5 Money Leaks Keeping You Broke

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Ep. 227: 5 Money Leaks Keeping You Broke (and How to Fix Them Fast)

Let’s pull back the curtain on five hidden money roles that might be causing you to leak cash – like the Earn and Burn, Upgrade Chaser, Comparison Spender, Feast or Famine Feeler, and Self Care Spender. I break down how these roles show up in everyday life, share practical mini shifts to help you stop sabotaging your finances, and offer mindset tools to help you take control.

Listen in to learn how you can choose a healthier money role, honor what you already have, and start building unstoppable finances for yourself and your business.

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24 Hour Rule – https://aimeecerka.com/do-you-know-the-24-hour-rule/
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The Unstoppable Experience – https://aimeecerka.com/unstoppable
Prosperity Simplified – https://aimeecerka.com/prosperity
Impulse Spending – https://aimeecerka.com/impulse

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Ever Had a Big Cash Month Then Felt Broke Again?

Ever had a big cash month and thought this is it, only to feel broke again two weeks later? Or maybe you bought yet another shiny new tool or course or mastermind thinking this is the missing piece. Or maybe you’ve caught yourself saying, well, everyone else is doing it, so I should too when you sign up for something.

If any of those sound familiar, you might be in one of the earners leaking money roles. Today we’re going to dive into what those are and mini shifts that you can make to choose a different role.

This is Money Simplified, the podcast where I help female entrepreneurs go from stress and struggle to unstoppable with money.

Money Is More Than Budgeting and P&Ls

Money is more than just budgeting and PNLs and we’re going to take you through all of it. We’re here. We blend proven financial strategy with mindset work and energetic alignment so you can create unstoppable finances, build an unstoppable business, and truly enjoy your unstoppable life.

It’s time to take my wisdom, my expertise to help you simplify money and go beyond the numbers. I’m your host, Aimee Cerka.

Welcome. I’m so glad you’re here. Welcome back to Money Simplified. I’m your host, Aimee Cerka. We are in our Money Role series and today we’re pulling back the curtain on hidden roles that we play with money.

The Earners Leaking Money Roles

These aren’t who you are, they’re just characters, roles that you’ve slipped into. The best part is you can choose a new role at any time. So in this episode, we’re talking about the category of money roles that I see are like their earners were leaking money.

These things show up in everyday life and there are small shifts that you can make to slip into something healthier. So let’s dive into it.

The Earn and Burn Role

The first role that we want to talk about today is the earn and burn. This is when money comes in and disappears just as fast. So this might be the role that you’re playing.

You celebrate a new client you had, a big payment comes in and then you go buy dinner or you go buy a new laptop or you’re going to go buy new clothes or maybe your tax refund comes in and you spend it all within a week. You feel rich on payday, but then you’re broke again two days later. Does that sound familiar?

If you’re like, oh yeah, that’s me, I definitely do that. Money comes in and then I end up splurging, spending it just as fast.

The mini shift is you’re going to funnel money into a savings or a profit account first. Small, little bit, right? Start small. 5%, 10%, 1% something. If you can have it done automatically. Fantastic. Have it done automatically. The pro step here is put this account at a separate bank. Because when you log into your main bank account, I don’t want you to see it. It needs to be that one step removed.

Automating Finances and Weekly Check-ins

If you can’t do it automatically, ideally you’ve got a weekly check in set up. Maybe your bookkeeper can do this for you as well. If you haven’t, if you have a bookkeeper and if you don’t and you’re for looking for one, hey, send me a message because I do have space for clients right now.

If you can’t do it automatically, schedule it with your weekly check in. Make there. Which we really should have a weekly check in anyways. One day a week that you’re checking in with your finances.

When you check in with your finances, then transfer the money that’s been deposited. You can also adjust like if you use Stripe, PayPal. I’m not as sure. I always do PayPal manually, but like my stripe payments, I’ve adjusted how often it hits my account. So then like I have all of the income for the week, like it’s deposited once a week and then I know how much to move out with my percentage based budgeting.

