Lynn Beattie, better known as MrsMummyPenny, spent 24 years in and out of debt before facing down £16,000 she’d hidden from almost everyone, then clearing it in two years while raising three boys alone. On this episode of the Money Gains Podcast she talks us through exactly how she did it, and why shame, not the number on the statement, is usually the biggest obstacle.
Lynn has been writing about money for 11 years and has become one of the UK’s most trusted personal finance voices, working with the BBC, the Financial Times and brands including PensionBee, Zopa Bank and Octopus Energy. But before any of that, she was an accountant with a corporate career, three young children, and a mortgage and childcare bill that between them swallowed almost everything she earned.
When she left her corporate job to build Mrs Mummy Penny full time, the business took time to find its feet. In that gap, debt crept in quietly, credit cards used to cover food shopping, a holiday she couldn’t really afford, and years of not adding it all up because she was too ashamed to look. This episode is her walking through what changed, and the exact steps she took to turn it around.
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Key takeaways
- Writing every debt down, who you owe, how much, and the interest rate, is the single most useful first step, because the number in your head is almost always scarier than the one on paper.
- Debt management works best from two directions at once: cut your costs and raise your income, then throw the widening gap at what you owe.
- Setbacks are normal. Lynn’s debt crept back up mid-journey after a family holiday, and that didn’t undo the progress she’d made.
- Shame keeps people quiet, and staying quiet is what lets debt grow. Talking to one non-judgemental person can be the turning point.
- Debt is rarely just a numbers problem. Emotional spending, mental health and money are tangled together, and dealing with one helps the others.
Timestamps
- [0:55] Introduction to Lynn Beattie
- [3:25] Leaving corporate life to build Mrs Mummy Penny
- [7:23] Buying food on a credit card
- [9:40] Reaching £16,000 in debt by 40
- [14:48] Facing the shame around debt
- [16:19] Writing every debt down on paper
- [22:03] Why Lynn skipped snowball and avalanche methods
- [24:19] Understanding emotional spending
- [36:37] Life after becoming debt-free
- [46:06] Coping mechanisms for anxious mornings
How the debt built up without her noticing
Lynn’s debt didn’t arrive as one bad decision. It built up over roughly two years while she got Mrs Mummy Penny off the ground as a single earner supporting three children. Household bills ran to around £3,000 a month once mortgage, childcare and council tax were added up, against income that was sometimes half that in the early days of the business.
As Lynn puts it: “three children, a mortgage of £1,000 a month, council tax, electricity, you know, add it up, add it up. £3,000 a month isn’t actually that much.” Mrs Mummy Penny turned over just £5,000 in its first year, with household income sometimes as low as £2,000 to £2,500 a month between her and her then-husband.
“I was literally buying food and putting it on a credit card at one point,” she says. Some of it was interest-bearing card debt, some was business debt, spread across four different pots she hadn’t looked at together. She didn’t tell anyone. “I buried my head in the sand, and I just let that debt build up and up and up.”
If your own spending has drifted without a clear picture of where it’s going, our guide on how to audit your spending is a good place to get the full picture before anything else.
The moment everything changed
The turning point came after a birthday trip to Las Vegas, when Lynn finally added everything up. “Oh my god, you’re in 16 grand’s worth of debt,” she remembers thinking. Her first move wasn’t a spreadsheet full of clever formulas, it was simply writing it all down: how much she owed, to whom, and at what interest rate.
The trip itself set the tone: a “stupid dollar day to Las Vegas” for her 40th, complete with a party that added roughly five grand to the total in a week. Looking back, Lynn traces some of the debt to years of small, repeated indulgences, admitting: “I’ve got 10 designer handbags upstairs, that’s 10 grand I spent on designer handbags, you know, through my 20s and my 30s.”
That plain list is what made the debt manageable, because a vague sense of dread became a fixed, specific target. If you want a structured way to work through what you owe and build a repayment plan from it, our full guide to getting out of debt covers the process in more depth.
Closing the gap between income and costs
Rather than follow a named method like snowball or avalanche, Lynn built her own approach: make the gap between what comes in and what goes out as large as possible, then put all of it towards the debt every month.
On the cost side, that meant a genuine spending diary rather than a guessed budget, cancelling unused direct debits, and switching to cheaper alternatives where she could. Our budgeting calculator is built for exactly this kind of exercise, giving you a realistic baseline rather than a wish list.
Getting specific mattered more than being strict. Lynn describes it as needing “to write it down for a few days, few weeks to actually know that you are spending £20 a week on coffee, £100 a week on Amazon purchases in the middle of the night,” so the budget reflects real habits rather than guesswork.
On the income side, even small amounts counted. “Even if it’s 20 quid, it’s making that gap as big as possible,” Lynn says. Once that gap covered minimum payments and more, the extra went straight onto the debt, tracked and celebrated month by month.
Lynn tracked the numbers publicly the whole way through, on Instagram and later in articles for the Financial Times, The Sun and iNews. It wasn’t for attention: “I massively went public because I wanted to help people. I just wanted to share my strategy and that it was working,” she says, and the visibility became part of what kept her accountable.
Setbacks are part of the process, not a failure of it
Lynn’s repayment wasn’t a straight line. After getting below £10,000, a family holiday pushed her back up. “It’s never a flat… it’s always a bumpy graph,” she says. What mattered was that the overall direction stayed downward, not that every month improved on the last.
The two years took a toll beyond the balance itself. “By the end of it, inevitably, I sacrificed my marriage, because he just wasn’t prepared to get on board with the financial stuff, and that’s the honesty of it,” Lynn says, a reminder that clearing debt alone rarely fixes everything else that debt has strained.
She’s also open about emotional spending continuing even now, admitting to an impulse purchase from Sweaty Betty the same week we recorded. Recognising the pattern, rather than pretending it doesn’t exist, is what stops it from spiralling. If unexpected costs keep knocking your progress off course, building a small buffer first can help. Our piece on how much should be in your emergency fund is worth reading alongside any debt repayment plan.
Why talking about it matters more than the number itself
Lynn credits two people with getting her moving: Sara Williams of Debt Camel, who warned her the debt would affect remortgaging, and financial journalist Faith Archer, who simply said she’d help once Lynn had a budget together. “That’s all you need. It’s just for somebody to say, I see you, I hear you, and I can help you.”
Sara’s warning was blunt: being self-employed with hidden debt would affect Lynn’s ability to remortgage. “Lynn, that’s gonna affect you when you remortgage,” she told her, though it still took Lynn six months to act on it, a gap she now recognises as the shame talking rather than the facts.
