TBG Library: Your Journey to Financial Freedom

Published Dec 8, 2023, 8:00 AM

We know y'all love good books to add to your bookshelf and this week we’re back with another selection. Today I’m joined by Jamila Souffrant to hear all about her new book, Your Journey to Financial Freedom: A Step-by-Step Guide to Achieving Wealth and Happiness.

During our conversation, Jamila and I chatted about how our relationship with money is impacted by our childhoods, the 5 stages toward financial independence that she outlines in the book, how financial planning can contribute to our mental wellness, and how she made the decision to expand the work she started with the Journey to Launch podcast to write the book.

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Where to Find Jamila

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Grab your copy of Your Journey to Financial Freedom: A Step-by-Step Guide to Achieving Wealth and Happiness

Listen to the Journey to Launch podcast

 

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Our Production Team

Executive Producers: Dennison Bradford & Maya Cole Howard

Producers: Fredia Lucas & Ellice Ellis

Production Intern: Zariah Taylor

Welcome to the Therapy for Black Girls Podcast, a weekly conversation about mental health, personal development, and all the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves. I'm your host, Doctor Joy Harden Bradford, a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia. For more information or to find a therapist in your area, visit our website at Therapy for Blackgirls dot com. While I hope you love listening to and learning from the podcast, it is not meant to be a substitute for a relationship with a licensed mental health professional. Hey, y'all, thanks so much for joining me for another TVG library episodes. We'll get right into our conversation after a word from our sponsors introducing our new Therapy for Black Girls Holiday gift collection. Our new ensemble of drinkwaar totes, journals and sweaters were made to remind you of the importance of centering your mental health. Purchase your TVG gifts at Therapy for Blackgirls dot com slash shop. Happy holidays, y'all, remember to take good care and give good gifts. We know y'all love good books to add to your bookshelf. And this week we're back with another selection. Today, I'm joined by Jamila Souffran to hear all about her new book, Your Journey to Financial Freedom, a step by step guide to achieving wealth and happiness. During our conversation, Jamila and I chatted about how our relationship with money is impacted by our childhoods, the five stages toward financial independence that she outlines in the book, how financial planning can contribute to our mental wellness, and how she made the decision to expand the work she started with the Journey to Launch podcast to write the book. If something resonates with you while enjoying our conversation, please share with us using the hashtag TBG in session. Here's our conversation. Thank you so much for joining me today, Jamla. I'm so happy to have you here on Therapy for Black Girls.

Doctor Joyet. Is an honor to be here, so thank you for having me.

Yes, yes, we had a chance to chat for Journey to Launch a couple of years ago with our other sisters in podcasting, so it's glad.

To have you here.

So I want to hear a little bit of the community who may not know how did you actually get started in the financial independence space?

Yes, I got started out of necessity. I needed to find a way out of my current situation. So I was in my early thirties commuting from Brooklyn to New Jersey, and I had a really hard commute. It was an hour and a half each way, and I was pregnant with my first son. And while I was dealing with that for almost ten years, at that point, that commute and that grind going to work and I almost like just said, this is my life.

I have to deal with it.

But being pregnant and the commute taking double the amount of time this one night to get home, I said to myself, I cannot do this like this cannot be my life. I had all these dreams and aspirations of being free and not being tied to a cubicle or having a boss in my twenties. I thought big like that and didn't know how to make that come true. And I realized that I was stuck in this job, stuck in this commute, and money was the reason for that. I needed money to survive. I wanted to grow my family, and I just didn't know how I could do that without being rich, without having married rich, which wasn't the case my husband is a teacher without coming from myny It didn't come from money or without building a big business or winning the lottery.

None of those things were happening.

And so I googled when I got home and at work, how to quit my job, how to retire early, all these things.

I didn't know what I would find, but I'm sure a lot.

Of you know listeners can to agree or remember moments like that. And I found out about the fire movement, the financial independence retire early movement, which was sharing all these stories about regular people investing and saving their way to freedom. And it would take some time, depending on their income and what they.

Were able to do.

But I was inspired by hearing those stories, reading those stories, and said, I'm going to pursue financial independence for myself.

So one of the things that I really loved about the book, Jamila, is that you talk a lot about how your mother's experience and your early childhood experiences really impacted and informed your relationship with money. Can you share a little bit about that story and talk a little bit about how our relationship with money is actually formed?

