August 17, 2025 • 34 mins
Welcome back to SugarMamma’s Fireplay, the podcast where we explore all things financial independence, early retirement, and long-term financial freedom, with honesty, empathy, and a touch of elegance.
Today, I’m so excited to be joined by Michelle, a self-employed mum of two, who, along with her husband, has been building a life of freedom, purpose and balance through the FIRE movement.
In this conversation, we unpack why women often approach FIRE differently than men and how that difference can actually be a powerful advantage. We’ll talk about lifestyle design, parenting with purpose, money in marriage, and how to build financial freedom with children in the picture, not in spite of them.
Whether you're starting from scratch or already on your way to FIRE, Michelle’s story is going to inspire you to think more intentionally about your own financial future and help you realise you absolutely can build a life of meaning, time freedom and wealth.
Additional notes kindly provided for further clarity and motivation by Michelle:
We are aiming to withdraw between $120,000-$140,000 per annum in the next two years from our portfolio so that we can move down to part-time, being 1-2 days a week of paid work. This consists only of dividends and the rent from one property we own.
The long-term goal is that we'd be able to access between $280,000-$320,000 per year in passive income when we finally down tools for good. We're now thinking that that will be by the time I'm 50 and will have to include passive income from all sources (rental income from all properties, super and dividends). The value of our investments is due to have compounded to a stage then that is factored into those calculations. Closer to, we will have to do more comprehensive tax planning.
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Whilst we discuss various financial topics, this podcast is not advice in anyway, but purely for educational purposes only. Nothing in this podcast is personal advice, investment advice or product advice. With any major financial decision, you must always do your own research, consider all the pros and cons, fees, caps, limits, costs, taxes etc. Always proactively educate yourself before making any major financial decision, consider your own financial goals, deadlines and risk profile. So please bear all of this in mind when listening to this podcast and please always speak to a Financial Planner when wondering what you should do to achieve your own financial goals and dreams.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Why women do fire differently and that's actually our superpower.
Welcome back to Sugar Mama's Fireplay, the podcast where we
explore all things financial independence, early retirement and long term
financial freedom, and we do so with honesty, empathy, and
hopefully a touch of elegance. Today, I am so excited
(00:20):
to be joined by Michelle who's actually previously been on
my YouTube channel many many years ago. She's now a
self employed mother of two who, along with her husband,
has been building a life of freedom, purpose and balance
through the Fire movement, a really powerful lifestyle movement. Now,
in this conversation that we're about to unpack, we're going
(00:40):
to explore why women often approach fire, that is, financial independence,
retire early differently from men, and actually how that difference
can be a really powerful advantage. We're going to talk
about the lifestyle design, parenting with purpose, money and marriage
and how to build financial freedom with children actually in
(01:01):
the picture, not in spite of them. Whether you're starting
from scratch or you're already on your way to fire.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Shell story is going to.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
Inspire you to think more intentionally about your own financial
future and to help you realize you can absolutely build
a life filled with meaning freedom, time, and.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Of course wealth. Good morning, Michelle.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
How are you, Hikennah, how are you? I'm really well. Thanks.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Now I want to get straight into this. Can we
go back to the beginning and start with your own
fire story? Like, what was it that, initially, I guess
was a catalyst or inspired you and your husband, of
course to pursue financial independence and create an early retirement
because you've been doing this for a long time, and
(01:49):
no one you would have been a bit of a pioneer,
No one would have even heard of that concept, you know,
ten years ago.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
Yeah, So I think for me it was just not
wanting to sort of follow the status quo. I wasn't
happy in my work at the time in a full
time role, and I sort of knew there had to
be a better way, or at least I hoped that
there was. And when I found out that you could
replace your salary income with investment income by just being
(02:19):
proactive with your money earlier, that was a very appealing
concept to me and my colleague who I worked with
at this company that I wasn't very happy at and
had been with for a long time, because they had
a bit of a they called them the Golden Handcuffs.
But I was a very early employee and it was
a I had an eesop plan that was vesting over
(02:40):
very unfavor very unfavorable to the employee timeline, so it
was really drawn out. So I was kind of really
stuck at this company that I wasn't happy at. But
I worked with this guy who's super clever, really smart,
and he told me about the fire movement and it
had really taken off in the States and it had
actually been pioneered by a guy called mister money Must
and I was like, this is amazing and so transferable
(03:04):
to Australia and I need to start doing this. And
he was sort of doing it, but he was very
quiet about it. He didn't really tell people. And he
was saying to me that he'd been doing it for
the last ten years and he was pretty much on
track to go down to part time the next couple
of years if he wanted to. And he was in
his late twenties at the time. So I just thought
(03:28):
that was incredible and I started from there. So that
really was where it all sort of began for me.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
And what was the first investment that you made?
Speaker 3 (03:37):
Oh, gosh, I think My very first investment was Vanguard,
and I think it might have been probably un a
ship if that's probably the as.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
Yeah, okay, all right, so that's the Australian Chare Fund. Yeah,
all right. So going back to sort of women and
where women fit in the Fire movement. You know, you've
mentioned that women they approach fire differently than men, and
I'm inclined to agree, But what would you say from
your opinion are the key differences that you've picked up?
(04:09):
You know, is it mindset, is it strategy, is it
motivation or is it a mix of the two, Like,
how do you see the key differences between men and
women in this incredibly powerful, inspiring movement.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Yeah, it's a good question. I think there's two things.
I've thought about this a lot. I think that it
boils down to the first thing is that I think
that women fundamentally want autonomy and security. I personally, and
this is like a lot I speak a lot to
Australian Fire followers, but also in the States and actually
the UK, Europe kind of globally. We're not really interested
(04:42):
in conquests, we're not interested in shooting the lights out
being the market. We don't want to pick unicorn stocks.
I don't want to day trade. I don't want to
see it at my computer all day. In fact, quite
the opposite. I want to build an est egg that
makes me feel safe and secure. And when I've dug
really deep into this, it often comes back to feeling tracked,
the concept of sort of untrapping. At the time when
(05:02):
I started, I was in a bad job that I
felt very trapped in, as I've said, due to this AESOP,
this employee share component which had just very extremely unfair
vesting terms. I had been at this company from its infancy,
so I was sort of there to see these shells
thisss so that I could sort of take them and go.
But I was really stuck there and I had a
(05:23):
proper it was a real nax CEO, Like the work
was really hard, super long hours. I just wasn't happy.
So it was this feeling of just like there has
to be another way, Like work can't always look like this,
And at the time I didn't know that it wouldn't,
but that was my frame of reference for what work
(05:43):
would be, and I thought, if I'm going to stay
and take startups, it's always going to be like this.
But over the years, this concept of sort of sort
of feeling trapped I wanted to move away from that
also popped up again once I had kids, because I
started to feel a little bit trapped in motherhood and
I was trying to juggle the paid labor of that
alongside the paid labor of doing an actual pay job.