Not everyone is the right person to tell. Lynn is candid that this takes some thought: “talk to somebody who’s not gonna judge you,” rather than defaulting to whoever is closest, because the wrong reaction can undo the courage it took to speak up at all.
The conversation also touched on the mental health cost of hidden debt, and the toll it can take when people feel too ashamed to ask for support. If money worries are affecting how you’re coping day to day, speaking to someone, whether that’s a friend, a free debt charity, or a professional, is worth doing sooner rather than later.
If you’re not sure where your own finances currently stand, our take-home pay calculator or our short money personality quiz are both quick ways to get a clearer starting point.
This transcript is auto-generated and lightly edited for readability, it may contain errors.
[0:00] Sammie Ellard-King: My name is Sammie Ellard-King, and welcome to the Money Gains Podcast. We’re a show all about making, saving, and investing your money, interviewing the top minds in the industry to unpack their tips to success. Today, my guest is Lynn Beattie, also known as MrsMummyPenny. Now, she’s an absolute legend when it comes to personal finance, and her story is amazing too. We dive deep into the world of debt, we dive deep into the world of mindset around personal finance, and so much more. You’re gonna absolutely love this episode. But for now, let’s get started on the Money Gains Podcast.
[0:36] Sammie Ellard-King: The Money Gains Podcast, the financial guide, no way. Let’s make some break.
[0:55] Sammie Ellard-King: So, Lynn, welcome to the Money Gains Podcast. How are you? You well?
[0:59] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I’m good, thank you. Thanks for having me.
[1:02] Sammie Ellard-King: I am really excited. We met at the uh Juno event at the Houses of Parliament. Very swanky, wasn’t it?
[1:10] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): We did. So fancy. It was like one of the fanciest events I think I’ve been to this year.
[1:15] Sammie Ellard-King: I think it was topped up there for me. Weird thing was, was I was like there twice in two days. It was like the most surreal experience. It was like I’d never been invited in my life, and then in two days I was going to like the most prestigious building in the world, I would say, probably. It was quite a quite a strange thing.
[1:33] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): And it and it was beautiful, wasn’t it? It was such a sunny day. And it had been really bad weather for a really long time. We were all like, this is happening for a reason.
[1:43] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, it was such a lovely event, actually. And hearing uh Simran from Girls That Invest speak and a few of the other lovely ladies that that that were on stage as well. It was a really cool event, eye-opening as well for me. And uh, you know, we’ve put a lot of that into the content. But um, I’d love for the audience to hear a little bit about you and and what you’ve been doing today.
[2:06] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): So thank you for having me. I do appreciate it. Uh so I’m Lynn Beattie, uh, otherwise known as MrsMummyPenny, and um, yeah, I do pretty much the same job as you, Sammie, um, where we we talk about money in an easy to understand way. Um uh I’m I base myself on healthy wealth, body and mind, um, because I think there’s a really close link between mental health, physical health, and your financial um stability. Um, and I’ve been doing it for 11 years, so like a really, really long time. Um, I’m one of the originals. Uh, so I’ve seen a lot of evolution
[2:52] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): in the world of websites, social media, and it’s really interesting because you know, there’s cycles every 10 to 14 years. I can see stuff coming back now that I started doing 11 years ago. So I think that would be an interesting thing to explore in this conversation when we talk about, you know, like our businesses and how they run is you know what, I think websites are coming back again because I’m being asked to write blog posts again. It’s really interesting.
[3:22] Sammie Ellard-King: So, what got you into this?
[3:25] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah, so reverse back 11 years. Um, so I’ve got three children and three boys, and I’d just given birth to my third son. Um, I’m an accountant by trade, I’ve always had quite senior sort of corporate roles, um, EE, Tesco’s, HSBC. I’m very blue chip, very through and through blue chip. And um, I was working at EE and um like I had three kids under five, and um, I was the breadwinner, and I was feeling I was married at the time, um, I’m not anymore, and um, I was feeling a lot of the sort of financial pressures of the the life ladder and and you know the rat race. So we have
[4:10] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): we had a house in the southeast that had a huge mortgage, um, you know, childcare was costing another £1,200 a month. So I was basically paying two mortgages, a grand on the actual house, £1,200 for childcare. Um, I had to have a job that paid at least like 70, 80 grand a year, because my other half at the time um earned sort of a quarter of that, a third of that. So um, yeah, I you know, it was all on me. So um, so yeah, I was I was in this corporate career and I just got really disillusioned by it. Um, having having children changes everything, um, which we can talk about. And I got really upset about the
[4:55] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): fact that um I wasn’t seeing enough of my children. And I sat in a meeting with my female boss at EE. She she was um she was one of these women who likes to be a man and um no children, she had a horse. No offence to people that have horses, but quite often you see that. And um, she literally said to me, Lynn, you need to choose between your family and your career. So I was like, F you, I’m choosing my family. So I literally orchestrated redundancy and I got out of there with a lot of money. And that money was the money I needed to properly fund MrsMummyPenny, which had been like a side hustle. Um, so I had 40 grand, and there was not one part of me that thought
[5:41] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I’m gonna overpay the mortgage, thank goodness. Um, it all went into um basically paying the bills whilst I built MrsMummyPenny up to the place where it was earning money, and within 18 months to two years, it was. Although there was a period where I built up quite a chunk of debt within those first two years of running MrsMummyPenny properly.
[6:07] Sammie Ellard-King: Well, they say like that in a way, probably when you’re managing debt like that, is probably a in a way is kind of like you’re taking a bit of risk to actually get your business off the ground, I would imagine, because you’ve still got to supplement your life, and you’ve got young boys that you know have after school activities, they want to do stuff. They eat, boys eat a lot at that age. Eat a lot, yeah, they probably still do. So I’d imagine like you’ve yeah, I can imagine. I don’t really think they’re remembering what I was like at 16, absolutely eating everything inside, six packs of crisps and gone in two seconds. Um there so I imagine when you went through that period of debt, it was actually much more to kind of keep the life going while you built the business.
[6:53] Sammie Ellard-King: Is that right?
[6:54] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Exactly. You tot totally nailed it.
[6:57] Sammie Ellard-King: So um I think that’s quite wise in a lot of ways, like in all honesty, because you’re taking the risk to go and build the business, and that’s scary in itself. And like I took out debt to start Up The Gains because it needed a bit of cash injection, and you know, that I was totally accepting as that. So like I suppose I’m trying to say is like not all debt is bad debt, right?
