ASHISH NATHU
November 4, 2021
11:53 am
On this episode of The Rich Equation Podcast, Ashish is joined by Kara Ayala. Kara is one of Ashish’s mentors and they provide a truly inspirational episode as they discuss everything from how women need to be running businesses completely differently to men and learning to create your own personal and professional boundaries to the value money holds and what richness truly means. Don’t forget to leave a 5 star review and share with a friend who may find inspiration from it if you enjoyed this episode!
HIGHLIGHTS:
0:00 – Intro 0:05 – Ashish shares an introduction to this episode and to his guest Kara Ayala 4:19 – Kara speaks about her childhood and her up brining and how her grandad being an entrepreneur impacted her adult life 7:40 – Ashish talks about how entrepreneurial life can be so dramatic 10:04 – Kara discusses how only as recently as 40 years ago, if a woman wanted to open a bank account she needed a man to do so 11:30 – Kara states that women are supposed to run businesses completely different to how men run businesses 14:47 – Kara speaks about her past roles in businesses and how she had to draw a boundary for herself and understand that just because she can do something, doesn’t mean she has to 17:22 – Kara states that it’s all about doing less and being more 20:08 – Kara mentions how when you’re stepping into freedom there is a fear of the unknown because it’s the complete opposite of security 22:27 – Kara talks about how she often goes into things expecting something and coming out of it with the complete opposite of what she was expecting 24:40 – Kara discusses how she prioritized being a mom and managing multiple businesses whilst having being a mom as her main focus 26:45 – Kara mentions how she works in yes seasons and no seasons and explains what this means 31:02 – Ashish states that people need to make a huge mindset in order to operate moving forward 31:45 – Kara speaks about how she thinks we are very black and white as human beings so oftentimes it takes us to go completely too far in one direction to realize that where you want to be is in the middle 33:15 – Kara states that she is afraid of weird things and allowing herself to be seen fully and mention how she’s not afraid of losing everything anymore because she knows she can rebuild everything 34:22 – Kara states that true richness to her comes from relationships and also being able to live the life that she wants and having that freedom 35:33 – Ashish states that money has a very intense energy 37:46 – Kara talks about how money is just a tool that amplifies who you are and how we don’t need to chase money – money is not the dream 39:31 – Ashish states that money is a bi-product of adding value 41:12 – Ashish asks Kara to speak about the piece of advice she finds herself sharing the most 42:53 – Ashish encourages you to share this podcast with someone who may find inspiration from it 43:03 – You can contact Kara through Instagram @kara_ayala
TRANSCRIPTION:
Welcome back to the Rich equation. Today, I am joined by one of my mentors, Kara Ayala. Kara believes that women can be successful while at the same time having amazing marriages and incredible children. She loves to share her lessons as a wife, mom, and business owner. Kara’s passion is to help others see that creating multiple streams of income provides more freedom to invest in what really matters the people in your life.
In this episode, we talk about how couples must dream and communicate about their vision together if they really want to have deep, connected relationship. Kara talks about how we can give ourselves permission to be who it is we want to be and how important it is to remember that no matter what you’re going through, it’s just a season. So give yourself some grace. And of course we get into the mindset of money from a woman’s perspective and talk about how important the woman’s voice is for the future. I am so proud of this episode. I know you’ll connect with this here she is, Kara Ayala. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to share it with someone that would be inspired by this or this information could be helpful and subscribe right now to the podcast and leave a review so we can continue to bring value to you.
Welcome to the Rich Equation podcast. Are you ready to discover how to live rich today and not wait for retirement? If you’re tired of struggling and want to live your best life now, you are in the right place.
Outdated principles will no longer work in today’s environment. It’s time for a new approach. Your host Ashish Nathu will help you discover methods to live the new American dream. It’s time to start living the good life on your own terms and experience a new way to live rich. Now here’s your host Ashish Nathu.
Ashish Nathu: Welcome to the show Mrs. Kara Ayala.
Kara Ayala: Thank you. I’m so excited to be here. You’re one of my favorite people. So this is going to be a fun conversation.
Ashish Nathu: I really appreciate your time. And you know, I think that it’s been such a beautiful journey over the last year, getting to know you and Mike, of course, but you’ve been such a great mentor to both me and Sigil and you have, so you are the real life wonder woman, and there’s so many things that you’ve taught me, and I’m really excited for you to be on the episode today to share all of your knowledge. So I just appreciate you being here.
