PP 053: Raising Your Zero

Quick Show Notes: Raising Your Zero

Kim Sutton discusses why raising your zero is vitally important for business owners.

Resources Mentioned

“Coach Frederick West” of LookFaithFirst.com
Dave Ramsey

Episode Transcription: Raising Your Zero

Welcome back to another episode of Positive Productivity today and want to talk to you about “Raising Your Zero.”

I have to give credit to my coach, “Coach Frederick West” of LookFaithFirst.com because he inspired this episode. In the spirit of total transparency, I need to let you know that our journey, my husband and my journey as entrepreneurs has not been the easiest ever. To be completely honest, we have dealt with our electric being shut off when you’ve dealt with losing our internet. Our water’s been shut off. Our rent spend late, you name it.

Well, a lot of this could have been prevented by having the proper system set up on the back end. There was also a little bit of scarcity mindset that was going on at the same time. What I mean by that is that often we were OK with our financial situation as long as our bank account was showing over a zero. In other words, as long as our bank account wasn’t in the red, we were happy. Now, “Coach West” challenged me on this. He said: “Is that really where you want to be day in and day out” and I really thought about it and I came back with “No”, and he’s like: “Well then we need to work on raising your zero” so I want all of you listeners to think about your own financial situation. Are you living day in and day out right now? Just being happy because your account isn’t in the red or would you like your new zero to be higher? Over the past couple years, Dave and I have been active in trying to raise our zero. It happens in slow increments first raising it to $20 and then to $50 a $100, $200 and over time you raise your zero a little bit more and more each month. This could mean setting up a new bank account, having a 10 head and in your closet, but essentially having money hidden away somewhere. That is your security in case anything should happen. “Dave Ramsey” talks a lot about having your baby emergency fund, which I believe is about a thousand dollars. Personally, I haven’t been through Dave Ramsey’s programs. However, I’ve listened to enough of his radio show to get that one point through my head. We should all have some type of emergency fund available to us for when the unexpected happens and it’s really difficult to make that happen when we’re satisfied, as long as our bank account is not in the red. There are so many different reasons why we could be struggling financially, but a lot of the reasons could improve themselves with minor shifts in our life.

One of our biggest shifts was after our twins were born, having one child on diapers costs enough, but when you all of a sudden you have three in diapers, I don’t even want to share with you how much we paid in disposable diapers on a weekly basis. For all of you who are. Who may be wondering. Yes, we did try cloth diapers. We really just cannot keep up with the loads. By trying the generic brands at our local stores, we were able to find a brand that work just as well as “Pampers” or “Huggies” could get our kids through the night and took a third off of our weekly diaper budget. We also started buying generic food and I have to be totally honest in some ways the generic brand tastes just as good, if not better. For those of you who are in the Midwest in the United States and may have a Kroger nearby, they’re, frozen pizzas, three for $10 have tasted better than our local pizza shops.

We, like so many other American families, love to have pizza on Friday nights, but it’s very cost prohibitive. Feeding a family of seven when you are ordering out, so when we go to our local grocery and buy their generic brand, we can actually feed all of us for a total of $15. When you start making those shifts, it’s really easy to start raising your zero. If you’re financially struggling and are living paycheck to paycheck are often wondering when the next client payment is going to come in. I strongly encourage you to take a look at all the little things that you’re purchasing from day to day. What can you cut back on? Or what can you possibly start buying generic on? Raising your zero, even if it’s only $5 every month will allow you to start taking the financial stress out of your life so you can begin focusing on what is going to take you to the next higher level of success. With that thought in mind, I hope you go forth and have a positive and productive day.