Episode 455: My Life Lately: Reflections on Freedom, Seasons + 3 Year Book Anniversary

Jamila Souffrant 0:02

When we're writing our stories of our life, I don't think it ever is complete, because of all the things that go on outside of our control and that can happen to us, and how we can see things and our relationships and how that impact us. And then throw money on top of that, and we're trying to financially think about our lives in a way so we can be free. But I really do think that the freedom that we all search for is first comes from within.

Intro 0:34

Welcome to the journey. To launch podcast with your host Jamila Souffrant as a money expert who wants her talk she helps brave journeyers like you get out of debt, save, invest and build real wealth. Join her on the journey to launch to financial freedom in 54321,

Jamila Souffrant 1:01

if you want the episode show notes for this episode, go to journey to launch.com or click the description of wherever you're listening to this episode. In the show notes, you'll get the transcribed version of the conversation, the links that we mentioned, and so much more. Also, whether you are an OG journeyer or brand new to the podcast. I've created a free jumpstart guide to help you on your financial freedom journey. It includes the top episodes to listen to, stages to go through to reach financial freedom resources and so much more you can go to journey, to launch.com/jumpstart to get your guide right now. Okay, let's hop into the episode.

You Hey, hey, hey,

Jamila Souffrant 1:44

journeyers, welcome to the journey to launch podcast. I am your host, Jamila Souffrant, and I am going to be recording a solo episode, meaning it's just me and you just me and my rambling thoughts, but I hope that this will still be beneficial for you, because I've actually been sitting at my desk for, I think, the last 40 minutes trying to figure out what I actually want to say and record. I have so many topics, so many things that I could talk about, and I'm like, What do I want to share with journeyers? What do I want to share with people who are actually going to tune in and then listen? Some of you have been listening from the very beginning, since 2017 Oh, my goodness. Some of you are very new, but I've been thinking a lot. And this, this actual week that this episode will come out, is the three year anniversary of my book, Your journey to financial freedom, which is kind of, I don't know, like Time is moving differently. Feels like we're almost in a time warp since the pandemic, on how quickly things move along. And I don't know if it's because I'm getting older that feels Time is moving faster. Whereas when I was a child or younger, things seemed to move slower, where it felt like it would take forever for something to come or happen, and now it just feels like it's going by with a blur. But I wanted this episode to maybe be an update about what's been going on, what I'm looking forward to, or what at least, I am going to be thinking about a lot over the next few months. I think if you've been following from the beginning, then you know the story of me working in corporate America and starting journey so long as a blog, and then eventually it becoming a podcast, and then quitting my job and then getting the chance to write a book, and all that has brought me to this point, and now, as I'm reflecting back on the last three years since the book came out, since it's actually been, how long now it's been, my daughter is seven, so seven years since I quit my full time job, and then 11 years since jumping into the Financial Independence journey. And how much has changed since then, and some of the things that I'm thinking about now are what what do the next few years look like for me and my family and my life? Because quite honestly, what I feel with my business, with journey to launch, is a feeling I've been feeling that when I started looking into financial independence when I was kind of a bit despondent with my job, which was, I'm doing this I'm grateful for, back then, my job and the paycheck, but I also don't feel like this is what I want to spend the rest of my life doing, and the same goes for a journey To launch. It doesn't mean that I don't want to continue to help and put my ideas out there. But as I start to think about, as I get older, with my birthday coming up in February, what I want to do, I'm thinking, what is the next chapter of my life? And I don't know that. I don't have the answer to that. And it may be something you may be thinking. Out for yourself, like, what's next for you, especially for someone like me who thinks, like, how did I get to be in my 40s? Like, who made me the adult in charge? Because I don't think I'm supposed to be. Like, I know how I got here. I know how I have three kids, I know how I have a mortgage. But sometimes you ever think to yourself when you think about all the responsibilities you have in life, like, how did you get here? And then how are you going to navigate the next phases? And this definitely comes up for me around this time of year, because I'm in New York, and I guess you can call it winter blues, maybe a little bit of seasonal depression, maybe just more being more introspective. It's colder, it's darker, and I just feel like it's more of a time to go within for warmth, and perhaps also with family and just a lot of self reflection on what what happens next, or how do you sit in where you currently are and Be content and be happy? Because everything, besides, you know, the millions of cash flow, perhaps right, everything that I wanted back then when I was driving that hour and a half, two hour commute, meaning I wanted freedom. I wanted to be able to wake up and do what I wanted to do. I wanted to earn money, but earn it in a way that felt good. I wanted my three kids, they were literally planned, God willing, the way, you know, two years apart, the exact months like I wanted this life, and now I have this life. And like I said, it's not a life that, you know, material wise. We may not have the best or nicest of things, but we live a really good life. And so now that I have all those things, all the things that I wanted back then that I have now, through the intentionality, through the taking risk, through the frameworks that I share with you, through the book, through the podcast, now what and I do feel like I'm entering a season of life where It's a question mark, there is no answer, and part of me wants to lean more into that. Part of me is scared to lean more into that, because what if I lean more into that and I realize I want nothing like I don't want to do anything else, right? And what does that look like? And one of the things I always go back to is how much emotional and mental work it is to be a mom, and I have to remember that and give myself grace for that. And that's not to say that because of that, my ambitions or my business is taking a back seat. I mean, I feel like it kind of is, and that's not a bad thing, but sometimes I forget how much work and energy I do put into that. But in the same sense, I don't think, I don't feel like I'm one of those parents who want to make my whole personality and life only about my kids. I want to still enjoy time with my husband. I want to enjoy time with my friends, my family. I'm more than just a mom, right? So it's also, I love doing things for them and with them, and it takes up a lot of time and energy to do those things. But also, what about me?