Kara Ayala: Thank you for having me.
Ashish Nathu: So I guess let’s get, let’s get right to it because I think that one of the things that you embody so well, and I’m not even going to give Mike this credit, I’m really going to give you this credit in that. One of the things that you both do incredibly well as a couple is find a way to have this relationship about business and money mindset, and communication, and have this really healthy relationship as you go through the world and you navigate business. That is really rare. And I want to just start right there because I think that most, and I’ll speak from my experience is that when I’m around most entrepreneurs, whether they’re men or women, to be honest, there is a very different communication. There’s a big gap between the communication between the entrepreneur and their spouse. And that goes with communication, expectations, clarity, all kinds of stuff, right. And I think that you and Mike do such a graceful job in making that look completely seamless, and I know that’s not natural, and I’m sure you put a lot of work into it. So I think a lot of listeners have this in their life where maybe that, you know, the entrepreneur feels like no one understands me and the spouse is like, he doesn’t listen or she doesn’t listen, or she doesn’t understand me. And so I think that what you guys do really well is to be in harmony as you go through this life. And I think that’s one of the biggest things that I’ve ever learned from both of you and especially you, and I’m not going to, again, I’m not going to give him that credit, cause I know you’re such an important part of that. So can we start there?
Kara Ayala: And I think you’re right in saying that you know, it’s not like it’s just a natural thing. I grew up in a home that was just to kind of give you a back history of me. We did fine financially. It wasn’t anything extravagant, but we also weren’t lacking for anything. But neither of my parents were entrepreneurs. But my grandpa was an entrepreneur. And so, but he had ended up doing an investment that he lost everything during that investment. And so my parents kind of, they talked about it. They talked about how he had risked this and went into a partnership and he’d lost this money. So I realized, I didn’t realize this till later on in life, of course, but I had this thought in me that if you were an entrepreneur or own your own business, that you could be risking your family, you could be risking everything and you could lose it all. That was like in the back, even though my parents didn’t tell me, like, if you become an entrepreneur, this is what will happen. That was still subconsciously the way that I thought. So Mike and I met really young you know, we were teenagers. And so, but one thing that we always had together that I think has been a really big tool that we’ve used is we always dream together. So we let ourselves like really dream really big. And there was no limit on what that looked like. And in high school it was funny things, right? Like we both wanted to be, this is really funny. We want it to be like undercover cops. So those were our dreams back then. But in saying that is, my husband has always been very entrepreneurial, like always, always been that always had that spirit. And when we were first married, he worked a job, I worked a job and he would start talking like he was going to open a business and I would immediately shut it down. Cause I was scared. It scared me because I thought we were going to lose something. And so it was a journey to get to the point. And I think, you know, this is the crazy part. It took us losing what we thought we had or what I thought I was going to lose to almost start that. So, you know, you probably have heard his story or my story before, but for those who haven’t heard it, you know, he was working out of town for the whole nine months that I was pregnant with our last child. And I had two little ones at home. They were toddlers and we were never, he come home on the weekends and wash his clothes? And I was like, okay, well I’d already don’t have this. Like we already aren’t, so let’s go do this. Let’s go. And it actually was even my, he had talked about it, but I was like, I just had this like moment of like, it’s go time, like I’m ready. And I think he needed like my permission almost to just go for it. And then, you know, we’ve obviously like it’s been, you know, working together and balancing all of that out. It’s been a journey, but I think the biggest thing is making sure you’re still dreaming together. So that’s one thing Mike’s always actually been really good at is he’s always invited me along on the journey. It wasn’t that he was building something and I was over on the side. It’s always been a very mutual joint thing. And I think that that’s been really powerful. Even if it’s your career bringing, you know, having conversations about what’s going on and then he was interested in what was going on in my life too.
Ashish Nathu: I love that so much. And I guess what I’m picking up from that is like that entrepreneurial life is so dramatic. It can be, it can be very much life or death, abundance or scarcity, survival or die. It is very polar in that way. And I think there’s some people that can survive in that ecosystem. And there’s some people that just like, ah, yeah, no thanks. I don’t like that level of polarity, but I think that, I think what I liked in what you said was that, you know, sharing the dream and giving each other permission to take that risk. It’s so powerful. It’s almost liberating.