(06:05):
I've also been in you aside from that, bad situations
while traveling or on nights out, and I've had to
make swift decisions to leave. So I think for women,
we want to be able to have choices and freedom
to navigate systems that haven't always served us equally. So
that's the first thing. I think. The second thing that
(06:26):
makes women a little bit difference is that we tend
to invest more in line with personal values. So when
I my husband and I talk about, you know, what
our next stock pick or next fund investment might be,
for example, he will often look at performance. He will
look at what he's read, so what's topical, Whereas that
(06:47):
matters a lot less to me over what the company represents.
So I, for example, look at things like ESG rating,
I look at performance reports. I look at whether a
company's been ethically screened. I always look at the female
representation on a board, because to me, that's a really
good patter as to whether they'll perform well. And I
think the research shows that women tend to invest this
way and in a more consistent way, albeit later than men,
(07:11):
whereas men tend to not follow a trend as much
because they're sort of more volatile in their decision making.
So I think, at least in my experience, and I
suppose anecdotally what I've sort of gleaned from talking to
other female investors is that those are the two sort
of key differences.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Yeah, and I would I speaking from experience obvious as
a financial that I'm working with men and women, I
completely agree with that, Like, that's very much what I've seen,
that kind of calm, rational, methodical approach by women, and
then men will have sort of a bit more I guess,
captivated by the opportunity, the upside, and perhaps maybe a
(07:50):
little bit more I wouldn't say your rational, but a
little bit more fast moving and making those decisions. Now,
coming to the topic of motherhood, you know, me, when
I became a mother, I suddenly went from being I
guess very driven and motivated to probably having a greater
desire motivation towards.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Security and stability.
Speaker 1 (08:13):
How would you say, you know, becoming a mother because
you've got two young children, has I guess impacted or
how your relationship with money has perhaps evolved in this transition,
and how has that impacted your fire goals?
Speaker 3 (08:29):
Yeah, I think it made me realize that I wanted
to go back to work because I'd spent a lot
of time feeling that my work was the problem. And
actually work wasn't the problem, it just wasn't that I
wasn't doing purposeful work.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
So when I had my first son, he was very
late to day care because I didn't think he went
to day care until he was two and a half.
And that's for a few reasons. The primary one was
that COVID happened right as he was born. Most of
his infancy everything was closed and we just spent a
lot of time together and indoors. So I really craved
(09:07):
going back to work, which was very unexpected for me.
And when I did, when he started daycare, I was
so renewed. I felt this really renewed sense of purpose
and identity in myself and that was a really nice
shift that was very unexpected. I was really laser focused
on what I wanted, which was also writing a nonfiction
(09:27):
book which had been on the backburn a few years
because quote unquote I never had time. Yeah, so you
know the difference I suppose in work, I think as
well as that my ability to multitask and balance is insane.
I'm very grateful and I'm hyper aware of the very
limited hours I have for things, so I'm much more
(09:47):
efficient with them. I also don't care as much about things.
But money wise, I don't think really it's all that different.
We've always been low and slow investors. That really hasn't changed.
The security piece has always been a very strong theme.
But I suppose what has changed is what we want
to do when we retire. So my husband always had
(10:09):
this sort of like open ended goal of like, maybe
you want to travel, that would be nice. I don't
really know what we would do if we weren't working,
But now we have this stream to buy a big
camp van, do lots of traveling with the kids, maybe
work part time on the road as we go. That's
definitely sort of a new development.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
Now.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
On that topic of working part time, you know you've
made that conscious decision when you hit that, you know, retirement,
it's not actually a you know, hang up your shoes
and go fishing and never work it down in your
life ever. Again, it's more about working part time indefinitely.
Why is that important to you now? Like that you
(10:53):
want this? You know your retirement is going to include,
you know, working part time. What's changed there?
Speaker 3 (10:58):
Yeah? I think I I want my kids to see
me working like it's important that I think that they do.
And I think I'm a better mother when I have
that balance in my life. To be honest with.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
You, agree more I could sometize I can't. We'll out
the door to go to work and have a conversation
and you my brain and you know, and I completely agree.
Letting kids see you work hard is still a really
great work ethic totally to follow. It's it's invaluable. And
you know, parents often say to me, like, how do
I teach my kids how to do money?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
I'm like, well, watch you work like that in.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Itself is a financial lesson and you know a message
of wisdom and you know, dedication and perseverance. So yeah,
I completely agree with you.
Speaker 3 (11:45):
Yeah, it's really important. I come back on my cup
as full and I just have more. It doesn't actually
drain me, it fills it up and I have more
to pour into them, which I don't think I would
have if it's just it's too important. Really, it's too
important to me. Like I actually I thought I hated working,
and I don't. I actually love working. I just didn't
(12:07):
like the work that I was doing for who I
was doing it for. And now that I'm self employed,
I pick who I want to work with, and I
you know, I have a lot of flexibility around my hours.
It's just it's totally changed the game for me. It's
I feel very lucky.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
And also I think, you know, when I'm the same
as you, I don't want to just retire and stop everything,
you know, I want to keep using my brain.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
I want to keep, you know, stay relevant. I want
to understand what's going on in the world. I want to
do charity work.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
I want to continue on building great relationships and connections
with people. So and that's all contributes towards wealth that
you know, wealth and richness.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
Now you've obviously weathered periods.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Of you know, no savings due to obviously higher interest
rates that we've all experienced, and you know, life events
you know, like maternity leave, Like how have you weather
these storms or you know period of time in your
life and actually still managed to stay completely committed and
resilient through this.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
Yeah, I think. I mean I had high premises gravidia,
which is just a GRL fabilitating condition, and I unfortunately
had it with both of my kids from very early
on them both pregnancies, and it meant that I was
effectively rendered from completely bedbound from like week six or
(13:29):
something up until I delivered both of them. So it
didn't go until I delivered the placenta, basically, Yeah, And
it was and it meant that I had to turn
off my life, like just from one day to the next,
Like one day I could sort of function and I
felt a bit nauseous, and then the next it was
(13:50):
just no like I was. It was awful. And I
think that time has a huge emotional there's a huge
emotional burden that comes with like an condition like that. Anyway,
in trying to and pregnancy is difficult. You know, some
women have great pregnancies and that's wonderful, but I think
the majority have some level of difficulty with a pregnancy
(14:11):
because it is a very difficult thing to do is
to create another human or multiples. And I often think
if I so I didn't have to worry about money
during that time because of the decisions that I had made,
which meant that I could focus on rest and recovery.
