They say money doesn’t make you happy, but I can’t fully agree. Who doesn’t want to reach financial freedom? I love money, and I believe it’s normal. We all work to earn. How else can you achieve financial freedom? However, money is not a goal; its an instrument to make your dreams come true, to live a fulfilled life, travel, be able to pay kids education and finally retire.

Money is simply a necessity like food or water, it helps you buy the things you need.

The Steps to Reach Financial Freedom

I believe everyone can achieve financial freedom following these easy tips and and some basic financial planning. These are the same elementary steps I followed to turn $10,000 into $3,000,000.

Assess Your Financial Situation

First of all, you need to find your starting point. This is easy – write down your debts; mortgage, loans, credit cards; savings, monthly income, and assets. One of the crucial step here is to understand what your assets are giving you now and what they can give you in five to ten years. I would say that’s the basis for long term financial planning.

Set Financial Goals

Goal setting is very important, but you have to be honest and clear with yourself about what you really want in your life. Once you understand where you’re at today, and where you want to be tomorrow, it’s time to set your goals.

A clear goal that will help you get where you want to be both motivates and disciplines you. Having a clear goal, you can build a plan on how to achieve it. Each step will bring you to a new level, and you will feel more confident and motivated when you see results and eventually reach financial freedom.

Control Your Spending

The most boring thing you need to do is to control your spending. But believe me, it’s very important and it makes achieving financial freedom million times easier. There are a lot of free online tools that can help you track your spending or create a dashboard for this purpose.

When I first started tracking my spending, I realized that I spent a lot of money on the things I don’t need. So, it helped me a lot to use my funds more effectively. And finally, I could start saving. I think “pay yourself first” rule is a must for you to achieve financial freedom. After you make all necessary payments, like rent, bills, etc., put some money into savings and then spend the rest. This rule helps to spend less, which allows you to invest more.

Invest Your Savings

Because of inflation, savings alone can’t give you financial freedom. No matter where you leave your savings, there is inflation eating away at it. So, saving without investing doesn’t help you reach financial freedom. There are different ways to make your money work for you – real estate, stocks, business partnership, etc.

You must find another way to generate more income. Investments are one way to do this, but I believe you have some hobbies that make you money as well – selling paintings online, blogging, etc.

Invest In Personal Experiences

Do not forget to invest in personal experiences and traveling. OMG, it is so exciting to visit new places, meet people, learn about their cultures! This is what makes life worth living, and it always brings me to the next level and inspires me. Life is made up of moments. The best moments come from quality time spent with friends and family.

Make sure you have enough money to invest in personal experiences. You can do this by assessing your current situation, remaining positive about your money and future, having a clear goal, controlling your spending and investing your savings.

If you do follow these basic steps I am sure you will build your financial future, reach financial freedom achieve all your goals!

Nominated to the Women in Finance Awards in 2016, Inna Rosputnia of Lady F Wealth Management is known as the female trader who turned $10k into $3,000,000 in just a few years of trading. She has run one of the fastest growing investment companies and was recently named “Wall Street Queen” by one of the bankers during the Women Economic Forum.

Inna has been active as a philanthropist since 2013, when she began providing funds to help women in Africa to attend universities and start their own businesses. In 2016 Inna joined the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women, where she has been working to promote gender equity, the values of open society, human rights, transparency and empowering women.

She is also the author of a book: “Basic instinct of trader. How I turned $10k into $3,000,000”.