Kara Ayala: Yeah, it really is. And the thing is, sometimes we can give permission and you know, our, I can be given permission or I can give permission. And then we realize, oh, that’s not actually what I want. So I think even taking that part of it away you know, there was a couple of years ago where Mike this really massive dream to do this huge, which he’s doing right now, but this was years ago when he had this idea and he came to me with it and I was like, no way, like we can’t do that right now. Like that’s what I was feeling inside and thinking. And I actually was like meditating and God told me, you need to tell, like give him space, allow him to do what he’s supposed to do. So I did, I told him, I’m like, you know what, scratch everything I just said, and you have space and there’s room for you to do whatever you need to do. And I trust you. And I think that’s a big thing is I trusted him and, and I’m telling him like, I trust you to do what is best for our family and for our livelihood and whatever that means and looks like I’m going to release my control and trust you
Ashish Nathu: Let’s get into you and your own entrepreneurial journey. Because I think that you know, I really mean it by that you really are a wonder woman and you’ve made such an impact to both me and Sigil. And you have this dialogue that you talk a lot about allowing yourself permission. And, and I want to talk to the women listeners, and I know that’s a big audience of yours in that, What do you see in the environment or in society today and why women feel the way they feel? And I know you talk a lot about, like, we need to start taking ownership. We need to start giving ourselves permission to live the life we want and, and show up that way. Talk a little bit about that.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. This is like one of my favorite subjects. I think as women, I think it’s deeper than just a surface issue. I mean, epigenetically this is generations and generations of women kind of being put in a low, low place. Like I’m going to mess up this number or this date, but it wasn’t until the 1980s that a woman could open a business account without a man’s name on it. Did you know that?
Ashish Nathu: Only 40 years ago.
Kara Ayala: That Is insane to me. So if she wanted to open a business or have any kind of business, which we all know that women are entrepreneurs and have business ideas, she had to get a brother or a husband or a dad. She had to get somebody on her account or she couldn’t open a bank account. And so I think it’s generational. Overlapping of what’s happened to a woman of like suppressing her, but then I want to flip it over on the other side though, too, because there’s also this very I am woman hear me roar movement that has happened that very feminist, which I’m all for empowering women, but it’s almost taken to such an extreme that they, it’s like it’s owed to us because we are a woman. And then we’re also running businesses like a man would, and that is not healthy. Like we are meant to run businesses completely different than how a man would run a business. So there’s two sides of that. There’s a woman who needs pulled out and to be able to be seen and that she can live the life that she wants to live at, which I think that’s what you were talking about, you know giving ourselves that permission of what it’s also, it’s doing that inner work. It’s like going backwards and like, where are these beliefs coming from? And are they really mine? Because most of us are living on borrowed material from our parents. And from their grandparents, like it goes back, it’s not, I’m not blaming our parents because that’s just the way they are doing their best that they could. So it’s doing, it’s like really going inside and asking yourself questions. Like, what is it that I truly desire? And what would my dream life look like and giving that’s where like the giving yourself permission to shine and go after what you want. It also, I’m just going to tap on this for a minute because women, women have this. We do it all right. Like you called me, I don’t even know what you call me super woman or wonder woman. So that’s put in our brains though from a young age that we can do all of these things and we actually can’t, we can’t meet everybody’s needs. We can’t meet all of our kids’ needs. Our husband’s needs, our friend’s steeds, our extended family’s needs our business needs without first taking care of ourselves. And I think that that’s probably the most overlooked thing that women do is we think we can do it all. And we’re really pouring from an empty cup and not meeting our needs first. And you’re so much more powerful when you can really fill yourself up and then just pour from your overflow.
Ashish Nathu: I want to let that sink in for a minute. That’s so good. I think what, one of the things that I see both in, in my personal life and also in my business life is that this also becomes a cultural issue. And I think there’s a lot of cultures out there that create even more of these boundaries and more of these dogmas of being submissive or being quiet or being don’t be you know, outspoken or don’t be bold. Don’t take risk, don’t get educated in some, in some cultures like education, we’re talking still about education here. And one of the things I was literally having a conversation this week with a person on my leadership team who is a woman, and I’m like, I need more woman out of you. I don’t need you to act more like a man in this room I needed to, and we need to get the woman out of you because of the perspective it’s so different. And we don’t need somebody to step into those rooms and act like everybody else. And I think that it’s a really beautiful contrast of thinking and it’s not necessarily have to be emotional. I think people think like, oh, well we want the woman’s perspective because it needs to be an emotional perspective. It actually is a completely different wavelength of thinking and seeing the world. And I think that people it’s definitely downplayed and it should not be.