And I remember thinking distinctly, like, this would be so
much more difficult if I was still having to try
(14:33):
to get up and go to work or even budget
and manage my money from bed, right, because you know
how much more difficult that I've made that time in
my life, and how much more stressful. I think even
when I was going through those times, I felt really
grateful for past me and the decisions that I had made,
(14:55):
because it was allowing current me toocus on the rest
and recovery, and that kind of kept me going for like,
this is why I do this so I may have
more periods, like if I continue to have more children,
I will inevitably have pregnancies like this again, or something
else could happen in my life, and you know, I
could deal with the chronic illness or have an unexpected injury,
(15:18):
or something could happen where I need to take time
out of the traditional workforce, and I will have my
investment in my passive income to see me through, And
I think that's really what kept me feeling very resilient
during those times, because it was like, I've made these
decisions for a reason. I'm seeing them come to fruit
(15:38):
now and they may have to come to fruit again
in the future, and that feels good.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Now, many families, like men and women, feel really overwhelmed,
particularly right now, with the rising cost of living, and
it makes it really hard to save, let alone invest
whilst raising children. Someone who as a mother with two
young children, who is actively involved in the fire movement,
(16:05):
what would be some you know, realistic and practical strategies
that other people could use, that you can recommend that
helped you get to where you are today.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Yeah, it's a it's a that's a hard question to
answer because I think we're in such an unprecedented time
in terms of the current cost of living, Like that's
even that's impacted us massively as well, the interest rates
on our Like we are used to saving huge amounts
of money, like after seventy percent of our income, and
this was probably pre children, not after having children, but
(16:39):
pre children we were doing that. So then with that
definitely went down when we had kids. Too much more
reasonable figure. You know, whatever we could had in surve plus,
it might have been twenty percent or thirty thirty percent
on a good month, to all of a sudden not
even like barely breaking even, and in some some months
(16:59):
not even at all, digging into the offset savings in
order to cover the shortfall of the mortgage and that,
you know, and if that's us, I can only imagine,
you know, the situation that other folk on potentially lower
incomes or not with the sort of financial news that
we have, the position that they were in, it would
have been very difficult. But I think the thing that
(17:21):
I always go back to is like, what a little
that you can do? It really is a snowball effect.
So it might not be you know, if you have
some disposable income that you can free up and save
and invest, that's fantastic. But I think some people sometimes
fall into the mindset of like, well, if I can't
do everything with grandeur, I might as well not do
(17:43):
anything at all. And I really don't think that's the case.
I think it's building wealth is a slow burn, at
least it has been for us. It's low and slow.
Lots of small incremental decisions lots of conscious spending making
those little choices do add up. So what little things
that you can you do that are realistic for you
(18:05):
in your day to day, in your life, in your
finances to kind of move the needle on the long
term goal of wealth, right, And that might be something
small like unsubscribing from a few marketing emails that you
otherwise wouldn't or finding something else that is a less
expensive way to get the dopamine that you need.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
And authentic sustainable dopamine heat as well.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Yeah, totally, like the little it's just you just don't
give up, Like, just don't give up through it. Just
something little small that it will It's it's a small
it's the slow burn, the small build.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
I and even just you know, opening up a savings
account transferring one dollar, that in itself is the birth
of your fire strategy. And you might be just transferring
one dollar. I think, what's well, guess what Tomorrow might
be two dollars, and the following day might be five dollars,
and the following day might be ten dollars. You know,
you know then this is the whole principle behind a
thousand dollars project is just small amounts of money, how
(19:10):
it can really do quickly add up and then you
can do something intentional with that money, you know, for
your fire journey.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Now you've talked about previously your son.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
And how you included him in your conversations around money
and fire.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
How does how does that work? What does that look like?
Speaker 3 (19:28):
Yeah? I think the big thing I actually wrote a
blog on this, and I think I kind of even
what it's called. I think it's something about like your
top lessons to teach kids earlyer or something on my blog.
But the big one that I think has resonated a
lot with my mum friends particularly, is the phrase you
can have. And there's a podcast. There's a woman who
runs a podcast that's called afford Anything, but the key
(19:52):
tagline is you can have anything but not everything. Yeah,
and that's something that's really like had to come into
play quite a lot as he's grown, because he will
ask for everything and children don't really have a very
you know, money is infinite to them.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
Yeah, it's so and beautiful, but obviously comes with the
problems further down the track if it's.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Not taught totally. And I so I have to you know,
like I don't I don't want to. No mother wants
to deprive their child of anything or a nice experience.
But I will often have moments where I have to
get down on his level and say, okay, so you've
asked for a few things. I know this is a
really overwhelming place for you because you can see all
of these things that you want, or we're walking past
(20:43):
shops that have these great displays in the window, but
we can't. We have a budget and we can't go
over that budget. So you have a little bit of
money left in your budget, but you've got to pick,
and that means that you might only have one thing
or two things, or if you've you spent money and
we've already used it for that week, then no things.
But you can have anything, but you can't have everything.
(21:04):
So you've got to be You've got to be discerning
and what you pick. And that is like we've done
that from when he was young, and that's been really
helpful because my mum friends on me do playdates will
often say to me now like, oh, he just accepts
that when you say it to him, Like, my kiddo
have had a screaming tantrum for three hours over this
and I'm like, oh, d we've had those, but he
(21:26):
now like, we've definitely had those in the past, but
he now really understands that concept, like, Okay, I spent
my money. I think that's a really key thing. The
other thing was around language around money. So I say
things to him like you are my best investment, and
then I use phrases like you know, we'll always have
enough in our sort of everyday language, because I want
(21:46):
him to know that attitude towards money is really calm
and it's balanced. It's money is not who we are,
it's what we have, and it comes and goes, it flows.
So I think those are kind of the key things.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Yeah, and you know, talking about you know, I guess
touching back on that whole dopamine topic, you know, teaching
kids about delayed gratification. Yes, and you know, doing the
research understanding difference between quality and quantity, and you know,
thinking about, Okay, if I'm going to buy this toy,
I wanted to last me a really long time. I
don't want it to fall apart or I don't want
(22:20):
to fall out of love with it or no longer
be you know cool with my friends. You know, those
conversations are really powerful and it means that you know
that dopamine hit is actually one that's sustainable. You know,
it's not about a quick hit, so you know, and
people don't realize actually how powerful these conversations are. They
cost nothing, They don't involve you having to do a
(22:40):
complicated investment strategy. But what you are teaching your children
will serve them for the rest of their lives totally.
Speaker 3 (22:47):
He actually had a hes, a little modeling agency, and
he had a shoot with a big department store and
they get paid for that obviously, and I said to him,
if you want to do this, then you'll get this money.
It's a much per hour, but the money and you
can have a think about what you want to buy
with that money. In Australia, it's like Nintendo switch on
(23:08):
a Nintendo switch. I said, okay, he's probably going to
have enough for that, but it takes So he did
the shoot. It was great. It takes a long time
for the money to land in your account once you
finish a job like that. And so every time we've
walked past a like a text door, go yeah, but
that I earned that money. That's mine and I want
to buy my Nintendo switch. But and then I have
to keep saying to him, Yeah, we have to wait
for the money to land, and when it does, you'll
(23:29):
be able to get the cash out. And that was
a sweet day for him when that finally came through,
we got that cash out, he went and paid for
it. It was like he actually said to me, this was
worth the way. And I think that's pretty self aware
for a five year old to say managing a screen
time is a separate issue, but you.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Know, oh that's gorgeous.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Can I move on to, you know, your marriage, if
that's okay? And like, ask you, how do you and
your husband stay aligned when it comes to making those
big financial decisions. Also balancing the work life balance, because
I feel like women were so much of the you
know life family life admin at the expense of their
(24:12):
career paths.
