Should You Wait To Start A Business Until Financially Stable

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Should You Wait To Start A Business Until You’re Financially Stable – With Helen Kartika – Ep. 27

We have talked about the benefits and drawbacks of starting a business but what about starting a business when you’re not necessarily financially stable?
Today I’m joined by Helen Kartika as we discuss if you should wait to start that business or if you should take the leap.

I thoroughly enjoyed this interview this one you’re probably going to want to listen to a couple of times because there are so many golden nuggets!

Helen is a certified business mindset and career confidence coach for women, passionate about working with business owners and ambitious professionals to cultivate greater inner confidence, overcome overwhelm, and face the limitations that are holding them back from taking action and achieving their personal and professional goals.

This is the Your Money Your Life podcast where ambitious women come together to have clarity, prosperity, and confidence with their money without sacrificing precious time and well-deserved fun! so let’s do this!

LISTEN OR SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE IN YOUR FAVORITE PODCAST APP:
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Resources:

Budgeting Simplified – https://aimeecerka.com/budget

Connect With Helen

https://helenkartika.com

https://instagram.com/_helenkartika_

Connect With Aimee on Instagram https://instagram.com/aimeecerka/

Podcast Keypoints
0:00 – Episode Overview
2:14 – Episode Sponsorship – Budgeting Simplified
5:16 – Starting A Business From Scratch
8:30 – Debt Mindset
9:23 – You Don’t Have Enough Money?
13:38 – Doing It First
15:00 – Doubts About Starting A Business
16:58 – Self Conscious Beliefs
18:08 – Making Money Is NOT A Sacrifice
20:48 – Tools for Mindset & Time Management
23:56 – Challenge
24:29 – Free 60 Minute Mindset Call & Connect With Helen

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Should You Wait To Start A Business Until You’re Financially Stable With Helen Kartika

Benefits and Drawbacks of Starting a Business

We’ve talked about the benefits and the drawbacks of starting a business. But what about starting a business when you’re not necessarily financially stable?

Should You Wait or Take the Leap?

Today I’m joined by Helen Kartika, as we discuss if you should wait to start that business, or if you should take the leap now. I thoroughly enjoyed this interview and this is one you’re probably going to want to listen to a couple of times because there are so many golden nuggets.

Meet Helen Kartika

Helen is a certified business mindset and career confidence coach for women. She is passionate about working with business owners and ambitious professionals to cultivate greater inner confidence, overcome overwhelm, and face the limitations that are holding them back from achieving their personal and professional goals.

Welcome to the Your Money Your Life Podcast

Meet Your Host, Aimee Cerka

Welcome to the Your Money Your Life podcast. I’m your host, Aimee Cerka.

After my husband and I faced three major financial roadblocks in the last six years, I felt like I wasn’t doing all that I could and I had let my family down. It always felt like life was a struggle, like I had to work harder than everyone else. It just came easy to them, and I didn’t feel worthy of success.

A Coach Changed Everything

Until a coach helped me see the successes in our experiences instead of our failures. This allowed me to create and implement systems to grow our network by $200,000+ while spending time with my loved ones and on my priorities. Now I help motivated women create the happiness, family life, financial security, and long-term wealth they deserve.

Ready to Eliminate Stress?

If you’re ready to eliminate stress, struggle, frustration, and guilt within your finances, you’re in the right place. Welcome, I’m so glad you’re here!

April is Financial Literacy Month

Did you know that April is Financial Literacy Month? That’s why this episode of the Your Money Your Life podcast is brought to you by Budgeting Simplified.

Struggling with Budgeting?

Do you struggle with stress and overwhelm with budgeting? Or do you get frustrated that you spend so much time on your budget, yet at the end of the month, you’re not actually getting ahead? You’re not alone. This is actually super common, and I’m here to help.

Introducing Budgeting Simplified

Inside Budgeting Simplified, I will show you how to budget successfully in a simple manner that sets you up to create prosperity, freedom, and security. As you go through this process, you’ll have a budget specific to YOU and the unique lifestyle that you want to live. One of the best parts is, you don’t have to be a numbers person; I did all that for you. I created the system that you can plug and play and finally have the confidence that you’re craving.

A Failsafe Built Into Your Budget

With Budgeting Simplified, you have a failsafe built into your budget. So then when life throws you curveballs, as we all know it will, your budget can handle it. Stop the cycle of your bank account draining every month and finally, feel confident and have fun with your money again.

Ready to Join?

If this sounds like a heck yes for you, then simply visit aimeecerka.com/budget. And of course, if you need that link again, it’s hanging out in the show notes for you.

Interview with Helen Kartika

Hi, Helen! Welcome to the Your Money, Your Life Podcast. I’m so glad to have you here with me today.

