I’m jumping on a trend here before it gets too big. It’s just so good that I can’t pass it up! It’s the “8 Investments That Changed Me as a Woman” post.
The idea is to put down the 8 things you’ve done, bought, or allowed yourself to have that have massively upleveled your life. (And yes, it’s “for women,” but you fellows may resonate to this list too!)
The list is materialistic because it’s about things we acquire. But it’s also a huge lesson in receiving.
As someone who practices Flowdreaming, I’m always thinking about what I want to manifest/make/create/have/be/do next. So this concept fits right in.
Here are my Top Eight.
1. Retreats for My Own Personal Joy, Creativity, and Wellness
It took me forever to allow myself to go on spiritual or creative holidays. I had so much resistance to it. For one, my husband would be upset that I didn’t invite him. For another thing, how can I justify spending the cash on myself like that, when I have no idea if there will be any “return on investment” for it?
I used to be so ridiculous about this. Sure, I’d take a regular vacation and not worry about “ justifying” it. But if I wanted to go off and do art for a week, or meditate for a weekend? Uh uh, that had to become a work expense or I’d find some other way to make it “ok.”
No more. Now I take one to two pure “me” trips each year. I choose things that I want to do or learn. I don’t invite anyone to go with me if I want to just be inside myself for the week. I’m not beholden to making anyone else happy when I gift myself these treasure weeks.
And you know what? These weeks infallibly end up cracking me open like a coconut. The point of these trips is to see what gets opened, exposed, or grown in me. I want to experience something that I don’t already know about myself.
These weeks accelerate my inner journey, which in the end, makes me far richer and more productive in my life. My well rarely goes dry as a result.
2. Great Housecleaning
When I was pregnant with my daughter, I remember leaning over the bathtub and realizing I couldn’t reach the bottom with the sponge. My belly was that big.
So I hired a housecleaner, and I never looked back. For years I skipped meals out and all kinds of other niceties so I could afford having my house cleaned. I knew that when I only had Saturday and Sunday off to be with my husband and kids, I didn’t want us spending one of those days cleaning baseboards. The thought of us spending only 4 days together a month made me cry. Not any more.
3. Good Shoes—Especially Boots
I don’t mean $5,000 fancy shmancy designer heels. I just mean good, cute shoes that fit my feet and are comfortable. I can’t tell you how often I’ve been tempted into cheapie shoes that I wear a few times then realize don’t fit right. And they sit there, sadly looking up at me from the closet floor for years because I hate giving away perfectly good, new shoes.
I stopped that. Now, I spend the bucks to get a few pairs of really good, well-made beautiful shoes—that fit.
What happens is that when I wear them, it doesn’t matter what the rest of my outfit looks like. I feel good, confident, and comfortable.
Your feet ground you. When your grounding is right, you carry yourself with ease.
Good shoes ease up my insecurity when I’m in a room full of strangers. Good shoes make me feel confident when I’m out with the girls on a Friday night. Good shoes are important.
4. Ok, this one is on a lot of people’s lists, and rightfully so: high-end coaching
This is another one that took me way too long to get. Not only was I not ready inside myself, but I just didn’t get it.
I didn’t get that this is how networks of successful people come together. It took me years to realize that people swim in schools, like fish. Migrating from one school of fish to the next takes effort. For a while, you’re in the deep empty water between schools. You don’t know who you are.
But if you choose the right new school to be part of, then you grow. My oh my how you grow! And you accelerate.
What would have taken you five years to learn now takes just one. But you have to be smart and fearless to recognize this, especially if you’re thinking of plopping down $5,000 – $50,000 a year for it. Gulp. Oh yes. Good coaches are costly, because their time is at a premium. They’re willing to spend that time with you and say, “Copy me.”
Mentors, apprenticeships and interning all follow this model. But with coaching, there’s an implicit promise that your coach is going to look out for you, encourage you, and demonstrate to you exactly what you need to do to create the same success your coach has created.
(And yes, I am a “coach.” My students learn how to spin amazing lives from practically nothing, like Rumpelstiltskin spinning straw into gold. I teach this because I do this. Here’s the link to my coaching program, if you’re interested.)
5. Things I Believe In
Ok, this is broad. But I believe in rescuing and spaying/neutering homeless animals. I believe it’s good for my kids to sponsor other children in developing nations. I believe it’s good to buy up land for wildlife habitat. I believe it’s good to create mobile clinics and teach and train health care workers in poor countries across the world. If I believe in these things, I should put my money where my belief is.
