This Nurse Makes Multiple Six Figures and Encourages Financial Stewardship - Ep. 5
Nakeetsha Dryer is a psychiatric nurse practitioner. Nursing has given her the opportunity and flexibility to change her family tree. It has opened the world of entrepreneurship to her and allowed her to pay off $140k in debt, $ 62k and counting since Jan 2019. She has always been able to negotiate unique work schedules and opportunities which allowed her the flexibility to be with and take care of her family. Later on, she was able to open a clinic, and also hold a contract working from home doing tele-psychiatry earning multiple 6 figures last year (in Alabama). Her goal is to pay off $184k in debt to become debt-free this year (2019).
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TRANSCRIPT:
Naseema McElroy: 00:00:07 So, we have the honor of welcoming Nakeetsha Dryer to the Nurses on Fire Podcast. Nakeetsha is a psychiatric nurse practitioner who loves helping others break free from the chains of debt so they can pursue God's best for their lives. Thank you so much for joining us, Nakeetsha. How are you?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:01:55 Hi. Great! I'm so excited to be here with you.
Naseema McElroy: 00:01:59 Well, Nakeetsha, I just love your testimony and we'll get into it in a minute. But the way we like to start this show through some rapid fire questions just so the people get an understanding of you and your background. So, in nursing communication, we use this thing called S bar. We're going to go through the S bar and we're gonna start off by talking about your situation. Where are you currently in your nursing career and your finances?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:02:30 Well, currently, I am a psychiatric nurse practitioner. I work from home full time. I have a full time contract where I see patients on computer via telepsychiatry. I do that full time. I also owned a business, a clinic three hours away and we can get into that a little later. I recently closed that a few weeks ago. I was in a psychiatric clinic that just started to grow out of this world more than I can handle in the few weekends that I was going here. As far as my finances, my husband and I set up a one year plan to be out of debt to pay off $184,000 in 12 months. So since January to date, we've paid off $59,000 on that debt.
Naseema McElroy: 00:03:32 Wow. So that's just five months into the year. That's January 2019. So, Nakeetsha is rocking it. You are well into your goal. So, let's talk about a little bit about your background. What happened in your life or career that made you want to make a change to your finances?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:03:53 Well, I'll say that I found Dave Ramsey pretty early on in my career and it helped me in a lot of ways. In the first 18 months after discovering Dave Ramsey on the radio, we paid off $50,000 in debt. But, I will tell you that your mindset has a lot to do with what you can accomplish. That $50,000 that we paid off was in consumer debt. I started to look at the mountain of student loan debt that we had and I told myself, I don't think we can do that. I just slowly convince myself that there's no way we could do that. Over the next few years, we've paid on them and then we started kind of living like we're debt-free. And so, let's not go on vacation and let's do these things. As I said, mind is a powerful thing. When I told myself, this is a stop in the start $50,000, no problem! But when I looked at the student loan debt that was about triple debt. I had already failed in my mind. So, I didn't really attempt to be aggressive with that.
Naseema McElroy: 00:05:10 What changed? What made you make paying off your student loan a priority?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:05:18 Well, one thing that changed, I was teaching Financial Peace at church and when we started talking about debt, I would always say, "well, I'm debt free except..." Then, one of the co-teachers came to me and say "I think you need to change your word. You're not debt-free. And as long as you continue to say I'm debt-free except my student loans, then you're telling yourself pretty much it's okay to keep them." I was kinda upset at first, but I realized that in conversation with other people, people will say the exact same thing that I'm saying.
Naseema McElroy: 00:06:01 That's true. I was like that too. I thought that if I paid off all my consumer debt, I was debt free. It was actually Dave Ramsey. If you don't know, Dave Ramsey is a person who puts together Financial Peace University. That is his program that he teaches in churches. When I started listening to him, I was like, oh, I guess I do have to address my student loans. Like I was avoiding them like the plague.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:06:28 Yeah. As long as I can look on here and I had forbearance left, so you have 12 more months of forbearance. I'm like oh okay,then I can continue to pretend like I don't have that debt. That's one of the worst financial mistakes that I've ever made. If I know that while I was sitting there pretending like I didn't have it that it was growing and growing and not to my benefit, but to the loan services benefit, I probably have gotten more aggressive sooner. After that we start paying all it, I'll say maybe we paid $40,000 last year and the year before that may be 30. To me, that was more than I was doing in the beginning. There's just one, it was about October or November that I had a dream and I woke up and that it was on my heart that I need to do this quick. Why are you stealing my going around with this? You get up and you teach people, counsel people and you're not truly free to do everything that you want. So that was kind of a turning point for me. I talked to my husband and said that I think we can do this faster than what we're doing it and it may hurt a little bit, but I think it's going to benefit us.
