Dr James, 9s:

Hey team, welcome back to the Denys and the West podcast. Do you know what? Today is a super exciting episode, and the reason that is super exciting? Every episode is super exciting. This one is extra, super, super, super exciting, of course, and the reason why it's super exciting is because we're going to talk about something we never talked about in Denys and the West podcast before, and that is holistic perspectives on wealth, and I don't know how we've made it to episode 206, 207, whatever this is. We thought exploring this in more detail, because we come at it from the technical side of things a lot, maybe. Maybe we just need to hear a little bit more in terms of our mindset whenever it comes to money, belief systems whenever it comes to money, and also perspectives that we might not otherwise gain until we've been through some sort of significant life event, because if we can take that wisdom and put it forward to the future and give it to ourselves now, guess what? We can make better decisions. And who better to assist us on this than wealth coach Jody Phelps? Jody, how are you today?

Jodie, 58s:

Good, thank you. How are you?

Dr James, 1m 0s:

I'm flipping amazes and thanks for asking so. Jody, I know that we've met and we've had a lot of catch up off camera. We've got to know each other a little bit over the last few weeks. Four of those people who are out there who are yet to meet you in common cross here, would you be able to do a little bit of a short and sweet bio about yourself?

Jodie, 1m 16s:

Yep, so I am a financial planner and coach. A lot of the work I do is actually helping people understand their relationship with money and helping them improve their kind of overall financial well-being. I've worked in the financial industry for 13, almost 14 years now, so lots of experience there and yeah, that's my kind of career, I guess.

Dr James, 1m 41s:

Hey, that's cool. Thanks so much. And you know what, in that career again something we were chatting about off camera you've got to see a lot of different people, a lot of different walks of lives and you've got to see them before and after significant life events and you've witnessed that changing perspective that comes along with it and that's absolutely something that we want to talk about today, because that has a knee and that concept as a name, and that's what wisdom is. You don't normally get that insight until you go through those events and then you get that perspective to be able to look back on certain other aspects of your life, the decisions that you made beforehand, and think to yourself, hey, I wish I could have made that better, wish I could have made a better decision, if only I didn't do that. X, y and Z. So normally you don't even be able to learn that perspective unless you went through it. But at least if we can hear those stories and share them on the Downsend Best podcast, then what that will mean is that that will go some way to helping us to obtain that wisdom before we otherwise get it and therefore be able to make better decisions in the hearing now. Cool way of looking at it.

Jodie, 2m 36s:

I always think yeah, and I think personally I went through a divorce myself and it obviously no one expects that. So going through a divorce with children it made my kind of whole financial situation blow up. So I think for me that's why I'm really passionate about helping people who have gone through significant life events, because you can plan as much as you possibly can and you never know what's going to life is going to throw at you.

Dr James, 3m 1s:

Hey, wow, thanks for sharing that. I actually really appreciate that and you know what, actually for yourself and for anybody who's been through a significant life event like that, actually quite often what happens is it gives them this renewed enthusiasm to go and help people in a similar position. So I'm going to read between the lines and guess that that's what happened to yourself a little bit, and that's totally fine. The only reason I say that, the only reason that I say that, is when I started Dennis Union Fest, I went through something similar and I realized that actually a lot of the things that were holding me back were my issues with my belief system and knowledge whenever it came to money, and that really helped so a lot. They say they have a saying about entrepreneurs. A lot of people don't like that word, but if we just use it for conciseness and brevity today, the saying about entrepreneurs that oftentimes their business is simply a manifestation of some sort of creation or organization that is really designed to help a three to four year previous version of themselves, like it's themselves three to four years ago that they're actually trying to help. And it's just that a lot of people are still on that journey and they still are represented by that avatar.

