Am I Having A Quarter Life Crisis?

This is Busy Getting Better, the podcast for women who are committed to prioritizing their own personal growth. I'm your host, Madison J. A mindset and money coach, a first generation wealth builder and a woman on a mission to help you master your finances and live your best life. Money is not all we are covering though, because in order to live your best life, you have to become your best self. So we are diving deep into all things personal development and bringing you the mindset shifts, money, tips and inspiration. You need to go out there, be bold, and build the life you can't stop daydreaming about. It's time to get busy, babe. Busy getting better. Wow. You guys, welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome to the very first episode of Busy Getting Better. I have been thinking about this podcast for. If I were to think back, it's probably been like a good nine months since I've decided that I wanted to start this podcast. So. So pretty much this is just me birthing my baby. Now that I'm thinking about it. It has taken me so much time to, to think about, you know, what kind of message I wanted to bring to the world, what I wanted the vibe to be, and also everything that goes into learning how to launch a podcast. Life has been very busy lately and so I had to pick it up and put it down a couple of times and now we're finally here. We're here and we're rocking and we're rolling and I'm so excited to kick things off. I thought it would be such a good place to start with just giving you a little bit of insight into me and how I got to the point of starting, starting my business as a coach, starting this podcast and kind of everything that has come into this idea of busy getting better. And so I guess I feel like I'll take you back to just like the start of where my money story started, because that is ultimately what led me to wanting to start a business helping women with their money mindset and with their personal finance. So I'll keep this succinct for sure. I'll definitely do a deeper dive for y' all later on it. But I moved out of my home at 17 years old, so while I was still finishing high school, I moved in with a boyfriend at the time and that was when my money journey really started to take place because I officially was on my own financially. I then, you know, went to college. I put myself through a four year university and got a degree in business marketing. I was the first person in my family to go to college. And I put myself through college on scholarships, student loans, credit cards, and working. I worked multiple jobs, always throughout college, I was always working at least one job, if not two, to be able to pay my bills, be able to pay rent, and, you know, obviously just survive. And so when I graduated college, I had been living in just like a paycheck to paycheck cycle for four or five years at this point. And so I was like, okay, my number one motivator when I get out of college is to not be a broke bitch anymore. If I'm being honest, I did not want to live paycheck to paycheck. And so I went into a job that allowed me to make commission. I went into a sales based role. I started working at an IT recruiting and sales company. And I was there for seven years. And when I was there, I started to make some money, make more money than I had ever made before. And that led me down a path of, thankfully, financial literacy. But it definitely didn't start that way. As you start making more money if you don't have good money management skills, which I was fine. I mean, I had good money management skills to, like, survive and get myself through life. But, like, I had never had an abundance of money in my life before. And this started to be the first time that I had an abundance of money. And I didn't know what the heck to do with it, really. So I definitely was doing my best to prioritize, you know, getting out of credit card debt. Um, but I, again, fundamentally, I just, like, didn't know what to do with it. So I also was just spending a lot more money. And this kind of got me in a vicious cycle of making more money, spending more money, and I think it was really probably when Covid hit that I slowed down. So I started working out of College at, in 2017. Covid came in 2020. So it had been, you know, a good three years of me working and starting to really get, you know, a good income, a good stable income. And when 2020 came around, obviously, as we all know, the world stopped, right? And I really had an opportunity to slow down a little bit. Sales is definitely go, go, go, hustle, hustle, hustle. I had just put my head down and was just trying to really, you know, get things right at work. And so 2020 was the first time where I was able to really slow down and kind of start to reflect on some stuff. And I realized I had been working really, really hard and I had hit, you know, income goals that I thought Were outrageous that I didn't know if I was ever gonna be able to make. Cause again, I didn't come from money. So making good money was not something I had even really like. I wasn't sure it was possible for me. And so I started to make good money. And I looked up one day and I realized that I didn't have a whole lot to show for it in the sense of like, wealth. If I'm being honest, I don't even think I really understood at this point, like, what wealth was. I just thought you like, made a lot of money. I thought making, you know, hitting a goal, hitting six figure income, all my problems were gonna be solved. And it definitely helped. I wasn't living paycheck to paycheck necessarily anymore, but I wasn't necessarily furthering this like wealth building agenda, which again, I didn't really have a name for it at the time because I didn't really understand what wealth was. I didn't understand how you built wealth. I didn't understand how people like stopped working one day. I just was like, hey, you work hard, you make money and then you turn 65 and you retire. But I really. This is going to sound so silly, but like, I really didn't understand that you needed to be