[7:23] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah, that’s thank you for framing it like that. Because I have always felt quite a lot of shame around it. Um because I talk about my debt story all the time, but I’ve never talked about it in this way. So um I was literally buying food and putting it on a credit card at one point because um God, I’ll get emotional. Uh um we we couldn’t afford to live, and um the bills were like £3,000 a month, and and I’m sure people out there will be like, well, how can your bills be £3,000 a month? Well, three children, a mortgage of £1,000 a month, council tax, electricity, you know, add it up, add it up. £3,000 a month isn’t actually that much, but
[8:09] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): but like we were only bringing in um like £2,000, £2,500 between the two of us. Because, you know, the first year of MrsMummyPenny, I turned over £5,000. Um, so it was it was yeah, it was really, really hard. And I didn’t tell anybody, I was really ashamed about it, and I buried my head in the sand, and I just let that debt build up and up and up, and it was literally like I remember the thought process because I’d think about it bloody hundreds of times a day. You know, you get to a sort of eff it sort of point of view where you’re like, I really need that holiday, I don’t care. We are gonna spend okay, it wasn’t an extravagant holiday, but we are
[8:54] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): gonna spend three grand going to um centre parks in Paris for a week. But yet, and I actually did that on Good Morning Britain with Simon Calder. He, because I was it was MrsMummyPenny Days, he arranged that for us. I couldn’t afford that holiday. It put it put us three grand more into the red. So um, but but I suppose what I’ll say about it is I had nobody a reasoning with me trying to hold me back because my ex was like just spend the money, just spend the money, I don’t care. Um because I always went out and earned the money, so you know, I I I I’m a fixer, I I always managed to fix the financial situations.
[9:40] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): So um, yeah, God, that’s quite deep. So, so yeah, so I I basically figured out that I was 16 grand worth in debt um by the age of 40. And um turning 40 was the point where I was like, this can’t go on. Like, I can’t go on living in this materialistic world, caning loads of money on okay, holidays are different because you know, when you can afford it, holidays are a beautiful thing and they, you know, give you wonderful memories and experience, but I’m not spending a thousand pounds again on a handbag. Like I’ve got 10 designer handbags upstairs, that’s 10 grand I spent on designer handbags, you know, through my 20s and my 30s. So um, so yeah, so I took my I
[10:25] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I just had a sort of ext what’s that word? Existential moment. Yeah. I had an epiphany.
[10:33] Sammie Ellard-King: Epiphany, yeah.
[10:34] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah, yeah, yeah. I had an epiphany and I was like, I can’t be in debt anymore. And I literally went for it hell for leather, and I paid off 16,000 pounds by myself in two years, and I was documenting it online for newspapers, um, on Instagram, all the way through. I had a wonderful community supporting me, and that’s what made MrsMummyPenny famous was that process, and then so I paid it off in April of 2019. Two months later, I separated from my ex-husband.
[11:06] Sammie Ellard-King: Oh, when you hit zero. Congrats! Amazing. Like, hats off to you because there’s a lot of like I I’ve been through this myself, as you know, like you know, debt debt is mm-hmm. Often you just as it creeps up and creeps up and creeps up, you’re very aware of it, but you compartmentalize it. So you’re just like, oh, it’s there, but it’s not really an issue now because you know they’re not banging down my door and asking for the money, they’re just you know, and I I pay it, I pay a little bit off, do a little bit here and there, and then oh, something else happens, or I want to go and do something like a holiday, or you know, or your mate buys a new car, and you’re like, All right, well, you know, I’ve got one up you now, haven’t I? So then it’s like
[11:51] Sammie Ellard-King: and and you do that and you don’t even think about it, and then suddenly you get to this point where you’re like, I’m actually in bit of trouble, and yeah, I’ve not told anyone and I’ve not said anything about it to anybody. Everybody just thinks I’m doing all right at work and everything’s kind of rosy, and uh underneath it all, there’s this like nagging thing that’s just been kind of like gnawing away at you on the inside for a long, long time, and debt can do that, and then suddenly it’s very overpowering. And often in those situations, people can get ill, um, they can get mentally ill, exactly. Uh, they say 90% of stress-related illnesses are money related, and a large portion of those are
[12:36] Sammie Ellard-King: due to debt. I think it’s 60%. Um, yeah, so that just says a lot, right? And at that point, you have one or two choices. You either have uh, you know, pathway one, which is like continue down this route, and we’re just gonna like increase these levels of feelings until we do get ill, or two, we need to do something about it. So, how do we do something about it? What’s that that step that we can take to actually just kind of put ourselves into a different frame of mind around our debt?
[13:11] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Um, that was really well explained because the mental health impacts of being in problem debt are huge. And I think the other thing we have to acknowledge is um suicides. Uh, sorry if that’s triggering, but there are a lot of suicides that are related to debt, however, where you get there. Well, it’s a whole particularly for men.
[13:36] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah. Sorry? It’s a hole. It’s a hole, and you’re ashamed and you’re sad about it, and those feelings can culminate in in in you know, suicidal thoughts in a lot of ways, because it’s can be an easier way out, but it’s you know, obviously it’s not at the end of the day.
[13:52] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I’ve got I’ve got um I’ve got a couple of friends who I grew up with in Cornwall who uh killed themselves um the last few years, and yeah, it’s all because of money and relationships breaking down because and and this is the thing, like because it it it can be a yeah, it just rolls and rolls. You’re like, oh my gosh, I’m in I’m in 20 grand’s worth of debt um now, but my family’s got your other half going to you, like, hey, you know, can we go on holiday?
[14:20] Sammie Ellard-King: And you’re like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[14:22] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, yeah, no problem.
[14:23] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, yeah.
[14:24] Sammie Ellard-King: You’re not telling anyone about it, or vice versa, you know. Yeah, uh, you’ve waxed a 10 grand on an Amex credit card and you spent it all on ASOS, and you don’t want to tell your other half. And you know, those conversations are really difficult. And if you’re not communicating as a couple or even as a family, that like it can’t be that that weight is huge, right? So what do we do? What do we do when we’re doing that? And the person that’s listening to this is thinking, fuck, that’s me.
