The Conversation I Wish Someone Had With Me When I Went Bankrupt

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Summary
In this episode, Louisa Larado shares the lessons she learned from her own bankruptcy experience and offers advice for those going through a similar situation. She emphasizes that bankruptcy doesn't have to be hard or mean that you will always be broke. She encourages listeners to use their bankruptcy as an opportunity to learn from past mistakes and become more empowered with their finances. Louisa also discusses the importance of mindset and how clearing limiting beliefs and adopting an abundance mindset is crucial for financial recovery. She highlights the value of investing in coaches and mentors to expedite the recovery process and avoid making costly mistakes. Lastly, she emphasizes the impact of financial stress on all areas of life and the importance of creating a positive money mindset for oneself and future generations.

Takeaways

• Bankruptcy doesn't have to be hard or mean that you will always be broke.
• Use your bankruptcy as an opportunity to learn from past mistakes and become more empowered with your finances.
• Clearing limiting beliefs and adopting an abundance mindset is crucial for financial recovery.
• Investing in coaches and mentors can expedite the recovery process and help avoid costly mistakes.
• Financial stress impacts all areas of life, so it's important to create a positive money mindset for oneself and future generations.

Keywords
bankruptcy, financial recovery, mindset, empowerment, financial education, investing, mentors, money mindset, holistic approach

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Disclaimer: The information contained on today’s podcast has been provided as general advice only. The contents have been prepared without taking into account your objectives, financial situation or individual needs. Before making any decision regarding the information, strategies or products mentioned on today’s episode, please consult your own financial advisor or other professional first.

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction
• 1:41 Bankruptcy Doesn't Have to Be Hard
• 3:13 The Power of Shifting Mindset
• 8:27 Investing in Financial Recovery
• 15:42 The Ripple Effect of Financial Stability

Transcript

The Conversation I Wish Someone Had With Me When I Went Bankrupt

Hello and welcome to the Bankruptcy to Bliss podcast. On today's episode, I want to have the conversation with you that I wish someone had had with me when I first went bankrupt. This is going to be all of those hard lessons that I had to learn the hard way. And if someone had just told me these things before, it would have made my recovery a whole lot quicker and easier. So stay tuned.

Thank you so much for joining me today. So I really want to get clear on all of those things that I just wish somebody had told me that I now have learned. Now looking back on our bankruptcy recovery and I just did not know at the time. And the fact that nobody told me these things meant that I was stuck for a while and it took a whole lot longer than it needed to for me to get back on track and set our family back up in that place of not only financial stability, but financial growth and being able to afford things that I could never even think that were possible during my bankruptcy period.

 So the first thing I want to tell you, and probably one of the most important things is that just because you were bankrupt, it doesn't need to be hard. It doesn't mean that you are always going to be broke. There are so many ways that you can use your bankruptcy to learn from what got you to the place that you currently are at what mistakes can you now avoid that you won't make again because you know the hard way that it led to your bankruptcy possibly and what things work for you and you can really use this time to become a lot more empowered by your finances.

and just start getting really clear on how you can use them to make them work for you rather than you feeling your money is taking control of you at the moment and it might be causing you a lot of stress and worry. It doesn't have to be that way. Just because you are bankrupt, it's not always going to be a struggle. Yes, initially it might be a bit more challenging.

because you were basically starting over depending on the type of bankruptcy you were in. A lot of people have lost almost everything. I know when I went bankrupt, we lost the house that we were living in, lost, we had some investment properties that we lost, the money that we had saved in our accounts we lost. we basically had to start from scratch, start from zero again and build our way up.

And for a long, long time, I decided that I was not good with handling money. I decided that money is a stressful thing. decided that it was going to be a struggle. And because of that, and because of these beliefs that I now had, I was very resistant to anyone that told me any different.

And that was a big mistake because obviously there was a better way, there was an easier way, there was a quicker way. But at that initial time, I couldn't see it because I didn't understand because I hadn't heard from people who had themselves been bankrupt and had recovered and got back on track quickly. All I saw was what was told on the media about bankruptcy, that it was this negative thing. It was associated with bad people.

or it was a shameful thing. I had not had any other examples in my life that I knew of that told me my bankruptcy could be anything else. So I had to learn the hard way of how to navigate that situation. So what I wish someone told me was that just because you've filed for bankruptcy and you've decided it doesn't make you a failure, it doesn't make you worthy of not having more money.