Speaker 3 (24:13):
Yeah, I feel like I'm I'm I feel like I'm
really lucky because I started on this journey much earlier
than he did. And he saw and he wasn't, you know,
the idea of saving a huge portion of your income
and investing it was not you know, preferable to him
in the early days. And he and I saw I
(24:33):
did it alone for quite a while, but he saw
the massive gains that I achieved on my own in
the beginning, and I think he just really respected that.
He really respected the research that I'd done into the
fire lifestyle. So he's pretty converted, I think, and he generally,
I think the respect is the key thing, because he
(24:55):
lets me lead on a lot of this stuff and
he kind of comes along for the ride, and I
think I'm and he kind of understands my decision making
a lot and if we need to sort of hash
it out and have a conversation about it, we will.
And that's not to say that I manage everything, because
he is certainly like has input into things. But I
(25:17):
think where we work is that I utilize his strengths
in a different way. So he's he loves excel. That's
his like thing, and it's a really powerful tool for
us for tracking our wealth. So I let sort of
him take that aspect of it off my plate and
him managed that, and then I sort of do all
of the picking and then the research into the companies
(25:39):
that we invest in, all the property that we buy,
for example, and he kind of That's just kind of
a dynamic that works for us.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Yeah, so I guess leveraging off each other's strengths and yeah,
divide and conquer.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
Yeah, and if something that I people want to do
doesn't quite work for him, like he says that, and
then we just let it breathe, We give it some time.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
I mean, that's that's you know, perfect and beautiful. And
you know, the teamwork makes the dream work. So and
I think what I It's interesting to say this because
I was in a podcast a couple of weeks ago
and talking about, you know, vulnerability and you know, knowing
that making peace with the fact that you could do
(26:22):
it on your own. But if you have the opportunity
to team up with someone, you're going to conquer more
and you're going to conquer things faster. And there's nothing
wrong or right between either of them. But you know,
there's I know, as myself, I've had a lot of trouble,
I guess.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
Letting go of my.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
Independence as much like whilst I'm financially independent of Tom,
I've also had to kind of at times, I guess,
sit through some uncomfortableness also maybe the self imposed limitations
that I put on myself about working together as a team.
It hasn't been an easy transition, and every now and
again we do hit I hit personal blocks that sort
(27:00):
of sit on and work through.
Speaker 2 (27:01):
But it is also scary as well.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
I think opening up and going all right, we're going
to combine our financial journeys and stories and build something together,
you know, and keep what we've done previously in the past,
us our own individually. What would you say from your
experience are the biggest misconceptions? You know, you've had to
yourself learn about fire or you know, building wealth as
(27:27):
a woman, as a partner and of course as a mother.
Speaker 3 (27:33):
Oh, that's a great question that women can't invest, that
we don't make good investors. So I and I'll use it.
I want to use a terrible swoyword, but I won't
to tell use a PG want is that a crap?
So I early on I used to I've told the
story a few times on sort of different interviews that
I've done when I was very when I started out
(27:54):
on this journey, I probably just due to the personality
type that I have, I was like, how do I
learn from? I want to learn from people who have
built large sums of wealth, and they would be you know, known,
well known, investors in particularly the sort of the Australian market,
so Sydney where I was living, or CEOs. So I'm
(28:16):
going to invite them out for lunch and I'm going
to pick their brains. And a lot of them said
yes to that, which is odd when an eighteen year old,
spunky eighteen year old it puts an email in your
books inviting you out. But they said yes. A lot
of them happened to be men, and I just took
a lot of them out for lunch. I was like,
how did you make the money that you've made or
the decisions that you made that have led you to
(28:37):
where you are? And a lot of them, not all
of them, but I would say that like over fifty
percent of them, particularly the ones that were men, told
me that women didn't make good financial decisions, Like I
remembered that being a theme that kept popping up. I
wish I could go back the version I am now
to the younger men. I know that I wish I
(28:59):
could tell them that. You know, I would't go back
and say that, but anyway, I was a lot younger
than but I remember thinking like, not, I can't be true.
I just don't think that's true, and I know that's
not true now, and I think that that's a huge
misconception that women are too shy or we're not good
with money, and that's just just crap.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
I think a lot of it's confidence, and then behind
the confidence is a lack of financial literacy. And that's
obviously why I'm so passionate about educating, because when you
can educate, you create clarity, and you create a sense
of purpose and direction, and you can follow the instructions
and you can tweak and change the instructions as you
go through your financial journey. So you know, I think
(29:39):
once you give someone the gift of financial literacy and
a bit of faith in themselves, you know, off you go,
like the sky really is the limit, whether you're male
or female, worthy, or young or old, or whether you
come from poverty or you come from extreme wealth.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Like, financial education is essential.
Speaker 1 (29:58):
It's important as understanding the importance of way to eat,
and the importance of understanding the value of exercise and
moving your body for long term health longevity. As we
wrap up today's episode, what I always like to ask,
like Land or conclude with, you know, what is the
one piece of advice? And so my question to you is,
what is the one piece of advice you would give
(30:19):
another woman listening to this conversation right now who is
feeling a little bit maybe behind financially or feeling as
I said, insecure, lacking in faith and confidence about fire,
but actually does have a little bit of a burning
curiosity deep within. You know, what would you say to
that one woman listening right now to this conversation.
Speaker 3 (30:42):
Or follow that follow that instinct. Yeah, I think I
couldn't agree more on your last point. And I think
actually to that last point it you know, if you
look at there's a lot out there on a lot of
it's us space, but there is a lot of reading
material out there from female bloggers who have retired early
or are on the path to it, and women have
(31:05):
these stories, you know, tell the tales of these women
who have retired early from like very little or nothing
or even massive amounts of debt where they otherwise wouldn't
have been able to And it might only be that
they've changed their story so that they can retire like
two to three years or five years earlier than they
normally would have been able to, or even that they
(31:27):
just retired at the normal age that someone should retire
at when the alternative if they continued on their previous path,
would have been that they would have been working until
they were in their eighties or you know, physically unable
to work anymore. So they've changed that story for themselves
(31:47):
by you know, following that instinct or you know, indulging
that curiosity to say like, I don't want to live
like this anymore, and I don't need to because there
are there are options for me. And it goes back
to that you know, little and open thing that you
start with. It really is a snowball effect, but go
with it, follow the instinct, and you.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Know, there are wake up calls, you know, all around
us science to say, come on, pull your head in,
come on, make a change, Come on, you can do this,
come on, just get started. But we just need to
learn to act on those signs and make them a
catalyst and start our financial journey like birth it as
we said about motherhood. Well look, Michelle, I can't thank
(32:29):
you enough for sharing your story, your insights and of
course your journey with so much honesty and.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Just practical wisdom.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
So for everyone who's listening, you know, hearing Michelle's story,
it reminds us that financial independence isn't about retiring early
or even actually hitting a particular number. It's really about
intentionally designing a life that feels rich to you, feels
deeply meaningful, and is aligned to the values in your
(32:57):
life that make you feel alive, happy, and resilient. And
to every single woman listening to this episode, I hope
that you actually now have a bit of clarity and
that very important confidence to know that you are worthy
of this path as well. You can pave this path
for yourself and be an incredible example for your loved
(33:18):
ones and everyone else around you. So, whether you're parenting,
or you're pivoting, or you're just planting those first seeds
for your own FID dream, please know that it is
never too late.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
You are never.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Behind, and you absolutely have the power to not only
change your financial future, but to leap frog and make
up for any lost time that you think you may
have created. Now, everyone for listen to this, thank you
so much for your time, and again, thank you, Michelle.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
If this episode has.
