Are you already making excuses?

An Issue Of The Chidera Peters Dispatch (CPD)

Hey Friend! I hope we are still friends since I haven’t written you this year 🫣. I didn’t write to you sooner because I had a slow start to the year and have also been thinking of a new direction for this weekly email. I haven’t quite fleshed it out, but I want to add a segment called ‘Money Corner’ or something of the sort, where I’ll share key money lessons I’m learning and answer questions you might have. By the way, if you have a title better than ‘Money Corner’, do let me know😅.

Unrelated photo: this is my scent stash which has cost me money to build 😅

Now that that’s out of the way, how are you keeping up with your new year goals or resolutions? Or wait, is it bold of me to assume you have one? 🌝 Do let me know. I’m asking to know if you’re already making excuses because I’ve realised that I was.

I was supposed to write to you last week, but “something” (as is common with many of us) came up, and I ended up not writing. Even today, I almost didn’t pick up my laptop to write because I had the most stressful day, but I had to ask myself, Chidera, are you making excuses again? One of my goals this year is consistency with these weekly emails, and even though I’ve already lost a few weeks, I’m choosing to get back at it today.

The truth is this; consistency relies on discipline and not motivation, and discipline is doing what’s necessary and not what’s convenient. As with a lot of things in life, to achieve the goals you’ve set out, you need to be disciplined. If you let it, there will always be reasons to avoid doing the things you need to; excuses abound all around. So, I ask you, are you already making excuses, or will you be disciplined today?

👩🏽‍💻 What I worked on this week

Your girl is being given more responsibility at work🥳. I will be managing a much larger team with a new job title. I’m excited and scared at the same time; I’m scared of the work ahead (it’s plenty😭) and excited about the new experiences that await me.

I spent most of this week in meetings, planning and strategizing for Q1 and Q2. Also, let me throw this in here for my corporate folks. Hard work does not lead to promotions. Results do. If you want to get promoted at work, you need to have results. One thing I did last year was to have a document where I recorded the key milestones and successes I achieved at work. Some people have dubbed this document a “Praise File”. I had to use this praise file to support my claims at an appraisal with HR, and not just that, reflecting on the contents of the document made me realize that I did A LOT in 2022.

Why am I sharing this? Create your own praise file for your job. When you get positive feedback from your Manager, add it to that document. When you suggest a strategy that works well, make a note of it in your praise file. When you achieve some milestone or solve a challenge, or come up with a solution that helped the company, make a note of it. A praise file is not something you write into daily; it’s a progressive document that you fill in when the need arises. Trust me. It’s better to write these things than assume you would remember because you won’t. Open a praise file today.

💷 Money Corner

Why do you save money? I want you to think about it for a minute, a lot of people save money to spend it. To get good at saving, you have to move from the habit of saving to spend money to saving to make money. Money is like a plant. It needs to grow to stay alive. So, how can you grow your money?

• Establish a financial goal and write it down. How much do you want to save, spend and invest monthly?

• Pay off and avoid debt. I know some debts are good debts, but the outfit you got from ASOS, which you split into four instalment payments and barely wore, is NOT good debt.

• Earn more money: this could be via a pay increase at work, a new job or a side hustle.

• Look into investing: we are all building wealth this year. One thing that holds a lot of us back is fear, but knowledge dispels fear. You can first start learning about investing before you decide to start. You can follow me on Instagram, where I share more money tips

📹 New Youtube Video

Remember when I mentioned in this email that I’m thinking of reinventing myself? Well, I have fleshed out a plan on how I intend to achieve that. Tap the image below to watch the video

That would be all for today. Till the next email, you know how we do it here - drink lots of water and stay hydrated! 😁

XOXO - Chidera