Well, So we are, I like to s say, unmolded clay. When we are born into this world, and then there began to be hands that molded and those hands are our family, our culture, or upbringing, our surroundings. And so for me, I think being raised by a single mom who was only twenty when she had me, who we were born in Jamaica, so she's Jamaican and I was born in Jamaica. But like many immigrants, she had this opportunity to come to the United States, but she had to leave me behind because my papers weren't in at the time when her papers came in. And she made this bold move at twenty years old to do that, to come to a country she's never been, and literally worked her way from the bottom up in terms of she didn't have her education, but she got her associates, the bachelors and masters. And I was able to join her just under two years old after she left me for a few months, and I was always with her because she couldn't really afford childcare. And I just remember watching her and she didn't teach me money lessons, but it was imprinted on me how hard she worked and how much she strived for a better life, and how money was important in order to have a better life and education. Education was another thing that she instilled in me. And so I saw her working her way up through education through her jobs and realized that if I wanted to have some independence and to have stability, I needed to have money. And so I focused on education growing up. And then I also got my first job at fourteen years old and have been working ever since. And those were the things she instilled in me by watching her. And saving money again, I think as immigrant or people who don't have a lot of money, it's necessary to be able to save something from the dollar you make. And that stayed with me up until I graduated college. And it was actually saving money that put me in the position to do some of the things that I've done so far. But it was learning how to invest money and learning about compounding interest and business that allowed me to really take my journey to the next level.

And what would you say about how other peop people's relationship with money is formed? Like what kinds of things might we even look to in our own past to talk about how we think about money?

Right, so we can look at it as was money discussed growing up or avoided in your household? Was it something that triggered arguments or something that people ignored right, And I think if you can look to how your parents or your family viewed money, how they handled money or the lack of handling money, whether you saw it or not, but it informed your surroundings, how comfortable you.

Were or not, then that usually.

Leaves an imprint on how we deal with money, whether we avoided or if we lean into it. I talk about being a saver a lot in my early years and how that helped me so much, But in some areas of my life I've seen how it's actually not as helpful to have a saver's mindset where I don't lean into spending what I have in order to enjoy myself.

I've since learned to let that go.

But you know, if you grew up where you didn't have a lot of money and you had to save every penny, you can either grow up to simulate that even if you have stability or feel like you are almost pushing against that and saying I'm going to enjoy my money, even if it's at a detriment to your current financial situation. So I always talk about the journey to financial independence is an outward one in many respects, because you have to do all these things, you know, earn money, optimize your expenses, invest save, But it's really an internal journey. Honestly, it's like the mindset, it's the habits. It's uncovering why we handle money or avoid money in the ways that we do.

So do you have any suggestions for those of us? I know you're a mom, I'm a mom for people who are parents or caretaking or caregiving for children, what kinds of things can we do to instill like good money habits and like people being comfortable with money even as children.

I think talking about money is important with your family. And if you grew up in a culture or an environment where you didn't like the young people couldn't ask questions or you know, you couldn't talk about salary, which I understand because you know, little kids, they have a tendency to share too much information with the outside world. But you know, growing up and allowing your children to discuss money, so my kids they'll be like, how much money do you make?

Or how much money do we have?

And that might sometimes feel like, wait a second, that's initially that's none of your business. I know that a lot of older people in my family told me that a lot. But with my family, with my kids, it is their business. They need to understand that the money or the things they ask for there is a trade off in order to be able to give them that, and so I don't do it from a place of lack or scarcity.

I try not to.

So it's not that I can't get this because I don't have the money, it's I am not buying that for you because that's not something that we are prioritizing right now, or if we do that, we cannot do this because we are working towards dis goal as a family. So I think it's being open and honest that it's not necessarily that you are broke, like even if you don't have a lot of money at the moment or in the time that your child is asking you about something, but explaining we have money, but it's for this reason. It's to pay our rent or mortgage, and having those open conversations. The other thing I think is really important for kids is that we live in a society now everything's instant. Money is invisible a lot to them because they don't see it where they don't really handle it as much as we did growing up because just order it online with the click of a button, or you know, nowadays you could just hold your phone over at the register to pay for an item. And so if your kids are watching, everything just seems, oh, like it's magic. You know what money like this is it's infinite, and you do want them to have a sense of that abundance when it comes to money. But realizing that a lot of them don't touch it, don't see it, don't understand the value of a dollar, and start talking to them about that is really important. And you can do it as early as you want. It's never too early to start or too late. That's the other thing I get from parents, where all right, that's fine for maybe kids under time, but my kids is already sixteen and we never had these conversations. I'm like, it's never too late to start and open up those communication lines.

