I love New York, right down to my bones. However, housing prices are out of control. It is time to completely disrupt real estate here to spur creativity, innovation, and a rebirth of art and culture. New York is losing its edge because the people with edge can’t afford sky-high rents and the ridiculous hurdles to getting an apartment. That’s why my latest projects, still in the very preliminary stages, are two tiny drops in what I hope will be a sea change for this city that I love so much. They’re ideas to encourage and support the boldest, most creative people in their pursuits to do well and do good right here in the Big Apple by making housing much more affordable and easier to attain. More details soon…
I’ve been thinking a lot about how to financially turn more of my attention toward my own professional projects. There are a lot of options available to business owners today to finance their work – debt, investment, crowdfunding, grants, partnerships, sponsorships. The list is endless. For the next 3 months, I’ve got a full work plate. After that, I want to take some time and figure out how to refocus on this very long list of ideas that may deserve their shot at a life off the page. I’m already excited about taking that journey.
Today I’ll be live tweeting High Water Women‘s Investing for Impact Conference. With an incredibly impressive line up of speakers from the investment, nonprofit, and NGO worlds, the conference will cover the triumphs and challenges of financial investing that is focused on making a positive impact on society.
High Water Women empowers women and youth in need by creating powerful volunteer opportunities that leverage the talents and aspirations of professional women. They focus their work in 3 main areas:
– Enriched education for at-risk youth
– Relieving the impact of family poverty
– Economic empowerment for women
You can follow the day via my Twitter feed, @christanyc, or through the High Water Women Twitter feed, @HighWaterWomen. The hashtag for the event is #HWW2013. I hope you’ll chime in, ask questions, and connect with others on this topic. I look forward to the conversation!
“The importance of money flows from it being a link between the present and the future.” ~ John Maynard Keynes, British economist
Money – what we earn, what we save, what we spend, and what we give away – is always a bridge between what we have now and what we will have in the future. It’s just energy. It ebbs and flows.
This perspective helped me to think of money as a much less terrifying force. I used to be petrified of it. Afraid I’d never have enough. Afraid that my pursuit of it, no matter how noble my path, might consume me if I didn’t remain on constant watch.
Now I see it for what it is – fuel that gets me from where I am now to where I want to be next. In this way it’s become a very selfless entity – something that shows up when I need it, allows me to use it to the best of my ability, and then happily changes hands without even so much as a glance back at me over its shoulder.
It feels good to no longer see it as a foe, but rather as an ally.
Last week, I wrote a post about the point of all teaching – to help others rise. That statement can be taken literally and figuratively, as I recently found out through a cupcake baking class at Butter Lane Bakery. Joe, our teacher and cupcake baker (and frosting!) extraordinaire, helped me recognize a very important business principle that we should learn from: we all have something to teach and should make it a part of our business model. (Yes, thoughts that profound can be found in the depths of a cupcake.)
Joe counseled us on the proper techniques to cream butter and sugar, why we need to add in the dry ingredients with a minimal amount of mixing, and the short window in which we have to add the dairy. With our fluffy cakes baked, he taught us the “pat down” frosting technique which produces a cute little wisp worthy of a Real Simple Magazine cover. (Okay, mine weren’t that good but they were damn close!)
The result: little pillows of sugar-sweet happiness, and more importantly, confidence in the kitchen. I can whip up a delicious dinner in not time; my baking skills are less-than-adequate, but this class helped me understand baking on a more intellectual level. The nerd in me needed that boost of knowledge, and I got it thanks to Joe.
Butter Lane Bakery could just keep churning out these sinfully sweet little indulgences and keeping its customers in the dark on how the magic happens. Instead, they invite people into the bakery for a small class fee, and share everything they know about their specialty. And it’s working – their class schedule is sold out months in advance. Follow their lead.
Get creative with your business model – there are more revenue streams in there than you think there are.
My friend, Phyllis Neill (CEO of Buzz12), recently sent me a link to Glassheel.com, “a career, lifestyle and networking site for professional women. Glass Heel is an online community of bloggers, experts and professional women of all ages — with room for thousands more. This site was designed to connect you with networks, individuals, events and other useful information to help you succeed professionally and build relationships. More importantly, through the network of learning, communication, and support, Glass Heel aims to see its members reach new heights in the professional world — breaking through the proverbial glass ceiling.”
My thanks to Molly Cain and the outstanding Glass Heel community for including me in their movement to break through this glass ceiling once and for all! I’m already at work on my next post. More to read shortly…
A group of women in Bangladesh helped by microfinance loans from GrameenFor a number of years, I’ve written about and donated to Grameen America and Kiva. Both organization provide microloans to entrepreneurs. Kiva works in the developing world and Grameen America works right here in New York City. Given my support of both organization, I was thrilled to get the information below in a recent email from the organization that explains the beginning of their new partnership.
If you have an interest in supporting entrepreneurship as a way to give lower-income individuals and families a greater chance for economic independence and freedom, please read on and consider supporting this partnership.
“We’re excited to tell you about two huge developments with Kiva and Grameen America.
First, there’s a new film featuring Grameen America showing for just one night on Thursday, March 31. To Catch A Dollar: Muhammad Yunus Banks on America tells the story of how the Nobel Prize winning Dr. Muhammad Yunus and Grameen America are helping bring the microfinance revolution to bear on addressing poverty in the United States.