Jodie, 4m 9s:

Yeah, exactly that. And I think, yeah, if I knew now what I did, know back, then I would be in a better position. And I think it's yeah, like you say, when you've been for it firsthand. It's just now. I'm really passionate about how people go for it because I know how overwhelming money can be. You know, the financial side of anything is often what causes people stress and anxiety, sleep problems. It can interfere in any aspect of your life and when you're going for a big change, actually having that burden financial burden really easily, I guess massively helps you focus on the problem at hand 100% and on that very topic, you know what?

Dr James, 4m 50s:

we could even focus on the separation side of things. First of all, what do you? Find in your experience through helping your clients? What do you find in your experience? Are there their biggest regrets or the things that they wish they could have changed or known beforehand? Or even just not even necessarily that, just maybe considerations that they could have taken beforehand or how they could have adapted their belief system or perspective, or literally anything under the sun.

Jodie, 5m 14s:

I think the main thing I would say is that most couples like 99% of the time, I find that one person in the relationship looks after the money and then, a lot of the time, I'll see you know people who've separated and the person who's not, you know who's kept their head buried in the sand and actually isn't clued up on their money situation. Suddenly, if they separate or, even worse, if you know the person's passes away, they're suddenly left in this position where they don't even understand what they've got, what their income is, what their outgoings are, what the pension means. So it's actually I'd say the biggest advice I would give, piece of advice I would give is for both parties in the relationship to understand their financial position. Educate yourself, you know, if there's something you don't understand, like actually look it up, like make sure you do. But yeah, I'd say, working with couples or going for separation or, like I said, bereavement, it's actually taking notice and understanding their financial position.

Dr James, 6m 17s:

Yes, I can imagine, and any hot takes on how one might make that process smooth, or on any hot takes on how one can go about educating themselves on finance, say, the person in that relationship who feels like they are second fiddle when it comes to money. Let's say they want to empower themselves. Where can they look, apart from the Denysso Invest podcast, of course, and the Denysso Invest? That's literally why I made the platform, of course, but I'm sure there's other things out there that you know off, jody.

Jodie, 6m 48s:

Yeah, there's a lot of. Even if you look on YouTube or TikTok, there's so many online platforms these days. That's the one, so yeah. So things like what is a pension? Unfortunately, there's a massive gap in financial education. We're not taught at school, college, what is a pension, what's the best way to grow your money. So, yeah, I think making an effort to understand these things, speaking to financial advisors massively helps. A lot of them will kind of go through your whole position to help educate you on what everything means. I personally have done a few webinars on financial wellbeing and understanding money, so I'm happy to send links through to them. But I take the internet. It's great for anything these days, good stuff.

Dr James, 7m 37s:

Love it, good stuff, okay, cool. So we've covered the separation side of things, and then we've touched upon bereavement. Is there anything else that you would add in there in terms of expectations whenever it comes to bereavement?

Jodie, 7m 52s:

I guess, as you a lot of people I meet, they tend to have so many different accounts, so many different investments, so many different savings and what you've got to think, especially when you are getting a bit older, you know, towards the end of your career, say is actually consolidation can make things so much more simple, first of all for you to manage, but also if anything happens to you. I see a lot where suddenly someone's passed away and they've got all these different accounts and investments and things they haven't looked at for years. So I guess making sure you keep on top of your finances every year, have a look, what have you got, you know, making sure that everything is suitable for you and not having a million different accounts, a million different places, I guess that kind of massively helps. Because the more you've got, and especially when it's a lady early and you know investment that was done in 1991 and she's never even looked at it, or shares that they may have and forgotten about, but kind of keeping your finances in check at least once a year, having spreadsheets, knowing what you've got, not just burying your head in the sand, I'd say, is the best piece of advice.

Dr James, 8m 58s:

Top stuff. Okay, cool, so we've covered two significant life events right there. Is it any others that I haven't talked about yet? Because you'd be the best person to ask, because you see this stuff retaining, or maybe those are the two biggies.