Naseema McElroy: 00:08:03 That's awesome. I love that you listen to that intuition or the voice that came to you to say that. I think subconsciously, even though you were saying that you were debt-free, you still felt that burden of that debt you owe on your back. That was always planning your subconscious. No matter how well you are doing financially, it was still back there. I'm totally familiar with that feeling.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:08:38 I am looking forward to take vacation after this. No matter what I did in these years, there was always something that made me feel like you shouldn't be doing this. I couldn't really enjoy it to the extent that I know our wheel in about seven or eight months, you know what I mean?
Naseema McElroy: 00:08:58 That's pretty much how we go through life. It's not only on vacation, but just like day to day when we spend money its always like this kind of guilt thing on our back. Should we be focusing on something else? To have that off at back is the most freeing feeling ever. So that's awesome. I'm super proud of you and what you've accomplished. So can you share with us some tools you've used to optimize your career and your finances?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:09:20 For me, nursing is just so awesome. It is the only career that I know we can drop and jump around to different things that interest you without having to go completely back to school. If you do have to go back to school it's just for a short period of time plus it's also the different areas that you go into is not looked upon badly as a matter of fact to your advantage. For me, I love psych from the very beginning, but I also needed a balance in my work life to accommodate having children. For a long time, I've never worked full time and because of my husband's schedule. So, when I decided to go into psychiatry, I knew it would open up opportunities for me, but I'll bet step until you that I've always been in psych just as an RN, but I knew more to have my all business and just be able to negotiate better. I want to be in this position as a nurse practitioner. Once I went back to school, I stepped out and got some experience and sometimes things don't go our way. Like, when I went to VA, I wanted to start seeing patients right away. They told me that the position they've hired me for is not the one I'm going to have. They had a new position that they wanted to try out and that was telepsychiatry and I was just like, I don't want to do that. I've been a stay home mom this long. I'm going to try this for a little while, but I'll probably go home and work nursing on the weekend. But I did it. I did it for about a year and little did I know that it would open up so many different avenues for me to even do what I'm doing now, which is to work from home. So yeah. I am self-employed. I actually serve in a contract that I had got to a service, a facility three hours away and doing the telepsychiatry. I'm able to do this particular job from anywhere, anywhere with a wifi. I think that is how I use this to my advantage and in my family's advantage. Otherwise, I don't know that I would be working full time because I have children and it's very important for me to spend time with them.
Naseema McElroy: 00:12:07 So how many hours a week do you work now?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:12:09 I work 40 hours a week but because I'm contract, I don't have to work any. I'm looking forward to taking a lot of vacations. It's never been on this side where I'm my own boss. I don't say, can I be off on these days? I say I need to be off on these days and here's the list.
Naseema McElroy: 00:12:31 You're, like, I'll schedule however you want to and you have the flexibility to move things around as you like. But how has that helped you financially?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:12:39 Oh, well, well I'll say that having experienced in telepsychiatry I went to prison work. Even in that work, I was able to tell them that I have experience in telepsychiatry. I wanted to work from home for a few days. Then, after working there for two years, this contract opened up. Well, what I'm being paid in now as a psychiatric nurse practitioner is twice what I was being paid. They are more than twice actually. I think last year I cleared two hundred thousand dollars working from home. Also in nursing, there are lots of opportunities to be an entrepreneur. I opened up a clinic, it was more of hard work for me because it was my hometown and I found out that there wasn't any psychiatric care within two hours. I decided to track three hours twice a month to open up a clinic in my home town, which wasn't my first entrepreneurial pursuit but this one just really got away from very quickly. I opened probably in July. By September, I was scheduled for 25 patients a day 'til Saturday. Then, it was so many patients that I also started seeing patients on Sunday. For a while there, about four or five months, I worked seven days a week and that was a big boost to us getting out of debt. But as you know, being self-employed, there were a lot of taxes with that too. I had to weigh that out. As a nurse, I decided, I wanted to do something else. I became CPR certified and I opened a CPR business. I got my daughter certified as a CPR instructor, my sister and my husband. While I was there I found out where I live in Mississippi, there wasn't anyone teaches CPR for miles. So, I was there on Saturdays, seeing patients in one office. Also, in conference room, my college daughter is teaching CPR classes. So, that was also extra income that we were able to put towards our debt.