Helen: So glad to be here. Thanks for having me!

Aimee: Absolutely. So, I always like to start off and ask, and yes, it’s the name of the show. But what does “your money, your life” mean to you?

Helen: Okay, so “your money, your life”. As a mindset coach, my kind of personal philosophy around mindset is that it’s all about personal leadership and taking agency and responsibility for your life. Right? When we talk about mindset, it’s all about, you know, having awareness of your patterns and your thoughts and feelings and all that kind of thing. But at the end of the day, it’s just self-management and personal leadership.

Money as a Vehicle for Life Ownership

So when I think about “your money, your life”, for me, it’s really about money being a vehicle to that, right? Money being a vehicle for you to be able to take ownership and take charge of your life. And I think, a lot of the time, we talk about money in the context of freedom and flexibility and things like that. But at the end of the day, money is about giving yourself options and being able to be that creator of your life to make an impact to build something for your family. So for me, it’s all about just taking charge of your life basically.

Managing Money with the Right Mindset

Aimee: I love it. And I totally agree when we get this mindset piece figured out, like, we are able to manage that money and all those things and just a whole other level. I’m really excited to hear about this. Tell me a little bit about your journey, starting a business from scratch, even when you weren’t in a great traditional financial situation.

Helen’s Journey to Entrepreneurship

Helen: Yeah, absolutely. So I’ve been in business for four years now and I’m on to my second business. The first one I actually started back in 2018, when I had what I think many would consider on paper, a dream job, right? I was running the social media channels for Netflix, one of London’s biggest creative agencies, it was all great. But at the end of the day, I got so severely emotionally and spiritually burnt out, right.

I was just lacking fulfillment, I was lacking purpose, and that I just had it. You know, when you get to that point, and you’re like, I can’t do this anymore. And that led me to starting my first business. However, at the time, I was actually $13k in credit card debt.

Overcoming Debt to Start a Business

And I don’t know if any of your listeners are in debt themselves, or have been, but you know, when you’re in that space, having credit card debt is so all-consuming and overwhelming, it is really, really stressful. And most people wouldn’t even consider starting a business when they’re in that kind of space, but I knew that I could do it. I had a really strong belief in myself and in my idea at the time, I started a marketing agency. And I just had that unwavering belief in myself that I knew I could do it, and that it was worth the risk, right?

Paying Off Debt Through Business

The kicker here, and why I love sharing the story is that 18 months into starting that business, I actually completely paid off that debt, right. And so $13k is a lot if you’ve got it on different credit cards, you’ve got high-interest repayments, that kind of thing. So what was really awesome for me was not just the fact that I was able to, you know, the reason I started the business in the first place is because I wanted to have more fulfillment in my life, right? So not only was able to kind of do that, and to kind of make ends meet and to break even, I got out of that debt in 18 months.

Achieving Financial Freedom

And I know for a fact that I would not have been able to do that had I stayed in my corporate job because obviously I knew what my salary was. I knew what my monthly paycheck was going to be for the next 12 months to 2 years, and I knew it wasn’t going to happen, right?

Encouraging Risk-Taking in Business

So the message I really want people to take away here, is that like, you know, you don’t even have to be in debt. But if you are kind of on the fence about maybe starting a business or going all in on a business because you don’t believe you have enough money, it’s totally not true. Right? Like you can make it work. And starting a business is all about taking risks, right? It’s a risk no matter what kind of financial position you’re in at the end of the day, because business is unpredictable.

Business Risks and Mindset

Aimee: Yeah, I love that. When this goes live, we’re going to be in the middle of Financial Literacy Month or actually wrapping up Financial Literacy Month. And I totally love that because I am a financial coach that does not preach for you to get out of debt, get out of debt, get out of debt, because of all the mindset factors behind it. We find that if we focus on that, it’s a negative thing and we end up getting ourselves back into debt.

Aligning Financial and Business Goals

I love that you took the jump and you did exactly, I mean, honestly what I did too, that you worked on starting a business and doing all these things, even though you had the debt, because it’s not like we don’t want to be there long term, obviously. But you’re not going to get to the place that we want to go if we don’t act and move towards those spots and like waiting, putting your life on hold because you’re in debt. It’s not the way that I want to live and you obviously didn’t want to live that way and our listeners don’t want to live that way. So I’m really excited about this.

Passion and Financial Planning

Tell me a little bit more about when you decided to go all in and what kind of gave you the confidence to do that. Because I feel like that’s something that we could probably work on.