[14:48] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah, yeah, yeah. And and yeah, there’ll be lots of people thinking that. Um, so the very first thing to do is to face your demons and to take your head out of the sand. And you know, I’ll just say things as they are, because I lived in Cloud Cuckoo Land for 20 years, you know, jumping from debt to debt. I I was in debt from 18 until 42. So um I had a couple of people, wise people, who just sort of fed a few bits of information into me, which sort of planted the seed. Um, one of which is um Sara Williams of Debt Camel, um, who I’ve known for many, many years. Yeah, she’s amazing. Like I put out podcast um this week with her, and she is one of the most wisest
[15:34] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): people I know, particularly when it comes to debt. And um, she’s my go-to person when I’ve got something I don’t know about. And um, she planted the seed that she just said to I was in 10 grand’s worth of debt at the time, and I told her, she’s like, Lynn, that’s gonna affect you when you remortgage. And I was like, What? No, it’s not. She’s like, Yes, it is, Lynn, because you’re now self-employed, and it still took me six months to actually deal with it because you, as you say, your head goes back in the sand. So um, yeah, thank you. I mean, I’ve thanked her many times for those words. So, yeah, so turned, I turned 40, went on a stupid dollar day to Las Vegas, had a massive party, you know, came like I don’t know, five grand or something in a week, and um
[16:19] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): got back from Las Vegas. In fact, it it actually in Las Vegas was when I got the light bulb moment of add all that up when you get home. So I did the day I got home, and then I was like, oh my god, you’re in 16 grand earth of debt, and some of it was on interest paying cards, some of it was business debt, some of it was a mess. It was four different pots of debt. So um the the very first thing I did was write it all down on a bit of paper, and I think that’s really key to do that is how much you owe to who, what’s the interest rate, um, you know, get all the facts down on a bit of paper and add it up, and then it’s like, oh my god, you’re in 16 grand worth of debt.
[17:05] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I immediately um spoke to my friend called Faith Archer, who is um financial journalist, and uh she runs much more with less, and she’s faith by name, faith by nature. Like she is such a wonderful person, and and just the point I want to get across is when you need to talk to somebody, you talk to somebody who’s not gonna judge you, who’s gonna help you, and just somebody you can talk through. So I I spoke to Faith, and I was like, right, okay, I’m facing up to it. This is how much I’ve got, I’m gonna do a spreadsheet, I’m gonna do a budget. And she’s like, Brilliant, Lynn. Send me the spreadsheet when you’ve done it, and I will help you.
[17:50] Sammie Ellard-King: Love it.
[17:51] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): And that’s all you need. It’s just for somebody to say, like, I see you, I hear you, and I can help you.
[17:58] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, yeah, it’s all good. Like, I’m here for you. It’s lovely, isn’t it?
[18:04] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah, like those both of those women are just like they’re absolute oracles to me. Um, wonderful friends.
[18:14] Sammie Ellard-King: They actually just probably go, oh yeah, cool, you know, like it’s not like it’s uh I suppose the thing is with debt, is that everyone’s like no debt? Like, but actually, everybody’s got a little bit somewhere here or there, so like they’re not gonna judge you, they’re actually just gonna go, oh cool, like is there any way that I can help you move this forward, right?
[19:23] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah, absolutely no judgment at all, and so that’s why it’s really careful who you choose because we we all we maybe that’s a tough question. No, I was gonna say choose the right person to talk to, and then I was just gonna say we’ve all got friends who are judgmental, and then I just momentarily went through my close friends, and I’m like, Yeah, I do have some judgmental friends, and I would never have spoken to them about it. So then I’m like, this thought goes through my head. I’m like, why am I friends with judgmental people? But anyway, that’s just a whole nother thing. So yeah, talk to somebody who’s not gonna judge you, and um it’s just yeah, uh and and and maybe it’s your partner, but it’s
[20:09] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): really tough talking to your partner when you’ve been, in effect lying to them because um you’ve got a load of debt that they don’t know about, uh, or you’ve been spending and spending and they don’t know about it.
[20:26] Sammie Ellard-King: It’s really tough to talk to your partner. Like I um struggle with that. I struggled with that. I had a friend, and a friend really stepped in and just kind of gave me the like he actually didn’t say, I’m gonna help you, he sent me a few books, and that was what got me started. And that was the beginning of all of this, was like my because I didn’t know about how to manage money or even what money really existed. I just saw it as a like a the more money I have, the more I can party and the more clothes I can.
[20:59] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): More I can spend, yeah, more holidays I can go on, the more bags I can buy. Yeah, yeah.
[21:03] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, uh, and you know, that’s really how I saw it. I didn’t see it as like a tool of growth, and uh um obviously came to to realise that. But I needed those books to kind of give me the the start, and I he did it in a in a in that kind of way, and we started talking when we met up, we started talking about money openly and having like conversations like that, which was really helped because it was just had nobody else to talk to about investing or like how to save for this or like what I’m gonna need when I do a house mortgage and things like that. Like, I just didn’t have any mates I could chat to like that. Um, I’ve come to find that it’s very different, and now we’re uh a group of friends are actually quite open about money together, which is quite nice. Um, yeah, obviously, I do what I do, so it does help, but um yeah,
[21:48] Sammie Ellard-King: I think uh you know the acceptance piece is massive. Um then you’ve mentioned the spreadsheets and putting it all together. Did you follow any of the kind of like snowball or avalanche techniques that are sometimes banded around?
[22:03] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I made up my own methods because I’m a revolutionary person. So and and and the thing is, is because you know what what we do for our jobs, I was I was just thinking to myself, well, I can turn this into content. This is genuine, authentic, living and breathing content. So I can therefore create some strategies and some theories that uh Lynn, Mrs. Mommy Penny invented. Um, and I I try not to read um too much sort of financial literature because I find that it influences what I say and what I do. Like I do, I um Um, I record a lot of podcasts with people and I talk to a lot of people like you,
[22:48] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): and I have a lot of you know great friends in our world, but I don’t read books because I find books really influence me. So, you know, like snowball, snowflake, whatever they’re called, um uh avalanche methods. Yeah, I I don’t necessarily believe it. So my strategy was um basically to make the gap between my income and my costs as big as possible. So you you have to hit it from two sides. You have to reduce your cost base to as low as possible, and you have to increase your income to as high as possible. And um, I mean, we we all we all know, I won’t, I won’t say that, but with the with the cost reducing methods, you know, you’re going, you’re writing a spending diary, you’re
[23:33] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): creating a realistic budget based on real life, which is very, very important. You can’t just make up a random budget on a spreadsheet from nowhere. You need to, you know, write it down for a few days, few weeks to actually know that you are spending £20 a week on coffee, um, £100 a week on Amazon purchases in the middle of the night because you’re so fucking stressed that you need that hit of dopamine. Um, and explore the emotions around your purchases as well because I’m an emotional spender and I still do it now. I I’ve done it this week. I’ve had a really emotional week. I’ve bought myself something from Sweaty Betty. I justify it because I’m like, it’s in the sale, it was half price, but
[24:19] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): it doesn’t matter. I still spent 80 quid at Sweaty Betty on two swimming costumes. Do I need them? I needed one. Do I need two? No. Anyway, I’ve kept two. I’ve spent eight quid, so be it. So um, yeah, really understand why you spend what you spend, create a realistic budget, get your cost base down, cancel all the direct debits you don’t need, get the best deal on everything, switch from Tesco’s to Aldi, you know, do all those kind of things. Um, and then think, right, what can I do to increase my income? And even if it’s like 100 quid, 200 quid a month, it doesn’t matter. Even if it’s 20 quid, it’s it’s making that gap as big as possible. And then when that gap is, let’s say it’s
[25:04] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): you’ve suddenly now got a 200 pound a month gap. Well, you can afford the minimum payments on your cards, maybe get your gap to 300, you can afford the minimum payments plus a little bit more, and you literally throw as much as you possibly can into that debt every single month, and you celebrate that every month via an anonymous account on Instagram, whatever way you do it. Um, I mean, I I did it in public, so and and I ended up, you know, writing articles for the Financial Times, for The Sun, for iNews about my journey. Um, so I massively went public because I wanted to help people. I just wanted to share my strategy and that it was working.