You know. That is so funny to me, Like I had never thought about that. But you know, my son will often want to like use the phone to pay, like when we're in the store, right, and it's like, oh, this is like a thing for them to do. But I hadn't even thought about connecting that to the fact that they don't really see money until it's like time for the tooth theory, or like if their grandparents give them money. So would you suggest we start like actually getting them more familiar with having actual cash and coins.

Yes, so this takes a bit of planning, but not really. I actually got this suggestion from someone else because I was struggling with the whole allowance and having enough cash on hand to give it to them, and they were like, just go to the bank and take out you know, whatever amount of money, let's say it's one hundred or fifty dollars, and put it in singles or small denominations so you have it on hand.

For the month or moving forward.

So you don't have to go to the every week or every day, but you take out a summer money it's singles, and then you're able to divvy out to your kids the singles or money so they have it and they can touch it and feel it and save up for it in their own way.

The other advice I would give is that you know, kids just like us.

When it came time for me to invest in my early twenties, when they came to me and I got my job and they said, you.

Know, you're four, oh, one K, you should contribute to it.

I was like, why, you know who cares about like the six year old Jamila, I want my money now. And kids they're just the same. So when we talk about money and trying to really give them these lessons, sometimes they don't want to hear it in the way we relate it because it's not interesting to them. But you know what's interesting to my kids pokemons and Roebucks and so all these things that they care about that now. My son just asked me the other day can I buy him skins or something on for Fortnite? And he just got money from his aunt and I said, well, okay, I can take that money you got from your aunt.

That's how much it will cost.

I was like, but you know, you said you want a Pokemon cards and so I can spend twenty dollars on this, or we can save up to get that big Pokemon pack that you want, and so talking about it in.

That way, he was like, oh, and he thought twice.

Instead of just saying I'm just gonna spend it, he thought twice about which one he valued more, And if you wanted to save up for something bigger or use it in the moment.

I love that. I love that. Thank you for those tips. I'll definitely be trying to practice some of that with my own little ones. So you already have a wildly successful podcast journey to launch, and now you have launched your first book. What let you know that it was time to expand the journey to launch universe with a book?

Oh, I love that the universe?

Yes.

Well, honestly, I always knew that I would want to write a book one day. I had these dreams as a child, and typically as we get older, we get busy, we get just we're not as focused. And when I started the podcast, I didn't understand or know the impact it would have on listeners or journeyers as I would call them, people on this financial independence journey with me. And I also realize that not everyone listens to podcasts, you know, doctor Jory, that you will still meet people and they're like a what, Like how do I listen? And I just knew that if I could impact people with just my voice and just the podcasts, that there was a bigger audience to reach and a deeper connection to be made with the book because people will come to me and say, what is financial independence? Or how is this different from you know, general personal finance, And you know, like I could direct them to the episode, but now I can direct them to a book that literally maps out and answers all those questions in one place. And so I just thought it was a great vertical and a different source of media for people to consume, whether you listen to.

Podcasts or not.

That I hope that people could fall in love with or a new audience could discover me and learn about this journey that so many people don't understand.

M And I think it would be great for that. It definitely would be great, And I'm curious to see how it impacts like people listening to the podcast or then your podcast listeners then going to grab the book for sure.

Yeah.

Yeah, It's like that relationship with you know, Chicken Our Egg, And you know, you'll get people who maybe never heard of the podcast, but now they read the book and they listen.

So I'm excited. I'm excited for that.

More from our conversation after the break. So, in the book, you outline five journeyer stages that the reader will travel on their road to financial independence. Can you share what those stages are for us? In the hallmarks of each of those stages.

Yes, So when I first discovered financial independence, and just to give a quick definition, it is this idea or the place in which you no longer have to actively work because you have enough investments or passive income to pay for your expenses and your lifestyle. Work becomes an option. You can choose to retire early or.

Continue what you're doing.