actually putting money into like retirement accounts and into brokerage accounts or. I just didn't understand how wealth was built. And so I just, I realized one day, like, I feel like I'm missing so many pieces to the puzzle here. And I went on a deep dive. This was really such like a deep dive for me, not only on financial literacy and wealth building, but also personal development and mindset. I got obsessed with the power of our subconscious mind. And like much, it rules in our life. Like your subconscious mind rules 95% of the decisions that you make. It is the autopilot computer in your brain. And so when I started to learn more about that and how our subconscious beliefs around money end up relating into how we treat money, our relationship with money, and how we end up, like how money shows up in our life and what we're able to do with it, There just was such a moment of like, crossover in my mind of to how important the money mindset was with wealth building. And on the wealth building side, I went so deep, man. We started learning about real estate investments. We joined real estate masterminds and groups. I was in courses, I was in all the groups. I tried to start a wholesaling business with my boyfriend at the time, that is now my husband. Like there was so much in the real estate world we were trying to figure out, because you start to realize, like, okay, a lot of people in, like, have money, get into real estate. They get into real estate investing, they own properties. And so I was just. My mind was blown alone. Like, I could not stop reading. I could not stop watching YouTube videos, listening to podcasts, going to meetups, listening to, like, any ounce of information I could on how to start multiplying my money, how to put my money into things that were going to allow me to stop working. I got introduced to this concept of financial independence. Retire early, which. Which, if you haven't heard this fact before, this statement alone blew my mind. Retirement is not an age, It's a number. Essentially, this means that as soon as your investments hit a number that can support your lifestyle, you don't have to work anymore. And so this concept of passive income and hitting my investment goals was all that was consuming my mind. That along with, okay, how the heck do I rewire my brain to be the person, to be the version of myself that I want to be? The personal development world sucked me in. I got so obsessed with just this concept of becoming the best version of myself. I realized that the ultimate fear that I had was getting to the end of this life and looking back and knowing that I could have done more. I could have become a bigger version of myself. I could have made a bigger impact. I could have helped more people, I could have experienced more, I could have saw more, I could have traveled more. But I stayed in my own way. My fears, my limiting beliefs, my view of the world that I had adopted at a younger age was gonna stand in that way and was gonna dictate my future. And so I started wanting to learn more and more about how to reshape my mind, about how to have different beliefs around money, about. Around myself, around what was possible in this world. And so I spent a good couple years just, like, living in this. Okay. All I was thinking about was, how do I, you know, make more money? How do I invest more money? How do I, you know, max out my retirement account? How do I reshape my brain to have different beliefs? How do I change my circle of friends? Like, all of this stuff? And so that was going on for a couple of years. And then I would say at the start of last year, start of 2023, I started to have a different thought. And this thought was more so around purpose. I started to feel really unfulfilled. I realized my job wasn't necessarily challenging me anymore. I wasn't growing professionally. And this was where I started to realize that I am somebody who craves growth. I love learning about new things. I'm obsessed with just expanding my mind. I love learning about different topics and I want to continue to grow as an individual. And I wasn't growing in my job anymore. And obviously I was like learning about, you know, wealth building in the mind, but there was just something missing and it was really the sense of like fulfillment and purpose. And then I discovered life coaching. My friend introduced me to a life coach and I started working with her. And I remember on the first call she was like asking me all these questions and I just remember being like, okay, no, but like, what do you do? Like what is your job? And I learned about the coaching industry. And it's so funny because as soon as I started to learn more about what a coach does for somebody, I realized I had low key. Been doing this my whole life. I'm constantly the person in my friend group and my family that people lean on for advice. Especially as these last couple years had gone on, as I was learning more about the mind and learning more about, you know, personal development, even like people were coming to me even more. And I was just constantly being the person that was, you know, giving, giving advice, but also listening and providing safe spaces for people to talk about things that was not, you know, in a judgmental way and lifting people up and having a really positive outlook on life. And so I realized so many components of being a good coach were kind of who I already naturally was being in my day to day life. But now I could pursue a path, an actual life path where I could turn my passion for helping women and inspiring them to live their best life and get out of their way and stop letting limiting beliefs hold them back with the power of like learning how to manage your money and how to build wealth. Because I think there's such a parallel with being able to get your finances in order and being able to live your best life. Like there's a lot of self worth that's tied into our net worth and what we think that we're worthy of and what we can accomplish. And so I just think mindset with wealth building to me is like such a powerful