Beyond money
Welcome back to Mindful Money Week!
One of the ways we can make peace with money is by it taking a less prominent role in our lives, in moving beyond money.
We are all plugged into the external economy to a greater or lesser extent and its impact can be damaging and scary, emotionally and financially for families, especially in these turbulent times.
How can we make our families more resilient, so we can ride the economic rollercoaster with maximum joy and confidence?
The sustainable money circle
- know how much you have
- know how much you need
- know your skills
- know your networks
- know your value
- set up your income streams
- do your work
- collect your income
- use your income
- rest and reflect
The first thing I recommend is to ensure you have rainbow streams of abundance. This means multiple income streams, some may be major rivers, like a full or part time job, others might be smaller self employed contracts. This way if one dries up, you are not left high and dry.
The other thing is to try and make sure that some of your income is passive! This means that after your initial input of work to set it up, you don’t need to do much. It sells itself. Leaving your time and energy free to create something else: think books or affiliate links rather than one to one teaching…
However, we are still a money based society, and whilst we can focus on reducing our outgoings, and find alternatives to hard cash for other needs, total self-reliance and living off the economic grid is not a reality for most.
So what to do?
- Take your money out of the banks, and keep it safe yourself.
- Pay off your debts.
- Invest in your health.
These have traditionally been property, fine art and wines. However you can’t eat art if you need it, and burning it aint much use either! A lot of people have had their fingers burnt with property investment in the past few years. Investments that might be worth investigating for the next few years– both because their value will increase hugely – AND they will be products much in demand are:
- Forestry – preserves the forested land and so helps combat global warming and gives you land plus wood if needed.
- Land – preserves it from large scale development, and again provides space to build/ grow food on, if needed.
- Green technologies – solar, wind and wave – either micro generation for your own home ( but do research CAREFULLY and consult with advisers who do not stand to make money from you- all solar panels are neither Good not practical for all people). Or shares in green technology companies, though knowing which will be successful is always a gamble.
- Oil– shares (though ethically this is very tricky -does one invest money in a company like BP which is responsible for the destruction of the environment?), or barrels stored somewhere for your own personal use. One thing I can guarantee is that the price of petrol/ oil/ diesel will only go up in the next few years as demand gets higher and extraction harder.
- Seeds and tools for yourself and your family
- Education and health. For yourself, your family, your community. Both of these have high costs when they are not “implemented” early on, and are priceless for individuals and communities.
Or simply informal skill swaps amongst friends and the community: I paint your wall and you babysit for my kids.
This is part of the Mindful Money series at Dreaming Aloud. Take some time to check out the other posts on…
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.