Regardless, you’re going to make it a habit when money comes in. We funnel it before you spend anything because if you wait to see what’s left over, nothing’s going to be left over. And you can start small. If this feels like money’s too tight, I can’t do this. Start with $25 a week. 5% percentage based budgeting is the way to go. So I fall back on percentages, but start somewhere.

The Upgrade Chaser

The next role that I see people falling into where we’re leaking money is the upgrade chaser. And I’ve got a client that comes to mind with this one.

The UpgradeChaser loves new tools, gadgets and courses. You bought software and you’ve never even logged into it ever. Maybe you don’t even know where the logins are. Or maybe you bought another course or that software subscription because it was on sale, right?

You got the one time deal, it was an app sumo thing or really great, what do we call those founders, like a founders thing. And you bought it because you didn’t want to miss out. FOMO was showing up and you end up that you purchase things, right? Or you subscribe to multiple email tools but only use one.

Are You Buying Courses and Not Finishing?

Maybe you bought the next big course, the next thing, even though the ones that like you already said were going to fix everything are still sitting unfinished. Now I know I have courses that I haven’t finished, but there’s a difference between buying it because it’s the upgrade, it’s the next new thing, it’s exciting and not finishing right now because you know in your gut it’s not time to finish it right now.

So this is upgrading software or gear before mastering what you have. This could even be like hiring a VA outsourcing before you’re ready to. So if you were like, okay, yeah, that kind of resonates, I might be falling into the upgrade chaser or when you do, we’re gonna use this mini shift.

Before you’re purchasing, ask yourself, will this help me use what I already have? The 24 hour rule will be a great thing for this money roll. Really all of these. But this money roll specifically to implement the 24 hour rule says you set a dollar limit. We’ll say $100.

If you’re gonna make a purchase that is above $100, you have to wait 24 hours to make it. This isn’t like your groceries. This is any other purchases though, unless you have already set the intention, because we’re coming into the holiday season as we’re recording this, right? If you set the intention, hey, I want to buy this this season. And then it goes on sale. You set the intention beforehand, that’s an exception. But otherwise wait 24 hours.

The Comparison Spender: Are You Keeping Up?

The next role that fits into this leaking money is the comparison spender. Now this is similar to the upgrade chaser, but the comparison spender buys just to keep up.

You’re buying a mastermind because your peers did or you want to feel connected, like the people around you are all buying it. And you buy because you want to feel connected, not because you need it and or because it aligns with your goals.

This could be upgrading to business class or VIP because you like the way it looks, that you feel like the first class, you feel like the VIP even though it wasn’t in the budget. Comparison spenders probably aren’t keeping track of their finances. So you might not have a budget in the first place or you’re buying branding, photo shoots, the luxury things just because everyone in your industry is doing it.

So why are we doing the things that we’re doing? That’s really what the comparison spender has to look at. Is this something that you truly want or is this something that you feel like everyone else is having so you have to fit in?

The mini shift for the comparison spender: Pick one expense. We’re going to audit one expense that you have purchased. We’re looking back on what we’ve already done. Is it truly serving you? Was it the best decision in the moment?

The key here is going to be not sliding into beating yourself up. Because if we slide into beating ourselves up, then we’re going to self sabotage and we create whole new set of problems. We’re looking at it objectively without sliding into emotion.

Feast or Famine Feeler: Riding the Income Rollercoaster

The fourth money role I wanted to cover today, these are the ones we end up that we’re leaking money. If we’re doing this, this is the feast or famine feeler, this is the rollercoaster income cycles.

You’ve got $10,000 in revenue one month you hit the 10k month and then next month you’re scraping by. But what you do with that is you’re celebrating and you do the big shopping spree, you make the big purchase during the big months, but then you panic when there’s not really revenue coming in or you paid off debt really aggressively one month because you had a great cash flow month. But then the next month you run the debt back up because the income wasn’t there.