Speaker 1 (33:52):
Resonated with you or you think someone needs to hear this,
can you do me a massive favor and send it
to them right now and if you have a spare moment,
I'd also greatly appreciate if you can leave me a
rating and review. I will link in the podcast notes
obviously Michelle's blog and so you can get in contact
with her whenever you need. But in the meantime, of course,
(34:14):
keep that financial fire burning right within, and I look
forward to catching up with you next Monday on Sugar
Mama's Fireplay
Why women do fire differently and that's actually our superpower.
Welcome back to Sugar Mama's Fireplay, the podcast where we
explore all things financial independence, early retirement and long term
financial freedom, and we do so with honesty, empathy, and
hopefully a touch of elegance. Today, I am so excited
(00:20):
to be joined by Michelle who's actually previously been on
my YouTube channel many many years ago. She's now a
self employed mother of two who, along with her husband,
has been building a life of freedom, purpose and balance
through the Fire movement, a really powerful lifestyle movement. Now,
in this conversation that we're about to unpack, we're going
(00:40):
to explore why women often approach fire, that is, financial independence,
retire early differently from men, and actually how that difference
can be a really powerful advantage. We're going to talk
about the lifestyle design, parenting with purpose, money and marriage
and how to build financial freedom with children actually in
(01:01):
the picture, not in spite of them. Whether you're starting
from scratch or you're already on your way to fire.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Shell story is going to.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
Inspire you to think more intentionally about your own financial
future and to help you realize you can absolutely build
a life filled with meaning freedom, time, and.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Of course wealth. Good morning, Michelle.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
How are you, Hikennah, how are you? I'm really well. Thanks.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Now I want to get straight into this. Can we
go back to the beginning and start with your own
fire story? Like, what was it that, initially, I guess
was a catalyst or inspired you and your husband, of
course to pursue financial independence and create an early retirement
because you've been doing this for a long time, and
(01:49):
no one you would have been a bit of a pioneer,
No one would have even heard of that concept, you know,
ten years ago.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
Yeah, So I think for me it was just not
wanting to sort of follow the status quo. I wasn't
happy in my work at the time in a full
time role, and I sort of knew there had to
be a better way, or at least I hoped that
there was. And when I found out that you could
replace your salary income with investment income by just being
(02:19):
proactive with your money earlier, that was a very appealing
concept to me and my colleague who I worked with
at this company that I wasn't very happy at and
had been with for a long time, because they had
a bit of a they called them the Golden Handcuffs.
But I was a very early employee and it was
a I had an eesop plan that was vesting over
(02:40):
very unfavor very unfavorable to the employee timeline, so it
was really drawn out. So I was kind of really
stuck at this company that I wasn't happy at. But
I worked with this guy who's super clever, really smart,
and he told me about the fire movement and it
had really taken off in the States and it had
actually been pioneered by a guy called mister money Must
and I was like, this is amazing and so transferable
(03:04):
to Australia and I need to start doing this. And
he was sort of doing it, but he was very
quiet about it. He didn't really tell people. And he
was saying to me that he'd been doing it for
the last ten years and he was pretty much on
track to go down to part time the next couple
of years if he wanted to. And he was in
his late twenties at the time. So I just thought
(03:28):
that was incredible and I started from there. So that
really was where it all sort of began for me.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
And what was the first investment that you made?
Speaker 3 (03:37):
Oh, gosh, I think My very first investment was Vanguard,
and I think it might have been probably un a
ship if that's probably the as.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
Yeah, okay, all right, so that's the Australian Chare Fund. Yeah,
all right. So going back to sort of women and
where women fit in the Fire movement. You know, you've
mentioned that women they approach fire differently than men, and
I'm inclined to agree, But what would you say from
your opinion are the key differences that you've picked up?
(04:09):
You know, is it mindset, is it strategy, is it
motivation or is it a mix of the two, Like,
how do you see the key differences between men and
women in this incredibly powerful, inspiring movement.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Yeah, it's a good question. I think there's two things.
I've thought about this a lot. I think that it
boils down to the first thing is that I think
that women fundamentally want autonomy and security. I personally, and
this is like a lot I speak a lot to
Australian Fire followers, but also in the States and actually
the UK, Europe kind of globally. We're not really interested
(04:42):
in conquests, we're not interested in shooting the lights out
being the market. We don't want to pick unicorn stocks.
I don't want to day trade. I don't want to
see it at my computer all day. In fact, quite
the opposite. I want to build an est egg that
makes me feel safe and secure. And when I've dug
really deep into this, it often comes back to feeling tracked,
the concept of sort of untrapping. At the time when
(05:02):
I started, I was in a bad job that I
felt very trapped in, as I've said, due to this AESOP,
this employee share component which had just very extremely unfair
vesting terms. I had been at this company from its infancy,
so I was sort of there to see these shells
thisss so that I could sort of take them and go.
But I was really stuck there and I had a
(05:23):
proper it was a real nax CEO, Like the work
was really hard, super long hours. I just wasn't happy.
So it was this feeling of just like there has
to be another way, Like work can't always look like this,
And at the time I didn't know that it wouldn't,
but that was my frame of reference for what work
(05:43):
would be, and I thought, if I'm going to stay
and take startups, it's always going to be like this.
But over the years, this concept of sort of sort
of feeling trapped I wanted to move away from that
also popped up again once I had kids, because I
started to feel a little bit trapped in motherhood and
I was trying to juggle the paid labor of that
alongside the paid labor of doing an actual pay job.
(06:05):
I've also been in you aside from that, bad situations
while traveling or on nights out, and I've had to
make swift decisions to leave. So I think for women,
we want to be able to have choices and freedom
to navigate systems that haven't always served us equally. So
that's the first thing. I think. The second thing that
(06:26):
makes women a little bit difference is that we tend
to invest more in line with personal values. So when
I my husband and I talk about, you know, what
our next stock pick or next fund investment might be,
for example, he will often look at performance. He will
look at what he's read, so what's topical, Whereas that
(06:47):
matters a lot less to me over what the company represents.
So I, for example, look at things like ESG rating,
I look at performance reports. I look at whether a
company's been ethically screened. I always look at the female
representation on a board, because to me, that's a really
good patter as to whether they'll perform well. And I
think the research shows that women tend to invest this
way and in a more consistent way, albeit later than men,
(07:11):
whereas men tend to not follow a trend as much
because they're sort of more volatile in their decision making.