Kara Ayala: I was even just thinking, so for years I worked in our, like, I’ve done literally every, I worked in every department. And you know, things would go wrong in the company or somebody would quit and they’d call Kara and Like I would do it. I would always answer that call. And it wasn’t until probably five, six years ago that I finally was like, woke up. And I’m like, why am I doing like, this is not stuff that really lights me up. I’m like going through the motions it’s not serving my highest version. I’m happy that I was able to do that. And actually it brought me a lot of joy in years past. But I think knowing when it’s time to move on and when something isn’t serving you anymore. And I finally got to the point where I was like, I can’t do this anymore. And I, you know, sat down with Mike and I’m like, I’m not going, I’m resigning from this position basically. And I’m not coming back. Like it had to be very like, this is how it’s going to be like cut and dry because I had to draw that boundary. Because if I didn’t, then I would always constantly be called back to that place. Because that’s the other part of like being a woman because I can doesn’t mean that I should.
Ashish Nathu: You asked us this question. It very early on in our relationship, you asked us this question of who do you need to be to 10 X your life. And I want us to really think about that question, especially as the listeners are listening, is that a lot of people think about, well, what do I have to do to 10X my life? How many things I have to do? Who do I have to call? What kind of career I have to be? How much money do I have to make? What do I have to buy? What do I have to invest in blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And what you often talk about is who do you need to be? Who do you need to be today? Who do you need to be tomorrow? Do you visualize yourself who you’re going to be, you know, five, 10 years from now, talk about that. How has that affected your life? I don’t want to underplay how powerful that is. So let’s lean into that.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. That’s actually, one of my favorite things is asking questions like that. And you know, when you think about, if I was to 10 X, what I’m making now, our mind immediately goes to the deal because we’re thinking about all the things we’re already doing. And we’re like, well, I’m going to have to do 10 times as much. Like that’s where I mind immediately goes. But really just in looking around, if you look at really successful people, they pull back and they allow other people to step into roles. And so it really is about it’s about doing less and being more so working on your capacity to hold that, because just because that’s the whole, it’s kind of ties into what we were just talking about, the woman going, and she’s just doing, doing, doing, doing, and that’s a pattern that humans, men and women fall into is like, the more I do, but then that’s when you burn out, happens, like you’re not going to be able to 10 times that’s where people are of success. Because they think if I go down this route, I’m going to lose, which was my thought press process, right? Like going to lose my family, I’m going to lose what we’ve gained, but it’s really about becoming, and it’s not just visualizing, it starts at visualizing who that is, but then it’s like embodying who that person is and, and thinking like that person. So it’s almost like you’ve got to envision who that is and then be like, how, how do they act? So if you think about I always like to use this for like people who are looking for a spouse because we like to make our list, right? So this might apply to both of these to make our list of, they need to be this. I mean, it lists all the things, this tall, this, you know, they had have dark hair, they have light hair, whatever it is successful, we name all these things, but I always tell people like, show me your list. And then they show it to me. I’m like, okay, let’s flip it. Who, who do you have to become to attract that kind of a person? So it’s the same in our lives. So if we’re 10 times in who we were going to become, who do we have to become to hold that? Because when you’re building something or you’re 10 times in your income, you’re going to have to have an emotional capacity to hold a lot more guaranteed than you’re holding now. So how do I take a step back and really work on me as a person? And it is as an individual, it’s more about that inner work of like, becoming than it is the do of what’s happening in your business and releasing control.
Ashish Nathu: Yeah. Oh, that, that was a really great way of ending. It is. Cause I think we all want to control every outcome and by trying to define what we want, it’s like, oh, we feel like we have control of it, but we really have to learn how to just focus on being surrendering and allowing.
Kara Ayala: I work with a coach and she was telling me a while ago, she said, do you want to know what the number one fear of mankind is? And I’m like, yeah, sure. You know, I’m thinking, I don’t know what it’s going to be. And she said, freedom.
Ashish Nathu: So good.