Helen: Yeah, absolutely. It’s an interesting one because I think confidence is something that really ebbs and flows, right? And like you, I work with a lot of people around confidence. And so, the point where I decided to go all in, I knew I wanted to do this. You know when you’ve got that pull, and for me, it was a calling to start my first business. I didn’t know that I wanted to do coaching, I just knew that I wanted to help people, right?

The Reality of Business Ownership

So I was working full-time at my corporate job and I started my business on the side, it was a side hustle. It got to a point, which is really interesting because we’re talking about financial literacy, right? So I was working all hours, I was working evenings and weekends, and it got to a point where I was like, I really have to make a decision here because I am getting burnt out. Again, I’m getting burnt out. I’m tired, I’m exhausted, and I don’t have time for myself.

Financial Priorities and Decision-Making

But I knew that I had to make a decision, right? So I had to kind of look at, okay, how much do I need to live for the next three months? How much do I need to live for the next six months? And then it was really like a decision, like an active decision to take that jump and to take that leap, right? And so what I did was, I actually left my job, and it was pretty scary.

Preparing for Uncertainty

I didn’t have like three months of savings, six months of savings, none of that. So, I wouldn’t recommend people necessarily take that risk. But for me, I really had to weigh up my mental and physical health against my financial position. Because for me, they’re both so important, but at the end of the day, I wasn’t happy, I was burnt out, and I had to make a change, right?

Overcoming Initial Challenges

Aimee: Yes, totally understand that one. So then I guess the next step would be, did you set up like, did you get a client right away? What did that transition look like? Like, how did you make that first little bit of money?

Helen: Yeah, so when I first started, I was very lucky, right? And so, I don’t want to discount the fact that I did have like, a bit of a network, I had connections, and things like that. So for me, because it was a marketing agency, I knew that I needed clients, right? And so, in the beginning, it was just about making the most of my network, and reaching out to people.

The Power of Networking

It was actually one of my old colleagues at Netflix who was one of my first clients, right? And then the word kind of spread, and it was through referrals, it was through word of mouth. It wasn’t necessarily the kind of business model that I would do again, because I think it’s great to have a client-based business, but I think there are other ways to do it, right?

Taking Bold Steps

But for me, at the time, it was really about just getting out there and just having those conversations. And I think that’s something that people are scared to do because they think, well, what if I get rejected? Or what if they don’t want to work with me? And that’s okay, right? But you don’t know until you try. And so for me, it was really about having those conversations, using my network, reaching out to people. And then I did get some initial clients. And that gave me the confidence to keep going, to keep pushing, and to keep taking those risks.

Finding Balance and Sustainability

Aimee: Love that. So then how did you balance the sustainability part? Because I think that’s one of the pieces that we miss a lot, especially if we’re working full-time and running a business on the side. We’re working full-time and we’re running this business, we’re working all these hours. But that’s not what we’re trying to create. We’re trying to create a business that gives us the freedom that we want, but we’re not feeling that yet. So how did you create that sustainability for yourself?

Creating a Sustainable Business Model

Helen: Yeah, that’s a really good question. So for me, when I first started, I didn’t have the luxury of having, like I said, a lot of savings, right? So it was really about making ends meet in the beginning, right? But once I got to a place where I had a bit of stability, where I had clients coming in, and I had a bit of a routine, it was really about looking at my business model, right?

So one of the reasons I ended up pivoting to coaching was because I knew that the marketing agency model wasn’t sustainable for me, right? Because it was very much trading time for money, and I didn’t want to do that long term. So for me, it was about looking at my business model and seeing how I could create something that was more scalable, right?

Shifting to Coaching for Scalability

So that’s when I made the shift to coaching because I knew that I could create packages, I could create programs, I could create things that were more scalable. And that allowed me to have more of that balance that you’re talking about. Because I think it’s so important, like, we get into business because we want freedom, right? But if we’re not careful, we end up creating another job for ourselves.

Prioritizing Self-Care

So for me, it was about making sure that I was taking care of myself, making sure that I was taking breaks, making sure that I was prioritizing my mental and physical health. Because at the end of the day, if we’re not taking care of ourselves, we’re not going to be able to take care of our business, we’re not going to be able to take care of our clients. So it was really about creating those boundaries for myself, and making sure that I was creating a business that was sustainable, that was scalable, and that allowed me to have the freedom that I wanted.

Final Thoughts

Aimee: Love that. Well, thank you so much for joining us today, Helen. I really appreciate it. And I think our listeners are going to get a lot out of this. So thank you again for joining us.

Helen: Thanks for having me. It was great to be here.

Aimee: Absolutely. So for our listeners, make sure you check out Helen’s information in the show notes. And as always, if you have any questions, feel free to reach out. We’re here to help you create the life and business that you want. Thanks for joining us today on the Your Money Your Life podcast.

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