It doesn't have to be a shameful thing. It means that you have become a smart person who has made the best choice for yourself, your family, by deciding to file for bankruptcy. That means you are taking charge of the situation and you are focusing on solutions, not the problem anymore. If the solution is bankruptcy and then being able to rebuild,

then that's a really smart financial decision. It is not something you should be ashamed of. You should be able to own that and be proud of it. And when I started doing this myself after a year or so of being bankrupt, when I decided, actually, we don't need to be ashamed. I don't have to feel like I've failed because I haven't. I've made a really smart financial decision in our situation that we were in.

was the best benefit for my family at the time. And it meant that yes, we could start again, even though the idea of starting over initially was really hard and stressful and overwhelming. Looking back now, I see that it was such a great opportunity for new learning growth, opening myself up to new ideas to really get to where I wanted to be

Just because you've now filed for bankruptcy or you're in the middle of your bankruptcy, it doesn't make you weak or unworthy with money. It doesn't mean that you are bad with money. It doesn't mean that you'll never be able to afford things or money is always going to be a stressful thing or that you just don't wanna think about your finances. It doesn't have to mean these things to you.

The longer you stay in this victim mentality, if that's what you're currently thinking, or these are the stories that are telling yourself in your head. So if you're sticking to that victim mentality, if you're blaming others or yourself, if you're feeling shame, you're feeling unworthy, or if you just decide that you're bad and unreliable with money, the harder it's gonna be to start moving forward and creating your new money story. All it is doing, those

feelings, those beliefs, those ideas, those actions, all they are doing is keeping you stuck and it stops you moving forward. And like I said, I had to learn this the hard way. So at least for the first year of our bankruptcy, and our bankruptcy period was three years in Australia, at least for the first year, almost year and a half, I was in this mentality myself and

we were earning decent money during our bankruptcy. We were very fortunate with the jobs that we had and the perks that came with those jobs that we should be doing quite well financially, even though we had to make payments to our trustee, we still shouldn't be able to save money. However, this definitely was not the case. We still found initially we were living paycheck to paycheck and we just didn't know why when the money we were earning was good.

I'd started learning things on how to better manage my money, but it still wasn't working because I was still in this mindset. I was still in this shame, victim, blaming myself mentality that didn't serve me. And that meant I couldn't move forward. So I wish someone told me that it didn't have to be this way. And I wish somebody had shown me an example of people that are doing okay once they've gone bankrupt.

finding solutions to their problem. And I wish someone would have told me what the solutions were. And this is a big part of why I've started this podcast and my Facebook support group and my online course is to be able to show you that there is another way. It doesn't have to be like that. And I can show you through my own example and the examples of others I have found.

So the biggest takeaway and the biggest thing that I wish I knew was that it is not just a simple learn how to manage your money or learn how to budget better or learn how to invest better. They definitely have a part to play, but it has to be a holistic approach, meaning that it's not just the practical things you need to do. It's also that mindset shift that needs to

because until that mindset shift happens, you are going to keep in those patterns that keep seeing you struggling, keeping you broke, that keeps you stressed and worried about money all the time. You know, I know for us what was happening when I was in that stressed, I was so careful.

I'm worried about spending money that all that I did when I was in that mindset was attract more things into our life that meant we had to spend more money on things that didn't serve our life. For example, things like our dishwasher breaking needing to be replaced, car repairs, house repairs. There was constantly these unexpected expenses that propped up in our lives.

that didn't feel good that was always happening. that it made sure to put despite how well I was doing at budgeting and allocating money to certain accounts and starting investing in things until I shifted that mindset. I would keep these things coming up in my life that were bringing these patterns that just kept us broke and not moving ahead.

So let me give you a bit of an example of what I mean so maybe you can visualize this a little bit better. So I want you to picture in front of you a garden that has been neglected. It might be your backyard currently. Mine's a bit like this at the moment because it's been winter here and I have not got around to doing my gardening for a while. But I want you to imagine this garden that has been left for the last couple of years and it is completely

full of weeds, it's overgrown, it's maybe not being watered so there's not being much rain so it's quite dry and you you walk out into it and the grass is up to your knees and it is just a mess and there were some nice plants and trees but they've just been overgrown. Now, I want you to imagine that being your current mindset. it's all, you know, it's that overwhelming, everything sort of all over the show and

Imagine now you wanted to transform that garden into a beautifully manicured green lush grass and maybe some flowers or some beautiful plants in there and just a beautiful tranquil place you want to step in. So hopefully you can picture that garden what you would like it to look like. when I first went bankrupt, my

mindset was exactly like that first garden, overgrown, full of weeds. that was, you know, all those weeds are those beliefs, those limiting thoughts that we have, those new ideas, the stress, the worry that just, it makes you feel overwhelmed. It doesn't feel good, know, unexpected expenses, all of that stuff. Now I wanted to transform my garden into this beautifully tranquil, manicured, lush garden.