Naseema McElroy: 00:15:17 I just love that because let me just, it was a couple of things I need to break down in that. Okay, so you live in Mississippi and you cleared over $200,000 last year. [Nakeetsha Says "I live in Alabama."] Oh, but the clinic was in Mississippi. I just want people to know its possible because every time they see how much I make, they're like, "oh, it's because you're in college". No, these opportunities are everywhere. I just wanted to put that out there.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:15:52 They don't need to look at somebody else's situation looking for the thing that they can't do. You understand? [Naseema Says "Thank you. Yeah."] People ask me about paying off debt and people marveled over what we've paid off thus far, but forgetting that when we had less than half of that income when we first got started years ago, we still paid off $50,000 in 18 months. We were really rice and beans there. So what God used that to show me is this not about what you have, what you're making, it's about stewardship. You have to use what you've been given in order to, you know, get to where you want to be.
Naseema McElroy: 00:16:40 It feels like it's amazing that you also are able to take a need and turn it into a profitable business. I mean, your CPR business and your Mental Health Clinic. All that stuff is a dire need and you are able to service that and then you are able to turn that into income. Those are things that anybody can do, anybody can address somebody's need and be able to create profit from it but it's really about that mindset. I like the way that you think because you don't think about limitations. You think about mindset. The way that you become better off financially, you can only do two things. Either you can decrease the amount that you spend or you can increase your income and you have gone full throttle on increasing your income and that is truly amazing. I love that. I love how you get your family involved. You've got your husband out there, you've got your daughter out there. That's what I'm talking about. You get all hands on deck because once your family, even just one other person is in alignment with you, your trajectory of you being able to accomplish your financial goals is exponential. It is substantial. They sky's the limit.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:18:04 Yes. That's so true. Because even with my husband, he did not want to teach this, but he said, I'll get the certification just in case you can't go or if you need me. Because my husband is a plant manager.
Naseema McElroy: 00:18:20 Right? Not a nurse, not a nurse.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:18:24 He's not a nurse but he said if this is something you want to do and I can help you with it. So he did get the certification. He never had to teach a class, but I just loved him because he says I'll be there. He can meet me and show them our way of going to get trained. So you're right, it is not even about me being a nurse practitioner because as you know, anybody can become CPR certified. It's just, God gives us so many ideas that if we just act on just some of them, we'd be a lot further ahead than where we are.
Naseema McElroy: 00:19:01 Even some things that you feel like God has set you back and you think like this is not what I asked for. It's like when you came into that VA job and feeling like you don't want to do this. But because you went into that job, it has opened so many doors for you. [Nakeetsha agrees] Even stuff disguised as disadvantages and the opportunities that we don't care for, are the things that we can grow to the opportunities for us. I mean there are opportunities everywhere you turn and you just have to be open to receiving them.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:19:36 Right. I'll tell you about something else that you just said that was really pertinent to my situation. I would've wanted to be out of debt 15 years ago, but even looking at the time that it's taken to do that, that has really helped me to have more empathy and compassion for people when they're not able to do things quickly. Before, I was just like bam, bam, bam. Anybody who said they couldn't do it, I'm just like, "what? I mean, why? What is your problem?" Now I'm able to see some of the mental hangups because of my own that kept me from this and it's just the facade. Anytime you tell yourself you can't do something, I'm telling you it's a facade. Look at what we've been able to do and honestly with our income we have made new changes. That's what we were talking about last night. Like man, we've been off this amount. The first time we did that is we had to really make changes to our groceries, things like that. It was easier. [Naseema Says "Yeah. You said you were rice and beans?"] Yeah, like a treat for my kids back then because they were very small. They would be like, "can we go to the red store at the end of the week?" That was target. Now, they're 14, 15. Target is not going to get yourself. Yes, it's different. I'll tell anybody to do it early if your children are young. Because they don't really even realize the sacrifices that have to be made as they get older. It's also weird because my children are ahead to be more involved. I say we don't, we haven't made many adjustments because we just watched very closely where our discretionary income has been installed and we don't go vacation, we don't have a vacation this much. But one of the things that we consider is that we have a daughter that is in all star-cheer and I don't know if you know anything about it, but it's a barrier. [Naseema Says "I just know it's expensive."] And so she's also very good and she also made through the high school cheer team and both of those things without the travel and going anywhere. They're about $3,500 each. So when she turned 14, she had an opportunity where she can work at the gym for a few days a week, teaching classes. That's something that she really loves but they said that she can do that in exchange for tuition and so that we were considerate because we realized that was a privileged, but it's not like she has to do this. She's not entitled to do anything. So even though it was easier when they were younger, this is where we are now. So since we need to teach all things that'll stick with you, you know, throughout the rest of your life.
