Know Your Money with Bronwyn Waner and Craig Finch
Know Your Money with Bronwyn Waner and Craig Finch
80. Creating a Balanced Life with Planned Breaks and Adventures Wheel of Life 4
Can planning your holidays transform your life? We think so! Join us as Craig shares his family's unique tradition of meticulously planning their holidays well in advance. Whether it's a lavish getaway or a simple camping trip, these breaks play a crucial role in rejuvenating and strengthening family bonds. By aiming for a "7" in all life areas rather than chasing perfection, you'll find greater happiness and balance. Bronwyn also weighs in, emphasizing how prioritizing holidays can be a transformative experience for families, and we even delve into creating a bucket list to keep your year exciting and motivating.
Fun and recreation aren't just nice-to-haves—they're essential for your overall well-being and financial success. Through engaging activities like volleyball, mom dinners, jujitsu, and braais, you'll enrich your mental health and build a sense of community. We explain how these pursuits make you more passionate, refreshed, and productive, ultimately benefiting your career and financial management. Worried this might sound too good to be true? We address common client concerns, reassuring you that a happier, well-rounded individual is indeed more likely to thrive professionally and personally. Tune in and discover how to bring more joy and motivation into your life!
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Welcome to Know your Money, where we will explore our relationship with money and how the psychology of it impacts our financial decisions, as everyone thinks about money differently. In our podcast, we'll be presenting a variety of financial topics in an easy to understand way, which we hope will assist you with managing your money. Hello everybody, welcome to Know your Money Guys. How are you today?
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm good. This is Warren Craig's also good Craig's good how are you?
Speaker 1:I'm very well, thank you. I like to try to change it up a bit.
Speaker 2:Honestly, I was stumped here.
Speaker 3:Another pizza slice on the wheel?
Speaker 1:Yes, so we're still on our series of trying to help you have as balanced of a life as possible, and what we were saying off air the other day is I think people might want to be 10 in everything. Yeah, and you don't necessarily have to be Like if you can focus on a 7 in all the areas, so give up a little bit on your money so that you have more time with your family or those kind of things.
Speaker 1:That, to me, is more balanced. So for me, the ideal wheel would be to have a 5 of everything instead of out, just not having any low ones.
Speaker 2:You don't want those low ones in there, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and today's one is based on fun and recreation, and what that is is things like holidays and hobbies and sport, doing some things that just bring a sense of joy, I guess, to your life.
Speaker 2:Playing with your kids in the garden. Yeah absolutely, craig, tell me about some of your fun and recreations.
Speaker 3:Well, I've got a concept that I've used for many years that in November we start planning our year coming up and the first thing we put in that year is the holidays. So we work out the holidays, and when we had kids at school we'd take the holidays you know, the school holidays and put those in, and then we'd say, okay, where do we want to go as a family? And then work it out. Now it doesn't have to be expensive holidays at all. We did do one big holiday for us. We went to Disney World in America and on the way there we stopped in London and as a family we sat and planned for it. We wrote our goals down and we all saved towards it and 18 months later we had the money and things all just fell in place because we all had this common goal and we did that big holiday. But the holidays can be weekends away. You can go camping. We also camp as well. That's a very inexpensive way of.
Speaker 2:I'm trying to get Kirsten to camp.
Speaker 3:It's a tough one. You've got to be comfortable. She's more into glamping. But you can go to self-catering places the food you would have had from at home you enjoy cooking.
Speaker 2:You cook there as well. Do you remember we watched a rugby World Cup match on my laptop in the middle of the bush Exactly? It was incredible, it was good fun it was that's right.
Speaker 3:Right, and those are the memories you're going to have. And so we plan a whole year like how many days you're going to work First, how many holidays you're going to take. So you put that in your diary. If you obviously have 15 days leave or whatever it might be, you try and work it out that you can catch a long weekend and that. And you say, okay, blank out my holidays, my holidays are in the diary, not negotiable. And then you as a family sit down and decide where do you want to go.
Speaker 1:And even if it is at home. I think it's important to use your days and take that break. So, if you can't necessarily afford to go away, still just take that time.
Speaker 3:Because wherever you are in the world you know close to you is a fun place to go to, a short drive away and you could take a day out and go there and come back, but the important thing is to block it off and to go on holiday.
Speaker 1:Commit to it.
Speaker 3:yeah, Commit to it and do things that you wouldn't do. No cell phones, no work laptops, nothing like that. You go on holiday and you're on holiday. That sounds like heaven, yeah, yeah, that's what a holiday is. It rejuvenates yourself. Heaven, yeah, yeah, that's what a holiday is. It rejuvenates yourself. You don't have to worry about work. If you're taking work on holiday, you're not on holiday, you're working still.
Speaker 1:Yeah, even if you leave.
Speaker 3:Letting your family go on holiday yeah, even if you leave those files in your boot, those files are shouting at you.
Speaker 2:When are you going to take them out? And't do it while you're on holiday. It really isn't. It's going to be exactly the same as when you left.
Speaker 3:So that's what we do and it's been an amazing experience, and every November we sit down. Now we've got a bucket list of things that we want to do, my wife and I, and we keep on trying to Give me a couple of examples, Craig. Serengeti is one that's nice. I want to go to Israel. We want to go back to America, Israel. Would that be? Jerusalem, Tel Aviv? I haven't been to any of those. I've been to Tel Aviv. It's beautiful.
