Intro: [00:00:00] Welcome to Energetic Advantage, the podcast where energy isn't woo, it's your edge. I'm your host, Jessica Cerato. Intuitive strategist, lifelong pattern decoder, lover of numbers, and energetic guide for visionary leaders. Around. Here we go. Energy first, strategy second. Every episode will give you a perspective, a tool, or a timeline shift that helps you lead from your power.
Because the truth is your energy is your most undervalued asset. Until you learn how to use it, get ready. You're about to have the advantage. Let's begin.
Welcome back to The Energetic Advantage. Ooh, today is a juicy one. I'm gonna talk about investments, expenses, assets. Okay, don't turn me off. Stay with me. I'm not talking about this in a monetary or financial sense, but we will touch on that. I'm taking all [00:01:00] of this into an energetic lens because one of the biggest mistakes that I see people make, both in business and in life, is around this topic and about misunderstanding or conflating the differences between investments, expenses, assets, and everything we're going to jump into today.
Now, before I was a numerologist, before I was an strategist, before I was talking about timing and purpose and all of these things, I was in finance. First on Wall Street, finance major, lived in spreadsheets, balance sheets, income statements, budgets, the whole thing, all the things. And one of the things, again, that I was talking about that fascinates me now is that every day you are making decisions that are actually financial decisions, but you just don't realize it.
[00:02:00] Because most people think investing is something that happens in a brokerage account, but I don't. I think, no, I know, that investing is happening all day long. Sure, you can invest with your money, but you're also investing with your time, with your energy, with your attention, with your relationships. So let's get one thing very clear here before we dive in.
The question today isn't whether you are investing. Uh, you are, spoiler, every day, whether you know it or not. The question truly is: what are you investing in? And then more importantly, is it actually an investment or is it an expense? Can you tell, and do you know the difference? This all [00:03:00] stems from a conversation I had maybe a few weeks ago, where I heard someone talk about her experience with a coach, and she was also a coach herself and selling coaching.
And so I heard her say something like, "Well, I spent X amount of dollars, and I haven't made it back yet." I remember thinking, "Oh, that's interesting." Not because of anything of the statement was wrong or right, but because of the lens she was using. She was looking at the entire experience through the lens of an expense, not an investment.
And how did I know that? Because the language she used, "I spent." And then when I was looking at her copy, and she was selling coaching, and she would say, "This costs this amount of money," I was like, "Oh, no wonder no [00:04:00] one's investing," because you're selling it like an expense.
And before-- this could be any example. So I don't want anyone to get caught up on this example I'm using in coaching, right? Because, not every coach is worth X amount of dollars or experience that they sell. Not every mastermind is gonna be magical. right? that's not actually the point here.
My point is that expenses and investments belong in different categories, and if we don't understand that, we will expect the wrong things from both and will continue to be disappointed. Again, noticing the language, and maybe that sounds like semantics to you, but I know its energy.
Because words that we use reveal how we're categorizing things, and how we categorize things determines what we expect from them. So let's break it [00:05:00] down. The first thing I just want to say is that most people are trained to think like consumers, not investors, right? Consumers ask, "Well, how much does this cost?
What's the cheapest option? How can I save money?" Right? Whereas investors will ask, "Well, what's the return? What is this building? What becomes possible?" And you could probably hear, literally through your ears and in your logical brain, but also energetically, that these are fundamentally different questions because a consumer is trained to protect resources, When they're gone, they're gone, so they want it-- or they wanna use it most efficiently. Where an investor deploys resources. Let's use an example that is completely generic or uncharged. Okay, lawnmower. Imagine someone buys a lawnmower for themselves. That's an expense. [00:06:00] But now imagine someone buys a lawnmower and starts a landscaping company.
Same purchase, completely different category. One preserves, one produces. The object, the thing that was bought is identical, but the intention is different. Let's talk Wall Street for a second. Stay with me because obviously there are so many different statements we can use, but let's just talk about the income statement and the balance sheet.
