Breaking Down Barriers: Live Coaching for Financial Freedom with Elisa Boogaerts

FN Intro/Outro: Welcome to the Freedom Nation podcast with Jeff Kikel. On this show, Jeff shares his expertise in financial and retirement planning from a different perspective. Planning for Your Freedom Day, which is the first day that you wake up and have enough income or assets and do not have to go to work that day. Learn how to calculate what you need, how to generate income sources, and listen to interviews from others who've done it themselves, get ready to experience your own Freedom Day.

Hey, Freedom Nation. It's Jeff here once again. And it is the final episode of our Potter Palooza featured podcaster episodes. And I get to spend some time with my friend Elisa. And she is one of you. She's out there. She's slugging it out in the cubicle every day. And she's already built her plan on how to get out and build her Freedom Day, we're gonna do something different that I've never done on the show before. And it's for you guys. We're gonna actually do a live coaching session with her. And we're going to walk her through in her own world, what it's going to take her to get her Freedom Day. So how are you my friend?

I'm so excited.

Are you ready?

I can't wait. I can't wait.

Yeah, you're gonna we're gonna bank through this. Thank you. So Alisa, when we're talking about your situation, so explain to me or explain to the audience a little bit about where you're at currently, with your your freedom, nice story.

So I have been working in the corporate world for over 20 years, I want to say, what, 23 years. And the beginning, I didn't know what I wanted to do. And then I kind of stumbled into project management that really fit my skill set well. So it became easy for me, and, and therefore I've done well at it. And I've kind of worked my way up the corporate ladder, and you know, been getting promotions. And now I'm in this position at this. It's called a staff. So it's like the level above senior technical program manager. And sometimes I think, how did that happen? I don't feel like what did I to the senior role? I'm not really that technical. And I was I was a project manager. So anyway, and so yeah, so I'm working full time. I about two and a half years ago? Well, actually, yeah, I guess it was 2020. Like when COVID hit is when I decided I was introduced to coaching in like, 2013, about 10 years ago, but I put it on the back burner, because my project management career took Oh, yeah. And then COVID hit and I realized that, like when I saw I lived abroad and moved back to Vancouver, and I realized that I had in three and a half years, I worked in four different companies. And I was miserable. And I realized, like, you know what, it's not the people. It's not the company. It's the job. Yeah, it's the job. And then I was like getting COVID hit. And I was like, oh, yeah, the coaching things. And I was gonna have some time and space, everybody had time and space. Sure. And since then, I've gotten four different certifications, coaching certifications, and witness two years ago, and been working towards my freedom day. And I am like, I feel like I'm this close to getting there, which is kind of where we are today.

Okay, so let's walk through the process now of figuring out when your freedom day is going to be so the first step in the process, what you want to do is you want to build a budget for yourself. So you need to understand what money's coming in money's going out on a monthly basis. And then from there, you want to break out what it is, yeah, basically what it takes to run your life on a day to day basis. So it's not vacations and all that kind of stuff. It's really, you know, this is the base needs that we have. And that's what we call our MRI. So when you were starting this process a couple of years ago, had you gone through that those steps as your and do you know what your MRI is today?

Yes, I definitely did some budgeting. And I know so I guess my mindset is that I would love to be able to maintain the lifestyle I have now maybe cut back on a few sort of like, furious things that I don't need. And that's kind of the budget that I've come to perfect.

So that's, you know, when you know that number, it's a less scary number than when you try and go well, I need to replace my income and I need to you know, I need to replace what I'm making is my income now. Well, okay, that's a big scary number. But it's not a big scary number. When you break it into well, I only really need to make four or five grand a month to do this. It's really not that hard. And you can then back into well, if I'm doing stuff, I just need to get to that point. Yeah, just get that number on a consistent basis. So that'll be your first time

My friends and family about back they're like look at your salary why Would you leave that shows? It's, it's you kidding, look at this than that. Yeah, you know, and I do think that I'm required to, to get to that number as an entrepreneur that might take a while. Yeah, you're right, I can just break it down to five grand,