this is what I did initially. I started off by thinking, all right, well maybe I'll just, I can't be bothered waiting, I'm just gonna water it. So I want you to imagine just watering it, maybe adding a bit of fertilizer. Now is that gonna be enough to transform my garden into the beautiful, pristine garden of my dreams? Well, probably not. What's gonna happen? It might green up a bit,

some grass might be growing under there. And that's what people do initially. And that's, know, if you see maybe a financial advisor or a financial counselling, or you listen to some money making strategies, the fertiliser and the water is like these ideas that they give you, these might be things like, tips and tricks, how to save, how to budget. So,

What that's going to do is definitely make some improvements. So yes, my garden is starting to get greener. But is it going to ever transform into that beautiful lush garden? No, because I have not cleared out the weeds. And in this scenario, those weeds are all those limiting beliefs, all those ideas, all these, things that are keeping you stuck right now, your money blocks, the blame, the

victim mentality, all of those things, until you can clear those out, you are never going to have that beautiful lush garden. You are never going to get there. There will definitely be improvements, but it's not going to give you a clean, beautiful slate where you can start then watering and fertilizing and making it all grow. So this is basically what I would compare my bankruptcy journey to is,

Initially, I started just watering and fertilizing my garden, which meant I started learning how to budget, how to set up my accounts. I did some course in share trading. So I learned how to invest my money through that way. I read a lot of books. So I had all these great money making and managing strategies that I had learned, but I did not get to that root cause, which was pulling out all of those weeds. And that wasn't until the

I started learning exactly how to get rid of my limiting beliefs, reframe my thinking, change my mindset, move from that lack mindset into a more abundance mindset that I learnt to let go of the blame I was holding onto, that I learnt how to not feel that victim mentality or feel like I was not good with handling money anymore. So it wasn't until I did

all of these things, which was pulling out those weeds, maybe trimming, mowing the lawn. That was when, once I had done that, and then I started adding the water and the fertilizer, which was the money -making managing strategies, then I had my beautiful, tranquil, zen, relaxing, lush garden. And that was the biggest game changer that nobody I've ever known has told me.

to do that when you are bankrupt. And that was the biggest shift. that's why I really want to make clear to you that unless you approach this as a holistic approach, you will find yourself still repeating patterns. You'll still find yourself maybe living paycheck to paycheck or running out.

or just feeling broken that money is a struggle. And I do not want that for you because you don't serve anyone by living that life. you might not be the best role model if you've got kids. You might not be the best person to be around if you're constantly stressed, unworried about money. So I really want you to think about how you could approach your recovery in a more holistic way.

The other thing that I really wish I knew before I went bankrupt and I did not do this at all for a while, for about three years. I learned all this a really hard way, which was by making a whole lot of mistakes and doing it myself and learning a little bit, like reading a few things, watching videos, trying out different things. It was a whole lot of trial and error.

And when I started to decide, okay, well, these are the areas I really need to work on. And I was really stubborn at first. I thought I could do all of this on my own. Yes, I know there's experts out there that can help me, but I didn't really want to invest in any coach or mentor at the time because I thought I could just do it myself. However, what I did not realize at the time was the...

amount of time I spent not investing in my financial recovery and the money I thought I was saving by not investing it actually cost me in the long run because for me to go from where I was to where I wanted to be took me probably five times the amount of time than it would have taken if I found someone that could just give me their roadmap, tell me this is what

I've done because I've been where you are and I know how to get the quickest way to get to where you want to be heading. And this is so you don't have to make the same mistakes that I did. So I wish I had, I wish someone had told me you were going to save yourself a lot of money and a lot of time and a lot of pain and a lot of struggle by just biting the bullet and investing in, it's not just investing in your financial recovery, but it's investing in

your whole future basically, because your money impacts so many areas of your life. So let me bring that quickly back to that garden analogy again. So you've got the weedy disgusting garden and you've got the beautiful lush garden. Now, if I said to you, I am going to pay you $100 ,000 if in one month or maybe two months time you can transform this.

disgusting, overgrown, weedy garden into the beautiful lush one. You've got two options. You can either do it yourself or you can employ an expert in that field that knows the quickest, the best, the most successful way to get the garden into that beautiful lush one. However, if you choose option two where you get an expert to help you, maybe the top expert.