Jamila Souffrant 8:14

And as I get older, and I'm thinking about the young Jamila and the Jamila who might have been less knowledgeable and burdened, I would say, with just life and responsibility. Then I think how blessed I am that these responsibilities helped me get focused and intense and got me to where I am. Because I always say, without my kids, I don't think I would have been as motivated to want to do the things that I did back in the day to get me here, quit my job, start a business, start the podcast. I don't know that that would have happened with such intensity, without them. And as I am evolving, as my kids are still pretty young, thinking about what the next few months look like before my next birthday, what do I want to do with my life? What do I want to do? How do I want to continue to work on journey to launch, which I'm continuing to do, and then continue to live the life that I want, where I am prioritizing movement, working out, prioritizing friendships and my quality time with my husband, like all those things are important still to me, but I will say that it is not easy to juggle or to do all those things, and so it's just something I've been thinking about. Wonder if you've been wherever you are in your life thinking about it too. I think it comes up more because as you go into the holidays and we think about family and life, it just becomes almost more underlined versus maybe there are more distractions for me, at least when it's warmer out and nicer out. All that to say, I am so blessed to be in the position I am today, and have learned so much on this path, on this journey. Including that your end point, wherever you think you want to be, is never the end point. It's always going to be levels to whatever it is that you want in any stage of your life. And I do think it's our responsibility, our goal, to find the happiness and being content not to say you can't want more, but with wherever you are, even in the discomfort, even in the unknowingness, where I feel like there's a little bit of unknowingness with what I want to do, but I'm like, that's okay too, right? It's that rest that sometimes we avoid, that we don't want to lean into, because we feel like we should be more productive. We should be working. It's all the things we should be doing. There's so many shoulds, and I was thinking about creating a list, actually, of the 43 things I want to do before I turn 43 I'm trying to figure out if that's going to be helpful or not, if it's going to make me feel like I have more pressure on myself to get these things done, or if I would feel inspired to do these things, because they're things I actually want to do that I feel will be helpful for me. And the list that I was thinking of it ranges, it ranges from like things where I maybe, you know, finally getting a new therapist, or getting a therapist. I had one a few years ago, but getting one right like that, I think should be big on my list of things to invest in and do before my next birthday, and things just like finally putting pictures in the picture frame in our hallway on one of the floors in our house because it's been empty since we moved in. It's like things like that that bother me or that. It's like on the checklist of things I need to do that I have not done, and I'm like, maybe that, maybe that will help me to start feeling more fulfilled outside of my kids, outside of journey, to launch outside of working out what are the little things that I need to do, and then I go back to maybe I just need to be and lean into the imperfection, which honestly I do feel like I've been doing for a long time now. So I'm sharing these thoughts with you because I just feel like having it all figured out and being happy. I don't know. I don't think that it's not a complete period when we're writing our stories of our life. I don't think it ever is complete because of all the things that go on outside of our control, and that can happen to us, and how we can see things, and, you know, our relationships and how that impact us, and then throw money on top of that, and we're trying to financially think about our lives in a way so we can be free. But I really do think that the freedom that we all search for is first comes from within. And I'm hoping by sharing these thoughts with you, you start to reflect also right now on the season of life you're in, maybe some of the things that you want to do or not do, let go or take on, thinking about what's inspiring you to move forward, what things are actually holding you back that you need to let go of, and as we are entering into a new year and a few weeks depending on when you listen to this. And actually, it doesn't really matter when you listen to this, because you can always restart. You don't need it to be on the calendar at the end of the month or end of the year to make a change. That change could happen literally today, right, that we can make these decisions. I sometimes forget. We forget that we have free will. We can do what we want in Reason, of course, without harming others. But what does that look like in your life? What is it like in my life? Right? You do not have to follow the same steps of the person that came before you, whether it's family member or the person next to you, or if it's a co worker, you can think outside the box, and I do think that's where life happens, is when we kind of wake up and figure things out. I talk about this in the book your journey to financial freedom. This that what the ants call an ant death cycle, where one ant will start, like walking, and then the rest of the ants blindly follow that ant, and then it turns into a circle, like there it's like a pinwheel, like a circle that keeps going. And then these ants, they keep going. It's a big thing about let me see if I can explain this, a spiral that they're spiraling and they're walking it eventually becomes hundreds of ants, and these ants will walk themselves in circles, into exhaustion and die, and that's all because they started following one ant, and they just kept walking in that circle, versus being able to, like, look around and out and outside, like the blind Earth, and say to yourself, do I have to do it this way? Like this is your life depending on, especially what you believe in your religion. It's one life, and thinking about time and how time moves differently, especially depending on your mindset. And as you get older, you know all the things that we worried about or. Thought about 10 years ago, five years ago, don't matter now or the things we could have started 10 years ago. Five years ago, yes, we've been so much further along, but today is the time to do anything that we want to do. And then you may think to yourself, well, maybe you're not ready, right? Some people are not ready to take action or do the things that we want to do, and it could be deeper reasons for that. So I just think this time of year or this time for me in my life, I'm thinking more about that. I'm being more intentional about being aware of my thoughts, being observant of what they look like, and also giving myself grace on what things look like for me and so again, I can't believe this is going to be a short episode. I don't want to keep rambling, but I hope something resonated with you. I can't believe that it's been three years since the book came out, so I wanted to just quickly jump in and record a kind of just update of random thoughts about what's been going on, just what I've been thinking about. And I do want to do something. So the paperback. So the hardcover came out December 5, 2023,