Speaker 1:Really beautiful. I'd love to go Go to Turkey.
Speaker 3:Yeah, go and see the flowers in the Western Cape. Again, there's many places in South Africa you can go. You don't have to go you ever done shark diving no.
Speaker 2:I think you'd love it. Eh no, I'm scared of swimming. I'm scared of swimming and sharks, exactly. I'd rather keep my feet on the ground, yeah, and Bronwyn instead of the holidays. What other things would you do for recreation throughout the year?
Speaker 1:I mean just sort of on the holidays. Being a partner with Craig has really opened my eyes to that, because he does he literally does block out those holidays and for us it was never a part of the plan, like I love holidays but it always felt like a financial thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Cool, but I don't have the funds to go on holiday and since then we have started that pot of a holiday pot and whatever that amount is. Just put it in there and it's built up and it really helps because it adds to that excitement and adds to the thrill of being able to.
Speaker 2:It gives you a bit of your freedom back as a family, doesn't?
Speaker 1:it and a goal and a purpose, and we're not stuck at home.
Speaker 1:In the holidays, we have the freedom to do something, yeah yeah, and this holiday well, this year I feel like we've been on the most holidays, which is awesome. But a part of that fun and recreation which my husband always says is so important is like if you have a sport, like he volleyball, so every Wednesday he goes and he plays volleyball and that needs to be factored in and it's his time with his friends and it's so, so important. And like, for us, we have a mom group and we do our dinners every now and then and, yes, we go do stuff with the kids, but just going to have that dinner as moms is so wonderful and paddle like. I haven't been into it very much lately.
Speaker 2:I've heard a lot of good things.
Speaker 1:I'm a bit low on sitting here doing my wheel, but I think just finding that thing that brings a sense of community and friendship and joy, like if it's a family, friends and even, to a certain degree, I would say just for yourself, every now and then.
Speaker 2:You know, yeah, I used to have jujitsu as the just for me thing and then, since the little man was born, it's been really hard. I haven't been able to go, but I know I will go back to it and it's that one thing where it's just for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And it's, you know, two evenings a week for an hour and a half. It's my thing, that's it.
Speaker 1:And it's so important to have those things because it makes you a better person and it makes you better for all those other slices of the pie.
Speaker 3:So holidays are one, but like your own personal sport, whether it's jujitsu, golf, paddle Cricket, whatever.
Speaker 2:Whatever it is.
Speaker 3:And also, like Bron says, the fun things with your friends.
Speaker 2:So when we had this is the fun things with my friends guys, Is it not yours? It really is. I love this podcast.
Speaker 3:But Supper Club we used to have as well. We used to have it. So then we used to have a roving one, so you could say well, I start at somebody's house and then mains at another house. Okay, you need Uber for that, but you can have all those, you can do fun things. Or you could say you know, I really enjoy braaiing and we're going to have a braai on a Sunday and my friends are going to come around, so that can be part of it.
Speaker 2:So that's something we're really looking forward to here, bras, because buying the house a big thing for me is host and. Kirst loves to host people you can try new recipes.
Speaker 1:You don't just have to bra do some fun stuff you can even turn it into a competition, have a poiky competition.
Speaker 2:I believe there's one coming soon, craig I don't know if you heard about that poiky off yeah.
Speaker 3:I have my pot, yeah, but it's so important to have.
Speaker 2:To have joy in your life.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly, Recreation, holidays and your own personal sports, and it might not even be a sport you might enjoy going to an art gallery.
Speaker 2:You might enjoy going to a movie.
Speaker 1:Painting croquet, whatever.
Speaker 2:Let's just say devil's advocate here. I'm the client and I go. That's all very good and well. I'm the client and I go. That's all very good and well. But how does that pertain to my financial?
Speaker 1:future Because you being a happier person allows you to enjoy your career more, to save more money to do different things. I know it doesn't seem like it impacts it, but it definitely directly does impact it. Exactly what Craig was saying If you go on those holidays and truly take that holiday, you come back with a sense of Passion again Passion, and you come up with ideas.
Speaker 3:Ideas, you refresh yourself.
Speaker 2:It's like a good reset, isn't it? And for your health.
Speaker 1:I think it's also good for your health, very important.
Speaker 2:I was just playing Devils. I completely agree with everything you're saying.
Speaker 1:If anyone doesn't agree, please send us a comment and we'll bring it up on air. We'd love to talk about it. Help you through it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely Lock off that year.
Speaker 2:November's coming. Yeah, so yeah, okay, thanks, greg, but start the pot. Yeah, yeah, start the pot. Yeah, let's not talk about those. Let's not talk about those, we'll get there.
Speaker 1:We'll get there Awesome stuff. Thanks guys. I've stolen hospital bills. Oh, those ones are fun too.
Speaker 2:But anyway, thank you very much for today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you guys, see you next Monday. Have a good one, cheers guys.
Speaker 3:Bye. Thank you for listening. If you have enjoyed this podcast or would like to subscribe, please visit our website, wwwgrowthfpcoza. The information we have provided in this podcast is our personal opinion. For more detailed information, please discuss your financial situation with a financial planner.