So I think, at least in my experience, and I
suppose anecdotally what I've sort of gleaned from talking to
other female investors is that those are the two sort
of key differences.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Yeah, and I would I speaking from experience obvious as
a financial that I'm working with men and women, I
completely agree with that, Like, that's very much what I've seen,
that kind of calm, rational, methodical approach by women, and
then men will have sort of a bit more I guess,
captivated by the opportunity, the upside, and perhaps maybe a
(07:50):
little bit more I wouldn't say your rational, but a
little bit more fast moving and making those decisions. Now,
coming to the topic of motherhood, you know, me, when
I became a mother, I suddenly went from being I
guess very driven and motivated to probably having a greater
desire motivation towards.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Security and stability.
Speaker 1 (08:13):
How would you say, you know, becoming a mother because
you've got two young children, has I guess impacted or
how your relationship with money has perhaps evolved in this transition,
and how has that impacted your fire goals?
Speaker 3 (08:29):
Yeah, I think it made me realize that I wanted
to go back to work because I'd spent a lot
of time feeling that my work was the problem. And
actually work wasn't the problem, it just wasn't that I
wasn't doing purposeful work.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
So when I had my first son, he was very
late to day care because I didn't think he went
to day care until he was two and a half.
And that's for a few reasons. The primary one was
that COVID happened right as he was born. Most of
his infancy everything was closed and we just spent a
lot of time together and indoors. So I really craved
(09:07):
going back to work, which was very unexpected for me.
And when I did, when he started daycare, I was
so renewed. I felt this really renewed sense of purpose
and identity in myself and that was a really nice
shift that was very unexpected. I was really laser focused
on what I wanted, which was also writing a nonfiction
(09:27):
book which had been on the backburn a few years
because quote unquote I never had time. Yeah, so you
know the difference I suppose in work, I think as
well as that my ability to multitask and balance is insane.
I'm very grateful and I'm hyper aware of the very
limited hours I have for things, so I'm much more
(09:47):
efficient with them. I also don't care as much about things.
But money wise, I don't think really it's all that different.
We've always been low and slow investors. That really hasn't changed.
The security piece has always been a very strong theme.
But I suppose what has changed is what we want
to do when we retire. So my husband always had
(10:09):
this sort of like open ended goal of like, maybe
you want to travel, that would be nice. I don't
really know what we would do if we weren't working,
But now we have this stream to buy a big
camp van, do lots of traveling with the kids, maybe
work part time on the road as we go. That's
definitely sort of a new development.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
Now.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
On that topic of working part time, you know you've
made that conscious decision when you hit that, you know, retirement,
it's not actually a you know, hang up your shoes
and go fishing and never work it down in your
life ever. Again, it's more about working part time indefinitely.
Why is that important to you now? Like that you
(10:53):
want this? You know your retirement is going to include,
you know, working part time. What's changed there?
Speaker 3 (10:58):
Yeah? I think I I want my kids to see
me working like it's important that I think that they do.
And I think I'm a better mother when I have
that balance in my life. To be honest with.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
You, agree more I could sometize I can't. We'll out
the door to go to work and have a conversation
and you my brain and you know, and I completely agree.
Letting kids see you work hard is still a really
great work ethic totally to follow. It's it's invaluable. And
you know, parents often say to me, like, how do
I teach my kids how to do money?
Speaker 2 (11:31):
I'm like, well, watch you work like that in.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Itself is a financial lesson and you know a message
of wisdom and you know, dedication and perseverance. So yeah,
I completely agree with you.
Speaker 3 (11:45):
Yeah, it's really important. I come back on my cup
as full and I just have more. It doesn't actually
drain me, it fills it up and I have more
to pour into them, which I don't think I would
have if it's just it's too important. Really, it's too
important to me. Like I actually I thought I hated working,
and I don't. I actually love working. I just didn't
(12:07):
like the work that I was doing for who I
was doing it for. And now that I'm self employed,
I pick who I want to work with, and I
you know, I have a lot of flexibility around my hours.
It's just it's totally changed the game for me. It's
I feel very lucky.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
And also I think, you know, when I'm the same
as you, I don't want to just retire and stop everything,
you know, I want to keep using my brain.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
I want to keep, you know, stay relevant. I want
to understand what's going on in the world. I want to
do charity work.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
I want to continue on building great relationships and connections
with people. So and that's all contributes towards wealth that
you know, wealth and richness.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
Now you've obviously weathered periods.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Of you know, no savings due to obviously higher interest
rates that we've all experienced, and you know, life events
you know, like maternity leave, Like how have you weather
these storms or you know period of time in your
life and actually still managed to stay completely committed and
resilient through this.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
Yeah, I think. I mean I had high premises gravidia,
which is just a GRL fabilitating condition, and I unfortunately
had it with both of my kids from very early
on them both pregnancies, and it meant that I was
effectively rendered from completely bedbound from like week six or
(13:29):
something up until I delivered both of them. So it
didn't go until I delivered the placenta, basically, Yeah, And
it was and it meant that I had to turn
off my life, like just from one day to the next,
Like one day I could sort of function and I
felt a bit nauseous, and then the next it was
(13:50):
just no like I was. It was awful. And I
think that time has a huge emotional there's a huge
emotional burden that comes with like an condition like that. Anyway,
in trying to and pregnancy is difficult. You know, some
women have great pregnancies and that's wonderful, but I think
the majority have some level of difficulty with a pregnancy
(14:11):
because it is a very difficult thing to do is
to create another human or multiples. And I often think
if I so I didn't have to worry about money
during that time because of the decisions that I had made,
which meant that I could focus on rest and recovery.
And I remember thinking distinctly, like, this would be so
much more difficult if I was still having to try
(14:33):
to get up and go to work or even budget
and manage my money from bed, right, because you know
how much more difficult that I've made that time in
my life, and how much more stressful. I think even
when I was going through those times, I felt really
grateful for past me and the decisions that I had made,
(14:55):
because it was allowing current me toocus on the rest
and recovery, and that kind of kept me going for like,
this is why I do this so I may have
more periods, like if I continue to have more children,
I will inevitably have pregnancies like this again, or something
else could happen in my life, and you know, I
could deal with the chronic illness or have an unexpected injury,
(15:18):
or something could happen where I need to take time
out of the traditional workforce, and I will have my
investment in my passive income to see me through, And
I think that's really what kept me feeling very resilient
during those times, because it was like, I've made these
decisions for a reason. I'm seeing them come to fruit
(15:38):
now and they may have to come to fruit again
in the future, and that feels good.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Now, many families, like men and women, feel really overwhelmed,
particularly right now, with the rising cost of living, and
it makes it really hard to save, let alone invest
whilst raising children. Someone who as a mother with two
young children, who is actively involved in the fire movement,
(16:05):
what would be some you know, realistic and practical strategies
that other people could use, that you can recommend that
helped you get to where you are today.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Yeah, it's a it's a that's a hard question to
answer because I think we're in such an unprecedented time
in terms of the current cost of living, Like that's
even that's impacted us massively as well, the interest rates
on our Like we are used to saving huge amounts
of money, like after seventy percent of our income, and
this was probably pre children, not after having children, but
(16:39):
pre children we were doing that. So then with that
definitely went down when we had kids. Too much more
reasonable figure. You know, whatever we could had in surve plus,
it might have been twenty percent or thirty thirty percent
on a good month, to all of a sudden not
even like barely breaking even, and in some some months
(16:59):
not even at all, digging into the offset savings in
order to cover the shortfall of the mortgage and that,
you know, and if that's us, I can only imagine,
you know, the situation that other folk on potentially lower
incomes or not with the sort of financial news that
we have, the position that they were in, it would
have been very difficult. But I think the thing that
(17:21):
I always go back to is like, what a little
that you can do? It really is a snowball effect.