And break it down into a less scary number, which is your MRI. Okay. Now, once I get to that, and we'll talk about that in a minute. Once I get to that, it's not a big scary number. It's really, I mean, most people's lives, it's not a big scary number, if you just break it down to well, I just need to make this per month. How can I do that? Okay, I sell coaching programs, maybe a couple coaching programs a month, and I'm there at that point. Yeah, the other part of that is, when you're an entrepreneur, and you're earning for yourself, taxes are a little bit different. Now, they may be different in Canada and the United States, you know, we work and we get taxed. And then we get to keep whatever's left over for our expenses. As a business owner, at least in the United States, I'm not sure in Canada, but at least in the United States, I earn money, I get to take all my expenses out, and then I pay tax on whatever's left over at that point. So it reduces my income a little bit. So I'm not sure about Canada, but the same, usually there's some rule around that, because they want to encourage business people. So it changes your world because you pay less taxes as a result of that. And you can expense more thanks. So step two, this is something you may not have done yet. Because this is something that's a little bit different, is you need to build a bucket list. And that bucket list should include places you want to go, the obvious things are places I want to go and things I want to buy. But you want to what I would suggest is you focus on 10 things in 10 categories. So first of which is places you want to go. That's the easy one, that's usually the one people can fill up quick things you want to buy goals that you want to accomplish, and maybe I want to be debt free. And maybe, you know, I've maybe I want to save X amount of dollars, or I want to buy my first rental house or whatever that is relationships you want to improve or things with relationships, health issues, mental issues, or mental things, learning that I want to do. activities that I want to accomplish. And I'll give you the example was one of mine was I I've always wanted to learn how to play guitar. And my friend Jim Cathcart got me really excited about playing guitar. He's been playing for a bazillion years. And I wanted to learn and I set a goal for myself. I wanted to learn how to play guitar. I wanted to learn how to play my favorite song. It's a very specific play my favorite song on the guitar, online show everybody that could do it. So all right, what do I need to do I need to learn how to play guitar, I need to learn how to play my favorite song, I probably need to buy a guitar. In that process. It's so there's something that we can do. You're going to take three things off of that list that you just absolutely want to do. And for the next six months, focus on those. Okay, make sense?

Yeah.

All right. Next step in the process, you've already got a side hustle. So we're REITs you're already retraining your brain by creating a coaching practice at this point. What I want you to do is, for the next six months, anything you make in the coaching practice, apply that first to those three things that you got there. That though now, you're rewarding yourself for retraining your brain. Oh, I'm done. I've heard. So number four. Step number four is debt. So do you have any outstanding debt at this point?

I do not, I did not.

Now you get to skip to VHS, you get the past.

And I paid it off in the last few years.

Good for you. So now that you're already passed that to step number five, at this point, which is now we need to start converting some of your income because we're focusing on cash flow here. The difference with most investment people is they want you to save massive amounts of money and invest and then you'll use that to make money from here we want to develop passive income streams. So in your business, you're coaching, are you doing anything in your business now? That could be passive income.

Lateral really have that much passive income. Okay, to be honest, I am just starting to get into like affiliates, which is kind of helping,

Okay, yep. Absolutely. I think we had talked before to or were you not considering building a course to

Yes, I have considered so I have like a six week program, but that's still like me coaching a group. Okay, so I don't know if that's gonna pass them can still using my time? Well,

It's still done. Yeah uses your time. But you know what I would look at. And this is something I had to do in my own world, because I'm kind of expensive to work with, you know, individually, you know, it's, there's only one of me and it's hard for you, I just can't scale it from that point. So I had to start developing a course, because there's some people that just aren't there yet, with getting ready to work with me, they wouldn't be great clients up front and less, I actually train them kind of get them going that way. So I developed a course that will be coming out that kind of handles the clients that aren't quite there yet. But trains them in my language and my what I do everything else, and can make, you know, can make them good clients down the road are good people to work with me individually. But I get to serve more people as a result. Right? Yeah. So that's kind of the phase you're at now. Because you're already boom, you've blown through me need to get the bucket list and focus on some of that. But now you're ready to really start focusing on okay, what can I do? You know, what possible ways can I do this? Can I write a book? Can I create a program, you know, whatever it is, you want to start developing that passive income. And courses are easy to do. It's quick, it's you know, something you can bang out, books are relatively easy to do, you can get that stuff done a buck actually good for you. Okay, boom. So that's a start, you market that now. And that could even be the beginning of your funnel to say, okay, the book, then there's the kind of done that, do it yourself. And then you become kind of the do it with me, side of it. That's your marketing funnel. So great thoughts. You're moving in that direction. Now, you want to start looking at, when can I get to my Freedom Day. So your freedom day is going to come when you have 125% of your minimum required income that's coming in on a consistent basis. So you don't want to have it? Yeah, then no, no. Job. Yeah. Well, then you wake up that the morning that you have 125% consistently. You woke up that morning, and if you went to work, you went to work because you wanted to not because you had to at that point, so it becomes a whole different relationship with work. But at this point, it's like I don't have the stress of money on my neck at that point. We reach step seven then which is to quit or not to quit. Now how do you feel about your job now? You may want not want to say this out in public but how do you feel about your career at this point?