When I first heard that, I was like, sign me up, how do I accomplish that so I can really be in control of my life. But then I also realized that while I was very ambitious and I started on the journey right away, that so many people, depending on their starting point, get tripped up. And so I broke out the financial independence journey because it's a marathon into these sprints, these smaller sprints, to help encourage people no matter where they start, that they can move ahead in the sprints. So the first stage is called the explorer stage. It's about getting to financial stability. So in this stage, someone may not be able to pay for their living expenses or their minimum debt payments without going into the red every month or putting things on a credit card.

And so their mission in.

This stage is just to get to stability, be financially stable, to be able to pay their expenses. When you're able to do that, you move on to the second stage of the journey, which is called the cadet journey or stage, and that is where you're focused on paying off debt. And this is consumer that I'm considering in this stage, not a mortgage, not student loans, just because those balances can be enormous, and so we're forocusing more on high interest rate consumer debt that you're working to pay off in this stage.

Once you pay off that consumer debt, you can move.

To stage three, which is called the aviator stage. That is where you are working on building financial security so you no longer have the debt payments that you have for your high interest rate debt, so you can focus on investing and saving more and building up your assets. Once you have reached a level of security, and for everyone it's going to be different, you can move to the fort stage, which is the commander stage. That is where you have reached work flexibility. That is the stage I'm currently in right now. So it's not that I never have to work ever again, but I'm in a position where I left my job. I could take a break from journey to launch if I want. We are comfortable to do something different. You have more control over your time and what you do for work, So if you're working in an oppressive environment or even in a relationship that is not safe, you can leave that. It won't be because of money that you have to stay, because you have more flexibility. And then the fifth and final stage is the captain stage. That is the you've reached financial independence. Work truly is a choice and you don't have to work again. And with all those stages, it's going to depend how long it takes for each person to go through it, depending on their circumstances. You know, their income, their assets, liabilities, all those things. But within each stage, even if you're in a stage for a few years, because it can take few years for someone or even a decade in some of these stages, there's freedom at every stage because one less debt that you pay off in the cadet stage, you have more freedom. One more asset that you buy or investment that you make. That's more freedom. So you don't have to reach complete financial independence or be a captain to enjoy your life.

You can enjoy it while you're on the journey to financial independence.

Thank you for that breakdown. I wonder if you can share some of the maybe common challenges that people might face on that journey, like at each of.

Those steps interesting because you can be at a earlier stage or stuck in an earlier stage like the explorer or cadet stage. And it's not based on your income, because there are people who earn a decent amount of money and they still feel and are stuck in those stages. And so income is a driving force to allowing you to move through these stages, but it's not the only thing. It's managing and optimizing your expenses, so not necessarily getting it down to the lowest it can be, because not everyone wants to be frugal, which I understand and I've changed my mind about that on my journey. But it's about what are your goals and what are you willing to do in order to get there. And so people when they're in these stages, they find out where they are and then they think about this idea of financial independence, and maybe they don't like their job and they do want to reach it. Then it becomes a exercise at first of what's my initial plan to get there. So first you do need a plan, which the book helps you map out what that initial plan looks like. So what is your starting point? How many things do you own, so your assets, what do you owe your life abilities? How much money are you making? And what are your expenses? And so those four components are things you can literally sit down and write out and put a number two right now. Then there are the intangible, what I call the intangible components that people tend to gloss over or want to skip, because it actually is the most work, and that is working on your mindset and habits, and it's sometimes not things you can measure, but it makes everything you do sustainable or even plausible to do. So I would say for most people, it's understanding what mindset and habits they have that are either holding them back to earning more or spending in a way that gives them joy or learning to invest or pay down debt, What habits and mindsets are helping that, and what habits and mindsets are actually not helping that, and what can you do to work and improve those things.

So you know, Jamila, I would imagine that there are people who are enjoying our conversation right now, who are saying, SiZ, the price of everything is much more expensive.

Right.

There are articles coming out every day everyday week around people who you know, want to buy homes but cannot afford to buy homes. Eggs are more expensive, clothes more expensive, cause and more expensive. Like everything is much more expensive, and so they may be thinking like, although this sounds great, but like, how can I do this realistically? Kind of given where we are in the world.

And it's valid being you know, inflation is real, and so many of us were not taught to invest or didn't understand it or feel intimidated, and so we're not able to grow our money in a way that works for us to help keep up with inflation.

Plus there's just some people who are not earning enough money.