Jodie, 9m 13s:

I think when you're looking to move, change careers, that's a massive one I think often people will think about. You know if you're thinking about jobs, you just think about the salary, but actually you know the benefits that you could be losing in moving jobs. So if you have got the benefits there, and also like old pension schemes I've seen it before where people haven't looked at old pension schemes for ages and then you know they haven't been working for them so anything that's going to change your income or outgoing moving a house, changing jobs, having children suddenly you've got a massive expense. Children are so expensive, and so I think all these moments are good points to kind of reevaluate your financial position.

Dr James, 10m 0s:

Gotcha Okay cool, so thank you for that. Another thing that we talked about just beforehand and I think is really pertinent and relevant to cover is the psychological aspect of money, and I feel like people don't necessarily give this the credit that it's due or maybe don't realize just how important it is to their outlook and perspective on life whenever it comes to that in a holistic, broad sense, but also specifically finances and also their success in the financial world. And just to give everybody some context, I was the biggest cynic when it came specifically to this stuff up until like four or five years ago, until I allowed myself to be a little bit more open minded to my opening, to considering my belief system, open my mind considering my belief system whenever it came to money and how I can refine that and enhance that. So like I say, if I can be a convert in terms of progressing my perspective, in terms of becoming a lot more open minded and understanding and appreciating how powerful and important this stuff is. There's literally hope for anybody on the face of this earth, because I was like way over here and now I'm way over here, on the opposite side of the scale. I'm like a proponent for it.

Jodie, 11m 10s:

So first of all, let me pause just there for two seconds. Does that make total sense for?

Dr James, 11m 12s:

those just saying Judy, yeah, yeah With me 100%. So maybe if we can come in and talk about some high level stuff whenever it comes to psychology, whenever it comes to money, like if you could in your clients, let's make that a little more tangible. Let's say your clients, or let's say people that you speak to, you know, and the people that you're coaching, whenever it comes to their perspective on wealth, what are the most common things in terms of misconceptions or in terms of opinions that they have that were thrust upon them perhaps whenever they were children, that you feel that you need to address so that they can move forward in life and no longer become women in beliefs?

Jodie, 11m 53s:

No, it's good question. I think we underestimate how our early experiences with money can influence our kind of attitudes and behaviors as an adult. So for anybody who is wanting to improve their financial wellbeing, I think understanding actually why you spend money the way you do now is really important. So I think everyone, if you think back to kind of you know when you were younger and the phrases your parents might say, like you know, money doesn't grow on trees, or buy cheap, buy twice, or you know all these little phrases I think that that massively influenced how you are. So I think, in terms of you know, I have this too there's two massive different scopes types of people here. So you've got the overspenders who just spend, spend, spend, spend, spend, and I guess for them it's actually they may then role model may not have been very good at savings, they never understood the importance of that, or they had loads of money when they were younger, so they've never had to actually experience, you know, saving and having to wait to achieve something. On the other hand, you know, I have a lot of people who are very successful, got a lot of money, but they have guilt about spending money, and that's like something I massively work with as well. I have lots of, you know, elderly clients who have all this money and they need to be able to spend it but they feel bad in doing so because you know they as a child they never did so. I guess it's kind of looking at your financial habits you know how do you spend money and then understanding why it's like that, and sometimes it's then worth having a sense check of actually what does money mean to no-transcript so yeah, so I think having that good balance in actually spending as well as savings really important. Yeah, does that make sense?

Dr James, 13m 47s:

It totally does, absolutely. And actually just having you break it down like that and say really it's a spectrum of those two things that you most commonly observe is extremely helpful, because before you said that, in my mind it was kind of like this big old amorphous mess of beliefs and how perspectives and people look like money. But whenever you said, actually here's these two extremes, and these are generally the two extremes that people fall into and this is generally one of the biggest things that you have to work through people with, that was really helpful I found. So just wanted to point that out. How do you help people with that, jodi? What do you do?