Kara Ayala: And I was like, what? Like, that’s like one of my biggest values, right? Like freedom, but there’s uncertainty in freedom. And so when you’re going through that, like, you don’t know what’s on the other side of that veil. When you’re stepping into something, when you’re stepping into freedom, there’s an unknown, it’s the complete opposite of security. It’s crazy to think about. It’s just like, if you think about Mike always talks about this, like prison being security, like that’s the highest security and anything we’re scared of, or we’re, you know, nervous for it. This can go into relationships. I’ve even seen relationships where they’re like, they don’t want to end their marriage or, you know, whatever it is, but they have to almost go through that like, we’re going to end it to realize that, oh, no, this is actually what I want. Because once you feel through that fear of knowing, like what freedom is, what that freedom is on the other side, whether it’s your business or relationship, or even within yourself going through that fear, that’s where the magic is.
Ashish Nathu: Are there things in this journey for you that you didn’t expect to show up, like as you were going through it and really focusing on who you wanted to be in this recent season of yours are there things that you didn’t expect either in the way that people showed up for you or the things that bubbled up for you internally as you were going through this expansion journey?
Kara Ayala: Absolutely. I feel like anything that I’ve ever expected always is 10 times better or 10 times worse. I’m like, wow, I was not expecting that. And I think, you know, I think when you’re doing, like working on yourself and trying to, you know, clear out the things that are no longer serving you, you realize how much you are still holding onto. And I think that that’s probably been my biggest growth part is really recognizing the parts of me that are still kind of in there. And then, but loving that part of me, because there’s like a little version of me, a little Kara inside of me that needs support and needs love. So how do I support that part of me, but then also just really act in my highest version, which is 41. I think I’m 41, 41 year old Kara, that version of myself, but letting the inner parts of me that might be scared or intimidated be at peace. And then I always think that I’m going into something for one reason and it always ends up being totally and completely different. So there’s been a couple, like I recently did a training for somatic release breath work. And I went in thinking like, this is going to be like a cool tool. And it was seriously intense. Like the most intense four days I’ve ever spent in a training and my mind was blown. And so it ended up being something completely different than what I was expecting.
Ashish Nathu: So awesome. Another thing you talk about often is seasons, and this is made a huge impact on my life. And almost, I feel like I’m giving myself more grace because I think about, well, what season am I in? And I think I want to talk about it again to the women listeners, because I think that what you do so well is have this harmony between all of your different roles, you know, wife, mother, woman, and businesswoman in different aspects and then different times. And I think a lot of people go through these different phases of their life. Let’s call it, you know, how do I run my business while I’m a woman? Well, I mean, sorry, while I’m a mother, you know, I have kids. That’s not realistic. I don’t have time. I don’t have this, I don’t have that. And we ended up falling into these traps of our own self-deprecating stories of why we can and cannot do something. And I think one of the things I love about your perspective is like, well, look, it’s just a season. Like let’s work through this season, you know, embrace the season, and then move on to the next one. I think that’s such a powerful perspective and I’m so appreciative of women after, especially having two girls in seeing how difficult it is to be a mom, how difficult it is to be a daughter, a woman, an ambitious woman, and to do it all together and then not learn how to give yourself grace and space is something that we’re not really taught in our cultures. Can you speak to that?