Jamila Souffrant 16:12

and now the paperback version will be coming out this, January 620, 26 so the paperback version of my book, Your journey to financial freedom, will be coming out January 6. It's a Tuesday. Books come out every Tuesday, if it's published the traditional way, for all my non book writers and people who don't know that, but typically, books release on Tuesday, so the paperback comes out on Tuesdays. I'm Tuesday January 620, 26 and I do have a bonus chapter in it, bonus content, and it's, I don't know I'm excited about it. It feels different from when the the hardcover came out. So this definitely is not going to be as big of a promo. I feel like I really went hard in promoting the book when it first came out, and I continue to speak about the book, because I do feel like this is just something I truly believe and hope everyone can read one day. But I'm excited that the paperback, aka, like the soft cover, is coming out with new, new content, some updated materials that you can check out. So I'm thinking about doing something. I don't know what that's going to be. I haven't done like a free class for everyone, so maybe I'll do that at the beginning of January. Stay tuned for more information, but just something to bring everyone together, to maybe reset and to think about the next stages of your journey and how I could support you there. So stay on the lookout for that. If you have not read the book yet, or you want to get the book, I think it's a perfect stocking stuffer and a gift that you can give to someone. You can go to your journey to financial freedom.com. It's available everywhere books are sold. You can buy the hardcover now and then. You can get the paperback when it comes out. Just go check it out again. If you enjoyed this and it has resonated with you something I've said, share it with me. I'm on social media at journey to launch or at Jamila Souffrant, I'm mostly hanging on Instagram, although I have not been as active recently. So if you do send me a message, be patient with me in terms of my reply or response. But it does help when I see that you guys are listening and that you're still there. I always say when I'm recording this episode, it's just me talking into the void, and sometimes I'm like, knock, knock. Y'all still out there, journeyers, so if you are out there, say, Hey, I'd love to hear from you. And until next week, keep on journeying. Journeyers, don't forget, you can get the episode show notes for this episode by going to journey to launch.com or click the description of wherever you're listening to this and you can still grab your jumpstart guide for free to help you on your journey to financial freedom by going to journey to launch.com/jumpstart

Jamila Souffrant 19:00

if you want to support me and the podcast and love the free content and information that you get here, here are four ways that you can support me in the show. One, make sure you're subscribed to the podcast wherever you listen, whether that's Apple podcasts, that purple app on your phone, your Android device, YouTube, Spotify wherever it is that you happen to listen. Just subscribe so you are not missing an episode, and if you're happening to listen to this in Apple podcasts, rate review and subscribe there. I appreciate and read every single review. Number two, follow me on my social media accounts. I'm at journey to launch on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and I love, love, love interacting with journeyers. There. Three, support and check out the sponsors of this show. If you hear something that interests you. Sponsors are the main ways we keep the podcast lights on here, so show them some love for supporting your girl four. And last but not least, share this episode, this podcast, with a friend or family member or co worker, so that we can spread the message of Journey to launch. All right, that's it. It until next week. Keep on journeying. Journeyers. You.