Jodie, 14m 20s:

So, first of all, a lot of focus on budgeting, actually understanding. And the first thing is how can you feel happy about your financial position if you don't understand it? So looking at someone's income, looking at their outgoings, and then when you have got that bit left over, actually you know you might have a short term goal, a long term goal that you're putting money towards, and then then we kind of figure out the amount that actually that amount there, that's your fund money. And then actually the people who feel bad spending. It's like actually that's the bit for you to spend, like go and enjoy it and don't feel guilty because you're still saving towards, go one, go to, and that's the bit for you. And the other end of the spectrum, the people who overspend is actually thinking right, if you really want to pay off that loan or buy that next house or whatever their goals are, you need to be able to limit your spending to X amount. So it's kind of fine tuning where they are, what their goals are, and then them understanding and a budget for themselves. And sometimes I find that actually putting that amount into a separate account and that being their spending account just helps the mentality of it and feeling organized and feeling on top of things, because nine times out of the 10, the reason why people feel so overwhelmed by money is because they don't understand and they don't know what their position is. And it's so easy to ignore and keep kind of going down this rabbit hole. And actually if you're fully aware of your situation and you know you're working towards a plan and goals, you already feel better about it. And I think another pointer I'd say is your kind of your conscious thoughts feed your unconscious thoughts. So if you're somebody and I've so many people say to me, oh I'm really bad with money, saying that oh man Like, oh, you're bad at money, you know. You probably hear all the time, actually. So if you're saying to me you know I can do this, I can manage my money, I will be better at money this year, that I think, naturally will make you feel better. The only other thing I'll pick up on as well is something that I suffer myself with, as well as retail therapy. I think so many people spend money to make themselves feel better. You know, if you're going for a stressful time, had a hard day, and then you might think I'm going to treat myself to. You know, suddenly I'm on ordering a new dress or new whatever it is on Amazon to get that instant kind of gratification. But it's being aware of doing that, and I find a lot of people suffer with that, and so I think what I say to people is actually have a little list of other things that make you feel good. It might be having a hot bath, going for a walk, facetiming a friend, and then when you go to spend money, you know, when you go to think, actually I'm a bit stressed on, find myself online shopping again, being, you know, saying actually no, I'm just going to add it to my basket and instead of buying it, I'm going to go for a walk, I'm going to go for FaceTiming a friend, and nine times that and 10 you'll come back to and be like no, you know, I don't need to spend that money. So just another little pointer.

Dr James, 17m 10s:

You know that's so true and that's so relatable and sure for lots of people here listening and I actually have an interest in belief system on money that when I was listening to you talk just then, I was just reflecting on how I perceive things and I like to think that I'm somebody who refines this and is conscious of it. But I can even see little instances where I was doing stuff like that and not even necessarily being aware. So, really interesting episode of Dennis Universe podcast. Anybody hasn't listened to it. We had a wealth hypnotist on yes, yes, this is a profession and, yes, it's incredibly valuable for the people that he helps, because you've often got these wealthy people for whatever reason, but they're spending a lot of money because their mindset is not the greatest Whenever it comes to money. So it helps them with that. And he said one thing to me. He said you know, james, until you work on this stuff, until you work on all the stuff that we're talking about just now, you're basically just a zombie to your subconscious. You're just paying out these little beliefs in your head and you don't even realize that you're doing it. Yeah, and here's the thing. It's not like you are or you aren't, like it's binary You're either a zombie or you're not a zombie. It's actually. To what degree are we a for things on the heat?

Jodie, 18m 21s:

That's interesting. Yeah, it's got all this stuff.

Dr James, 18m 23s:

And you know what? I was racking my brains when I was talking to him. There's got to be a better word than zombie. But then I was like you know what? I'm going to use the exact word that he used, because it just draws up all sorts of connotations in our head about being mindless and playing out this program. So I was like you know what, you know what, I'm going to roll with this word that he used, because it really struck me. What do you think about that?