[25:47] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah.
[25:47] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Um, but also I wrote a really interesting article halfway through where um I’d paid off 10 grand of the 16. It’s really monumental when you get below 10
[27:06] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): grand, but then it I hit the summer holidays, and my kids were like, We really want to go on holiday, or my ex-husband was like, We have to take the kids on holiday. So I I paid for a holiday and that put me back up to 10 grand in debt again. So it’s never a it’s never a flat. Yes, it’s always you know a bumpy graph, and it’s just it’s just realising that it can be done. It’s it was really, really hard. I had to sacrifice a lot in those two years, and you know what? By the end of it, inevitably, I sacrificed my marriage because um he just wasn’t prepared to get on board with the financial stuff, and that’s the honesty of it.
[27:52] Sammie Ellard-King: Uh what I love about what you said there was that life just fucking happens to us, man. Like I just have to say that to people because there’s like they probably look at us and our accounts and the way that we talk about things, or like a lot of accounts out there, and you think, oh, you know, like everything’s rosy is all moving up in the same way.
[28:13] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Oh yeah, perfect life, perfect life.
[28:15] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, it it it just uh listen to be frank, guys. Like it just doesn’t exist even for like the best people out there, the best in like who are managing their money down to an absolute T. They might walk around the corner and someone drives into their car and they have a financial, you know, problem. It’s how you let those financial problems, when they happen, do they do they mount up more than you solving them? And that’s the battle you’re trying to win. So if you are making two steps forward and one step back rather than two back and one forward, you are winning the fight, and that is all that needs to be said because yes, there is gonna be an opportunity for you to go and do something, and that might mean on your debt journey that you’re putting yourself back by a grand here and there, and it was
[29:00] Sammie Ellard-King: the best opportunity. You built so many memories, but you know when you get back from the holiday, you’re not gonna take out another five grand credit card and start waxing on new cart clothes and bags, or trainers, or whatever them. My my vice was trainers and coats. Like I’m that was me. Uh I had a sick selection of trainers and coaches, but you know, I was broke. I looked looked rich, but I was broke. Wow. I loved, I loved, I love trainers. Um, and so it’s just one of those things. So I knew that. So eventually I started moving into the mantra of like, okay, now we’re moving forwards. Yes, occasionally I’d have a little slip here and there, uh, but I was beating it by also the thing you said, uh increasing your income.
[29:45] Sammie Ellard-King: That can come in two different places. It can come from your main job by saying to your boss often, like, hey, by the way, as a this is a great strategy, by the way. Because uh I did this. I said, I’m actually deep in debt and I’m really trying to earn some extra money at the moment. What’s some ways that I can do this?
[30:00] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): And so such a good idea.
[30:03] Sammie Ellard-King: They they were like, Oh, yeah, no problem. What about if you hit this target, we’ll give you an extra five grand in bonus? And I was like, right, let’s fucking go. And so uh, and I did, and I hit it. Um, and I got the well, it was uh it worked out about three and a half grand when they paid it to me off to tax and all of that. But um it’s three and a half grand of a 24 grand debt, that’s quite a significant chunk. And uh yes, I didn’t pay it all, I didn’t pay all of it towards my debt because I’d worked quite hard for it, and I feel like it’s important as well to kind of reward yourself along the way as well. Yeah, you have life to live, so factor that into your budget when you do it. Um, yeah, but yeah, like uh the increasing income thing, that’s a really good thing, but also side hustle, so you can literally go and start an online fucking survey site in two minutes from now and be earning
[30:48] Sammie Ellard-King: money to start.
[30:50] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Not much though.
[30:51] Sammie Ellard-King: No, not much, but you’re sitting watching Netflix, man. Have a laptop open, do some multiple transitions, you know, like it’s uh uh what I’m trying to say is like put your time to work. Like if you’re sitting in your ass for three hours a day, if you’re looking at your phone and you’re on Instagram three hours a day, put an hour of that time into doing something to get yourself out of debt.
[31:12] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah, yeah. So I like right, this is this is off on a tangent, but um so I um I’ve got seasonal affective disorder and I really struggle with um well I struggle with October, which is when the clocks change, basically.
[31:31] Sammie Ellard-King: Really?
[31:31] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Um I’m I’m a I’m a I’m a cyclical person with with the clocks, and um it it really hits me hard in like October, November, December. And um, I was really struggling last year, and what I find in those quite dark, depressive times is I become addicted to really unhealthy things, like um this is really embarrassing. I’ve never told anyone it.
[31:58] Sammie Ellard-King: You’ve gone there now, you’re gonna have to throw the bridge.
[32:01] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I know, I have to say it. So I got addicted to this um game app called Matchington Mansion.
[32:07] Sammie Ellard-King: Okay, yeah, yeah.
[32:09] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): And I was spending money on it to get more lives. Okay, because I needed to sit there. And when I look at my app usage, I was literally sitting on it for like three hours a day, and it was costing me money because I was having to buy coins. And this is just this is just like this is really awful. Um, and I I ignored it to the point where I published spending diaries sometimes, and I was just leaving out that information because I was so embarrassed, I was so full of shame about it. Um, and it was all because of this seasonal affective disorder, which I managed to get on top of because we um I went home for Christmas, which was the first sort of step towards um beating it, was just being by the sea
[32:54] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): um and being with my family, um, like as in my kids, but also like my sister and my niece and my nephew and my brother, you know, I’ve got a very small family, that’s literally it. Um, and um then from the first of January onwards, I decided I was going to do 15,000 steps a day. And um, so number one, that got me away from that bloody app that was costing me loads of money. I could enrich my life listening to podcasts like this beautiful podcast. Um, I could listen to audiobooks, I could experience nature and do 15,000 steps a day, and I’ve not missed a day this year.
[33:32] Sammie Ellard-King: Congrats. You identified the problem, right?
[33:36] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah.