Naseema McElroy: 00:22:57 I love that. Plus, because she sees you doing it. I mean, I love to raise more on caught than taught. Because she sees you doing it. It is going to empower her so much more financially. I just love all these little lessons that you're sharing, but I really want to know, what is your ultimate goal? What are you really looking forward to, pursuing in your finances and in your career?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:23:26 Oh, okay. So I think about this often. One of the things that I have done over these years and you can help me with this. One thing that's dangerous about stretching out the Dave Ramsey quote-unquote technique for a long period of time. Even he warns against it. He's like band-aid off and does it. But doing it over a period of time in long years and not really doing it like we were, you can develop a scarcity mentality or "we can't do that". It's like, you're always apprehensive about doing everything. And here it is, we went from 40, 50, $60,000 to make over $300,000. And I found that sometimes my mindset is still there because of: number one, I didn't go ahead and finish what I started. I always had this feeling that I was doing the wrong thing like what we talked about before. But also, just kind of develop this mentality that I'm not supposed to do that, we're not going to have enough. If I do that, I'm not going to have... Do you know what I mean? So, over this time, I'm looking forward and I'm doing this now, retraining my mind that there is abundance. God is an abundant God. There is much out there for us and that we're good stewards and good stewardship doesn't mean necessarily always doing something cheap or not doing things. So I'm retraining my mind. One of the things that I'm really looking forward to is just coming into the fullness of that. I think that for me now, I'm not buying it. I'll give you an example. We bought a truck that I didn't really want, it was a really nice truck. I don't want to seem arrogant or anything like that, but it was not the truck that I've been wanting all this time, you see? But we bought it. Why? My husband said, this one is a lot less expensive than that one. I'm telling you, we kept that truck for some months and just walking to that truck every day, I felt like I never get to get anything that I really want. And I feel like I'm not good enough. I just have to be working on it because it was given to me. That's a mindset thing because if we're making over $300,000, if you're making $500,000 it doesn't matter, it's about contentment. I wasn't contented with that because that's not something I wanted. Actually, I said that to my husband after months that I don't want this truck. This is not what I wanted. If I'm going to work and work towards something, I don't want to always just take the list or one just because that's what's been. I think it's okay and it wasn't even that big of a cost difference. I'm really looking forward to a new heart and new me. I hope I'm explaining this well, it's not about getting something because it costs more. It's just getting what I prefer because I deserve it and I'm worth it.