Jodie, 18m 44s:

Yeah, I think it's so true and I think, unless we sit back and analyze our financial mistakes and patterns and how we actually you know how we've been managing money in the past and how are we going to make it better in the future and, like I kind of alluded to earlier, actually a lot of how we manage money is just because that's what we've seen in childhood and actually is that the right thing to be doing for you? Well, it might not be. You know, you might be living life like you earn 20 grand a year, but actually you have got more money and you can have money to invest or do other things with, but you're not, because you feel like you need all in cash sat there. So so many different elements of things. Unless you take notice of it and analyze yeah, like I said, your mistakes and your past, then how are you going to improve?

Dr James, 19m 25s:

I guess Love it we were talking about the psychology of money by Morgan House, or you and I, weren't we? I believe the other week Was that yourself and regardless. Have you read it? Have you read it?

Jodie, 19m 42s:

No, oh, okay.

Dr James, 19m 44s:

It was definitely somebody else in that case, but anyway. So yeah, psychology of money when it comes to Morgan House. So he's just pointing out that a lot of the times, the things that we think about money are not our own thoughts or thoughts that have been given to us by someone else and we haven't actually really questioned them. We just picked them up when we're young. Apparently, there's some sort of science behind this that when you're under seven, somebody in authority says something to you and they say it to you over and over again. It becomes your beliefs, it's literally adopted by your subconscious, and then what most of us don't do at any stage is ever really actually challenge those beliefs, because they're just really ingrained, because we don't even realize that they're there effectively. So how can you challenge something that has no form? How can you challenge something you don't even necessarily know exists or recognize in yourself? What he was saying was now, this is definitely by no means blanket advice or blanket information. This is by no means advice that everybody should take, but he was saying this. He was saying in our parents' generation, a lot of them made money through property. That was like the big thing, Like British, property prices in the 70s were so much closer as a multiple of your average wage. There was so much closer to that than, with time, they outpaced and outpaced and outpaced and what it meant was that a lot of people got wealthy through that asset, and that's why there's a lot of received ways to move around now which is like, hey, go invest in property, do this. And it's not say that we shouldn't invest in property. It's just to say that things like ISIS, which appeared in the last 20 years or so, are not part of that belief system. So therefore, there's like a 90% focus on doing on investing in property. That's being reinforced to us, which isn't actually fair in balance to how the landscape currently is, which is why a lot of people maybe are over invested in specific sectors over and above the other. But don't get me wrong, there's lots of people out there making loads of money in property. I'm not saying this is blanket advice, just to harken back to what I was saying a second ago, but all I'm saying is it's interesting and really we need to question the beliefs that are given to us. Really we need to question this logic, this information that we think emphasis on think is a universal law or a fact, because actually it's representative of this era, that we're no longer in an era gone by and does it necessarily still apply? And if so, or if not, how much does it still apply? To what degree does it still apply?

Jodie, 22m 2s:

And you really need to be able to question this stuff and challenge it and I think in my work, actually what you've just said there is, one of the most common things I've come across is people who are really successful, earning lots of money. Literally yesterday I was with one of them and I say how are you investing? How are you making it grow for your future and their property? Just property, that's it, nothing. No pensions, no investments. And actually for me it's educating them to know actually what you want in retirement is freedom and choices. So actually if you've got all your money and property and the property markets down, then you might have to sell it as a discount and also the taxes involved, and if you've got options of where you could pull the money from, you're in a lot better position. I think the two reasons why, like you touched on, is obviously that that used to be a given. That's how you earn money and pension freedom act and how you can manage pensions now is a lot different to our parents' generation and previous. But also, I think a big part of it is because people understand property. People understand it, so it's easy for them, so they think, right, buy a house, get some income from it and sell it later. So one of the reasons people don't then look at alternatives like you know, pensions, investments, ices, bonds is because they don't actually understand them. So for them, it's the easier and yeah, the easier route just to go down property. So, yeah, I think it's a really good point that you've made is that that's a very common misconception. It's just properties the way forward.

Dr James, 23m 28s:

It's cool, it's cool. And you know what we've got? Morgan House. All the thank you on that one.

