Clarity: the pillar you need first

With all the information around money it can feel overwhelming when it comes to what you need to do first. That's why I developed the Thriving Money System. It's a visual framework, five pillars, and every time I've walked someone through it, they've said the same thing: "Oh, this actually makes sense. I can see how I get from where I am to where I want to be."

For many of us right now, this may feel less like a bridge and more like a canyon. I've been hearing it a lot lately. I don't know where the money goes. It's not clear what I'm doing. My energy is scattered. I have no motivation.

Before launching into solving the "money problem" with budgeting or apps, there is a missing piece that often is skipped, and it happens to be the first pillar - Clarity.

This is the first part of a five-part series: Clarity, Mindset, Education, Systems, Wealth.

Today I only want to talk about the first one, because you can't do anything with the other four until this one is in place.

You can't go anywhere unless you know where you're going.

That sounds obvious when put this directly, but I've lived a chunk of my own life without it. I spent a good part of my 20s without any real plan, just moving through life reactively. Then I got married, had my daughter, and there wasn't headspace for any of that anyway, you're in survival mode. It's only in the last while, now that my daughter's a bit older and I've got some of that headspace back, that I've started asking again: what am I actually doing? What do I actually want?

That question is where clarity starts. It's important to realise that it's not a light switch. You don't wake up one day with the full picture. It builds slowly, and it's often easier to work out what you don't want before you name what you do want. That's fine. Start there if that's where you're at.

Clarity has two layers, and most people only think about the second one

When we think about getting clear on money, we usually jump straight to budgets and numbers (that's why there are so many budgeting apps out there!). Instead, let's go one level up first: lifestyle. Where do you actually want to be? What does your day look like? This isn't about picking a specific location. It can be more of an impression, a feeling, and it can change over time. That's normal. Start writing down the impression, even if it's fuzzy (although I'll bet you're clearer on it than you at first realise).

Ask yourself where. Not just geographically, but what kind of life. Do you want the beachside town where shoes are optional? The hustle of a big city where something's always open? Both, at different times of year? None of that is wrong. It just needs to be what YOU want.

And I mean you. Not your partner's version of the dream. My husband is currently renovating his sailboat and plans to go on longer ocean voyages. The idea of being on a boat in the middle of the ocean with no sight of land for weeks on end fills me with dread, not joy. So, the compromise is for me to fly and meet him at the destination, with our daughter, for as long as she wants to come. Once we were both clear and honest about that, we could actually talk about it properly instead of me quietly resenting a plan I never agreed to.

Even the plan can change, and that's fine

Life has a funny way of not always going the way you plan, and the reality of something can be very different from the idea of it. That means it's OK to plan for and even execute the plan and then realise it's not what you actually want.

Don't forget to put fun on the list

As kids, we live for fun. We love to play and the stories we have from fun adventures fill our memories. As we get older, with more responsibilities, fun can tend to get pushed to the side. Do that for long enough and you can even forget what you like to do for fun. This happened to me, so I speak from experience.

Having a conversation with a friend not that long ago, we were talking about what we like to do for fun and I genuinely had to stop and think. There were things I enjoyed doing, but they usually involved my family, or were minor hobbies. What did I love to do, just for me? My friend then pointed out that I always lit up when I spoke of travel.

My friend was right. It's been true since my 20s, when I worked for an airline and was flying somewhere almost every month. Some fun costs money, and travel is definitely in that category!

So, think about it properly. Not what you do for the family. What lights YOU up, specifically you, even if nobody else came along.

Then get granular: people, tasks, things

Once you've got the big picture, bring it down a level. Who are the people you want around you, the ones worth investing time or money in, mentors, mastermind groups, even someone who can support you as a parent or friend? What tasks would you happily pay someone else to do, the ironing, the cleaning, the meals, so you get your time back? And what things, technology, tools, would actually make life easier, not just add more stuff to the house?

This is where clarity turns into direction for your money. Without it, you fill your house with things, your money disappears and you can't say where, and you're not moving toward anything because you were never clear on what "toward" even looked like.

Your task this week

Get it out of your head. Write it down, dictate it into your phone, whatever works, just get it onto a page or into a recording so you can hear it back. You'll be surprised how different something sounds once it's outside your head instead of swirling around inside it.

Next, we move into pillar two: Mindset, the stories, habits and beliefs sitting underneath all of this. Clarity lays the foundation. Mindset is what we build on top of it.