Avoiding loss + What it really takes to be wealthy

You're in the best spot you'll ever be...because you have the most time you'll ever have ahead of you. 

And yet so many people dwell on future losses that never happen (especially with the stock market) and so NEVER take action, and never start.

If you decide to build financial independence, make the decision, own it, act on it, make it happen. 

But most people never DECIDE.

Will you?

xo
Simone

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If you want to keep on earn more and make more money you're in the right place. I spent over 10 years learning from the most brilliant minds in money, wealth, and investing to take myself from 20 K in debt to a seven figure investment portfolio. Join in. As I share the secrets towards growth, money investing and ultimately freedom. My name is Simone Mercer Huggins, and welcome to ms. Wealthy's. Kiss my money.

Hey guys, welcome back to another week. So I have just got back. Uh, it's been a few days, uh, from the Whitsundays. So sailing around the wit Sunday coast for about 10 days and a lot happened. There are some amazing times amazing memories and also some in very deep, steep, rather, uh, ups and downs, uh, emotionally. So I had a great time. However, the week did start off with me losing my phone, my iPhone, dropping it, um, into the ocean off of the boat. And now it's living with the fish deep in, deep in the ocean of the bits negate Sunday coast, um, gone, completely gone forever. And I, it was something that I wasn't actually expecting. You, obviously you go on things like sailing trips and boats, knowing that you need to protect your assets and protect, um, your electronics and any valuables, but it was just one of those freak accidents that happened.

Um, I was on the day bed off of the back of the catamaran and there was this tiny slit at like the bottom. That's my friend. I'm going to turn that off the tiny slit at the bottom of the day bed. Um, it was like a tiny minute gap, um, in between the boat and the day bed at the bottom, like kind of thing. And what happened was literally, as I was getting off the phone, slipped out of my hand, fell down onto the floor, bounced off the corner of the boat and like fell down this split, which fell straight into the ocean. It was like, you honestly couldn't script it. And it was after a really long day, um, of sailing and we were super tired. And if you've ever slept on a catamaran or on the ocean or on, you know, on a boat that isn't completely like that isn't a massive power boat.

Um, you know, that there is some ocean rock, even if it's like super, still calm. And so, because I am not used to the bed rocking as is most people, uh, I just, I didn't sleep well those first couple of nights until I got used to it. So it was a combination of being tired. I'd already had a drink, um, you know, a glass of Rose and it was kind of dark and it just, it just was one of those things that happened. And I honestly, I cried, I like bold my eyes out seeing his phone, which, you know, everyone that I've spoken to afterwards have said I would have done the exact same thing, um, which does make me feel better. However, what I'm really impressed with was how quickly I got over it. I was super upset and 100% beating myself up over dropping, you know, this $2,000 iPhone off the, the back of the yacht that, no, it wasn't sure.

Cause I just don't insure stuff like that. And because the trip was local, meaning in Australia, it wasn't overseas. I don't tend to get travel insurance on, on local trips. So anyway, um, got back home 10 days later. So it meant I didn't have a phone for the, for the basically entire trip, um, which was partly cathartic and partly really painful. Um, but as soon as I got back, you know, got the new iPhone, another two grand, um, it's just one of those things, right? So what I did realize after having a super good cry was that I didn't lose my eyesight. I didn't lose a lamb. It was just a phone. What was most painful was actually probably losing a lot of my data and photos because I hadn't backed up for months. You guys, if you have not backed up, I encourage you to go and do it now.