[33:37] Sammie Ellard-King: And then you did something like that.
[33:39] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): It went on for a while, though.
[33:41] Sammie Ellard-King: But you you seem to have a history of this, Lynn. Like you’ve identified the problem, and then you did something about it. Like so, again, you’re like, this happens, right? Like, I got addicted to Clash of Clans when it came out. Standard, right? Clash of Clans. It’s so good. We spent about 300 quid on that. Yeah, just buying more likes, like, and buying more lights, like, or buying things on the city builders so it moved faster by a day and stuff like that. Like, I’ve done it, everyone’s done it. But the um, but you identify the problem and you go, right, okay, I need to do something about this, it’s now a problem, and now we’re gonna move forward. It’s exactly the same thing with debt, it’s exactly the same thing with uh you’re saving for a house, but you keep dipping into your savings. That’s a problem. How
[34:26] Sammie Ellard-King: are you gonna identify that problem and what are you going to do about it? And that is the journey that you need to take with all aspects of your financial life. And if you can identify the problem and do something about it and stick to it, have it take three months to form. So if you can do it for 90 days or three pay cycles, you’re away. It’s quite hard to go backwards from that point.
[34:50] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah. Three months is a bloody long time to stick to something.
[34:55] Sammie Ellard-King: It feels like it, yeah.
[34:56] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): You’re telling but and and it’s not just money, is it? It’s um it’s healthy body um habits, it’s healthy eating habits, it’s um uh journaling every day. It’s all of these kind of really healthy coping mechanisms which sort of reverse the effect of the emotional spending, the emotional spending. Yeah.
[35:21] Sammie Ellard-King: You’ve got to be ready. Like you were ready. Like you’d probably been telling yourself off in November, carried on doing it into November and December, and then went, I am not doing. And you needed a reset and a moment which went, now I’m putting my flag in the ground, and New Year’s is a great way of doing that because everybody goes, Right, I’m gonna stop eating chocolate, or whatever that happens. But it interesting, only 11% of people are still doing their New Year’s resolution by January 30th. 11.
[35:49] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): No way! Yeah, oh, I’m gonna remember that stat. That’s good.
[35:53] Sammie Ellard-King: So you beat that, so you’re in the top 10% of the country. So, like that, if you can get through that, that’s the way I remind myself, that’s a reward to yourself, right? There, if you can get yourself into the top 10% of the country, like it for New Year’s resolution, brilliant, you’ve done a pretty good job there. But if you can stick with it till March, you are generally setting yourself up for long-term impacts on your life. So I think that’s really, really powerful. So I want to talk a little bit about like the journey from here from now for you. Like, you hit that net zero, you created your business, you run a business. Like, how how’s like how does how do you manage your life like financially now with running a business and and you know as a as a single parent household with with three kids?
[36:37] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah, oh I’ve just got the best job in the world. I absolutely love it. And um, like I I make decent money, okay, because I you know I’m a I’m a financial journalist. That’s how a personal finance expert, that’s how I describe myself. But I don’t make my money from newspaper articles and TV appearances. Believe me, the BBC does not pay you very much money, but I love working for the BBC because it gives you um authority, and you know, I’m I’m one of the BBC’s personal finance experts. So then the corporate stuff comes to you because I am literally the best, you know, in my bracket. Um I’m
[37:23] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I’m the best single mum talking about money in her 40s. And when a brand wants a mum who, you know, has been through this financial journey and and is respected and authoritative, I’m the only person they can employ. So um, and that’s not being cocky, that’s just I’ve I’ve purposely got myself into the situation of being the go-to person, and therefore I do do like corporate work with very specifically chosen brands, um, and I’ve got really long-term relationships with them. So PensionBee, um, Zopa Bank, Octopus Energy, Um, American Express. These are companies who I’ve um really carefully
[38:08] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): chosen because their ethics and their principles, you know, are very similar to mine. Um, I only work with companies who look after their staff and look after their customers. Um, I know the boards of all of the companies I work with, um, and um am really good friends with the CEOs and all that kind of stuff. And um, yeah, they we all have the same ethics and ethos. So, what goes with that is that I get paid a really good daily rate from them, but you know, it’s it works beautifully for both sides because they’ve got me being an ambassador for their brand, and likewise I get to say, you know, I work with these incredible brands. So I
[38:53] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): sort of operate on a Robin Hood model, is how I like to describe it. So yeah, I um I yeah, make a really good amount of money from the corporates, but then I do loads of amazing work with charities like uh grief encounter, because so my parents died with an I we’ve talked about before, but my parents died when I was a teenager, and there was no therapy or counselling available for me in the 1990s, and I’m only fixing things now in my 40s from all that trauma I went through as a child. So grief encounter who actually look after children who are bereaved, like it’s to charity so close to my heart. Um, Christians Against Poverty, I work really closely
[39:38] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): with um, you know, all kinds of sort of poverty-based um charities and projects. Um not loads. I think you just need to work with the ones that actually mean a lot to you. But um, and and then obviously, like like you do, Sammie, I I give away helpful content that’s gonna inspire people to actually make a difference to their lives.
[40:00] Sammie Ellard-King: So you’re you are you’re robbing from the banks to give back to the poor.
[40:06] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Literally, literally, because the banks pay the most money. Oh, yeah. I used to work for one, like, oh my gosh.
[40:16] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, well, they’ve got the money, haven’t they? Let’s be honest. Um yeah. So you’re so how does that impact your let’s say I I suppose what I’m trying to get at is that where you where you are today versus where you were. All right, yeah. How’s that how are you feeling now versus where you were before? You see what I mean?
[40:36] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Oh my gosh, right. So I was trapped. I was trapped like a bird in a cage, and every day I died a little bit more inside. And um I’m very like in touch with my I’m very self-aware. I’m a I’m an empathic person. Um, and it it took me a lot of years to get comfortable with that because it’s it’s you know, it’s it’s quite scary when a lot of people open up to you and tell you their life stories and you know, tell you how much they earn and that they’re in lows of debt. So so that thought sat with me for a few years, and I was like, I need to do something with this. Like people are telling me their stories, so I I have some kind of um wisdom
[41:21] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): to share, or and and that all comes from my parents’ dying when I was a teenager, right? They that was all passed down to me, and then eventually you come into your power. Um, so yeah, I I am I’m not I’m not a hundred percent happy now because there’s always things going on in my life which are shaky, and and you know, that’s just the yin and yang of life. But I like to say that um at the moment um my family are happy. Um, I’ve got amazing friends, I’ve got a great work-life balance, I love myself, which I’ve done a lot of work on. Um, my health is quite shaky because I’m going through perimenopause, but I’m managing it the best I can, and
[42:06] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I’m seeing really good results from you know, fitness and muscle, fat percent, muscle and fat percentage, all that kind of stuff. Um I’m I’m really quite in touch with my sort of spiritual side. I do a lot of yoga, um, I’ve got a lot of friends in that world. I surround myself with the right people. I I I’ve cut quite a lot of toxic people out of my life. Um, so I’m in a really good place, and and then financially, like, I mean, I’m probably gonna go mortgage free nick this year, next year. Like, how have I got to this position where
[42:51] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): suddenly I’ve got the the opportunity to become mortgage free at the age of 47? I’m like, how’s that possible? Because I’ve taken all these steps and worked really fucking hard. But but fundamentally, you know, I’m a mum and I look after myself first and foremost. That means I can then look after my children. Always look after yourself first.
