April 18, 2024

Living the dream with CPA, TED Speaker, International Best Selling Author and Holistic Financial Coach Estelle Gibson

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Discover the secrets to financial freedom with Estelle Gibson, a holistic financial coach, as she shares her 40-year journey from CPA to bestselling author. Dive into an inspiring episode of 'Living the Dream with Curveball' where Estelle reveals her personal struggles and triumphs, transforming financial turmoil into empowerment. Whether you're rebounding from divorce, a career shift, or just seeking peace with your finances, this episode is a treasure trove of wisdom for anyone ready to take control of their money story.

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> Speaker A>Welcome, um, to the Living the Dream podcast with curveball. Um, if you believe you can achieve Chee Chee.

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> Speaker B>Welcome to the Living the Dream with Curveball podcast, a show where I interview guests that teach, motivate, and inspire. Today we're going to be, um, talking about finances, as I am joined by CPA international bestselling author, speaker, and holistic financial coach, Estelle Gibson. Estelle has over 40 years, lots of experience, and she's worked with individuals as well as small to large businesses. And what she does is help them personalize their finances to what will work for them.

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> Speaker B>So, listen up, listeners. Uh, you might get some tips. I definitely will. Estelle, thank you so much for joining me today.

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> Estelle Gibson>Hey, thanks for having me.

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> Speaker B>Why don't you start off by telling everybody a little bit about yourself?

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> Estelle Gibson>Okay. So, uh, you started out by saying, I'm, um, a CPA and holistic, uh, financial coach. And, um, I've been doing that for 40 years. And now working. I've been working with coaching clients. I still work in the accounting industry, but, um, have been working with financial clients on and off for about 20 years and helping them to rebuild their lives financially and emotionally. And I mostly work with people that have gone through some kind of a, um, life changing circumstance where they are starting their life either after, uh, divorce, a change in career, an ending of a career, a, uh, life changing their family, and they struggle with managing their money, and they want to rebuild their lives financially and emotionally.

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> Speaker B>Okay, well, what made you want to start helping, uh, specialized groups of people?

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> Estelle Gibson>Well, it started for me when, um, I got a divorce. Now, I started my career in accounting and was, um, moving along in my career.

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> Estelle Gibson>And then I got a divorce. And it was during that time when I saw my attorney helping women through the divorce process. And I had to rebuild my life because my husband managed all the money. Even though I was a financial professional, I was tired of working on people's money all day long. So he was managing the money, and I didn't stay involved.

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> Estelle Gibson>So when he asked for a divorce, I was left with a house I couldn't afford and bills I couldn't pay because I had handed over my financial power. And so when I went through my divorce, I had the thought in my mind, geez, I wonder if some of these women that my attorney is helping need help in rebuilding their lives financially because I was having to do the same thing. So that's the first idea about it that I had. And then as I began to rebuild my own life, I got involved in self development community. And I saw that the two communities that I was in, the financial community, where people have a lot of money, but they worry about it, they struggle with it.

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> Estelle Gibson>They don't want to lose their money. They're trying to protect it. And then in my new community, where people didn't have as much money when they were living paycheck to paycheck. And I started out that way when I first got divorced, too, and they were struggling, I saw both communities that I was in, um, were not having freedom around money. And so that's when I put together the process that I use now so that people could actually have financial freedom, because it doesn't matter how much money you have. Financial freedom and financial peace is not a function of how much money you have. It's a function of how you feel about money, how you, um, relate with money, how you think about money, your beliefs about money. So, uh, that's what I work with people on, are both managing their money and the beliefs and the environments that they have around money.

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> Speaker B>Well, so listeners will know that you're definitely qualified to speak on this topic. Tell the listeners about all the companies you work for.

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> Estelle Gibson>Oh, my God.

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> Speaker B>It's kind of giving overview, like the small and large companies.

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> Estelle Gibson>Yeah. So I started out as an auditor in an international accounting firm. So I worked with Deloitte.

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> Estelle Gibson>So I have worked with companies like General Motors and, um, international harvester and large banks and health care industry, and some small companies, too. Small, uh, um, public companies, and then individual companies, uh, business owners, entrepreneurs, doctors, attorneys. So when you work in the, uh, international accounting world, you interact with lots and lots of different size companies and types of companies. And I really loved working with businesses.

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> Estelle Gibson>It was usually my goal before I left auditors. I always say auditors are one of the most hated professionals in the accounting profession because people think you're coming to spy on them and to see what they're doing. So I made it my mission that when I went into a company, that I provided value outside of what we were doing, just in evaluating their books and their money, but that I could look at their business processes and, um, systems and give them some kind of feedback to help them, uh, as a business owner. So, you know, it started for me back then in working with companies, in, um, coaching and trying to help them beyond just their money situation. So I've worked with a lot of different business owners. I've worked with individuals. I've worked with couples, um, people that have gone through divorce. Not gone through divorce, people that have just gotten married that want to get their finances in order. So couples and individuals, women and men, uh, in all walks of life.