Not loving anymore? Yeah.

It's for you, it's like okay, I'm good at it. But I don't necessarily like it. Yeah,

My passion i The difference is amazing. When I do my coaching, how much energy I get out of it. Yeah. Even today doing these podcasts I get to talk about all day long and bottle Palooza different interviews, and I'm just I'm buzzing buzz.

I joke by my previous interview, I was telling her I watch a show on on Motor Trend. And they always talk about best day at work ever. And I'm like, this was best day work ever. Because I'm like, You know what, I have enough income from my businesses and everything else that I could take an entire day off of work and just do podcast interviews all day and get to meet all these incredibly cool people. It's the best day at work ever. So that I can see the smile on your face when you when you talk about that. You want this to be your best day at work ever get out and and I think you know for you, it's going to come down to the day you reach your freedom day is going to be that decision day to say you know what, all the benefits and all that other stuff that that I get from this great job are just not worth it. And I just want to spend more time doing what I truly love. The beauty of it is you're gonna have more time to do what you love. And you'll get to do that every day. And you'll make more money as a result of it because you do love what you do. Wow.

Yeah, that's what I'm kind of noticing now that kind of balance the two to generate enough income to add all those hours it takes on top of the 40 hours I'm already doing Yeah, two years of trying to do that into it.

It's exhausting, man. But But know that there's, there's a light at the end of the tunnel and it's not an oncoming train and you just, you know, the more that you can start to shift and I think you're starting to see that. Okay, there's only so much scalability if you're doing Don't just personal individual consulting or coaching, you're always going to be, you're basically going to be limited by the amount of time that you have. So the more ways that you can look at other things that will generate that passive income, it's going to take a lot of the weight off of you. And you can be a lot more selective with the clients that you choose to work with. You know, today, I'm very, very selective, and I only really work with a very select group of clients that fit, I'm the only one that can do some of this stuff for them. So, you know, I'm the source of this, and I'm the only one that can really do this stuff. So they're the Perry, they're the perfect people, everybody else can pretty much be taken care of by other things throughout the system that I do. So that's kind of where you are, where you're at. I mean, you're, you're closer to the end than you are the beginning. Amazing. The final step in the process is, once you've reached that, go, no go, you're gonna start to live the Freedom Day lifestyle, and the Freedom Day lifestyle means you're not stuck in any one place, you can work anywhere in the world. You can do whatever you want. So some days, you're gonna wake up, and if you don't have appointments that day, it's I'm done, you know, I can go do something else. If PATA Palooza pops up and you have the opportunity to interview, you know, eight people on your podcast over a day, you do it. And I still have enough money coming in. I don't have to worry about that. Because I've got multiple multiple revenue sources coming in. So you always want to be looking at what else can I do? If I've got one of my revenue sources up and running? What else can I do? What else can I do and some of them may make 1000 bucks, some of them may make four or $5,000. It's just starting to build more and more revenue sources. And that's going to be your ongoing thing that you'll do throughout the years. And it might be things that are you know, okay, I want to invest in real estate now. Okay, great. I need to learn about that. And I need to do this type of stuff. So what I would tell you is, you are way closer to the end than the beginning. You've done a lot of the right stuff. I think now you get to do the fun stuff you got out of debt. So that, you know, that made it life huge. You've already got your side hustle. Yeah,

Yeah. I wanted to ask though, I after getting out of debt and having the side hustle, I've been able to save enough money. Yeah, that if say I did quit today, and I didn't have any revenue, I could still live with that step one budget. Yeah, here. Yep. So is it? Would it like, does that give me enough to do to quit and do the freedom lifestyle? Or shall I still have to wait till I'm making the revenue, and just

I would, I would make sure you're getting really, really close to the freedom, I would make sure you get at least close to the 125% of consistent revenue. It may not be all passive income. It may be Hey, I've got to go hustle and steal. I'm coaching. But I know every month, I can count on three to 4000. And then maybe my my little other things that I've got going generate another 1000 or so. Okay, I'm okay. Because I know I'm going to be out. I'm not going to just stop and not work. And I've got a fallback position. It's just a lot of people are like, Okay, well, I am ready to go at this point. And they don't, they haven't really baked and I will tell you from my own personal situation, I had a really good savings. And I did not plan this very well. I've been the I've been basically the guinea pig for this whole system for the last 10 years. And I didn't plan this, I jumped off the deep end burn the ships of the shore or whatever the whatever the the, you know, whatever you want to say about it is I burned the ships at the shore and gate put myself in a situation where my goals of what I was gonna make didn't match what I was actually making. And I burned through a ton of savings. And really, I wasn't able to, you know, it took me years and years and years to build up so I would get it to where it's really close. And then knowing Hey, you know if I have to pull a few 1000 bucks out of savings here and there. I'm good. But it sounds to me like you're just super super super close at this point.