This also could be not paying yourself, not paying yourself, not paying yourself and then paying yourself and then the business can’t support it. Where we’re going all over the place, right? And this feast or famine, the income roller coaster, like as entrepreneurs and even as W2 employees, I’ve had this. Our income fluctuates, we have a little bit of the up and down. It’s gonna happen.

That inconsistent income when you have the systems in place to support you isn’t a big deal. So the problem here with the feast or famine feeler is they’re essentially looking at the revenue that’s coming in as opposed to looking the budget or the things that are in place that like, help steady that out.

Yes, the income might be going up, down, up, down, up, down. But you have the budget in place to level it out so that you’re covered, you’re safe, you’re not going back into that panic. You’re paying off the debt consistently, you’re paying yourself consistently because it doesn’t matter what’s coming in. You have the percentage based budgeting. You have the budget in place to support you.

Building Buffers and Budgeting Systems

This takes a little bit to build. And the mini shift I have for this person is to build a buffer, even if it’s small. We got to start now, right? We have to set aside some of that money to help cover the lower one, the lower income months.

Percentage based budgeting is absolutely the best place to do this. We talk about this Inside Money Mastery Academy and the Unstoppable Experience. Both of them have my best budgeting systems in there. So you’ve got Budgeting Simplified, which is the personal budgeting system, and Prosperity Simplified, which is the business budgeting system. And they work together to like make this seamless, remove the stress and the panic, all of those things for you.

So I’ll put a link in the show notes to check out that as well. If you are ready to dive in, Prosperity Simplified might be available as a standalone. So I’ll put that link in the show notes as well. And you can just grab the budgeting systems.

That is the feast or famine feeler. And this, this one’s so easy to fix. It really feels like it’s so simple when you have this system in place. It takes the burden off of you when you do this. Like, because this one. Yeah, okay, we’re not gonna go any farther.

The Self Care Spender: Is Self Care Hiding Overspending?

The final one we kind of talked about a little bit in our intro or our final one for today. We kind of talked about in our intro, but it’s the self care spender. They use self care or business growth to justify overspending.

Are you buying another course to “fix yourself” when you’re already overloaded? Marketing and advertising is a billion dollar industry. Billion dollar industry. It works, right? Great. There’s nothing wrong with marketing and advertising, right? Shoot. I do it again.

We could all like talk about the tactics behind it if we’re doing that ethically. But are you letting somebody’s marketing tell you that you’re broken? That’s not accurate. We don’t need to buy another course to fix yourself even though you’ve already got too much on your plate.

Are you buying treats or self care items on rough days and then you end up regretting it? Maybe you’re going to go get ice cream. Maybe your Amazon spending, maybe you’re shopping, buying clothes like stress, stress spending. Great.

We talk a lot about that in the impulse spending series that I created. We can put that link in the show notes too. That’s a free resource there for you. You can grab that one.

Or that late night shopping and just buying things because of the emotional state we’re in. Like that’s a big thing. I think this is the two biggest things. It’s the self care and we’re justifying it, right because it was a hard day or we have a lot going on now for the business growth and the courses.

Emotional Spending and Finding the Root Cause

Let me put the caveat here on this. I am not saying that you should not spend money on yourself. You absolutely should. Especially like even when money is tight. But we have the systems in place, place to not overspend and we’re looking at the root of this.

Are we emotionally motivated? Is that why we’re overspending? Is it the stress shows up and this is our go to that we’re gonna go do this, we’re gonna treat ourselves to this. We’re gonna do this. And it’s like we are avoiding the emotion. We have to look at the root cause of what’s going on as well. What’s the motive behind it?

So the mini shift here would be to catch yourself once when you’re going to go spend and you want to do something. What’s something free or something that you already have that you can lean into for this self care or the business growth. What is something you already have? Look at the library, look at the things around the house. Do you have a candle. You can go light a candle, soak in the bath. Can you go take a walk? What’s something that would rejuvenate you, restore you, without spending additional.