Naseema McElroy: 00:27:19 I think what's tricky is when people say, I deserve it. Because then, they feel like they can do these other things because they deserve to do this. I think it's more of something that sparks joy. When something sparks the joy in your life and you are doing the things that are fulfilling, you continue this down this pathway of doing more things that are fulfilling in that attracts abundance to you. It's not just doing things because you deserve to do, it is because it's elevating your vibration, it is elevating your frequency and it's increasing your positivity. Therefore, more positive things are coming your way instead of just settling. On the other side, on a more tangible physical side. I think I saw this question posted just today and it kind of spoke to me, it was where somebody said: "what's the difference between lifestyle creep or just raising the quality of things that you have in your life?" Now you're at a different level. You're not just struggling, but you can afford to have nicer, more quality things that are going to be more beneficial that are not just cheap versus like oh I'm buying this because now I can afford it, which is lifestyle creep. I think that's the difference. That difference is the spark of joy, the thing that's going to bring you inspiration and the things that are gonna make you feel good. And everything that you do financially, no matter what anybody tells you is all emotional. If you can raise that frequency on your emotions, you're going to attract more to you. It's gonna bring you to the spaces like this. It's gonna open up opportunities for you to expand into different worlds that you didn't even know existed. Like you didn't know anything about telehealth. That's just like one example and it's just like doing this. I didn't start Financially Intentional because I thought it was going to be this big platform. I started Financially Intentional because I was struggling and I wanted other people to feel what I was going through because I felt the freedom as I started paying things off. This feels good to me, I know it's going to feel good to the next person. In doing this and raising my vibration and feeling better and doing things that I enjoy doing, it opened up so many doors. Just bringing it back down to the truck, a lot of people were frowned on even the car that I drive, but it's what brings me joy.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:30:16 Right. And that could be something that I like because it costs so much more. As I was saying, it wasn't that much of but it's a $5,000 difference. But I'm like, you have to understand, my husband is one of 10, so there's always like, let's go to the list. Yeah. He's peanut butter and jelly man, he don't really care about much. I'm willing to work and the thing is too I don't, even if it takes longer, I don't want to settle for something as a substitute because over a period of my life that hasn't really brought me joy and has made me feel good. I don't know how else to put it. But now I, we ended up getting in the truck that I wanted and I am just I'm very happy with it, not because I'm like, "Oh, I'm somebody now". I look at the truck and I said, this is the beginning of me. I'm making a choice to have something that I really want instead of settling. [Naseema Says "It represents abundance instead of deprivation."] Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I read that in Jack Canfield's book it was one of the first books that I really read and I am re-reading "Success Principles" and he's just starting very on early in your life. Get it. Like if somebody, he talks about notebooks, if he walked into a conference and somebody has no books and you can choose one, if you prefer the purple, don't get the yellow. Just say, "I preferred that one". And he said, if you make that a habit and see, and so, so anyway, yes. That's one of the things that I'm looking forward to it. As I said, that is continuing over time.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:32:18 The other thing that I'm really looking forward to the freedom to go after other things that really interest me. I like speaking and I like consulting or mental health as well as finances. Right now I put those things kind of back and I'm planning for them later because right now I just want to work as much as I can so that I can hurry up and get out of debt. But, those are some of the things I'm looking forward to nurturing my opportunities that have come to me, some, I've had to turn down because I'm really focused on getting to this goal, but I'll be able to have the freedom to say, "okay, I think I can put that on my calendar for that day and tick off and do that".
Naseema McElroy: 00:33:13 It's all about what you get to do, not what you have to get it. [Nakeetsha Says "Yes. That's a great way to put it. Yeah."] I love it. So just like talking to all the nurses out there I know we've talked about the benefits of being a nurse, but what are some things that you wish to share with people who are interested in going into nursing or somebody that's maybe a nursing school right now?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:33:42 Well, this is awesome. Awesome question. Because people whoI see sometimes they, you know, "how you do blood, how do you do wounds" and so forth and so on. I just laughed and I said: "you get through nursing school, you grind in there and then you get out when you decide who you want to be". I said that's it all the time. I'm not that kind of nurse. I work from home. If you're bleeding, you have broken stuff then, I'll be the first one to call out 911 and try to get you to where you want to be. But if you hear voices and you want to kill yourself, I'm your girl and that's what I do. So, I always tell people to have an open mind. This is nursing of the new millennium. This is not where you're going to be by the bedside cleaning up and I admire them [Naseema: taking orders]. I admire those nurses. I mean it's when I ever get sick, I asked the nurses and I want to see the one who loves what she does and wants to be there. I love my labor and delivery nurses. I just love how it feels but that's just not me. And in return they love me.