And so I always like to say and meet people where they are when I'm talking about financial independence, that some years or some time may need to be spent just on working on education or your income. So there are a lot of things you need to work on this journey. But in order to increase your income, it's not something that a lot of people can do overnight. It may take a couple of years. Right in some investment into whether it's courses or resources. But for people who are feeling strained and they are doing their best, it is more about realizing that and giving yourself grace for that journey. And so you'll hear people when they talk about their journey, or even me be able to say, oh, I did this thing or equit my job. But every one's journey is going to look different depending on their circumstances. So if you're not earning enough and you know that's your primary issue right now, then it may just take some time to work that out. Or if you are dealing with an expense issue, meaning when you really are honest with yourself, you look at how much you're spending and there are ways in which you can cut back so that you can get to the next stage or to a goal. Then it may need to be more disciplined or more systems in place, like a budget that you follow to help you accomplish some of these things. But in general, this journey is a privileged one where it doesn't mean you have to have a lot to start it, but if you find that you can't because of legitimate reasons, then those reasons are fine to focus on in the moment and also to give yourself grace for how long it may take you to get through these things, because some things are not in our control. Right, we can't control the government, inflation, economy, but what can we control? And those are the things that I like to focus on to help people through the journey.

So the significant part of the book, like you mentioned, talks about like this mindset piece, and you even talk about needing to go to therapy as a part of the journey to financial independence. Can you talk a little bit more about the tying in of talking with the therapist about some of these things.

You know, it's so interesting.

I think our overall mindset and well being, Like money is.

Just a part of that. It's a big part of it, but it's a part of it.

And sometimes how we interact with people and money, it's all stemming from like deeper things, whether it is relationships with people that we want to have or don't have, and like issues or trauma. It all impacts how we show up in the world and so being able to uncover that and you know, you don't have to go to a money therapist, but just a therapist to talk through what are the things inside of you that need to come out.

I think is really helpful.

I relate it to earning money, right Like, someone may be not able to speak up for themselves and you know, ask for that raise or negotiate or feel seen at their work, even though they're great at what they do for not necessarily because they're not competent, but because it's something deeper that if they were able to, you know, have those conversations work through it, it would impact eventually their money because of how they show up and how they advocate for themselves. Even being an entrepreneur, there is this always needing to put yourself out there to show the world what you have or to sell something. And I realize this in myself sometimes like my maybe inability or my wanting to protect myself and not show up in some areas could be tied to a deeper place.

It's not just money, but it impacts my money.

And so I think, what, you're able to make those connections and see that there is a connection, but then get professional help to help talk you through those things, you will have a domino effect in the other areas of your life.

And the one big area is money.

More from our conversation after the break. So you also talk about in the book there are lots of different formulas and you do give people lots of different places to get started. Can you talk about some of the most important formulas that people will find in the book and what kinds of things they're going to be helpful.

For right now?

Don't let that turn you away from the book. There are formulas, but you don't need to memorize them. It is really just a way in which people if you understand the way money works and how to reach any goal you have for yourself, then eventually you don't have to Just like riding a bike, you don't have to think about writing it.

You just do it or you have that skill in your back pocket.

One of the formulas is the FI formula, and really it is a matter of knowing all all the components that make up your financial independence and money journey. And we talked about some of it before, but there's six of them. For of them are the tangible things that we can list out or write out or numbers for That is your income, your expenses, your assets, and your liabilities. And then two are intangible. They make the tangible happen that's your mindset and habits. And really it's a matter of your income, So how much you bring in minus your mandatory expenses, so what you need to spend in order to survive, you know, rent, mortgage, groceries, the basics, equals hopefully a gap. It's what I call a gap in the book. It's the money left over. And with that gap that is how you get ahead in your finances to your goals and to live the life you want. So this is where we also talk about spending money on things we enjoy. So with the gap, after you pay for your mandatory expenses, you are looking to increase your assets so that save and invest, paid on liability and also pay for your discussionary expenses and the things you like doing. And then in order to do that though, you need enough income. So income drives all that, but it's really your habits and mindset that make it all work.

Got it? Okay, So you've talked a little bit about, like from the mental health angle, how our mindset impacts our ability to save and how we think about money. But I also know that financial planning and having a budget can also help our mental health. Right, can you talk a little bit about some tips and strategies for how we might build a budget that actually supports our mental health.

Right.