And again, you can think about this in terms of money, but really it's about energy. It's not gonna become an accounting class, I promise, but this distinction really matters. The income statement is all about a period of time. What came in? What went out? What did it cost? What was the profit? This is where expenses live.
Expenses like rent, internet, insurance, software subscriptions, office supplies, Zoom, right? [00:07:00] Expenses reduce profit. That's literally their job. Expenses are necessary. They maintain the business. They support the current reality Then there's the balance sheet, and the balance sheet asks a completely different question: What assets do we own?
What creates future value? What appreciates? What depreciates? What increases capacity? What increases leverage? What creates future opportunity? And this is where I think entrepreneurs, business owners sometimes get themselves into trouble because they start to take something that belongs on the balance sheet and put it or judge it or expect it like it's something on the income statement.
And so again, going back to that coaching example, when am I getting my X amount of dollars back? That's an income statement question. [00:08:00] That's an expense question. But if we looked at it differently as an, an investment, well, what assets did you acquire? Did you become a better decision maker? Did you gain confidence?
Did you meet someone who changed your trajectory? Did you finally launch the thing you've been talking about for three years? Because those are assets, and assets often continue producing value long after the money is gone. One of the things that I've learned not only on Wall Street but in my years as finance and even currently as an investor today, is that sophisticated or experienced or confident investors do not obsess over cost.
They do obsess over value, right? Nobody... Oh my gosh, this is such a funny example. Nobody buys a commercial building and says, "Wow, that building was expensive." Of course it was. Duh. That's not the question. It's not an expense. The question is: What does it [00:09:00] produce? What opportunities does it create? What appreciation might occur?
What future cash flow exists because I now have this asset? And so this is all about your life and how you can approach this energy differently, right? And if I think back in my life, some of the best investments I've ever made, it wasn't because it made that tangible or that tit for tat money back immediately.
It's because the investment expanded my capacity. It changed how I thought. It helped me trust myself more, and the return from that investment is still paying dividends years later And I know what you're thinking. Well, how do you even calculate that? How do you calculate the value of finally trusting yourself?
How do you calculate the value of clarity? How do you calculate the value of making this decision? and that answer is so annoying. You can't, at least not neatly or in a [00:10:00] way that can make sense to our logical brain. But you can really look at this ROI in your energy, and it is then that you know it is valuable.
And this is where we're gonna take it even deeper 'cause this isn't simply a business conversation. I know you know this already, but I just have to say it. This is a life conversation. Some of the greatest investments you will ever make will not show up on a spreadsheet. A family vacation, a book that changes your perspective.
Maybe it's therapy or counseling, a conversation that changes your life, a friendship that expands your world a trip that helps you remember who you are. Most people will categorize these things as expenses and try to fit them into their budget. I don't, [00:11:00] because I don't think that they're investments Because they create assets.
Not just financial assets, human assets, emotional assets, relational assets. And this is where energy becomes so fascinating. Energetically, expenses feel like maintenance. They hold, they preserve, they stabilize. They're earth energy, structure, foundation, infrastructure. We need expenses, yes. Investments feel so different because they're future-focused, expansion-focused, possibility-focused.
They contain uncertainty, and therefore, they're more coded in fire energy, creation, growth, expansion, vision, potential. And here's where we get trapped. Most people want future results while only allocating resources towards present comfort. Gonna say that again. Most people want future [00:12:00] results while only allocating resources towards present comfort.
This is not how portfolios grow. This is not how businesses grow. This is not how people grow because growth requires allocating resources toward a future that doesn't exist yet. And I get it. This is why investments feel scary because every true investment requires faith, and expenses don't require faith.
I don't buy an orange and need trust that I'm gonna eat it. No. Right? But this faith, faith that the future asset will become more than the current resource. And even when I say this, not everything is binary. So we've talked about expenses and investments, and I also think there's a third category that we haven't quite talked about, and it's leaks.