[43:19] Sammie Ellard-King: Just want to say to you here and now, live on this podcast, like you are an inspiration, honestly. Like just to go through all of the things you have throughout your life, all of the little steps and things that you’ve done to challenge yourself and still be here, like cracking on with a big fat smile. Like, honestly, like hats off to you, mate. Because it’s just it is one of them things that uh you know, I think a lot of people will take a lot of kind of they’ll be at different points of you along this journey. Things have happened to them, or debts happened to them, or they’re feeling stuck in a job, and they or their boss is an arsehole and they don’t know what to do, and they’ve got a bit of consumer debt, and like they haven’t told anyone. And I I just feel like there’s so much of this nation,
[44:04] Sammie Ellard-King: and so I just think I wanted to ask you that question just so they could see that there is a light at the end of the tunnel as well, because always it it always it takes a long time to get to where you’ve got to, but you’ve got there, and then yeah, and uh even now, as you said, like you know, there’s still bumps happening left, right, and centre, but you’re just batting them rather than letting them kind of overwhelm you.
[44:33] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): And and like I’ve got this amazing tool chest of of really simple coping mechanisms. So um let’s say um, let’s say you wake up feeling really anxious, okay? So this is something that I struggle with. Um recently I’ve been struggling with anxiety because of perimenopause, right? So my hormones are all over the place. So I’m going through a process of regulating my hormones. I’m nearly there, I’m really nearly there. So yeah, if I wake up feeling anxious, the first thing I do is I tidy the kitchen and I wash all the dishes. And I actually wash the dishes old school because it’s quite a mindful act washing the dishes.
[45:12] Sammie Ellard-King: We’ve got a dishwasher, we don’t use it. Uh I’m the same. Yeah.
[45:16] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): So my my dishwasher broke and I’m not fixing it. Like, I don’t need it.
[45:20] Sammie Ellard-King: Smart.
[45:21] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Um, yeah. And and then I’ll like sit on my computer and I’ll maybe faff around a little bit on social media. Um, and then like the kids will wake up and they’ll go off to school or whatever they’re doing. Uh, because my kids are 16, 14, and 11. Um, so one’s on a three month GCSE break at the moment. Nice for him. Um, and then um I’ll I’ll go out for a walk. Like, I’ll get out into nature because the feelings of anxiety, like I need to go to the woods. I need to be near trees. I need to be with birds and squirrels and the kites flying around. And that totally grounds me. And then I’m not anxious anymore. Um, so
[46:06] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): it’s it’s yeah, having that talk here of, and there can be all kinds of things, you know. Maybe it’s leaving a voice note for a friend, maybe it’s journaling. Um, but all of this stuff is free. You don’t, you don’t, I mean, I am in therapy, okay, like, and I’m very privileged to be able to afford that. I totally accept that, but also I want to relieve the NHS waiting list by paying for it myself because I want somebody else to have that place that I need. Um, so I pay for therapy once a month, and that is an absolute lifesaver. Um, I’ve always been I’ve been in therapy since I was 20. Um and I I wouldn’t be here without it.
[46:48] Sammie Ellard-King: It’s gym for your mind. Sorry? Gym for your mind.
[46:54] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Vim for your mind.
[46:55] Sammie Ellard-King: Gym. Working out Jim. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s the way I see it.
[47:00] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah.
[47:01] Sammie Ellard-King: And as a founder and an entrepreneur, I feel like it’s absolutely essential. So, like it really is. I do do the same. And uh it’s just having someone not judging your situation, being able to you being able to talk about everything, you know, like my my family are all absolutely nuts, and we have such an odd relationship. Everyone thinks it’s when I explain it to them, they’re like, it’s like a sub fucking sitcom. I’m like, Yeah, I know. So like that should be a TV show. I’m like, I know, it’s odd, you know, it’s very weird the way it’s all set up, and uh kids over here and there and everywhere, but like that. So you I need to go and talk about that to someone because like it’s not yeah normal. So,
[47:46] Sammie Ellard-King: like, and it has it has effects on me and my relationships and my business and the way that I do things, so like I need to go and talk to someone about that, and then that makes me better as a person. I show up better for my partner, I show up better in my business, and so I am a massive proponent uh of introducing some form of therapy and gentlemen out there listening to this. I know we’ve got a lot of guy listeners. Yeah, put your put your fucking guard down, take your armour off, and go and have a chat to someone because you know honestly it’ll be the best thing you ever do. And like that’s coming from a bloke who’s done it, and I absolutely hated it every minute of going to that first session. I remember going and thinking, like, who am I? I’m a weak man, like I’m doing this, and like I got there.
[48:29] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): No, you’re a strong man doing it.
[48:31] Sammie Ellard-King: You’re a strong man, yeah, but you do feel like that, right? Like as a bloke, you don’t want to, you know, it’s the whole thing about you know, mate as male, as males, you don’t necessarily want, or you’re not supposed to, or you’ll have that kind of ingrained in society, like men stiff up a lip kind of thing, crack on. Um, and like the day we don’t. And so it’s very important, I feel like, to go and speak to someone about your your way that if especially if you’re struggling, especially if you have debt, having that person there that you can have a chat to is really, really helpful. There are some fantastic free charities out there that help you do that. That’s the NHS you can lean on, or if you can afford it, get yourself into an appointment. 110%, male or female listening to this is massively important. Um, but yeah, it’s working out for your mind, but also exercise
[49:17] Sammie Ellard-King: is also hugely important. If you’re not looking after your body and your mind, it will impact you financially 110%. There’s no ways about it. I’m the fittest I’ve ever been right now in um probably 15 years, 15, 20 years. That’s it. But the moment I started working out properly in December, um, in that time frame, my business has gone up tenfold, like legit.
[49:43] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): So it all it all happens at the same time, but and it it’s literally it’s my it’s the healthy wealth body and mind. If you could nail all three of those things, you are fucking sorted.
