Not Your Average Things To Do in Lockdown Blog….

IN order to keep you reading every item below is not your run of the mill things to do list...
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I wrote this off the back of Annie Kane putting the shout out to her broker reader group that she was going a bit Stir Crazy. I love how Annie, Editor of The Adviser was completely transparent and popped her email address in her recent request for help! What a brilliant lesson to ask for help. So in honour of you Annie, here are some things I think we can all be doing during lock downs to feel productive, or better about ourselves!

Create your Slush Fund account 

You know, if you do not have a slush fund for ALL of your weekly, fortnightly, monthly and annual bills how are you even adulting? This is by far one of the best things I ever did myself and it does away with budgeting and worrying about hard mail! All you do is create a list of all your bills and how much they are. Add it all up to an annual figure. Divide that figure by your pay cycle i.e. 26 for a fortnight or 52 for weekly. Stick that much in your slush fund every week, ask HR to transfer it directly there so it doesn’t even touch a spending account, and use it to pay all your bills. ​​That way you know the rest is available for saving or spending. Creating a slush fund account was one of the best things I ever did for myself emotionally. At all levels of my business and family’s growth I knew how much we needed every week in that account to pay the hard non optional bills and it gave me a lot of confidence in my capacity to be the main breadwinner for my family when that happened.

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Do some Badfuls

​Gratefulness is a wonderful thing and scientifically proven to result in increased levels of happiness. However, sometimes you just need to get things off your chest. I speak with my children about gratefulness a lot, however, my five-year-old Winnie this year, started sharing ‘Badfuls’ which are things she is still unhappy about that happened to her that day. I believe badfuls are a great lesson, they remind you to check in with your loved ones for empathy. Checking in on the phone with a friend that can express empathy for your ‘Badfuls’ may just help you get through the difficult times. Just remember to balance them out with some ‘gratefuls’ and listen to your friends badfuls too. Remember, if you're suffering and speaking to friends isn't enough, Lifeline are there to talk on 131114, they even have a texting service too now.

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Direct Debit Clean-up!

​You know back to my slush fund that I was just gloating about. If you have debits coming from five places; your credit card, your income account, your partners credit card, and some random other account, it can become a nightmare. Even when you apply for finance, this can slow down the process too as banks are scrutinizing expenses and management of your accounts. So, I recently moved every single DD to my slush fund. Now when I want to check if something was credited back, or was the prescribed amount, or to notify a lender or insurer of a change, I know which account it comes from or needs to come from. It’s simplified things. For instance, I cancelled my audible account TWICE, and they are still charging me. Because I only had to check one account, I noticed it was still being charged. Make a habit of checking it every couple of weeks to look for strange transactions. As it’s not mixed in to your spending account, the slush fund can help alert you faster to these types of things.

Oversupply JULY!

This is in no way in support of doing anything too crazy, this is about INTENTION. In 2016 I was doing a Dry July, after years of overwork I was burnt out, and I ended up in hospital with septicaemia and having my appendix cut out urgently. Of course, I was badful of Dry July and blamed it (I still do)! Whilst I realise that Dry July was not entirely to blame, it made me realise the pressure I was putting myself under was too intentional.  So I invented Oversupply July. I still support and sponsor others in Dry July, I just choose to raise Cancer money in May with the Biggest Morning Tea instead! Oversupply July is licence to intentionally drop my guard. It is a renourishing and regenerative effort to bunker down, enjoy the best of Winter, and laying low with Covid without all the guilt.  Oversupply July does not have to be reckless, it’s just an intentional relaxation of ALL of my rules for one month. Make your own month, if your body is craving a break, give yourself intentional relaxation time. 

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Tax Time

Trust a finance person to talk about tax. Yet, lets be tactical here. Right now your health fund, lenders and property managers are emailing you end of year statements, why not pop those straight in a file and email your accountant?
Also, a lot of you are required to have your taxes up to date for the best shot at lending, yet you dont know when that will be, how about give your tax agent a heads up and pop in their queue instead of being urgent later on? 
I am really excited to get my taxes done and focus on the next big job so get it out of the way now! If you finish something like this, it's a big tick off the life chore list and you'll feel like you got something done in lock down. Here is a handy checklist link i created six years ago when I was excited about taxes then too. As you can see, I'm excited about tax right at the start of the new financial year.