So let's talk about leaks because leaks are expensive, and not just financially, [00:13:00] energetically. So a leak is something that neither maintains nor multiplies. It just drains. And typically, leaks come from stagnancy, so staying in a relationship you've outgrown, avoiding a difficult conversation, living in indecision.
Of course, stagnancy also means procrastination, so it could be scrolling for three hours, constantly starting over, buying programs, doing certifications that you never implement, complaining about a problem that you are unwilling to solve. Those are leaks. And if you are spending more energy managing those leaks than building assets That is expensive.
And I know this because the most expensive things in life rarely come via an invoice, right? They come from indecision, from waiting, from avoidance, from not having the difficult conversations, from ignoring your health, from refusing to ask for help, playing small. [00:14:00] These can cost years. They can cost you relationships, dreams, and yet these things never show up on this credit card statement And, when I think about the energy that really shifted for me is this knowing that resources are meant to be allocated, not hoarded.
And if we think about this, money is a resource, time is a resource, attention is a resource, energy is a resource, confidence is a resource, right? And every day we are allocating these resources somewhere. So the question is, where? Because your life is a portfolio, and every single decision is a vote. Every yes, every no, every dollar, every hour, every commitment, you're building something.
And the question is, what asset are you building? And so many of us look to [00:15:00] others about how we should invest, right? Or how we can allocate these things. And of course, I'm coming through the lens of a numerologist, which says, people just don't earn differently. They don't just spend differently.
They invest differently. And the reason why I think so many investment and money conversations become so frustrating is because often we're judging ourselves through someone else's risk lens, right? Or investment lens. What feels valuable to one person might feel completely irrational to another. And I've done a whole program on this.
It's called Abundance Codes, and it's your unique chart and what it tells you about your risk tolerance your investment st- style and strategy, and not just financially, although we do get into it in depth in that, in that program, but financially as well and how-- what you value most. And so before we get into some scenarios here, I just want to invite [00:16:00] you it's a self-led course lots of tangible I'm laughing, spreadsheets to help you.
We'll put the link in the show notes so you can check that out. But what I want to do here is just prove my point a little by giving you a little bit of information about yourself, and we'll do that by using the ruling number. So I'm going to share a little bit about how each ruling number tends to invest and what they like to invest in.
And so if you don't yet know your ruling number, the first step is to calculate it. So you can do this now. I'll also put a downloadable free resource in the show notes that you can do this. But I want you to take your birth date, and I want you to write it out into single digits. And then I want you to add up all of the digits of your birthday and until you get a number between two and eleven.
Okay? So I'm going to give you a second to do that. And now that you have your ruling [00:17:00] number, I'll share a little bit of a tidbit of how you tend to invest. So if you are a ruling number two, you invest in people, in connection, in partnership, in community. A two will often spend money, time, and energy helping others succeed.
And so the abundance lesson here is learning the difference between investing in a relationship and rescuing a relationship, and what are leaks and what are truly investments or expenses. If you are a ruling number three, you like to invest in expression. A three invests in creativity, ideas, communication, visibility, experiences that allow them to be seen and heard.
A three often spends money and time on things that help them express themselves more fully. The abundance lesson is trusting that expression itself can be an asset, but not every [00:18:00] return comes through productivity. Sometimes your return comes through visibility. Ruling number four, investing in evidence, right?
So a four is interested in both possibility and probability. So if you're a four, you're an excellent steward of resources. The abundance lesson is learning and realizing that not every return can be calculated in advance, and so you are going to need to trust opportunities before the evidence arrives.
Ruling number five, you love to invest in experiences. A five invests in expansion, adventure, travel, learning, freedom. You intuitively understand that experiences create value. And the abundance lesson here is learning when an experience is truly expanding you versus distracting you. Not every [00:19:00] exciting thing is an investment or is meant to be one.
Okay. Ruling number six, you invest in responsibility. You invest in people that you love. You invest in family, in clients, community, home, legacy. I find sixes often invest heavily in creating safety and support for others. But the abundance lesson for you, my six, is remembering that you are also worthy of receiving investment.
