A road trip to financial freedom

Stress is deadly and needs to stop at all levels, including financial

By Lizelle Steyn

11 March 2024

infographic with 6 tips to ban financial stress

Have you ever had the experience that the more you exercise, pushing yourself when feeling tired, the harder it becomes to shift belly fat? The body stubbornly clings to those extra few pounds when under stress. Medical science can shed a light on why this happens.

Watching a conversation between neuroscientist Dr Tara Swart and Steven Bartlett (Diary of a CEO), I was struck again by how bad stress is for our bodies and brains. When the brain signals to the body that it’s under threat, the adrenal glands release more of the stress hormone, cortisol, than normal. Small amounts are necessary to regulate many of our everyday bodily functions. But the extra surge of cortisol that prepares us for “fight or flight” comes at a cost. The body, for example, needs to borrow from both the immune system and the endocrine system to channel resources towards being “fight-ready”. Cortisol also triggers the release of glucose (sugar) from the liver, explaining why we often can’t lose abdominal fat when under pressure. There are cortisol receptors in almost every system within the body, which is why being exposed to higher-than-normal levels of it over prolonged periods of time eventually leads to health challenges such as:

But what do all of this have to do with your financial life?

Most South Africans are extremely stressed about their finances. It’s hard not to notice that so many people living in South Africa are functioning under stress. The reasons are complex but we know that financial stress is a major contributor. A recent Sanlam Savings survey on the impact of money showed that nearly 90% of the South Africans surveyed are stressed and 60% reported being extremely stressed about their finances.

Financial stress has become a national affliction. But it doesn’t have to be that way. It’s important that the choices we make don’t put more pressure on us, but create some venting and breathing space. Here are a few ways to ban financial stress from your life.

1 Let off steam in a healthy way

It’s difficult to start working on a stress-free financial future when our minds and bodies are frozen with fear and worry. The first step is to dissolve some of the stress by finding a healthy outlet. Do you have someone in your life who can listen to your worries without judgement or wanting to fix you? If not, you may need to write it all down – everything that’s stressing you out about money. Moderate exercise will also “mop up” some of the excess cortisol. Be careful of extreme fitness training, though, as that might have the opposite effect and bring even more cortisol into your system. Ideally choose something that you enjoy enough to do several days a week. Even just listening to relaxing music can also untie the knots.

Weightless - created to be the world's most relaxing song


2 Live below your means

When your head starts to clear and you feel like you can lift your mind above your current situation, it’s time to take a look at your income and expenses. Yes, it’s easier for high income-earners to work their way out of financial stress, but it doesn’t guarantee a stress-free life. The truth is that someone earning R100k a month can feel under immense financial pressure because of the size of their financial responsibilities, whereas someone who earns R10k a month can feel relaxed because their expenses are so little. The key to a stress-free financial life is being able to live below your means most months, irrespective of what you earn.

Where can you take some of the pressure off? If you’re a job-starter, can you live with your parents or house share a little longer? Do you really need a car? If you’re retired, have you applied for the old age grant yet? The world is hungry for coaching and mentoring – can you turn your passion or hobby into an extra income? For everyone in any other life stage, do you really need that much house? DSTV or other subscriptions? Any expensive habits that are not good for your health? Or do you need to draw a line between yourself and a spouse or family members who may not be aware of how much financial pressure you’re under and keep on asking for more? In terms of our income earning potential, all of us are battling at least one self-limiting belief. Do you know what yours is, and how that might be keeping you from a life of having more than enough?

3 Plan for an emergency

A debt trap like an overdraft or a micro loan often starts with not being able to fund an emergency – losing a job, a business going under, sudden illness or an accident, or a car that keeps on breaking. It's therefore wise to first set aside money for these types of events before you start working on your long-term savings or paying off your bond. And every time you draw from this fund for emergencies, it needs to be topped up before any further savings or investment can happen.

4 Give your bank account space to breathe

Once your emergency fund is ‘fully charged’, it’s time to look at how to invest the money that will be left every month after your expenses are taken care of. (If you have a bond, that "investment" can also take the form of putting extra money into your bond every month.) Like exercise, it’s best to start slowly in order to not put yourself under unnecessary pressure. There are financial service providers with whom you can invest from as little as R1 per month. And, importantly, with whom you can start-stop-restart your contributions at any time without any penalties. Schedule a debit order for a basic amount to be invested every month – at the start of the month. Choose an amount that challenges you, but only moderately. If you still have money left at the end of the month, also invest that on top of the scheduled debit order. This way you keep control over how much pressure you put on yourself. Investing should be exciting and rewarding, not painful. As you build up your saving and investment ‘stamina’, you can gradually increase the basic debit order amount going into your investment account at the start of the month. Allow yourself some space to breathe, for your savings habit to become sustainable.

5 Heal your relationship with money

While you’re taking practical steps to turn your life around, consider going a bit deeper. We all have an attitude towards and a relationship with money, and it’s not always a good one. Think of money as a person. The best results sprout from a healthy relationship where we respect money and see ourselves as worthy of and equal to money. A relationship in which neither money nor lack of money is defining us. Our money beliefs are often inherited from our parents. Were you taught that you are not wealthy and never will be? Did you constantly hear the phrase “we don’t have money”? Or were you taught that you are nothing without money, giving too much power to it?

Interrupting and changing any negative money programming can take years, but start by being aware of what you tell yourself and friends and family about money, because it will shape your reality. Will your words take you where you want to go? Or do you need to pause, and radically re-phrase? Earlier in my life I often heard the words “we don’t have money”; now I’m in the habit of saying, “I am a money magnet”. It takes some self-awareness and plenty of practice, but eventually the mental “upgrade” sticks.

6 Choose your news

Notice the difference in your body after reading about or watching the horrific details of war and crime versus hearing the voice of someone wise who loves and cares for you. We cannot ignore the tremendous suffering in the world. At the same time it’s immensely stressful to all social creatures, including humans, to witness suffering and not be able to do anything about it. Be involved where you’re being called to make the world a better place, but also actively choose your news and all voices that you invite into your head and home. Voices can be musicians, authors, traditional media, social media influencers, our teachers and healers, and our circle of friends and acquaintances, including Whatsapp and FaceBook groups. Can you list all the voices in your life?

In the world of financial news, it sometimes feels like most headlines are intentionally phrased to put us on high alert in order to grab our attention. The reality is that the stock market is a social mechanism. Humans – not cold facts - are placing buy and sell orders. As a result, share prices are heavily influenced by human sentiment and an over-reaction to bad news in the short term. In the long term, the stock market generally follows an upward trend. That’s good news for long-term investors like us. It would then make sense to check our investment accounts and to read financial news less often. I personally battle with this one, but am aware that the headlines are often painting a worst-case scenario.

There are many aspects about our finances that we can’t control: how the stock market performs, when interest rates move up and down, whether we lose our jobs or client base, and a streak of bad luck with cars and other possessions, as well as sudden health expenses that are not lifestyle-related.

But there are also many aspects that we can control, or at least plan for: how we relate to money, whether we have an emergency fund, how we draw from our resourcefulness and creativity to spend less than we earn, having a disciplined investment habit, and being unfazed by negative market events. We can tame the wild cortisol ride when, in the words of Maya Angelou, we're "hoping for the best, prepared for the worst, and unsurprised by anything in between."