Now again, spending money on yourself isn’t bad. We have to look at the motive behind it. And that’s what the self care spender is doing. It’s like money is, it’s an emotional, emotional support. It’s not even support, it’s emotional crutch. There we go.

And that’s what we want to handle. Because money is absolutely a tool, but we need to be able to use it in alignment and things that we want to have, which we’re kind of going back to some of the other ones, the purchases and the things that we’re buying aren’t necessarily bad.

And I don’t like the word good or bad, right. They’re just choices. And if you’ve made these choices in the past, we are not beating ourselves up. This is about choosing something different and moving forward. Now, looking at the root, why are we doing the things that we’re doing?

And this can be challenging by yourself. That’s why we have the support containers with Inside Money Mastery Academy and the unstoppable experience, like that’s why they’re there, is that I can, so I can support you while we uncover these things. Because when it’s not this crutch that you’re leaning on, that you’re dependent on, it’s so freeing.

The Five Money Leaking Roles & The Underlying Pattern

Okay, those are the. Let’s see, we had 5, didn’t we? 5 earners that spend 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Yes. Okay, so those 5 earners who are leaking money.

The underlying pattern beneath them all is there’s no direction with the money. These people are probably some of the ones or are some of the ones that come to me saying, like, it’s not about the money for me, like I want to create the impact because it’s almost like we’re afraid of the money. But money again is a tool.

So when money comes in, we have to have that intentional direction. When we’re in one of these roles, we’re spending reactively. They’re driven by emotions. We’re not making clear choices. We’re not being in control. So pick one money habit. We gave one for each of these roles. So pick one that’s gonna help you build the stability. Maybe it’s making the transfer to savings or profit account before you’re every time, like you get paid, maybe it’s looking at the resources of what you already have.

And a almost like a mantra, a phrase really, that you can say to help center yourself when you find yourself sliding into one of these roles as opposed to beating yourself up. Right. Because I don’t want you to beat yourself up. It’s my money grows when I honor what I already have. My money grows when I honor what I already have.

So often we’re looking like we got to hit the next income goal. We got to hit this. We got to do this. We have to, like, keep reaching. I need this next thing. And that gratitude and honoring and taking care of what we have now, that sets you up. And then your money does grow. It’s amazing. It’s exponential. We love it. But we’re gonna honor what we already have.

Choose a New Role for Your Money

You don’t have to keep leaking money. You get to choose a role where money sticks and grows. Remember, the role that you’re playing with money isn’t permanent. You get to choose a new role right now.

And if you want support in making that shift, I would grab your free copy of my money mindset playbook. Because your money role and your money mindset go hand in hand. The playbook is going to help you uncover and reset the beliefs that are shaping your money story. That’ll be https://aimeecerka.com/mindset. You’ll also find that link in the show notes.

Make sure to stay tuned because we have three more categories where we have so many roles that we’re going to go into over the next three weeks. And then we’re going to talk about the money role that we are aspiring to have and how to choose that role to be unstoppable.

As always, you get to choose the role that you play with money. So we’re going to choose a role that supports you too. That’s what I’ve got for now. We’ll see you next time.

Thank you so much for listening to Money Simplified.

Stay Connected With Aimee Cerka

My favorite place to hang out is on Instagram. You can find me at @AimeeCerka to catch all the behind the scenes of my stories. Send me a message to share your biggest takeaway or just to say hi. I love hearing from podcast listeners.

When you’re ready to take action on your mindset, your money, or the systems behind it all, I’m here for you. Whether you’re snagging a free resource, exploring a mini course, diving into the fundamentals with Money Mastery Academy, getting in depth support inside the unstoppable experience or scheduling a complimentary bookkeeping consult to finally get hands on help with your books.

Your next step is waiting for you. https://aimeecerka.com/podcastlinks has all the information, and of course that link is hanging out in the show notes for you.

We’ll see you next time. 👋