Second, we’re proud to announce that we are partnering with Dr. Yunus’s Grameen America to provide financing to low-income entrepreneurs in the United States.
Elizabeth’s Story
Thirty years ago, Dr. Muhammad Yunus began a quiet revolution. He found that poverty could best be alleviated in his native Bangladesh not through charity, but through unleashing entrepreneurship. By grouping rural women together, he was able to provide financing for businesses that banks weren’t interested in serving.
Fast forward thirty years, and Dr. Yunus is working to bring group lending to low income entrepreneurs in the United States.
And Kiva is going to be there to help. Through our new partnership, entrepreneurs like Elizabeth, pictured to the left, are able to grow their businesses and communities.
Browse Grameen America’s loans, and learn more about Elizabeth and other Grameen America entrepreneurs.
To Catch A Dollar
Speaking of Elizabeth, she is featured in To Catch A Dollar, along with several other Grameen America entrepreneurs.
The documentary introduces viewers to Grameen staff and borrowers, as they work together to prove that the group lending model can work in the United States. Following the documentary, there’s a special panel, recorded earlier this month in New York, featuring Robert De Niro, Kiva President Premal Shah, financial guru Suze Orman, Dr. Yunus, and CNBC’s Maria Bartiromo.
The film will be showing at over 200 theaters across the country. Remember, this is a one-night-only event, so please get your tickets now!
A strong showing on Thursday will help guarantee international distribution for the film and get the word out about microfinance, so buy a ticket and take a friend. For those in the San Francisco Bay area, the Kiva team will be attending the screening at Embarcadero Cinemas. Drop by and say hi!
Dr. Yunus
Grameen and Kiva are in many ways a natural fit. The inspiration for Kiva came during a lecture by Muhammad Yunus at Stanford in 2005. His experience in Bangladesh inspired Kiva’s founders to travel to Uganda and begin the long journey of building what would one day become Kiva.
We’re thrilled to announce that earlier this month we passed $200 million in loans made on Kiva. This would have never been possible without Dr. Yunus’s inspiration, and for that we’re eternally grateful.
Speaking of microfinance in the United States, Kiva will be co-presenting the Microfinance USA Conference in New York on May 23-34. For more information, click here.
One final note: don’t forget we have borrowers from over 40 countries who are looking for loans every day.”
This post is available as a podcast on Cinch and iTunes.
“Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.” ~ Theodore Roosevelt
“Is that really going to help you make enough money?” a friend recently asked me about my business, Compass Yoga. I didn’t get my yoga teacher training nor did I start my company in order to quit my job and make my entire income from it. The intention was, and continues to be, to do something that made my time worthwhile. The job I do for money is fine. I work with nice people, I have some flexibility in my schedule, it’s helping me pay down my school loans, and I have the chance to learn about new technologies and market innovations. It’s not the work of my life, but it makes my life’s work possible under my current circumstances.
My friend, Amy, recently told me about a book called Your Money Or Your Life. I haven’t read it yet but it’s on order through Amazon. Since I work in financial services and have always been fascinated by the psychology of money (mostly because I grew up with very few financial resources), I’m looking forward to exploring the framework. The premise of the book is this: where are you trying to go, how much do you need to get there, and what plan can you put in place right now with the income you have to get you to that point, whatever that point is? Its authors put forward the idea that it is okay to have a job that makes you money to pour into your passions. They give readers permission to separate their financial life and the work that they are most passionate about.
Now, if you are making money from your greatest passion, then I applaud you. (Please tell me how it’s going, too!) Your Money or Your Life, and this post, are for those of us who are grappling with having a job that makes us some good money but doesn’t necessarily light our fire the way our other interests do. I spoke a bit about this for my interview with Liz Massey on Creative Liberty. I spent the early part of my career working in theatre. By all accounts I had exactly the job I wanted. The trouble with that job was I worked so many hours, often without good pay, that is wore me down and actually made me hate the theatre. After I left my last theatre job, I didn’t go see a show for over a year. Now I love going to the theatre — I needed to make my money some place else so I could actually fall in love with my passion again.
I’m not in any way suggesting that you run out and make lots of money doing something you hate because your passions won’t pay you well. Not at all. What I am saying is that making money doing what you love can seem like nirvana from a far and be less than satisfying up close. I also believe that making money doing what we love can be an incremental process, and progress in increments is more than fine. Every journey really is made by putting one foot in front of the other, however long that journey may take.
I have been considering the idea for a book about yoga and personal finance. Here are the very needs of the idea in a guest blog post on Elephant Journal. Showcases what the yamas and niyamas taught me about managing my money. Let me know what you think!
I’ve heard a lot of people resolve to get a hold of their finances in 2010. 2009 knocked us all for a loop. Almost every one of our preconceptions about working and earning was turned on its head last year, and we’ve vowed to never be in that position again. Trouble is, how are we going to avoid 2009, the sequel? Where do we start?
Welcome to Smart Cookies, a clan of 20 and 30 somethings who got together for one main reason: to turn around their financial futures. They were successful women with good jobs and not much to show for it. They formed a money group and together developed strategies to improve their finances and still have fun. Now they’re sharing what they learned in a few ways: in their book, on TV, and through their on-line community.
My favorite feature on the website is the opportunity to join a local money group to get your financial engine running in the right direction and keep it that way. Check out what the Smart Cookies have to offer you on your road to financial good fortune.
Christa Avampato 