Uh, because things like those photos are not something I will ever get back and I have like literally months and months and months just missing. So anyway, I kind of got me thinking about the idea of loss and how there is this crazy part of our human behavior that psychologists have studied four years and there's all these theories around it and data around how we behave around loss aversion. So this idea that there was more pain experienced or thought that we think that we, we think that we will experience more pain from loss, from losing something we have or already have compared to the pleasure from gaining that same amount. So like if you were to lose a hundred dollar bill, a hundred dollar note out of your wallet, you would feel more pain, more loss from losing that if you had, instead of, if you had had like just found a hundred dollar note on the ground, the pleasure from that would actually not be as high as extreme. And it wouldn't last as long. So it is like this crazy theory of loss aversion that our tendency prefers to avoid loss instead of acquire the same gain or chase after the same game and, um, you know, prioritize that. So that makes it really interesting when it comes to things like, uh, building wealth and increasing profit and increasing your income and investing your money

Because, because it,

This loss of version, it means that as a human being, our trait and behavior is leaning towards avoiding any loss, which is why one of the, if not the most, in fact it is the most common fear, worry stress when it comes to investing is around losing money or, you know, the stock market crashing or investing at the wrong time because they think it's going to go down.

This is the biggest thing. That's

Stops people from investing, particularly women because women tend to be, and this is a very big gender stereotype, but women do tend to be more risk adverse than men. It's just how we're wired. It does also mean that we make better investors. So there's a lot of studies out there that have proven that women do make better investors than men longterm, because a lot of men do take on massive, massive risks. They put all of their money into one stock, which is a complete no-no, um, and you know, risk a lot of money. Maybe they take out and borrow money against one, you know, one stock. And all of that risk is just on, on one single thing, performing, which is not how you invest. You invest in, in a diversified portfolio, port folio. So anyway, this loss aversion is what is the underlying basis of why so many people are scared about investing and part of the reason it's more prevalent, more prominent with the stock market is because I think a lot of people don't realize that it's just as tangible well as real estate, but because you can't actually feel it, you can't touch the walls of it.

You can't actually see a stock when you, when you buy it, except for it, you know, electronically appearing in your broker account or appearing on your screen on your phone. It's different to housing. So because you can touch walls and feel property and see property, there's this idea that it's more safe, which is complete bullocks. It's absolutely untrue. And if you have been following me for a while, then you know that the stock market outperforms property, so this loss, aversion, this human behavior is what underpins a lot of the stress, worry, fear about investing and is what stops a lot of people. So I want to talk about that because it's stopping a lot of you from getting ahead. It's stopping a lot of you from jumping in diving in and hitting the go button, um, as well, because I'm seeing so many people right now freaking out about the, you know, quarter 4% drop or half percent drop in interest rates, which means the savings account interest rates also drop, right?

So for the banks that are passing on the interest rate reduction, uh, it also means that the savings rate reduction decreases. So it makes it better as an investor for property, or even as an investor for if you've taken out loans to invest in the stock market as well, because those investment loans decrease as well provided that your home loan bank has passed on, um, that reduction and you're on a variable interest rate. But certainly as you know, you probably know already I've spoken about it before with my investment portfolio, I have property as part of it. Majority is in the stock market, but I do have property. And so that interest rate goes down, but I'm seeing a lot of people freaking out about the drop in interest rates on savings account. Right? Then if I haven't really yet talked about it at length, I have definitely spoken about it in different groups and stuff like that around this stress around worrying about the 2% or the one and a half percent on savings accounts, which is tiny and ridiculous and insane that anyone would focus on that as a wealth building strategy, because it's not saving money, does not build you guys.

I need to be super clear about this. Like this is not something that is going to get you to your first or next million, a savings account we'll never, ever, ever, ever get you there. And when you're seeing, when we see returns on the stock market and, uh, and you know, diversified portfolios of on average, 10%, 10% guys focusing on the 1% you that you get on savings account is a lot of a difference, like 10 times 10 X difference. And so I don't want you to be focusing on the wrong thing, because this is what I see as hindering. So many people, it's about what you focus on and the focus on tiny present differences that are not going to get you very far compared to what you could actually be making. So if you really want to work towards wealth, you really want financial freedom in your near future.

If you really want it to be inevitable, you have to ask yourself if you actually want it. And are you actually willing to do what it takes? Are you prepared to make that decision and commit to it, to become financially free, to become a millionaire? And are you prepared to take on the responsibility required? Because let's be honest. Most people don't and most people sit in the comfort zone, let fear and scarcity drive them and dictate their behavior and actions. And it means they sit and stay where they are and stagnate. But if you actually get real with it, and if you are real with yourself about being prepared to do what it takes to be rich, not just act rich or appear rich or seem bridge, then you will actually break through the barrier. You will actually hit that tipping point of turning and making it a reality when I decided years ago.

