Breaks
I have not created content over the last two weeks, and it has been amazing for my head.
This post is 1,449 words, a 6-minute read. Enjoy!
Creating money content regularly, I can easily trend towards nihilism. In the post I will release next week, I was in one of my nihilist phases (subscribe so you don't miss it).
I accepted my darker inclinations and beliefs about money. I embraced the anxiety and panic that money can induce. As you know, I struggle with financial comparison. In my nihilist state, I drifted back into my old mentalities. I stopped focusing on my own goals and my own path. I focused only on the accomplishments or lack of accomplishments of other people as a way to either make myself feel better or worse, depending on the person.
To get out of this mindset, I did the only thing I knew to do which was to Pray, Fast, and to hit the escape hatch. Hence my necessary break over the last few weeks.
The first week of the break my church was also doing a week of prayer and fasting (an awesome time). I was able to join in community with others in prayer and worship.
The following week, I took a last-minute work trip. It completely changed my routine. I worked from sunup till sundown. It gave me no time to do all my regular news reading or social media scrolling. I embraced the extra time away from the day-to-day static, that I had grown accustomed to hearing. For the first time in a while, it sounded silent between my ears.
During the break, I stopped doing all the things I told myself I enjoy doing. I needed to take a moment to see if I still enjoyed doing these things or I was doing them out of habit. I needed to determine if the things I was doing were actually part of the reason for the excess stress and my nihilistic tendency. Most importantly, it was for me to determine if they were sucking up time that I could be using to do nothing.
Is two weeks enough time to make this review? Probably not but I felt like sharing where I currently am as I still try to figure out things.
💵💸Tracking Expenses and Over Budgeting
One of the biggest decisions I made during my break was to delete all my financial apps on my phone. I did not log into Monarch (the greatest money tracking and planning app). I only logged into my banking or credit card apps if I absolutely needed to.
😎😊Takeaway: There are some apps that do not need to be on my phone. As much as I enjoy being in Monarch Money all day erryday. The time I was spending in Monarch Money was not just because I enjoyed categorizing things. It was also because I was overbudgeting. I had been over-saving and was regularly in the red. Which added to the stress of me being in Monarch trying to find ways to reduce expenses when I already don't spend that much. By adjusting my savings, it allows me to take a bit more hands off approach with my finances and free me to actually live life.
📲🤳🏾Social Media
I have always had a love-hate relationship with social media. Recently, it has been a lot more hate than love. Social media has been great in connecting me with some great folks and learning a ton from people. (You know when someone says something nice, they are about to say something harsh.)
However, social media turned into a burden for me. I turned it from something fun and loose, into a second job, one that I hated. A job that I never get paid for and hardly get any feedback on. I felt like I was shouting in the middle of the ocean except I was underwater so absolutely no one would hear me as I drowned.
The irony is people actually respond to my content. I was just wanted hungry for more and was comparing myself to friends that had good success on their content and were able to translate that into an income.
During the break, I was able to get a different perspective on creating.
The ideas never stopped.
I could not stop thinking about how to communicate about money in interesting and different ways. I was still coming up with scripts for various personal finance topics.
I also got new things that I felt was not being talked about like Insurance (I hate talking about insurance but need to do it more cause people getting taken advantage of).
Accept where social and life position currently is.
I realized I was comparing my content output as a solo creator who edits and post everything himself to others who have an entire staff helping with creating content
I was comparing my zero-budget effort with business budget creators
I am comparing my 2 Job having self with folks that have far more flexibility in their life.
I am comparing myself to 2020 and 2021 when I was home 24/7 and had all the time to create content nonstop
🥳🙂Takeaway: As amazing as making money from content creation would be. It does not have to become an income producing thing. It can create as I have the ability and time to do it. I never wanted it to be my full-time thing anyway. Stop looking at other people's success. Celebrate with them and keep it moving.
📝✍🏾Writing
I will never stop writing. Of all the things I took a break from doing, this was the most painful to stop. I love this so much. The ease of being able to just sit down and create from my mind and not have to deal with having to set up anything is just AWESOME! It is a great alternative to making videos.
Takeaway: The break just made me realize how much I enjoy putting my thoughts on paper. However, the break gave me a chance to read not to make content on but just to read. Which is how ideas are formed for the future.
🗞️📰Reading Blogs and Newsletters, Listening to Podcasts, Watching YouTube
As much as I love staying up to date with everything that is happening in the world. Especially in the world of finance, it can get overwhelming. I was subscribed to over 30 newsletters or blogs and 104 podcasts. About half of these are daily newsletters and 75% of the podcasts are daily or multiple times a week.
The information from these podcasts is not always useful or interesting. Unfortunately for someone like me, who has a desire to know everything. I hate missing parts of things because I might miss a life changing insight. Also, I have a completionist mindset. This adds unnecessary stress on myself to catch up and never miss an episode.
🤷🏾♂️Takeaway: The break made me realize; I could miss things, and it was OKAY. I have begun the art of scanning to see if something might be interesting rather than reading every word of a newsletter. I also began reading show notes of episode of podcasts from the podcasts I absolutely love. The other podcast only gets listened to if I have the time or I am bored or I want to learn a specific topic.
🙏🏾🤲🏾The Biggest Takeaway
It is one thing to stop doing things, but I had to be very mindful of the things I replaced that time with. Or even more importantly accepting doing nothing as a perfectly acceptable state. I realized the importance of rest in more than one way.
The most important way that I rediscovered rest is for me to REST IN THE PEACE OF GOD! I was able to rediscover the beauty of walking with God and staying in His presence. Spending time listening to and reading His Word, the Bible, and just talking with Him (praying); issued me into a state of Calm and Joy that I had been missing for a while. It reaffirmed what I had known to be true but had chosen not to do. Making time for Him has to be my number 1 priority if everything else is to go right. The funny part is I used to view it as "work", but I am realizing that is the ultimate place of REST!
If you made it this far, thank you for reading. You are a REAL ONE! It means the world to me that you would spend your most valuable asset (time) on me. If you think a friends might enjoy my ramblings as well, please share it. Otherwise, your time is more than enough for me. Thank you!
Remember Generosity is greater than greed.
God Bless You!
✌🏾