landscape gardener, then obviously you're gonna have to pay him or her for their services. Now if you think, well don't wanna have to pay for someone, I'm gonna go on my own. So this is much slower route and you're not gonna get there the quickest way, you're gonna be making mistakes. So if you have that two month time limit to transform that garden, which would you choose? What would you choose? Would you choose to go the slow route and

be very likely not to make that deadline, but you're saving money because you're not investing in that expert gardener, or would you take the quickest approach where, yes, you're investing a bit of money upfront for their services, however, you know that you are gonna reach that deadline and get that prize money for having that garden transformation.

looking back now what me not taking action and paying for coaches and mentors to get me to where I wanted to be financially. it wasn't until I thought, know what, doing this myself is just not working. I want to learn from someone who has been in, you know, in this financial struggle before.

and has got themselves to a place that I want to be so they can give me their exact steps and strategies. And at the time, and I still am yet to find anyone though that has done this from a bankruptcy perspective. There's a lot of money coaches out there. There's a lot of people that talk about different investments and money making, managing, budgeting sort of mentors that you can have out there. But I'm yet to find anyone else that has

experience bankruptcy themselves and can show them the quickest route to get to the other side. So that's really why I wanted to create something for people because I know that there's such a demand. So I had to invest in a whole range of different mentors and coaches. So I had a money mindset mentor that I had that has taught me some great strategies on the mindset stuff.

I did the share training course so could learn some investment strategies. I did another bit of training on money managing strategies. So I've done all these different things. what I've done is I've brought them all together now to create some more holistic financial education through my online course, the Bankruptcy Breakthrough Blueprint.

So what I have found by making that investment on these courses and coaches and mentors and training is that it's paid off more than I could ever have imagined. Now, we went from struggling paycheck to paycheck to having always more than enough money in our savings, having bought investment property, having just last week booked an amazing

Christmas family holiday overseas that we didn't even have to think about or question trying to save up for it because the money was just there. Like we can make these great decisions now. And what I also noticed, which I wish someone had told me, is the more that we stay in that struggle, broke, stressed money mentality,

impact that that not only has on your financial life but your whole entire life. I was becoming a terrible role model for my kids. They sort of started getting those limiting beliefs themselves where they're like, no, we probably can't afford this or that. And they were echoing back those things that I was saying constantly about money. I was always stressed. And as a result, my eating habits were worse. My relationships were worse.

Sleep was terrible. it impacts every area of your life. So once I started doing the work around my mindset of money, then I've noticed the flow and effect to every single area of my life. the stress levels have gone down.

I'm a much better person to be around. I have become a way better role model for my kids by modeling the behaviors that I want them to have. I don't want them to be stressed about money. I want them to feel great and empowered about money. I want them to see money as a resource that they can do good with in the world and not a bad thing. I don't want to pass those beliefs onto my children. I want them to feel empowered by money, but also being able to be a better partner to my husband.

be healthier, every single area that it impacts. I can't even explain. So I really, really wish people had told me these things before I went bankrupt or while I was in those initial stages of bankruptcy. So if you were there right now, if you're feeling that stress, that worry, remember it doesn't have to be that way. There are solutions and the quicker

you start focusing on the solutions rather than being stuck in the problem and all those negative thought patterns that I discussed earlier. The quicker you move to how I can solve this and how can I get back on track and how will this best serve my whole family, then the quicker you are gonna have that recovery and the quicker you're gonna start reaching those goals and just.

transform not only your life, but your whole family's as well as our result. if you want to dive into this more, I have packaged everything I know about recovering from bankruptcy and all the learnings and teachings I've learned from others over the last few years in

to my premium program, the Bankruptcy Breakthrough Blueprint, which is an amazing holistic online course that will help you not only regain your financial stability, but reach money goals you've only ever dreamed about. So to celebrate, I'm going to be hosting a free Bankruptcy Recovery Masterclass.

Now in this masterclass, I'm going to share the exact same framework that I'm going to be teaching inside this paid program. So if you're curious about learning a bit more about the Bankruptcy Breakthrough Blueprint, or if you're looking to make a strong financial comeback and want more practical, empathetic and holistic advice, then this class is going to be perfect for you. So I've put a link just below in the show notes.

and you just have to click that link to save your spot for this transformative masterclass. Now it's gonna be held at a few various times. So all you need to do is choose the best time that suits you. Now don't forget, if you have been enjoying the Bankrupt to Bliss podcast, you can subscribe to this podcast so that you'll be notified every time I release a new episode. And if you've enjoyed what I have to say,

then feel free to leave a review or rate this podcast. I will be so grateful for that. Hopefully I'll be seeing you on the free masterclass. Don't forget the link is just below in the show notes. And I'm really hoping that I can help you transform your financial future. And remember, you are not alone in this journey. The path

is clear now, the steps are there. So it's time to start taking action. until next time. Thank you so much for listening and I'll see you on the next episode.