combo that has changed my life that I wanted to then go build a business around. And so I got certified as a mindset coach. I actually got certified in nlp, which is Neuro. Neuro Linguistic programming, which works completely with the subconscious mind. So it's all about how to identify your Limiting beliefs and actually work with how your brain works to rewire your thoughts that you have to have different beliefs in this world. Like, oh, I could go on. Our brain is so, so powerful. And so I got certified as a mindset coach, life coach, and then within those NLP techniques, and I started to actually get the opportunity to coach women and help them on their path to pay off debt and start figuring out how to leverage their retirement accounts, Help them understand the concepts that retirement is a number, not an age. And, you know, here's why you should be prioritizing some of these things, especially in your younger years. Like, if I can help women in their 20s and 30s capture more compound interest. Like, that is so exciting because the more money you put in now, if you put it in earlier, it actually works faster for you and you don't have to contribute as much. So if we can just start prioritizing this stuff at a younger age, it's going to be so much more impactful. So I started to actually sit down and coach women on this topic. And when I say my heart was just, like, so full of me, being able to turn all of my lessons of trial and error and hours and hours of research and reading and podcast listening and networking and asking questions and getting in the right room, if I. I could just, like, simplify that and kind of demystify the money world, because it is very mysterious how it all works and it's meant to be confusing so that people can profit off of it. If I could turn that and the power of your mind and, like, turn that into a business and instill confidence in women, like, that is. That was such a dream. And so it started to really fill that bucket of, okay, now I understand. I get why I went through all these trials and tribulations. I understand why I had to learn all of this stuff on my own. And I was able to, like, really release any sort of, like, victim mentality, if you will, around my journey. And I just recognized it was all for a purpose. And that purpose was to lead me here, to now be able to pour into other people, make their journey so much easier, provide a space for women to be able to talk about money without being judged and just be able to kind of be that girlfriend. Like, there were so many moments on that journey of me trying to get my finances in order and get out of debt and start building my net worth and figure out a plan to financial independence and freedom that I just wish I had someone to talk to about it. And not necessarily like, oh, go Talk to a financial advisor who's motivated by, you know, making money off of you. Just like a girlfriend that's like, yo, I'm trying to do this, what do I do? You know, and just have a really unbiased approach to helping people build a game plan and also just helping people, helping women understand that you do have the power in you to master your finances, to you know, figure out what your financial future looks like, to dream bigger than you've been dreaming and to put a plan in place to stay consistent and to frickin do the dang thing. And so all, all of this led me to the last couple months which has been a little crazy. So I started really pondering this idea of wow, what if this side business can be a full business and what if I can turn it into a full time business a lot sooner than I was originally planning? So the original plan was really to run my business while continuing to work full time. Because now, now I'm still been at the same company for seven years after graduating college and things are, things are good. Like I'm, I really feel like I've done a good job building a good brand there. I definitely found a lot of success, success. I was making really great money and I wanted to stick around and obviously benefit from that. But I don't know how to say anything other than like I just woke up one day and I just knew that my purpose was to build this business full time. I, I, I just had this innate feeling like I think it's time, I think it's time for me to jump all into this thing. I see the impact I can make in such a small time frame for the, you know, the people that I've gotten to work with. But like I wanna, I wanna turn this into something bigger. I wanna be able to make a bigger impact with people and also I want that growth I really want again I said I'm obsessed with personal growth. I wanna continue to push myself to become a bigger and a better version of myself. And so I wanted the personal development that comes along from running your own business. Someone has said before that entrepreneurship is really just personal development journey wrapped into a business idea to make money. And it's so true because you really do have to believe in yourself and you have to push yourself and you have to just trust that no matter what comes your way, you know you're going to figure it out. And so I was just ready for a level of growth that I wasn't going to be able to get where I was at And I had done, you know, a really good job with my finances over the last couple years. I had completely paid off all of my debt. I'm completely debt free. My car is paid off, my student loans are paid off, my credit cards are paid off. I've got a good emergency fund, I've got money invested. I am in, you know, a good spot with my retirement accounts where even if I stop investing in them, like, I'm. I'm going to be in a way better spot from a retirement age that a lot of people are because of how I prioritized it over the last seven years. And so it's just been. It was just a moment where I was like, I think I've done the work to be able to jump in. And so then it was like, okay, well, what is the journey gonna look like? And part of that journey was bringing this podcast to life and kind of trying to pass along this main message that I feel like has really