[49:56] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, exactly. And it does, it all stems into each other. I have more energy now, I like I make smarter decisions, uh, I um feel better, I sleep better, uh more money, and um I’m actually just and I I look and I look better and I’m gonna live longer and like do you know what I mean? So it’s all together, and so when you do it all like that, and that’s why I think it’s very important to say that therapy is a part of that because your mind is a massive part of that, and however you do your therapy, whether that’s meditation at home, yoga, all of these aspects of it, they are forms of therapy. Walk taking a walk is a form of therapy. Um, yeah, you know, I little tip leave your headphones at home, just go and
[50:42] Sammie Ellard-King: walk and clear your mind because we again consuming, consuming, consuming, consuming all the time, we always feel like we need to be. Um, that’s something I’ve started doing recently, and that’s been really, really lovely. But you know, I come up with such great ideas on those walks.
[50:56] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): It’s um so I love um, I don’t do this enough. Going out for a run with no music, no earphones, yeah, no watch, just nothing. Just run.
[51:10] Sammie Ellard-King: So good, as well.
[51:11] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): It is crazy. It’s so good. I love it.
[51:15] Sammie Ellard-King: Mine just come back. So I just I’m like, right, now I need to go and do this, this, this, this, and this. I always know it as soon as I walk through the door, rather than like sit down, what I’m gonna do. Let me open social media. Ten minutes go by, suddenly I’m doing this, suddenly I’m doing that. Oh, what was I supposed to do again? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, I’m gonna do that. And then I’m off to make a cup of tea. And do you know what I mean? And then suddenly that fucking hell, it’s two o’clock. Like, what have I done?
[51:36] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Do you um class your question? Are you have you got like a ADHD brain, or do you have like those kind of traits?
[51:44] Sammie Ellard-King: I don’t know. I have always thought I did, but then when I looked at the list of traits, I don’t necessarily have a lot of them, but I I have very bad attention spans, so I have to um get myself into sort of mind frames, and I know I work at different so I sometimes my brain switches on, and sometimes it’s at 7am, and sometimes it’s at 4 p.m. and sometimes it’s at 11 o’clock. Oh, really? And I just have to let myself now I used to force myself through it, and that would just mean that I wasn’t actually very unhappy or churning out very good work. Whereas now I’m very much just listen to the way I feel. That’s interesting. I know today that I’m on it, and so I can once we come
[52:29] Sammie Ellard-King: off this, I know I’m just gonna pile into a load of deep work because I’m ready to do it. But yeah, like, for example, the other day I said, I’m gonna do uh, you know, I’m gonna shoot loads of videos today, and I just wasn’t up for it and on it. And I set all the lights up, I did everything. And they’ll be rubbish videos, and I just sat there and then halfway through, I just went, No, fuck this, I’m not doing this. And I went and did something else. In fact, I think I went and watched the football. I just went and just like, no, I’m just not even gonna do it. I’m gonna put the game on and I’m just gonna switch off. And then suddenly, four hours later, I was like, boom, ready. And then I went back up and did it, and I’ve nailed it. So, like knowing that about yourself, like you’re not always gonna be on, and that’s like totally fine, and that’s something that I’ve come to learn in through through also through exercise,
[53:14] Sammie Ellard-King: through therapy, and just understanding myself a little bit more and just being a little bit more emotionally aware um of who I am, and that’s that’s something I would say take away that for everybody. Like, don’t put yourself under pressure because you know, you everyone can feel like you you need to turn up and you need to be your best from nine till five, and then you need to be your best for your kids from five to eight. Like, it doesn’t fucking happen, man. So um you know, you’re gonna have good days and bad days, and just try and decision stack more good decisions over bad, and you will find that over time your trajectory goes one way, yeah.
[53:50] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Can can can I just also point out you’re you’re are you 35?
[53:54] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, nearly next two months.
[53:57] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): So you’re 34. Um, so you have to appreciate to have got to this point to have this awareness about you know holistically your life, um, and to have got to where you’ve got to with your business because I know that you’re absolutely killing it with your business by your age is incredible.
[54:21] Sammie Ellard-King: Thank you.
[54:22] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): And as a guy as well, because of all the things you’ve referred to with men and the expectations of men and the unrealistic expectations of men.
[54:35] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, I have a um uh hats off to my partner. You know, she opened my eyes to a lot of these things, and uh you know, she’s been she’s had she’s had her own struggles throughout her life, and I’ve seen the impact that therapy had on her, and I think like where she was seeing some of these behaviours creep into my life, for example, and she was like, You just need to go and speak to someone, and I no, no, no, no, whatever, whatever, whatever, whatever. And eventually I did, and then so it does have a massive, massive impact. So I will um you know, absolute hats off to her. She’s a she’s a strong, powerful woman, and it’s had a massive impact for me. So I feel like it’s yeah, yeah, I would definitely say that. You’re a power couple, yeah. Hopefully, yeah. We did have a big party this morning, we’re not talking now, so there
[55:20] Sammie Ellard-King: we go.
[55:22] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Yeah, but and then that just brings it back down, doesn’t it?
[55:25] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
[55:27] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Whatever. Like you’re not you’re never gonna be, you’re never gonna have all your ten, I call them temples. You’re never gonna have all your temples solid and aligned. Because that’s not how life works. Life is light and dark, yin and yarn, yin and yang, male and female, summer and winter, isn’t it? So you can have a bit both.
[55:47] Sammie Ellard-King: Yeah, actually, occasional little fight is probably healthy, I always think so. It is, it is well, I’ve absolutely loved this. It’s been like an epic episode. Uh, I’ve so loved it. Loved it. Um, thank you. Thank you very much for coming on. Where where can people find you?
[56:06] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): Uh so I tend to hang out mostly on Instagram. Um, I’m MrsMummyPenny UK, but I have everything. So if you ever Google me, there’ll be about a thousand things that come up. But I’ve written some really good articles for like the Financial Times, and I had a column with the mirror in 2022, and some of that cost of living content, it is incredible, like really, really, really good. So, um, yeah, just Google me.
[56:34] Sammie Ellard-King: Wicked. Well, um, we 110% were taking this podcast live as well in a few months’ time. Um, why I keep saying it’s gonna be in in August. We still need to get our shit and gear to actually make that happen.
[56:48] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): But uh everyone’s on holiday in August. Do it in September.
[56:52] Sammie Ellard-King: I know. I’m I I am thinking that just to push it back a bit, but I’d love to get you on for that because um I feel like there’s a lot more than I’ve got to do.
[56:58] Lynn Beattie (MrsMummyPenny): I’d love to. We can talk about so much. That was really great. Thanks so much for having me on. I really appreciate it.
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