I know, there’s no real “payoff” for me. But in way…there is. For instance, my kids know that they are the ones directly sponsoring the child. I want them to grow up with this understanding of how we should behave.
I know that I have helped some fearful mother when her child had a high fever, and that some scared lonely animal is getting a good meal.
And I also know that I’ve let go of that lack-feeling that used to tell me that I don’t have the luxury to give up my cash. That lack feeling said, “You don’t have enough. Wait until you have enough.”
Except that even when I got more money, the feeling never went away. That’s when I realized I’d never outpace it. I had to change my attitude toward it. So I began donating, even little bits.
And now I escalate up what I give in accordance to what I get. I’m never feeling lack anymore. And when I don’t feel lack, I don’t create lack. Win-win.
6. Raised Gardens of Healthy Veggies
My raised gardens are my moments of Zen. I have a continuous wheel of tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, eggplant, parsley, and squash in rotation. My husband and kids trot out to the garden all through the day to pick the food they then eat. They’re connected with knowing that carrots come from dirt, they don’t just “appear” by magic on frigid grocery store shelves. This is the basis of all our good health in the house.
I invest in this because I eat better, fresher foods more often. As a woman, I’m connected to my inner Green Goddess.
7. My Expansion
This is different than going on retreats. This category covers lots of little things. It covers the books I buy and the classes I attend. It covers seeing therapists, healers, and intuitives if I want to.
Investing in “my expansion” means that if I consider buying something, I’m asking myself if it will somehow grow me. If it grows me, then I know it’ll grow my family. If it grows all of us, then we give something better to the world.
So this year, my expansion has included putting on a Mastermind Retreat at a gorgeous spa for me and my M.E. School students. It’s included investing in a set of Tibetan singing bowls. It’s included a number of Vedic astrology readings and Indian yagnis. It’s included so many books I can’t list them all.
Yes, you could say this is my hobby. But this has also changed me as a women. These investments take my limitations away. They dismantle feelings that I have to earn these things before I can have them, because I’m not good enough/rich enough already. No one is telling me I can’t have that. If it’s something that expands me, it’s going to enrich me somehow down the line.
This has proven itself to me over and over.
8. My Retirement Funds
So you’ve probably guessed by how boring my list is that I’m a Virgo. Otherwise, my list would be full of cocktail dresses and exotic trips!
But no, Number 8 rounds up at my retirement funds. When I was 20 my mom came into some cash and bought me a small annuity that I’m not allowed to touch until I’m 59 ½. She did this because, after multiple divorces herself, she didn’t ever want me staring in the scary face of an empty account as an old woman.
Scroll ahead a few decades….and god am I grateful she did that for me. Even if I’d never met the success I now have, I’ve been able to maintain a sense of security all these years. You see, I myself began adding to that account that very same year. No matter what I had to scrape together, I did it.
As women, we particularly know the feeling of not being able to leave situations and feeling trapped. I was able to sidestep that fear. Even when I lived on less than $12,000 a year in my early 20s, I always knew that I could earn my own way, and all I had to do was look at the far-away retirement account to know that I would be ok, always. As I held that feeling that I was safe no matter what, I of course manifested more of that in my life as well. What you are, you create.
Investing also taught me patience. It taught me buy-and-hold. It taught me how to sell at a loss and take a punch. It taught me about compound returns. I use all of these concepts in Flowdreaming. I’m always teaching about knowing when to hold, and when to let go. I’m always preaching about the effects of allowing your Flowdreaming investment to “accrue.”
Buying stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and annuities absolutely changed me as a woman. It created a knowing in me that I am absolutely good with money, and I never need to fear its lack.
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There’s so much more than could easily go on this list. And yes, like I warned you, the list is materialistic. It’s meant to be. That’s the point.
Because ultimately what you buy is what you believe in. It absolutely pinpoints what you value. Look at your expenses for last month. See the dinners out? The coffees or soft drinks? The movies you rent? These things are all important enough to you that you spent your energy on them. Because that’s all money is: an exchange of energy that someone valued into dollars, pounds, euros or pesos.
Now let’s share some ideas with each other: What have you bought that’s truly changed you, as a man or a woman? Post one or two things below.
This post was inspired by:
http://stephaniesynclair.com/8-investments-that-changed-me-as-a-woman/
http://tonyaleigh.com/8-investments-that-changed-me-as-a-woman/