Thank you. I'm so excited for you don't get in it. Yeah, so So

Alisa, what other questions do you have at this point?

Things I'd be like I got some homework to do and I'm really excited to do that was the main question. I was like, Can lights my strategy was to build up the savings and live off the savings but I much yeah, that idea we get the revenue going first.

Well, it's it gets us out of that mindset because the problem is of the financial industry. Our fallback position is always well just save money. The problem is you save money but you're not thinking Getting in the terms of cash flow. And that's, that's where you get, that's where you can break yourself free faster is focus on cash flow. So what cash flow is coming in? Okay, if I'm close, I mean, like I said, if you're within a few $100 of your number, you're you're there because you've already saved money at this point. So focus on. Okay, how do I, how do I get there? Now I've got a fallback position where I know now I'm able to, you know, if something happens, or I have a bad month, you're not, you know, stressed, you know, okay, well, I can just pull from savings. This is my, this is my emergency fund.

Yeah.

I love it. I'm so excited for you. We'll have to keep up and make sure we get updates on your situation and all that and share that with the audience. Yeah, absolutely. All right. So now, before you leave, I want to go over the Fast Five questions with you. Are you ready? Yeah. All right. So number one, you wake up in the morning, your business is gone. You have 500 bucks laptop computer place to live food and clothing. What are you going to do first?

With the business card that does that mean that I know I have an income?

Yeah, that's correct. Well,

I was looking for new jobs. That's probably that I would get on the left. I'm like, oh,

yeah, we'll find a new job. But what else would you do? I mean, how do you get yourself back to where you are today? Now,

if I put together a type of plan, now a project manager by trade? Yep.

Build a plan. Go for there. Yeah. I love it. Yeah. What's the biggest business mistake you've ever made?

Was actually like, What did my walk my my self confidence book was I created my confidence method, my signature system, I created this 90 Day program. But I did it without trying to sell it first. Okay, no, I built it. But they did not come about it. And so I spent all this time building this amazing program, which I was lucky enough to be able to put into a book and I'm going to use, but

Yeah, yeah, sometimes. Yeah. As entrepreneurs, yeah, well, just, yeah, I'll build this beautiful thing that everybody wants, and nobody seemed to want it. It's amazing. I did that recently, I broke my rule recently, and created a course of how to write a book using AI and then tried to sell it and could not sell it at all. Now I'm like, I don't get it. Just don't get what's a good book that you would recommend for our audience?

I love a book. Actually, I haven't here. It's from Jonathan fields. It's called sparks spirit. And this is all about and it says discover your unique imprint for work that makes you come alive. Okay, so through this, you can really find out what makes you come alive and how you can apply it to whatever, mark you. It's amazing. Mark, he's great. Jonathan field.

I love this. Okay, what's a tool that you use in your business every day that you might recommend?

Notion

Ooh, it's a new one. Like

I use it as like a task list. But as you can do notes in there, you can make like project plans, you can even do kind of like a little board of the tasks and like workflow is done. And

Wow, it's great. It is the project manager in us coming out. All right, final question, what is your definition of freedom?

I would say like stealing my life, the word I want. And like what I want to do, and allowing that to just like, evolve and change as they come. You know,

I love it. I love it. Well, thank you so much for being on today, I and thank you for sharing your life as we went through that, that eight step process. So I appreciate you being a good sport. And going through that, and sharing where you're at. And I'm just so excited because you're so close. At this point, it's just going to be awesome. If I can help, please reach out to me, because I'm more than glad to help get you over that hump, and get you to all last days

I really appreciate the support and all the knowledge and the coaching that you gave me today's You are

welcome. So, folks, if this resonated with you, and you got to hear kind of what the the live version of Freedom Day method, give us an upvote click on this. Like it wherever you're at, you know, give us a five star or something like that, give us a comment if you like it, but I hope you really understand how the the eight steps of the Freedom Day method can be used. And I really appreciate our guests being able to share her story with us. We do these every week, twice a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays make sure you subscribe to the channel wherever you're at. And if this resonated with you, it probably resonates with your friends. So share it on your social media share with a friend. We want to make sure that we get this message out there. And thanks a lot. We'll see you guys back here the very next time

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