When it all feels like it’s crashing in …

The morning I shockingly discovered (omit any discussion) I was financially frozen out of all my money and all that I had been tirelessly working for, was right before heading to school for drop off. Fear intensely took over. Glacier still I stood, I was terrified to every inch. My life raced before me. F$%* my mind screeched and mapped!

How would I put petrol in my car to get them to school? Into … “This morning was groceries, how would I pay for that?” Another reality of my situation hit me head on, and at that very moment, while ever considerate of two sides to every story, I didn’t spare thought to an iota of  awareness to personal differences. I was plainly and simply frightened and my anxiety was officially now off the planet.

I told myself to … “Get it together and get them happily to school.” So I did.

The Australian Institute of Family Studies https://aifs.gov.au/ states categorically that …

“Divorce has a substantial and long lasting negative financial impact on women. Married women’s median wage increases, on average, at 4 times the rate of divorced women. It is extremely difficult for women to attain pre-divorce income levels”. It found that a staggering 61% of women found difficulty in paying bills during their first years of divorce. Why?

  https://www.forbes.com/sites/…/the-6-nasty-financial-surprises-for-divorcing-women/

In July 2018, Forbes,  the famous American business magazine,  published an online poll . This poll called “Building A Financial Fresh Start” was conducted by https://www.worthy.com/ and was responded to by almost 2000 women. It  found that 46% of the women who responded did not understand their marital dept; they underestimated child support or alimony, they thought they could keep the family home and found the staggering costs of healthcare, insurance and renting debilitating. Their single biggest fear, across the board, was how to live on their one wage.

When was the last time you allocated an hour of your time to sit down and look closely at your personal income and expenses?

Personally, my immediate fear was simply survival. Food and a roof over our heads. We had enough clothes to cover our backs. I had to let go of all my future financial plans and investments and be in the here and now. What did this mean for me day to day? Like right now. I had to let go of the future and truly be in the moment. I had to look at the money.

Your greatest money priority right now is that you need to know the figures. Good, bad or in my case which could be the same for you, just plain ugly! You need to know where you sit from week to week with your money. If this is something you have been avoiding, I strongly advise you face it front on right now.

Here’s a super simple non technical starting point to get you going. Grab a pen, a calculator, a piece of paper, 3 highlighters and your most recent bank statement. Draw two lines down the page. The headers for each columns are #1 Income; #2 Essentials to Survive and #3 Luxuries to Live. Go through your bank statement. Highlight in green your income. Highlight in yellow your Essentials to Survive items (e.g. food, rent/mortgage, petrol). Do the same with a pink highlighter for Luxuries to Live (e.g. eyebrow wax; craft items for your kids etc).

If there is anything you are unsure about, ask yourself and be honest with yourself and the answer …

“Can I survive and manage without this for a short period of time?’

Don’t get caught up spending too much time here and over thinking things. Be logical. You know what you and your kiddies need to simply get through each day. Highlight these things in yellow. The rest should be pink for now. Keep moving forward. Sure and steady steps to starting over remember.

Now, tally each of the 3 colours up, and write down the totals under the corresponding heading and have a close look. From here you can break break it down even further and itemize, but for now, we are simply making a start because …

Good, bad or ugly, you need to know where you sit from week to week with your money.

Constructively ask yourself these questions  …

• What do the numbers tell me about my spending?
• What do the numbers tell me about my earning?
• Which Essential to Survive items can I reduce the cost of?
• What Luxury to Live  items can I get rid of entirely for a short while or forever?

The one thing to do right now – get a handle on the figures. PLUS, maybe now is a good time to give some inner thought to how you currently live, what you can and can’t change. Things like that. Mediate on it. Pray about it.

What Luxury to Live item or items you have decided to do without for a wee while? Will you leave a comment below and let me know what you have decided and why?

Thank you so much for being here and for adding your perspective. Please share this post with someone you love, because it might help them forward to simply start over too. They can also easily sign up here for me to guide them along too, we would both love that.

Blessings, Hiddy xx

P.S. REMEMBER THAT FRIDAYS I AM LIVE ON INSTAGRAM  . I look forward to seeing you there this week on Friday 22/02/19 10am AEDT.

Photo of me by https://wandererandthewild.com/