And at the time I probably didn't really realize how significant the decision was that I was making when I decided to I was going to do whatever it took. And I was so prepared to work my butt off, to get out of debt. I took on a second job. I learned about investing after that in my weekends. So I gave up partying and, you know, days out in the sun with friends and like time off work. Cause I did it in my spare time. Like it was so important to me. It was the most important thing to me because I realized that I had to step up, get committed, take responsibility and do what it took to get there. And the reality is most people just aren't. I know that a lot of people, if not all, would say that they want more money, they want financial freedom.

They want financial independence that they want to become a millionaire. But the reality is most people just aren't willing to work on it, to do the work, to do what it takes. Recently. I have been watching and engaging with a lot of grant Cardone stuff. And you know, I've known about him for awhile. He's big in the real estate space. He has a conference called 10 X and a book called 10 X, I think, um, a lot of stuff on YouTube and he has a podcast and he recently had some video content that I was looking at. And this guy has now 61 doesn't look it. Um, but he was talking about when he was in his thirties, he was driving around in an old Toyota Camry and he had close to a million dollars in the bank and wearing the same clothes. You know, it wasn't really going shopping or whatever, but what was different was that everyone else around him was taking out Collins and, you know, not actually being serious about building wealth, they were doing things that looked rich so that they could seem rich and appear rich and keep up with the Joneses and all that crap whilst he was building an empire and it's taken him years.

Cause that's what it takes. Right. And that is the difference. You guys like, please don't think that the people that you pass in the street or that you see driving fancy cars or whatever it is, or you see on Instagram or the worst, uh, that they're all real. Like they're not, you have to understand, you do not know what is behind it. And so never, ever, ever compare yourself to someone's highlight reel, never compare yourself to what you think you know about someone else's life, because there is a massive difference between making a decision, being committed, taking responsibility and working your butt off in the background. Rather than that, just the facade. I realize I have jumped around so much. This was actually not the structure I was going to talk about today, but I did want to talk about this loss aversion. And I did want to talk about these three things that makes the difference to doing what it takes to get to where you actually want, meaning making the decision to become a millionaire, like actually making the decision and then being committed and stepping up and doing that.

Not Netflixing chilling for 20 hours a week, like not using your screen time of eight hours a week on crap, on stuff that isn't really gonna make a difference to your life in two years time and taking the responsibility, meaning taking ownership and stepping up because here's the thing it's absolutely okay. If you don't want to do those things, if you don't want to be committed, if you don't want to take responsibility, if you haven't actually decided like fully decided to become a millionaire to become financially free, that's fine. But just get real, right? Like just make a decision about what you're doing and don't beat yourself up about it. Like it's not for everyone. Otherwise everyone would be there, but that's the reality. Okay. I've gone on my little rant about that, but I want to talk about it because I'm just seeing a lot of people say they want it talk about wanting it and then taking action that goes in complete opposite to what they've said.

And that's fine. There's nothing wrong with that. What's important is that you get real about what it is you actually want and get real with those decisions, not aligning with maybe the things that you've said you want and being okay with that, like being okay with, okay, well maybe that's not something that you really want or prepared to do. And if it is then, you know, you know what to do next, like, you know, there are so many, I've spoken about so many resources on this podcast. I've spoken out about books. You can come and join the free Facebook group. I'll put the link in the show notes. Like there are so many resources that you can use at your disposal right now to get serious, get real and to start your journey or at least Excel your journey, accelerate the path you're on. If this is the decision that you have made and I want you to come join me, cause I want more women to be, uh, on this path. And I want to be surrounded by those same women. Like I want that to be something that is in my life and in my reality, because it's in your reality too. So I'm going to put a bunch of links in the show notes. If you're not sure where to start, if you need the next step, if you need the next bump, if you need, you know, the next quantum leap, then I'm going to put them in there and I'm going to see you in there. All right. Back till next week.