So it might not be you know, if you have
some disposable income that you can free up and save
and invest, that's fantastic. But I think some people sometimes
fall into the mindset of like, well, if I can't
do everything with grandeur, I might as well not do
(17:43):
anything at all. And I really don't think that's the case.
I think it's building wealth is a slow burn, at
least it has been for us. It's low and slow.
Lots of small incremental decisions lots of conscious spending making
those little choices do add up. So what little things
that you can you do that are realistic for you
(18:05):
in your day to day, in your life, in your
finances to kind of move the needle on the long
term goal of wealth, right, And that might be something
small like unsubscribing from a few marketing emails that you
otherwise wouldn't or finding something else that is a less
expensive way to get the dopamine that you need.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
And authentic sustainable dopamine heat as well.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Yeah, totally, like the little it's just you just don't
give up, Like, just don't give up through it. Just
something little small that it will It's it's a small
it's the slow burn, the small build.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
I and even just you know, opening up a savings
account transferring one dollar, that in itself is the birth
of your fire strategy. And you might be just transferring
one dollar. I think, what's well, guess what Tomorrow might
be two dollars, and the following day might be five dollars,
and the following day might be ten dollars. You know,
you know then this is the whole principle behind a
thousand dollars project is just small amounts of money, how
(19:10):
it can really do quickly add up and then you
can do something intentional with that money, you know, for
your fire journey.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Now you've talked about previously your son.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
And how you included him in your conversations around money
and fire.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
How does how does that work? What does that look like?
Speaker 3 (19:28):
Yeah? I think the big thing I actually wrote a
blog on this, and I think I kind of even
what it's called. I think it's something about like your
top lessons to teach kids earlyer or something on my blog.
But the big one that I think has resonated a
lot with my mum friends particularly, is the phrase you
can have. And there's a podcast. There's a woman who
runs a podcast that's called afford Anything, but the key
(19:52):
tagline is you can have anything but not everything. Yeah,
and that's something that's really like had to come into
play quite a lot as he's grown, because he will
ask for everything and children don't really have a very
you know, money is infinite to them.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
Yeah, it's so and beautiful, but obviously comes with the
problems further down the track if it's.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Not taught totally. And I so I have to you know,
like I don't I don't want to. No mother wants
to deprive their child of anything or a nice experience.
But I will often have moments where I have to
get down on his level and say, okay, so you've
asked for a few things. I know this is a
really overwhelming place for you because you can see all
of these things that you want, or we're walking past
(20:43):
shops that have these great displays in the window, but
we can't. We have a budget and we can't go
over that budget. So you have a little bit of
money left in your budget, but you've got to pick,
and that means that you might only have one thing
or two things, or if you've you spent money and
we've already used it for that week, then no things.
But you can have anything, but you can't have everything.
(21:04):
So you've got to be You've got to be discerning
and what you pick. And that is like we've done
that from when he was young, and that's been really
helpful because my mum friends on me do playdates will
often say to me now like, oh, he just accepts
that when you say it to him, Like, my kiddo
have had a screaming tantrum for three hours over this
and I'm like, oh, d we've had those, but he
(21:26):
now like, we've definitely had those in the past, but
he now really understands that concept, like, Okay, I spent
my money. I think that's a really key thing. The
other thing was around language around money. So I say
things to him like you are my best investment, and
then I use phrases like you know, we'll always have
enough in our sort of everyday language, because I want
(21:46):
him to know that attitude towards money is really calm
and it's balanced. It's money is not who we are,
it's what we have, and it comes and goes, it flows.
So I think those are kind of the key things.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Yeah, and you know, talking about you know, I guess
touching back on that whole dopamine topic, you know, teaching
kids about delayed gratification. Yes, and you know, doing the
research understanding difference between quality and quantity, and you know,
thinking about, Okay, if I'm going to buy this toy,
I wanted to last me a really long time. I
don't want it to fall apart or I don't want
(22:20):
to fall out of love with it or no longer
be you know cool with my friends. You know, those
conversations are really powerful and it means that you know
that dopamine hit is actually one that's sustainable. You know,
it's not about a quick hit, so you know, and
people don't realize actually how powerful these conversations are. They
cost nothing, They don't involve you having to do a
(22:40):
complicated investment strategy. But what you are teaching your children
will serve them for the rest of their lives totally.
Speaker 3 (22:47):
He actually had a hes, a little modeling agency, and
he had a shoot with a big department store and
they get paid for that obviously, and I said to him,
if you want to do this, then you'll get this money.
It's a much per hour, but the money and you
can have a think about what you want to buy
with that money. In Australia, it's like Nintendo switch on
(23:08):
a Nintendo switch. I said, okay, he's probably going to
have enough for that, but it takes So he did
the shoot. It was great. It takes a long time
for the money to land in your account once you
finish a job like that. And so every time we've
walked past a like a text door, go yeah, but
that I earned that money. That's mine and I want
to buy my Nintendo switch. But and then I have
to keep saying to him, Yeah, we have to wait
for the money to land, and when it does, you'll
(23:29):
be able to get the cash out. And that was
a sweet day for him when that finally came through,
we got that cash out, he went and paid for
it. It was like he actually said to me, this was
worth the way. And I think that's pretty self aware
for a five year old to say managing a screen
time is a separate issue, but you.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Know, oh that's gorgeous.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Can I move on to, you know, your marriage, if
that's okay? And like, ask you, how do you and
your husband stay aligned when it comes to making those
big financial decisions. Also balancing the work life balance, because
I feel like women were so much of the you
know life family life admin at the expense of their
(24:12):
career paths.
Speaker 3 (24:13):
Yeah, I feel like I'm I'm I feel like I'm
really lucky because I started on this journey much earlier
than he did. And he saw and he wasn't, you know,
the idea of saving a huge portion of your income
and investing it was not you know, preferable to him
in the early days. And he and I saw I
(24:33):
did it alone for quite a while, but he saw
the massive gains that I achieved on my own in
the beginning, and I think he just really respected that.
He really respected the research that I'd done into the
fire lifestyle. So he's pretty converted, I think, and he generally,
I think the respect is the key thing, because he
(24:55):
lets me lead on a lot of this stuff and
he kind of comes along for the ride, and I
think I'm and he kind of understands my decision making
a lot and if we need to sort of hash
it out and have a conversation about it, we will.