driven me these last, especially the last, you know, four years since COVID And that's this concept of busy getting better. And it is kind of the methodology that I. Or, like, I don't know if it's a methodology, but more so just kind of a life motto that I've been living by, where I started to get really diligent about what I wanted to be spending my time doing. And I looked around and realized I was saying yes to a lot of things that weren't necessarily lighting me up. They weren't really helping me become a better version of myself. They weren't like. They were. I was just saying yes to say yes. I think I was, you know, just grateful to get invited to things or wanted to make sure I was in. In the loop on things. And I. I was just doing things that, you know, like watching all the shows and going all the happy hours and partying on the weekends and just trying to stay in the know. And I just realized along my journey that those things weren't actually helping me get closer to the version of myself that I was picturing in the future. And so I started to be diligent around drawing boundaries and just feeling comfortable saying no, releasing fomo. Embracing this concept called Jo Jo Mo, I think is what it is. The joy of missing out versus the fear of missing out and just being really happy with who I was becoming and pouring into all areas of my life. So really focusing on, you know, my mental health, my physical health, my spiritual health, my financial health, like, all of those components to me make you the best version of yourself. You can't just pour into one of those without being able to see like a full effect in your life. They're all equally important. Obviously, I think mindset is like critical to anything that you're going to do in life. And then finances, I just think, don't get enough love. Like, I think that figuring out your finances is such a, such a form of self love. Because if you are mastering your finances, you are teaching yourself discipline, you're teaching yourself the love for delayed gratification. You're seeing a bigger vision for yourself and for your money than what's in front of your face right now. And you're working for a bigger goal. You're working for a future that you know you deserve. And I think that is so lovely. So that is really right. The concept behind busy getting better, it's just finding time for yourself. It's carving out time in your day or in your weight week to stick to the goals and to stick to the habits that are going to make you the best version of yourself possible so that you can experience all that you're supposed to experience in this life. That is what I want to instill in people with this podcast. So let me just flashback, baby, two months ago for you. I just recently got married. I chopped my hair off after the wedding. Like, my hair's always been so long and just I think we chopped like seven or eight inches off. I decided it was the time, it was the time to go all in on my business. And so I came back from my honeymoon and that first day back from my honeymoon was actually my seven year anniversary with the company. And I sat down and put my notice in with my job. I just was like, I need to rip the band aid off and I need to go all in. Also. Also, funny enough, I'm really itching to get my first tattoo. And so I had this reflection that I just, I figured you could laugh a little bit with me of just like, holy crap, am I having a quarter life crisis right now? Because I am just really, really itching for amounts of change that I don't even know where it's all coming from. I'm like, let me just go ahead and up, level my whole life, uproot my whole life, flip it upside down and just start to be a totally different version of myself. Like, I'm ready. So of course I did what anyone, anyone would do with a major critical question like that, am I having a quarter life crisis? I took it to Google and what I found on Google is that A quarter life crisis is apparently a period of uncertainty and questioning that can occur in a person's early 20s to mid-30s. And it is similar to a midlife crisis, but on a smaller scale. It involves anxiety and self doubt about the direction and qualities of one's life. People may feel trapped, uninspired or disillusioned during this time. So I thought that was really interesting. I wouldn't say I necessarily like slipped into like any sort of depression, which is why I was like, no, I'm definitely not having a quarter life crisis. But if I'm just looking at this like, hey, I am questioning where I want to take my life right now and maybe the path that I'm on right now isn't it. Maybe I, maybe I am having a quarter life crisis. I was like, I don't know, I got to experience something new. I think what I learned from this question and kind of reflecting on my own situation that I was in is that I think sometimes we're just so afraid to pivot and we're so afraid to recognize the fact that maybe something was good. Like, I think the situation that I was in, the career that I had built, the success that I had attained was good. I was really proud of it. And at one point it was all I ever wanted. Like, I dreamed of being a badass saleswoman. I was like, just always wanted to be somebody that produced and that, you know, I think it was just like I proved to myself that I could do it. And having a, of sense stable job and having a stable income and having a high income were all things that were like of utmost importance to me at one point. And it, it was, I was living a good life. And so it took me a little bit to really come to being okay with the fact that that chapter of my life was so good and I wouldn't be able to move on to this chapter without that chapter. And everything that I wanted, I had. But those desires were from a different version of me. I've changed so much over the last couple of years that those desires don't align with the future vision and the future life that I want to build anymore because I think I fulfilled it. And I think sometimes we're really hard on ourselves or we have a hard time letting go of certain things when we're