HERE'S HOW MUCH I PAY MYSELF.

After tax, I take $950 a week from my business as a single person.

Consistently.

Even if we’ve just had a $50k launch with multiple five-figures sitting in the bank, I pay myself the same $950 after tax every Monday.

My mortgage is $1006 a fortnight—which doesn’t include other expenses like my body corporate, rates, or food—and I’m pretty good at juggling the rest, ensuring I can always buy my favourite premium toothpaste and get my nails done.

I live really lean.

It doesn’t seem on-brand until you realise I cycle between the same 8 outfits—all of which I bought on sale—and that my apartment is… bare, lol.

I’m single, so all my bills rely on me.

Including my business—my number one priority.

And my business gets the best. I give it everything it needs to flourish into the vision I imagine it to be one day. For example,

• I have a premium coworking space in Toorak, and I work among some of the best businesses in the country. I meet people daily that you couldn’t meet without the workplace connection.
• I have an amazing bookkeeper, accountant, and money extraordinaire as my monthly contractor.
• I pay to run beautiful events every single month, including room hire and catering.
• I don’t go overboard with expenses, and I always make sure to put aside tax.

But if you looked at my books and my personal spending, it’s all pretty conservative for some really sexy launches.

I think personal lifestyle creep is a killer when it comes to a good business that could be great with a bit of funding… that the founder keeps taking out.

Potentially a pressure of proving yourself to yourself—that you can support yourself—and to your friends and family too, as a way of going, “See! I can do this.”

But I think we forget to support the thing that supports us—our business.

By pulling out what it often needs to grow — funding.

One of my favourite articles is by Smart Company, and it interviews founders on how much they paid themselves in the early days:

“Nearly every founder paid themselves nothing at the start of their business and didn’t start paying themselves a salary until one or two years into the business. The lowest starting salary for a business owner was $50 a week, and the highest was $150,000 plus dividends.”

Browsing the article you can see answers like this:

I know for me, it feels really freeing when a client doesn’t want to continue, and I don’t have a grabby sense to keep them because my lifestyle relies on it.

I could sell $0 next month, and there’s enough there in the bank to sustain all bills and my wage with no stress.

That wouldn’t happen if I paid myself a bonus every time a client paid in full or we had a great launch.

And I think it’s a bad habit to get into when you resent your business for not performing or growing, when the reason could be that you’re taking out all the funds that could help it grow.

Honest question—are you giving to your business to grow it, or do you use it like your personal piggy bank?

Peta ??

>> QUESTION FOR THE GROUP CHAT >> WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON MAKING DECISIONS BASED ON REVENUE AND WHAT'S IN YOUR BANK AND NOT BASED ON ACTUAL STRATEGY?

LOVE THIS? THEN YOU'LL LOVE THE FOLLOWING ??

EP. 31: YOU'RE RUNNING YOUR BUSINESS WITH AN EMPLOYEE MINDSET