I think it's also stepping away from the fact that a budget gives you constraints and to re engage with it in a sense that it will give you freedom. Because if you are someone who has anxiety or just second thoughts around where you are with your money, and most of us do, is that a budget or a plan for your money, Because that's what a budget is. It's literally telling your money what to do before it tells you to do because so many of us are reacting to you know, situations the money is bossing us around, right, But with a budget, you're able to tell your dollars in advance what your plans are for them. You are in control, so you say, all right, this is where you're spending this money. And when you do that, you actually have the ability and freedom to spend more without feeling that you should be suathing something else with your money. So when you go out to brunch with your friends, which I like doing, or to a restaurant, instead of feeling like can I really afford this? Like I feel bad I should be putting this towards my debt or having these feelings come up. You know you put outside this money already and you can do this and not have guilt.

Or if you.

Decide that you know what, I'm going to go out for that extra brunch that was not planned for, you know that there is a plan for your money that you can start to readjust to make that brunch doable. And so when it comes to budgeting, especially for people who don't like it or have not tried it, or tried it and it has not worked yet, it is this idea that it gives you free them. You have to stick with it until something sticks. And so if that means trying differenting budgeting apps, pen and paper, Google sheets or Excel, you have to find a method that works for you. And then also, it's not just enough to create the budget. My first thing is if you created a budget, that's great, meaning you sat down, you look at where your money is going, and you have numbers and category line items.

It's a great start.

But you need to let that budget inform you now, because the point of a budget is it helps you be proactive and so that you check it as you go on, whether it's once a week, once every other week, depending on where you are on your journey, but that you are checking in with it, so the budget is able to do its job and you're able to readjust if you need to as you go.

And as you were talking, I'm thinking some of it. I really feel like the mindset part is really important because some of that those behaviors don't change just because you make more money.

That's the thing.

And I know people who are financially independent or on their way and they're still not happy. They still have a lot of issues with money or not knowing if they have enough and insecurity around it. And so money obviously at a certain level, is that takes care of your security is important, but it's so necessary on this journey to really find out and heal whatever needs to be healed, and to have community and love and enjoy wherever you are, even if you're at that explorer stage, even you know, the fact that you even have placed yourself on this journey is a big deal. I always like to say, like that's you need to give yourself credit for that, because so many people unknowingly are on this journey. Because the time is going to pass anyway, You're going to get older, God willing, and you're going to need to still take care of yourself, and so you might as well take back control now before it's.

Not too far gone.

But you know before it just takes more work at the end of your life, where it's more of a burden for other people. So the mindset and thinking about how you feel on the journey because it takes so long, is important because you don't want to get to the end of it. Let's just say you say, okay, I need a million or two million dollars invested to be financially independent, and you do all this work for fifteen years or twenty years or whatever it takes for you to get there, and then because you kept looking forward to the next thing or to that thing that that would make you happy, that you're still not happy. And I know so many people like that, and I don't want to be like that. I don't want anyone in this.

Journey to be like that.

And so it's like, how can you be happy no matter where you are, even if you are in debt, even if you are working to pay just for your rent and the minimum debt payments. Where can you find perspective and encouragement to do that, and that's all mindset and the habits that support that to make that possible. You know, Jamila, I know you and I have had conversations in the past about you doing public speaking in this space and like finding that it's just a very white space, right there are not a lot of people who look like you in the financial independence space. Can you talk a little bit about some of the particular challenges that black women may have when it comes to following this kind of journey and financial independence. I think in general, it's this idea because when I started listening to a financial independence podcast, they were all white men, and sometimes they would have a person of color on or a black person on, and I'd be so excited because I just knew their perspective was just different. They were speaking more to my journey, even if they came from a different background. And so what I've seen and I am still seeing on my journey, as I'm still on my journey and helping other people, is that there's just this disconnect of like our starting points, all the things that impact us as women, and all the statistics that, well, how we are the matriarchs of the family and most things fall on us but then now you doll it down to people of color and then black women, and how we still have to show up for mostly everyone, not only ourselves, which usually we put last, but everyone else in our life, whether you have kids or not. Right, it's like family members, and there's so much on our shoulders that we are holding and carrying.

And then this.

Idea now of well, okay, I know you know about like basic personal finance, so budgeting and saving a small percentage to make sure you're okay when you're maybe sixty five, And now I'm asking you to consider something that's a lot more audacious and radical, which requires more of you and for a lot of people and black women, that feels like I'm already doing a lot and now you want me to do more.

Isn't this enough?