like, oh, but this is all I ever wanted at one point. And it's like, yeah, because that's what you needed at that point and that helped you fulfill that desire and it helped you accomplish that goal at that time. But it's okay for your goals to change. It's okay for your life to switch it up a little bit and move in a different direction. And it's okay to walk away from something that is good in pursuit of something that is better, in pursuit of something that's going to fill this new version of yourself up more and gonna push this version of yourself more. So I was really interested in this concept of just kind of like, why is it so hard for us to say goodbye to things in our life that we feel like we've poured so much into? And what I found is that there is this concept that is called the Sunk Cost Fallacy. And essentially what it's saying is that we have a hard time letting go of things that we have already poured so much time, money and energy into. Essentially that time, money and energy, it's sunk, it's gone. We've already put it into a job, into a relationship, whatever it is. And so we're like, ugh, well, I've already invested so much time in this, right? For me, I've already spent seven years building this career. Like, do I really want to throw all that away? Do I really want to start over? But it's not throwing it away and it's not starting over because it's all building blocks. It's all stepping stones to get you to this next chapter. And again, I wouldn't be able to take this next chapter if it wasn't for all of the lessons and all of the growth that I did in that chapter. But sometimes it is okay to close that door in order to move in to another one. And so I think there was something written down here where it was just saying, like the Sunk Cost Fallacy. Essentially we can think of it as a dark side of our brain's ability to commit to long term goals. One of the things that makes humans unique is actually our ability to plan, to collaborate, and to execute on goals that might have extremely long time horizons. But one possible explanation of the Sunk Cost Fallacy is that while this commitment superpower has helped us to achieve a lot compared to other species, it comes with an irrational attachment to finishing what we've started. And that really sunk in with me of just this thought of thinking that we have to stick with something even if it no longer serves us, even if it's no longer benefiting the life path that we are choosing to go on. And so I guess I just want to leave you with this message of if there's anything that you are looking to pivot in Your life. If you're looking to make a major change, if you feeling like something that you're doing, whether it's a habit or a job or a relationship, a friendship, a romantic relationship that you're in that is just no longer serving you, that you feel like was everything you wanted at one point or you felt like did benefit you at one point, but maybe doesn't, don't give in to this sunk cost fallacy and recognize that all of those things were benefiting you and they were benefiting that version of you. And it's okay to become a new version of yourself. It's okay to adopt a new identity of yourself. And maybe this new identity of yourself doesn't need those things. Maybe those things are actually holding you back from fully embodying this new identity. And I'm not right? I'm not necessarily saying go out and quit your job or do anything that drastic. I mean, maybe that's what you are being called to do, like me. And if you are, let me know and we can chat about it. Because it's kind of a wild thing to wake up one day and just be like, I think, I think I'm gonna quit my job anyway. I digress. Okay, well, I wanted to wrap it up with sharing this poem that I received from my life coach. She sent me this beautiful bracelet and it came with a poem on it for when I finally went ahead and made the decision to put in my notice at my job and jump fully into entrepreneurship. And I think it just totally resonates with this message here of just feeling okay to say goodbye to things that are no longer serving you in pursuit of something bigger. And so the poem is called Begin Again. At any given time, the world will try to define you. But within the depths of your soul lies an infinite universe awaiting to unfold. And when life tries to place you on a path that is no longer paved for your heart, I hope you have the courage to forge your own. I hope you shift with the tides and move mountains with your heart, trusting that you always have what it takes to change, to claim and to begin again. On days when it seems as if things are falling apart, may you be reminded of who you are and what you are made of. That you, my dear, were built for the unraveling, for the redoing and the undoing. Like a serpent shedding its skin, you are free to let go of what no longer brings light within, forever growing from the knowing that sometimes what comes must also go. For what breaks you also builds you what leaves you also shapes you. No matter how many times you feel lost or how many times you feel found, know that you are infinitely becoming. And with every fallen layer, there are new parts of you that rise. Thank you guys so much for listening to the first episode. I hope you continue to join me on the journey as we dive into all things physical health, mental health, financial health, and spiritual health and help you become the best version of yourself that you could become. Yeah. Thanks for. Thanks for being here, guys. I'll see you guys on the next episode. Hey, before you go, I just want to go ahead and say thank you for spending a little bit of your time with me today. And also congratulations for finding a chunk of time to carve out and focus on you and moving the needle and becoming a better version of yourself. If there is anybody that you think could benefit from this podcast, please share it with a friend, share it with a family member. Feel free to share it on your socials and help me spread the word about busy getting better. Thank you so much and I will see you on the next episode.