Kara Ayala: Yeah. And honestly, like, this has been a very big journey for me too. One thing though, I always wanted to prioritize being a mom, like from the beginning, I just wanted to be a mom that was like a really big goal of mine. But I also had all these other ideas and dreams. So we opened multiple businesses and I just kept my priorities straight. So knowing that if for me and this doesn’t apply to everyone, because there’s so many things that I probably could have done better when my kids were younger of outsourcing a lot more things in the home. So that when I was home, I could be just fully present with the kids. But I think, you know, like you said, knowing the seasons, I knew I had a short amount of time with them and when they say it goes quick, like, it really goes quick. I’m realizing that now. Cause they’re leaving. But then there, even during those seasons of being a mom, though, there were seasons where I was in like full growth mode or we were opening a business, but the kids were just there hanging out with us, they are along for the ride. And they’re learning so much by being surrounded, we’d be talking about it at dinner. They’d be in, you know, we had an import store for a while. They’d be in the import store, like hanging out there. So I think, you know, incorporating it doesn’t, we don’t have to separate it so much. I think a lot of times we want to separate and you know, a lot of people will be like, don’t talk about business at the dinner table. And Mike and I have not, we’re not very good at that because that’s what we love to talk about. So we are always talking about, I mean, there’s a time and a place for if something’s really stressful, like, okay, we’re not going to be bringing that to the dinner table. Like there’s a time and a place for it, but we’ve always just brought it all in and mixed it with the family. And I think that that’s been I think has been beneficial for our kids even to see like the inner workings of it. We’re still, you know, we don’t know yet because they’re just now leaving the house, but it seems to be working out good. But also knowing like right now is my last year. So the last couple of years I’ve been in a very much, I like to call them yes seasons and no seasons. So I’ve been in a very like yes season where I was saying yes to almost everything because I needed to grow myself and I needed to see what I liked, what I didn’t like. I needed to go full out into my passions or my business and this like might last month. And you know, this is the other cool thing about marriage is allowing each other to have those seasons too. So Mike was full in support of me. And right now he’s in full blown yeses. Like he’s in a very much a yes season. And in fact, in September, he’s like, I’m going to be working a lot this month. And I think, you know, communicating that is really powerful too, but I’m going to be working a lot this month more than I’ve worked in years. And I’m like, huh, I’m taking the month of September off. Like, and so just recognizing where are you, I love to lean into like, what is it that I’m needing to be doing right now? So if your business is massively growing, you’re probably at a yes season and it’s okay that you’re in a yes season. I think giving yourself permission to be like, your kids are going to be okay, they’re going to be okay. I promise as long as you’re like making them a priority, scheduling them into your schedule. And I know that sounds like it’s, they’re part of your like duty or putting it in your calendar, but it’s important that you make that a priority. And if it’s not in your calendar and you’re in a massive busy yes season, it’s not going to happen. And you’re going to wake up three years, in three years and be like, oh my gosh, like I missed out on this period of my kid’s life just because I was in a yes season. And I don’t think it has to be an either or my daughter’s a senior this year and I’m in a no season. I’m barely saying yes to anything. If I’m saying yes to it, it’s because it lights me up. And it’s something that I feel really led and directed towards. And some things I want to say yes to, but I know that my priority is making sure that I’m spending as much quality time with Kaitlin that I can this last year that she’s at home.
Ashish Nathu: I love that. I think one of the things that I’ve learned also from you is that, you know, it’s okay to schedule family time and it doesn’t need to sound mechanical that, you know, planning vacations, planning contributions, planning, a date nights, all of those things are things that should be on our calendars and should be prioritized. It’s such a beautiful way of looking at it, especially if we were trying to look for harmony.
Kara Ayala: Yes, absolutely. And especially if you are any kind of a career driven or business oriented have passions, we prioritize everything else and put it in our calendar. So how much more should those things go in first? Because those are the things that matter the most. So I even liked to put those in at the beginning of the year, we were like planning out our vacations and all of that at the, and then everything else can get filled in after that.
Ashish Nathu: I mean the whole thesis of the Rich equation is define harmony. And I think one of the things that I, and a big part of why I’m launching this content is that, you know, how do we find all of the things we want in our life, whether it’s financial abundance or family time, deep connection with our family, or it’s incredible health and routine or a personal self-awareness and, you know, healing ourselves, like how do we do all of it and how we do it in harmony. And I think that we are often taught growing up that like, you have to do one or the other, and one of them has to be sacrificed. And I think that what you just said about, you know, we incorporated everything all the time. Like we talked about business at the dinner table, we took the kids to the office. I think that is a lifestyle design. You can design your life around that type of ecosystem. It doesn’t have to be you know, people often look for work-life balance. I don’t think there’s anything that exists like that anymore. I think those days are gone, that we’re all looking for work-life balance. Work-life balance I think in the old days was nine to five, anything before nine is balanced and then anything after nine is work. Like, the world is no longer that way. If you have an iPhone, the world is no longer that way. So I think there’s a huge mind shift that people need to make in how to operate moving forward.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. It’s almost like the pendulum swing. I almost feel like you have to swing one way like really far in order to bring it back into balance. If you think about, you know, even like working out, think of a cross fitter, they’re all about like CrossFit, like lifting heavy and crazy, and then there’s yoga who’s all about like stretching and lengthening and really, there’s probably a balance between those two. And that’s what our lives too, but we always have to swing the other way to create a problem to swing back.