And I'm like, you know what, you are doing a lot and it is amazing. But doing this is not to be looked on as a deprivation or something that takes away from your life. It actually will help your life more so. You being able to focus on yourself and your own finances and making sure you're good first allows you when you get to stability, when you get to security, to help other people if you want to do that, or you being able to wake up and choose what you want to do for work, a walk away from a situation that is not serving to you. Having money and understanding this allows you to do that. And so I just feel that I understand the load is already a lot, and our responsibilities. Sometimes it's just more, especially if you have family in another country or state that you're helping out. But you can incorporate that in your journey as long as you are looking at and honestly being selfish in some ways, with yourself first and putting yourself first. I say, that's like the biggest thing I see is that feedback of already have a lot going on, like mentally, it's hard to even consider this, And I'm like, you can't afford not to consider this, because your life, even if I always say I think everyone can make it to this fourth stage that I'm in, this fourth stage of flexibility and more options, and you can't afford not to try to do that, not just for yourself, but yes, for your family, but really just for yourself. Because I couldn't have told you, doctor Joy that seven years ago I would be here talking to you with a book and a podcast just because I started the journey. And that's what I want to encourage black women to know, is that you deserve this. It's your right, and you will be surprised at how amazing your life will be in the journey. In the moments, not even when you get million dollars you do all those amazing things you want to do, but in the journey who you become as you work on yourself.

So how do you want people to engage with the book?

Oh my gosh, I want people to actually so buy it. Yes, your journey to financial freedom. Buy the book. But I really want people to read it. I know we have a tendency like we buy books and then we have well intentions to want to maybe read it, but we don't. Then I want this book to be something that people can go back to and use as a reference. So like, read it through the first time and hopefully it's sparking a lot of new cells that allow you to think differently about your life and what it can look like. And then as you you start to plan your journey, which the book allows you to do, is that you plan that first journey and what that may look like to reach financial independence and then you come back to it, because that's the other thing. Your mind will change on this journey. Your circumstances will change on this journey, and you might want to change your approach. In my earlier years, I was really focused on saving and investing, and I wasn't too concerned about.

Enjoying the things.

Now, as I'm a full time entrepreneur, my kids are a little bit older. Now, I want to enjoy my money more and lean into that. And so I've changed how I go about financial independence. And so I've had to come back and readjust my plan, and I will still maybe need to go back and readjust it in a couple months or a year. And so I want people when they read the book to know they can come back to it and help them figure out or recalibrate what their journey looks like because it is flexible live bit.

So tell us where can we stay connected with you? Where can we grab our copy of the book. What are your websites as well as any social media handles you want to share?

Yeah, so you can go to your Journey to Financialfreedom dot com. That's the book a website, and you can find all the places to buy it Amazon, Bookshop dot org, walk into your local bookstore, Barnes and Noble, all the places, and then I'm at Journey to Launch on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. I'm also at Jamila Sufront. That's my little personal brand handle where I try to share more of the personal journey and what it's like to launch a book into the world. But you can find me there. And then ultimately it's go to your Journey to Financialfreedom dot com and pick up the book and become a journeyer. So I always like to say, when you're on this journey with me, you become a journeyer.

And I love.

Being able to connect with you and see how far or just how much you can surprise yourself on this journey.

So absolutely we will be sure to include all of that in the show notes. Thank you so much for spending some time with us today, Jamila. Thank you for having me, Doctor Joe. Absolutely, I'm so glad Jamila was able to share her expertise with us today. To learn more about her and her work, or to grab a copy of your Journey to Financial Freedom, visit the show notes at Therapy for Blackgirls dot com, slash financial Freedom and don't forget to text two of your girls right now and tell them to check out the episode. If you're looking for a therapist in your area, visit our therapist directory at Therapy for Blackgirls dot com slash directory. And if you want to continue digging into this topic or just being community with other sisters, come on over and join us in the Sister Circle. It's our cozy corner of the Internet designed just for black women. You can join us at community dot Therapy for Blackgirls dot com. This episode was produced by Frida Lucas, Elise Ellis, and Zaria Taylor. Editing was done by Dennis and Bradford. Thank y'all so much for joining me for another TVG Library episode. We'll be back with our regular weekly episode on whens Day. Until then, take good care.

Therapy for Black Girls

The Therapy for Black Girls podcast is a weekly conversation with Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, a license 
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