be lost at sea because the captain is on his 10th martini as well, and being distracted by beautiful women.

Don’t be on that boat! It’s like Gilligan’s Island all over again!

Complacency when things have gone well for a long time is awesome, however we tend to go on autopilot and then forget that things can go wrong.

I’m not saying they will, I’m saying we get off course one or two degrees and then the reality is that we are really off course and need to re-align.

The big thing that happens in investing is that people do well (meaning their account value on paper is up!) with a fund or stock.

Then they sit on it.

And sit on it.

And sit on it.

And greed sets in.

You made money, now take it and move it to something else.

Or at least re-assess the situation and set a new fresh goal around that investment holding that you have.

Lots of people lose money when greed sets in – sure fire recipe for disaster!

Again, we are back to the AIM.

Make sure you have a new aim once you have reached your goal!

This is important.

I think the other big problem for all investing is when the emotion of greed gets in the way.

And I’m not even talking the BIG OBVIOUS GREED you can see a mile away, but the subtle, soft greed that’s just enough to block you from receiving! (Yes, a money block!)

You have got to get over your AIM CONFUSION & AIM COMPLACENCY and just focus on the aim then release the outcome.

(All the same stuff/energy work/tools that work in the rest of your life – like weight loss, health restoration, romance, relationships, etc – all work the same way for your money!)

Hey, investing is never going to be perfect – get over that! It’s never going to do you any good if you are constantly worried over it.

Set aim.

Release.

and….

Live Your Legacy!

xx Lisa

PS. If you haven’t yet signed up go to FINANCIALBLISS.CA and unlock your free content now!