Not every resource needs to flow outward. You need to allow it to come inward as well Ruling number seven. Ruling number sevens tend to invest in understanding. A seven invests in wisdom, knowledge, mastery, research, depth. Often I find sevens are willing to spend money to understand something deeply. And the abundance lesson here is recognizing [00:20:00] that eventually this knowledge must become action.
At some point, the investment needs to leave the library and enter into the world Okay, a few more numbers here. Ruling number eight, you are investing in leverage because eights naturally understand assets, right? I love this about eights. Systems, scale, influence, return. This is often the number that I find most naturally aligns with investment thinking.
To all you eights out there, it's like, how can I create a result that continues to produce value? And the abundance lesson is just remembering that not everything valuable can be measured immediately. And as you're hearing this, I'm sure you're starting to clue in about others in your life, being like, "Oh, that so and so," or, "Oh, that so and so."
And of course, you can use the same formula that I shared to find out their ruling numbers based on their birth date. So we [00:21:00] have three more numbers. The ruling number nine tends to invest in impact. A nine invests in meaning, in contribution, in transformation, in mission, in humanity. A nine will often invest in something because of what it changes for others.
But the abundance lesson is understanding that impact and profitability are not enemies. You don't need to choose one or the other. A mission still requires resources, and you can, and you deserve to be both impactful and profitable. Number ten. Oh, ruling number tens, you invest in possibility, in potential.
You often see what could be before someone else does, and so you are most willing to take a chance on a new idea, a new business, a new direction. And so the [00:22:00] abundance lesson for a ten isn't usually courage, it's about discernment. Because if everything looks possible, where do you place your resources?
So a mature ruling number ten learns that not every opportunity deserves an investment. And ruling number elevens invest in transformation, in human potential, in breakthroughs, in movements, in intuition.
The eleven often spends resources following a feeling before the evidence exists And the abundance lesson for the 11s are trusting your intuition while at the same time building the structures that allow others to follow. Because the greatest challenge for an 11 is not seeing the future. We can see the future with our eyes closed, [00:23:00] speaking from the perspective of everyone number 11.
Our challenge isn't seeing the future, it's actually translating that future into reality. And again, we go so much deeper into abundance codes, where we look at your Saturn, at your Jupiter, what you naturally value, what you naturally invest in, what you avoid investing in, and really some tangible real-life ways that you can increase the value of your portfolio, right away.
And this is why, I love energy work so much because at its core, energy is allocation. Where is your attention going? Where is your life force going? Where is your focus going? Where is your money going? Where is your trust going, right? What are you funding? What are you feeding? Because whatever you are funding is growing.
So here's really the reflection and the question that I want you t- that I want you to really consider today. The next time money [00:24:00] leaves your bank account, the next time time leaves your calendar, the next time energy leaves your body, I want you to ask yourself, is this preserving? AKA, is it an expense?
Is this multiplying? Is this an investment? Or is this taking away from? Is this leaking? Because once you start asking that question and really knowing the answer everything will change because you will stop looking only at what things cost. You will start looking at what they can create And these questions might be one of the most valuable investments you'll ever make because every successful investor eventually learns the same lesson, which is wealth is not created by what passes through your hands.
Wealth is what is created by what remains after you've allocated [00:25:00] your resources. And from where I sit today, this is true in business, it's true in investing, and it's absolutely true in your life. And really diving into this can truly become one of your greatest energetic advantages. Thanks for being with me today.
Thanks for coming through on this financial, yet not so financial lesson. If this sparks something in you, if you're curious to learn more, reach out. I'm always happy to have a conversation in the DMs. Hope you have a beautiful day investing in things that matter to you. Thank you for investing your time with me here today.
See you next time.
Outro: Thanks for being here inside The Energetic Advantage. If today's episode open something for you, share it, tag it, or send to the person who popped into your mind. And remember, energy first strategy second. [00:26:00] Your advantage has always been in you. Now it's time to lead with it. See you next time.