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> Speaker B>Okay, well, I know in your bio you talk about how people can be poor by choice, and you show them how to, uh, get past the lies and create their own financial truth. So elaborate, uh, on that.

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> Estelle Gibson>So, um, the name of my latest book is called poor by choice question mark.

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> Estelle Gibson>And, um, so it's kind of got three or four different meanings. So the first meaning is people. The first part of the book is about financial dependency, and that's my personal story that I had handed over my financial power. So, people are financially dependent, whether the dependent on a job, a situation, or a person for money, and they feel trapped and they're dependent by choice, which was my situation. I got. I chose to do that or by circumstance.

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> Estelle Gibson>So people that are dependent by choice are people that hand over the financial power. It can be in a relationship, it can be in a business arrangement. Think about all the celebrities and athletes that hand over their financial power to their managers and their family members or whoever's managing their money, and they end up sometimes losing their money because they don't stay involved or informed. So that's dependency by choice. Dependent by circumstance is whether you're dependent on a job because you can't leave, because you need the insurance, you need the money, you have to pay your bills, or you're dependent on somebody else because you've had a tragedy, you've lost a home, you've had a relationship breakup, and you've had to move in with family and friends. It happens with the elderly, it happens with adult children living with their, um, their parents. So those are financial dependencies by circumstance. And so the choice piece had to do with choice versus circumstance. Now, the next meaning has to do with, do we really have a choice? You know, are we always at choice? Do we have a choice in what we're doing with our money, or are we a victim of our circumstances? Do we, um, you know, is. Is feeling like we don't have a choice? A choice is not doing anything about it a choice? So it's kind of a rhetorical question on whether or not not we have a choice based on our circumstances or what's going on with our, uh, with our money.

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> Estelle Gibson>And the next one is that we do have choices throughout our money life. I call it the money life. So, you know, growing up for being a child, to a teenager, to a young adult, to someone in their career, to someone that has a family, to someone that's in their later years, we go through a money life cycle, and throughout those cycles of our life, we have different choices.

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> Estelle Gibson>Like, I had a choice. My parents said they couldn't afford to send me to college, so I had a choice.

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> Estelle Gibson>I could have made the choice to stay home or to go to a school close to home and live at home, or I made the choice to get my own financial aid, work three jobs, and pick the university. That made sense for me.

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> Estelle Gibson>So that was a choice that I made when I got divorced. I could have made the choice to, you know, spend a lot of money and, um, when I started, you know, rebuilding my life and gaining more income. But I choice chose to invest it and to save it so that I could plan for my future. So throughout our money life, we have choices that we can make. And now the last one is a little bit different. It's the question, do we really have a choice? Because we don't teach people about money. There's not a lot of financial literacy in, uh, schools and in, really, society. And because we, um, don't teach about money, and because we don't talk about money, because money is kind of a taboo subject. So people learn about money through what they experience in their environment. So it's what they see in their home, it's what they see in their neighborhood. It's what they see in society. It's what they learn from kind of, you know, what, what not what they're taught, but what they see in their environment.

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> Estelle Gibson>So are we really choosing, or are we a function of our beliefs, behaviors, and environment? So all of those things make up whether or not we are, you know, having the choice. And some of it is to uncover some of those things that we may have just fallen into believing about and really choosing for ourself so that we can make the choice. Yes, I want to have financial freedom. Yes, I want to have financial peace. Yes, I want to learn about money and through literacy and be informed and making those choices so that you can, you know, create the. The life that you want. So that's kind of a, uh, long way around, kind of the four parts to this, uh, poor by choice piece.

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> Speaker B>Well, you also talk about how you help people not be on a money money diet and how you can help them create a unique spending plan.

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> Speaker B>So tell us about that.

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> Estelle Gibson>Yeah, that's one of my favorite topics. So I think that budgets are, uh, like a five letter word, you know, bad word, because budgets are like diets.

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> Estelle Gibson>And the definition of budget is to make an estimate, the actual definition.

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> Estelle Gibson>But somehow we have gotten it in our heads that budget means restriction, that I've got to go on a budget, I've got to go on a money diet. And what I have found is that when people go on a money diet and start restricting without information, without understanding, you know, choosing what they're trying to do, there can be a backlash. Just like when you go on a diet, when you come off of it, you can overindulge or, uh, overeat or overindulge. That happens with people when they've restricted for no reason, then they just revert back to using credit cards, spending, you know, um, it's a backlash, really. So I have people go on, what's a spending plan?

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> Estelle Gibson>Which it's really a mindset change.

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> Speaker A>Um.

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> Estelle Gibson>Um, so that you're thinking about taking responsibility for what you're spending, understanding what you're spending, looking at the estimates of what you need to spend, and then making choices based on that.