Ashish Nathu: Why do you think that is?
Kara Ayala: I think we are very black and white as humans and extreme, especially if you’re like an entrepreneur of any kind, like it’s just in our brains of like go. And then, but I do think we can manufacturer that as well. So if you’re listening to this and you have it swung clear over and you know, we’ve all had those times where I know that there’s been times in Mike and I’s lives, where we were working way too much and realizing that we weren’t having connection with our kids, or, you know, there’s a couple instances where, you know, something happened in our lives where it like really swung us back to the middle, but I think you can manufacture those by thinking about this and by saying okay, if I do swing over here, what am I losing over here and really sit with that losing part because and I don’t really like sitting in the yuck, like I would much rather visualize like good things, but sometimes it’s really powerful to visualize the worst. And if I do, you know, devote all of this time just to my family and become just, because it can swing that way too, and then I’m going to wake up and my kids are going to be gone. And are we going to have any kind of wealth to live off of it? Am I going to be able to provide for my kids, the lifestyle that I want to provide for them. So it can swing both ways. And so it’s finding that balance and sitting in the yuck of the opposite way rather than having to experience that.
Ashish Nathu: Is there anything that Kara Ayala is afraid of?
Kara Ayala: Yes, I like, Hmm, like, what am I afraid of right now? I’m afraid of weird things. Like I’m trying to think like, cause I’m pretty, like we can figure it out. That’s my attitude. Like we’ll figure it out only because we’ve always figured it out and we’ve went through some really low times. So I think my fear in the past would have been like, we’re going to lose everything or, and now I’m like, who cares? We’ll rebuild it. Like, that’s my attitude now, but I had to swing that way, to almost be at the place where we lost it all. But I think now it’s more of allowing myself to be seen fully. And I know I talked to women about that and that’s probably why I talked to that about it as much as I do is because I think we’re so scared to let people see us at our fullest and be okay with maybe a light in my face or Mic in my hand, like that’s probably the thing that like scares me the most is really fully stepping into who I am and knowing that that might be a part of it. That’s kind of scary to me.
Ashish Nathu: What does true richness mean to you?
Kara Ayala: True richness. True richness to me is, I love this one. So I think a lot with relationships, I think true richness comes from relationships, whether that’s in your family, your friends, even in business. I think that’s where true richness is. I think you can accomplish a lot. You know, that will say like you have to have money to make money. I think like relationship capital is the most powerful tool that we have. But I also think richness is being able to live a life that I choose and in that freedom. Being healthy, like I’m kind of dipping off at other areas, but I think if I could just name one, it would be in our relationship and the capital that we have with relationships.
Ashish Nathu: That’s awesome. Let’s take a 90 degree turn into money. And I know this is a topic that is near and dear to you. And in both, like, it’s just a really fun topic to talk about, right. In looking for abundance and being ambitious and chasing your dreams. Money has a really intense energy. And I think a lot of don’t give themselves the full permission to go after it. I’m going to be greedy. You know, what are people going to think of me? People are going to take it away. More money means more risk. So many limiting beliefs around money. As a money expert, Let’s talk about money. What is, you know, what advice do you have for people who really need to step out of their bubble and go after it? And I shouldn’t say need, they really want to, but they’re dealing with their own limiting beliefs around money. Walk us through perhaps even your journey and some of the advice that you have about our relationship with money.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. Money is, I mean, money is really just a tool. Like it’s just the hammer that you build the house with. And it’s just value. It’s the value that you provide, but we have so many stories, so many stories around what money is. And so I think my biggest piece of advice is to really take an inner look at like why you view money the way you do. Like you said, I’m going to be greedy. So if we look at the way we were raised and the way money was talked about in our household, when we were growing up, that’s a huge, that should be your huge red flag. So even just writing down, like, what were your first experiences with money? When did you first hear money being talked about and what did you feel in your body? Because most of it is just these stories we’ve created around money. And then if you look at like movies or TV or in society, money is so has such a negative connotation with it, like even cartoon. So it starts really, really young, like SpongeBob Krabby Patty, the crab guy, he’s greedy, because he owns this business. So what does that do? It instills in little kids’ brains that if you have money, you’re greedy. In movies, if there’s any kind of money involved, there’s like, it’s like gangs or corruption or it’s all these negative things. And money is just a tool. It’s just something that we can use to provide. And it actually amplifies who you are. And so if you are greedy, yeah, you’re probably are going to be greedy. But I don’t think we should be chasing money. Money is not like it’s not the dream. It’s not, I think that also gets mixed up is people are like, I got to have more money. And if you take a step back and realize that money is just the tool to get you to your dream and rewrite what your dream actually is, the money is just like the vehicle. And I think a lot of times and I think we see this in society too, which can be also a turnoff is people will sacrifice relationships, sacrifice their health. They sacrifice everything for money. And that’s not the goal. That’s not the dream, money is just a product of you adding value to the world. And then also how much can you add to the world if you have money. Like spiritually speaking, that’s another one that really affects people is how they were raised what their religion said about money, that can have a massive effect. But here’s the deal, like you can’t help anyone if you don’t have money. Like if you’re trying to help the poor or the needy or something that is really impactful for you, you’re going to need money. And you’re probably going to need a lot to make the massive impact that you’re going to want to make. So healing that relationship with money is probably the first and most important step. And your journey to building any kind of wealth or business.
