Intentionally setting money aside for things you love ahead of time, can add a lot more happiness to your life!

• The goal really for today's episode is for you to think of ways to easily do more of the things you love without the anxiety that tends to come with it. (01:36)
• Money blocking is basically a term I came up with to describe intentionally setting aside or blocking money for certain items that make your life more enjoyable on a more daily basis. (02:25)
• With money blocking, what you could do is say take a piece of this bonus and buy four gift cards for that massage place that you love. You now have one guilt free massage every single quarter. (03:21)

Quote for the episode: "If money blocking every year allows you two extra massages, an extra let's say hockey game, make sure you take a vacation and let's say an extra daily shot of espresso in your coffee for the next 30 years, that's a lot of extra happiness that I don't want to be missing out on." (04:46)

Securities offered through TFS Securities, Inc., and Advisory Services through TFS Advisory Services, an SEC Registered Investment Advisor Member FINRA/SIPC. TFS Securities, Inc., is located at 437 Newman Springs Road, Lincroft, NJ 07738 (732) 758-9300.

Welcome to the EnjoyMore30s Family Finance

podcast. The only podcast dedicated to making life more

enjoyable for young families by hitting on the financial topics

that tend to weigh on us, stress us out, and distract our focus

from simply enjoying life.

Hello, and welcome. Thank you so much for

joining me once again on the EnjoyMore30s Family Finance

podcast, where we're aiming to try to help you take steps

forward, gain that confidence and really therefore remove that

financial anxiety that you might have, so you can focus solely on

making your life more enjoyable. We're entering the middle now of

our new years series, Setting Your Compass for the New Year.

As always, if you like what you're hearing, please make sure

to subscribe, follow us on Apple podcasts, wherever you listen.

Clicking those stars leaving those reviews it really helps us

reach the literally millions of other young families out there

that are just like you.

So far this season, we've covered a lot, covered setting

your compass with your spouse, so joint goal setting, then we

discussed the importance of actually paying yourself first,

giving some of that hard earned money to yourself, crazy I know,

to reach those goals that would actually make you happy each

month. And finally last week, we discussed bucketing your goals.

So separating out different accounts for each individual

goal. So you can easily see the track for each goal, you can

easily achieve each goal. So if you haven't checked out those

episodes yet, definitely definitely want to do that soon.

Today's episode is titled Money Blocking for Fun!, where we're

going to cover easy ways to set money aside, aka what I refer to

as money blocking for specific things that will increase your

happiness throughout the year. The goal really for today's

episode is for you to think of ways to easily do more of the

things you love without the anxiety that tends to come with

it. Sounds good, right? If you've ever received a gift card

to something that you love, maybe your favorite restaurant

or the movies or really anything else you enjoy doing, you know

what a great feeling that is. It's kind of like literally a

free pass for fun. There's no anxiety around the spending or

the financial outlay or the money you're given because it

doesn't matter what else is going on for you right now in

your life. You can go out and enjoy this completely guilt

free. It's a free pass, it's not your money. This feeling is

something you can actually feel more often though, throughout

the year within your own control with something that I call money

blocking.

Money blocking is basically a term I came up with to describe

intentionally setting aside or blocking money for certain items

that make your life more enjoyable on a more daily basis.

So for example, let's say that you love getting massages,

however, you may get them sporadically or there may be

times when money is tight during the year and you just don't feel

like you can even you know do that though you really really,

really may need a massage. Generally when things are tight

and you're stressed, a massage could probably be pretty helpful

right? Now, the easiest way to go about this is when you get a

lump sum. So think of a bonus or a tax refund, somebody hands you

a big chunk of money, maybe your parents give you money for

Christmas every year, they gift you money, something like that.

So for purposes of illustrating this point, let's say that every

year you have a $5,000 bonus from work. Now normally without

a plan for this kind of money, which I've talked about before,

it has a tendency of disappearing. With money

blocking, what you could do is say take a piece of this bonus

and buy four gift cards for that massage place that you love. You

now have one guilt free massage every single quarter. So you see

what I mean? You can do this with anything to. Hockey games,

Starbucks, your favorite restaurant, if you set money

aside money blocking, and buy those massage gift cards. When

you're super stressed during the year, money may feel tight, you

could walk right into the massage parlor and say, you

know, hey, here's my gift card, get a massage, and there's no

extra outlay for you. You can do this same concept on a monthly

basis too. I would say it's generally not quite as easy. But

let's say every month you put $150 aside into what you would

call a separate vacation account, separate bank account

that you reserved just for vacations. Now every year you're

going to have $1,800 to take a vacation to stop, pause, enjoy

life with your family. So money blocking is all about enabling

yourself to have more fun.

So from today's episode, hopefully you're taking away how

you can adjust how you're going to go about doing things you

already enjoy. You probably take vacations every year, you

probably get a couple massages a year. But if you're more

intentional about setting money aside for them ahead of time, it

can add a lot more happiness to your life. It can guarantee a

lot more happiness is going to happen in your life on a daily

basis. If money blocking every year allows you two extra

massages, an extra let's say hockey game, make sure you take

a vacation and let's say an extra daily shot of espresso in

your coffee for the next 30 years, that's a lot of extra

happiness that I don't want to be missing out on. And I don't

want you to be missing out on either.

So thanks for tuning in today and join us for next week's

episode called, Yes, There Can Be Too Conservative!, where

we're going to cover how paying yourself first, separating out

your goals is all well and good but if you're using

inappropriate types of investments for certain goals,

they may take much much longer to achieve or perhaps you even

may never achieve them at all.

So overall, if you're able to implement what we covered today,

that's fantastic. You have less to worry about than before, you

could focus more on enjoying life. If you are wanting help

with these things though, where you have questions you need help

in clarifying, check out the ASK JOE section on the show's

website EnjoyMore30s.com. That's EnjoyMore30s.com. Until next

week. Thanks for joining me today and I look forward to

connecting with you again soon.

The conversations on this show are

Joe's opinions and provided for general information purposes

only. They do not constitute accounting, legal, tax, or other

professional advice for your specific situation. You should

always seek appropriate advice from a financial advisor,

accountant, lawyer, or other professional before acting upon

any content or information found here first. Joe is affiliated

with New Horizons Wealth Management LLC, a branch office

of TFS Securities, Inc., and TFS Advisory Services an SEC

Registered Investment Advisor Member FINRA/SIPC.