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> Estelle Gibson>So it's a little bit of a different mindset about, uh, spending. And it gives you, you know, you can make choices. It gives you power and control, because you decide, here's what I'm doing right now. Here's what I'm spending. Do I want to do that, or do I have a goal? Do I want to save money? Do I want to spend on something else? Looking at needs versus wants, needs being things that you feel like you want, you need to have, versus things that are necessities and that are aligned with your goals and your dreams. I actually have people start with, what are your goals and dreams? And then begin to align their money and their finances based on those goals and dreams instead of just, you know, going through life and then thinking, I just need to restrict because restriction doesn't always work. So kind of that's the theory behind, um, creating a unique spending plan. And it's unique because everyone has different wants, needs, um, things that they want to achieve in their life and goals that they have for their money. Whether it's saving, spending goals, um, or investing, all of those are different for each person. So they have to look at what they really want to achieve, what their income is, what they're currently doing, and how they can create a spending plan that creates freedom and gets them to their desired result.

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> Speaker B>Okay, I know you touched on your second book, but tell the listeners about your first book as well.

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> Estelle Gibson>So my first book is called rewrite your money story. And it's a guided journal. So I wrote that, um, guided journal because when I was going through the period after my divorce, I did a lot of self development and took a lot of classes and programs. I used to say you could find me in the self help section of any bookstore, and I was taking any and every class I could to, you know, not get in the situation that I had been in again. And so one of the things, uh, that I learned about was your money story. And it was one of the most impactful things that I went through to understand why I had become dependent and how I had, um, turned over my financial power and the beliefs that I had learned from my community, my family, and my own personal beliefs that set me up for that. So that, um, book is about learning. It's got three phases in it. Understanding what your money beliefs are, understanding where they come from, the family and the origin story of your money story, and then making the choice to choose something different, to consciously choose something different, and to rewrite, uh, that story.

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> Estelle Gibson>So it creates an awareness and uncovers your limiting beliefs and the stories that you have around money and where they come from. So then you can now make a choice to rewrite that. And the journal walks through. It has questions and journal prompts. Uh, it's about 135 pages on all the different pages to help you walk through the process and, um, answer questions and bring an awareness to all your limiting beliefs. And then at the end of the book, it has a section where you can set your money goals and write affirmations and begin to start to shift those, uh, words, thoughts and beliefs into ones that serve you based on what you're really, uh, interested in creating in your life doing.

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> Speaker B>Tell us about any current, upcoming projects that you're working on that people need to know about.

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> Estelle Gibson>Uh, so I'm currently, I just finished recording the audiobook version of my book.

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> Estelle Gibson>So I'm working on that. Um, I'm working on a program called Sacred wealth, which is about creating, just bringing everything that I'm doing with holistic coaching, bringing in mindset and, um, different areas of your life. And, you know, because money affects every area of your life. And so I'm creating a program to help people to, um, refocus and reset and evaluate the areas of their life and how money affects them, and beginning to put in place what they want to achieve in their life. And so that they can have financial peace and choice and create a wealth definition for them and have a customized program to help them create the wealth that they want.

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> Speaker B>Okay, so listeners can keep up with everything that you're up to throughout your contact info.

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> Estelle Gibson>They can reach me at, uh, estellegibson that's spelled estellegibson.com.

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> Estelle Gibson>And if you're interested in speaking with me further, you can click the button that says let's connect and send me a message and so that we can connect further and I can help you on your own personal journey.

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> Speaker B>Okay, close us out with some final thoughts. Maybe if that was something I forgot to talk about that you would like to touch on or just any final thoughts you have for the listeners, just.

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> Estelle Gibson>Uh, final thoughts for you as listeners. Um, just know that, you know, a lot of people think that they're failing when it comes to money and know that, um, if you have never been taught, you just don't know because people feel really bad about their money situation, but it's because they didn't have the information. And, um, you can always learn. It's never too late to learn and to shift and to transform your money life.

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> Estelle Gibson>So it's never too late. You can always get started.

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> Estelle Gibson>So, um, don't feel bad and don't delay, but begin to start on your money journey no matter where you are in it.

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> Speaker B>All right, ladies and gentlemen, great advice by the great Estelle Gibson.

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> Speaker B>Estellegipson.com. Please be sure to follow rate review share this episode to as many people as possible. We all have financial, uh, issues, so if you have any guests or suggestion topics, go to. Go to Cjackson 102.

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> Speaker B>Put that in your favorite email program and send them to me. You know, get on your favorite podcast platform app and hit that follow button that like, uh, put a review. As always, thank you for listening and supporting the show. And Estelle, thank you so much for joining me and sharing your expertise.

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> Estelle Gibson>Thank you so much for having me.

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> Speaker A>For more information on the living the Dream podcast, visit www.djcurveball.com.

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> Speaker A>Until next time, stay focused on living the dream. Dream.