Jodie, 23m 31s:

The author of psychology money, so it's such a cool point.

Dr James, 23m 37s:

Do you know what? By default, I pointed over there to say that it's over there behind me on my bookshelf, where I'm not in over now, and it's meant to be normally to find myself. It's a really, really, really good book. Actually. That's a real favorite of mine, for anybody who's listening, and definitely recommend it. And do you know what? Just to go back to my belief system on money and how I see things for me personally, I feel I really, really, really feel that there's seven billion people on this earth, and I think it's close to eight billion now perhaps I'm gonna have to fact check that one. I really think that there should be eight billion businesses on this earth as well, because when you own your own business, you see things from a totally different perspective and you know what. Business doesn't have to be this like sprawling empire. It can be some sort of coaching or something that you do on the side or something like that, and the reason I say that is because that's an asset in itself or it can be, at least with time and what it means is that you're diversified even further still. And what I didn't get away business for a long time was you know what's important actually, this is super interesting and now I'm really reflecting. I remember my dad when I was young and he used to say to me oh, if you go over to tits up your son basically James, you know your bankrupt and all of those things and I was like, oh, it sounds a little bit too risky for me. That's just not how it is. You can have one with virtually no overheads whatsoever, or certainly minimal ones. You can run one in such a low risk web it's an internet business, for example that actually the chance of you getting liquidated or the business going broke are incredibly slim and all of a sudden, as well as that, it opens up all these other doors and realms possibilities for you. So I've literally just learned that, reflecting just now.

Jodie, 25m 8s:

So there we go yeah, now it's very interesting and I'm similar to you. I went self-employed a year and a half ago, and before that I was always employed. And when I was making the leap to go self-employed, one of the biggest reasons I almost didn't is because my mum because she always, you know, brought us up. We didn't have very much money and was so cautious about, you know, making sure you're okay, and actually I had to really fight against that in me, you know.

Dr James, 25m 31s:

So it is, yeah, it's really interesting and there's always a really good analogy that I compare belief systems to, and it's this imagine if you were seven, if we go back to what I was saying earlier, and somebody told you that everything outside your house was lava, you probably would have believed them. Right now, the consequences of falling in the lava is obviously that you're dead. So they're pretty grave. So chances are you'd never go outside the front door of your house. You never actually open the front door. Walk outside and find out that that's not true. And beliefs are really like that because we limit ourselves, we never test them, because we just assume that they're a boundary, when in reality the only real way to actually break that boundary is to cross it and see what's on the other side. So if you're living in this zone where you want to stay in your comfort zone and you want to stay within this boundary of beliefs that you've created around yourself, and actually you can never find out whether they're true or not until you overcome that fear factor, so if you want to take that a layer deeper, actually we've got to realize that the fear should be there, the fear factor should be there, because that way we know that we're pushing a boundary yeah, and if you do the same thing over and over again, you're never going to improve results, are you?

Jodie, 26m 43s:

so it's actually doing something different and seeing how it is um, of course you've caught a corner balance.

Dr James, 26m 50s:

That doesn't apply in every instance, but there are lots of times where that's true, which is really interesting anyway, Judy listen. I've had, naturally, smashing time on this podcast today and it's been really fun, as I knew it would be at the very start. Have you got any parting words of wisdom that you'd like to leave with Dennis University audience with today?

Jodie, 27m 8s:

cool pressure. Um, I think, just, um, yeah, just. I think you know, taking it right the way back to start and, like we've kind of alluded to a few times, it's understanding why you manage your way, running the way you do and challenging yourself and thinking actually, is that in line with my goals? Is that going to, you know, help me achieve what I want to achieve? So, yeah, I'd say, if everyone has a little think about that, then hopefully that will help some people um, judy, thanks so much for your time today.

Dr James, 27m 36s:

I'm looking forward to having you back on the Dennis University podcast very soon.

Jodie, 27m 40s:

Much love and see you next time.