Ashish Nathu: I doubled down on everything you just said, and I think people need to go back and listen to that a couple of times, I think that it’s so important to remember that money is a by-product of adding value. You know, what you just said there was, I mean, that is it. We ended up chasing money and we forget about what value we’re trying to create. In fact, if you just focus on the value and create space for that value to manifest money will come. And then the second big takeaway I took from that was, well, you know, what is the money Mo like, why is there a motivation to have money, right? And so if you are motivated to have money because you want to buy a plane or you’re motivated money, because it allows me to give back to my church and build a community in my church. Well, then that motivation is, there’s a higher probability of you achieving that money with that type of motivation because it doesn’t waver. It’s a pure motivation.
Kara Ayala: And, you know, even with the harmony, I think we need both because if you’re only focusing on, you know, giving, it’s almost like you’re denying yourself that you deserve to live a life of luxury, whatever that is. And maybe it’s not a plane, but maybe it’s taking your family on a really awesome vacation once a year. And I think making a list of like, what could I do if I made X amount of money a year, whatever that is for you, that’s a stretch. What could I do that would add, I’m losing the word for this, but like add to your family or add, add to maybe a community you’re wanting to give to and putting that down on paper just really changes your perspective. Cause you’re like, oh, okay, actually, this is doable.
Ashish Nathu: As we wrap up here, what is one or two pieces of advice that you find yourself giving the most to people?
Kara Ayala: I think the thing that I get find the most is loving ourselves. And doing that, like healing work inside, I think like remembering who we are, we came here is probably the thing that I find myself working with the most with people. So I think the advice would be like, don’t be scared to shine. Don’t be scared to let your light shine. Like the sun does the sun doesn’t go and hide. It comes up every day and you were meant to be here for a reason. And so remembering like what that purpose is. And then also the other thing I find myself talking a lot about is what we just talked about with money as healing that relationship and making it a priority that we healed our relationship that we have with money. Because if you have a broken relationship, even if you make a lot of money, it’s not going to, it’s not going to do anything for you because you still have that broken mentality. And it’s probably going to end up ruining your life rather than adding to it.
Ashish Nathu: Well, listen, Kara, thank you so much for riffing with me. I feel like there’s so many amazing takeaways for this episode. I really, one of the things I really want to ask people to do and I like to do this after that episode is to really give, like, what is the, to do after this episode is to like write down the stories of what you saw about your relationship with money and realize that we’re in different seasons of our life. And what permission do you need to give yourself during this season. So if you really enjoyed this episode, please make sure you share it with somebody who can equally be inspired or get something from it and like it Kara, how can people find you?
Kara Ayala: Instagram is probably the best place I hang out there a lot. So it’s Kara_Ayala and DM me. I always love chatting with people. So yeah, that’s probably the best place.
Ashish Nathu: Well, God bless you. Thank you so much, Kara. And I really appreciate it.
Thank you for listening to the Rich Equation podcast with Ashish Nathu. Do you want more ideas on how to live rich? Go to www.richequationpodcast.com for show notes and resources. Then take one minute to leave Ashish, a five-star review on apple podcasts, and we’ll see you on the next episode.
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