And that's not to say that I manage everything, because
he is certainly like has input into things. But I
(25:17):
think where we work is that I utilize his strengths
in a different way. So he's he loves excel. That's
his like thing, and it's a really powerful tool for
us for tracking our wealth. So I let sort of
him take that aspect of it off my plate and
him managed that, and then I sort of do all
of the picking and then the research into the companies
(25:39):
that we invest in, all the property that we buy,
for example, and he kind of That's just kind of
a dynamic that works for us.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Yeah, so I guess leveraging off each other's strengths and yeah,
divide and conquer.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
Yeah, and if something that I people want to do
doesn't quite work for him, like he says that, and
then we just let it breathe, We give it some time.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
I mean, that's that's you know, perfect and beautiful. And
you know, the teamwork makes the dream work. So and
I think what I It's interesting to say this because
I was in a podcast a couple of weeks ago
and talking about, you know, vulnerability and you know, knowing
that making peace with the fact that you could do
(26:22):
it on your own. But if you have the opportunity
to team up with someone, you're going to conquer more
and you're going to conquer things faster. And there's nothing
wrong or right between either of them. But you know,
there's I know, as myself, I've had a lot of trouble,
I guess.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
Letting go of my.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
Independence as much like whilst I'm financially independent of Tom,
I've also had to kind of at times, I guess,
sit through some uncomfortableness also maybe the self imposed limitations
that I put on myself about working together as a team.
It hasn't been an easy transition, and every now and
again we do hit I hit personal blocks that sort
(27:00):
of sit on and work through.
Speaker 2 (27:01):
But it is also scary as well.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
I think opening up and going all right, we're going
to combine our financial journeys and stories and build something together,
you know, and keep what we've done previously in the past,
us our own individually. What would you say from your
experience are the biggest misconceptions? You know, you've had to
yourself learn about fire or you know, building wealth as
(27:27):
a woman, as a partner and of course as a mother.
Speaker 3 (27:33):
Oh, that's a great question that women can't invest, that
we don't make good investors. So I and I'll use it.
I want to use a terrible swoyword, but I won't
to tell use a PG want is that a crap?
So I early on I used to I've told the
story a few times on sort of different interviews that
I've done when I was very when I started out
(27:54):
on this journey, I probably just due to the personality
type that I have, I was like, how do I
learn from? I want to learn from people who have
built large sums of wealth, and they would be you know, known,
well known, investors in particularly the sort of the Australian market,
so Sydney where I was living, or CEOs. So I'm
(28:16):
going to invite them out for lunch and I'm going
to pick their brains. And a lot of them said
yes to that, which is odd when an eighteen year old,
spunky eighteen year old it puts an email in your
books inviting you out. But they said yes. A lot
of them happened to be men, and I just took
a lot of them out for lunch. I was like,
how did you make the money that you've made or
the decisions that you made that have led you to
(28:37):
where you are? And a lot of them, not all
of them, but I would say that like over fifty
percent of them, particularly the ones that were men, told
me that women didn't make good financial decisions, Like I
remembered that being a theme that kept popping up. I
wish I could go back the version I am now
to the younger men. I know that I wish I
(28:59):
could tell them that. You know, I would't go back
and say that, but anyway, I was a lot younger
than but I remember thinking like, not, I can't be true.
I just don't think that's true, and I know that's
not true now, and I think that that's a huge
misconception that women are too shy or we're not good
with money, and that's just just crap.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
I think a lot of it's confidence, and then behind
the confidence is a lack of financial literacy. And that's
obviously why I'm so passionate about educating, because when you
can educate, you create clarity, and you create a sense
of purpose and direction, and you can follow the instructions
and you can tweak and change the instructions as you
go through your financial journey. So you know, I think
(29:39):
once you give someone the gift of financial literacy and
a bit of faith in themselves, you know, off you go,
like the sky really is the limit, whether you're male
or female, worthy, or young or old, or whether you
come from poverty or you come from extreme wealth.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Like, financial education is essential.
Speaker 1 (29:58):
It's important as understanding the importance of way to eat,
and the importance of understanding the value of exercise and
moving your body for long term health longevity. As we
wrap up today's episode, what I always like to ask,
like Land or conclude with, you know, what is the
one piece of advice? And so my question to you is,
what is the one piece of advice you would give
(30:19):
another woman listening to this conversation right now who is
feeling a little bit maybe behind financially or feeling as
I said, insecure, lacking in faith and confidence about fire,
but actually does have a little bit of a burning
curiosity deep within. You know, what would you say to
that one woman listening right now to this conversation.
Speaker 3 (30:42):
Or follow that follow that instinct. Yeah, I think I
couldn't agree more on your last point. And I think
actually to that last point it you know, if you
look at there's a lot out there on a lot of
it's us space, but there is a lot of reading
material out there from female bloggers who have retired early
or are on the path to it, and women have
(31:05):
these stories, you know, tell the tales of these women
who have retired early from like very little or nothing
or even massive amounts of debt where they otherwise wouldn't
have been able to And it might only be that
they've changed their story so that they can retire like
two to three years or five years earlier than they
normally would have been able to, or even that they
(31:27):
just retired at the normal age that someone should retire
at when the alternative if they continued on their previous path,
would have been that they would have been working until
they were in their eighties or you know, physically unable
to work anymore. So they've changed that story for themselves
(31:47):
by you know, following that instinct or you know, indulging
that curiosity to say like, I don't want to live
like this anymore, and I don't need to because there
are there are options for me. And it goes back
to that you know, little and open thing that you
start with. It really is a snowball effect, but go
with it, follow the instinct, and you.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Know, there are wake up calls, you know, all around
us science to say, come on, pull your head in,
come on, make a change, Come on, you can do this,
come on, just get started. But we just need to
learn to act on those signs and make them a
catalyst and start our financial journey like birth it as
we said about motherhood. Well look, Michelle, I can't thank
(32:29):
you enough for sharing your story, your insights and of
course your journey with so much honesty and.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Just practical wisdom.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
So for everyone who's listening, you know, hearing Michelle's story,
it reminds us that financial independence isn't about retiring early
or even actually hitting a particular number. It's really about
intentionally designing a life that feels rich to you, feels
deeply meaningful, and is aligned to the values in your
(32:57):
life that make you feel alive, happy, and resilient. And
to every single woman listening to this episode, I hope
that you actually now have a bit of clarity and
that very important confidence to know that you are worthy
of this path as well. You can pave this path
for yourself and be an incredible example for your loved
(33:18):
ones and everyone else around you. So, whether you're parenting,
or you're pivoting, or you're just planting those first seeds
for your own FID dream, please know that it is
never too late.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
You are never.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Behind, and you absolutely have the power to not only
change your financial future, but to leap frog and make
up for any lost time that you think you may
have created. Now, everyone for listen to this, thank you
so much for your time, and again, thank you, Michelle.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
If this episode has.
Speaker 1 (33:52):
Resonated with you or you think someone needs to hear this,
can you do me a massive favor and send it
to them right now and if you have a spare moment,
I'd also greatly appreciate if you can leave me a
rating and review. I will link in the podcast notes
obviously Michelle's blog and so you can get in contact
with her whenever you need. But in the meantime, of course,
(34:14):
keep that financial fire burning right within, and I look
forward to catching up with you next Monday on Sugar
Mama's Fireplay
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