Naseema McElroy: 00:35:03 Yes, exactly. I can't do the site 'cause you know, I don't have the bandwidth because we'll just be going at it. Yeah, I mean, I think that's the power of nursing is that it is the most of bursts career. Ever. You can basically write your own career spectrum, like whatever you want to do. You can do that. You can be in nursing administration, you can be a nurse out on the field, you can be in telehealth and so many different things. Like I'll be speaking for days, listen out all the things you can do as a nurse. But the bottom line is that you have to get in it because it's something that you're passionate about and not just for chips. Okay?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:35:56 Sometimes I'm hesitant to tell people what I'm making, I mean I've talked to a doctor and he says, you realize that you are making as much as I was making when I worked at whatever clinic. So after people know that psychiatric nurse practitioners have a lot of opportunities and then the same people who tell me, "I can't stand that. I don't want to do that." Then, you know, curious a little later they're texting and saying or asking, "how do I get into that?" And my answer is the same one. I hold this profession very near and dear to my heart.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:36:40 Yes, because of the honorable population that we see and usually the downcast of the people, [Naseema says "We literally have people's lives in our hands."] And in psychiatry, we see the people that are not well and in society's term, just kind of people who are in the back, you know what I'm saying? Cause mental health. When you want to get into this, not just a profession, I'm saying the specialties such as mine, you got to do it because I love mental health. I have a passion for mental health and I want to see these patients better no matter. Because we're sitting here and I'm telling you where I am today. I don't get to tell you that when I worked at the State Hospital, I didn't get to tell you how many times I was attacked and ended up in the emergency room, being bitten by a chow or whatever, and having to come back to that facility, the next day and still treat that job, you know?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:37:47 But that's nursing as a whole. You have to go into nursing with the compassion and a love for wanting to care for people. If you're doing it for anything other than that, I don't care how much money you make, you'll never be satisfied. [Naseema: Yeah, that's real.] Yeah. But I would say to anybody who's in the nursing field and you're going through some of the rotations. Then you're thinking, "I don't know what I've gotten myself into", finish, finish it and then get out and explore. Nursing is one of the professions that you could sit down and say, what is the need? How can I fill it? What do I need to do to just fill it? There are so many nurses and entrepreneurs out there who started businesses that blow my mind. There are so many nurses out there who are working in different fields doing things that I wouldn't have even thought of. And I just say, hats off to all the nurses, male and female, young and old. I just love nurses. When you come into the friend as a nurse, I feel safe because I know this is that he can take care of your business. That's what I always say is this somewhat, "Hey, she's a nurse. She can take care of business. You're still gonna be fine." [Naseema: Yeah.] My other word of wisdom that I have to say when you get out of nursing school, if you have student loans, attack those quick, quickly and look for all the opportunities. I'm also in school getting my doctorate and I started looking and searching on the internet. I mean for scholarships, I had a scholarship and all I do was fill it out the five questions, little paperwork and verification of what I do. They gave me a four to $500 just like that. [Naseema: Wow.] My goal is not to pay for the rest of my education. I paid on a monthly basis and I say, you know what, this is my new goal. I am going to over the summer, find money and have some money to pay for me to go to school. There are too many scholarships out there, so I'm going to use what I know,mental health and doctorate and anything else I can use in order to apply for these scholarships and I guarantee you I'm not going to pay for this to finish this degree.
Naseema McElroy: 00:40:29 Oh yeah. And also just because of who you are and your unique position as a black female nurse practitioner in Alabama. You can approach certain organizations and just be like, "would you be willing to fund it?" They have budgets for that. I mean hospitals, even if you don't work, they have a budget for it. I know this because I used to be in charge of those budgets. Yes, don't be afraid to reach out to the community benefit or the public relations department of these major hospitals and say, "do you have funding for things like this?" And as part of their nonprofit status, they have to. [Nakeetsha: Okay.] Often times they're searching for people to give money to and it's very important for you or entrepreneurs out there because usually, it's a built-in part of your compensation as a nurse when you work for these organizations. But on the other side, on the flip side, they have the obligation to serve the community. If you are part of that community, please reach out to those organizations. It might take a couple of phone calls just like anything else, but these people have money for you. So yes, I support you in that goal and I know that you can achieve that. Bear with me, what are the techniques and resources that you use to grow in your career or in your finances?
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:41:56 Whoa. One thing that I'm doing now, I use the baby steps but I also diversified who I listened to. To be prudent with money, you've got to hear all angles because now I'm prepared to invest. Seven months down the line, I want to know where do I need to invest. You know, what are the biggest test text breaks for me as an S Corp, all that kind of thing. I'm really trying to listen to your podcast and this is the thing too that I have to know. You don't have to do everything that someone would say is. You have to take some of what works for you. I'm not going to live in a tiny house, that's not going to work for me. You know, I'm through with beans and rice, but I'm always, for the rest of my life I'm going to be on a budget because I believe that it's stewardship. That's one of the things. Also, as far as my career I used to do before we had this, I used to go to a lot of conferences to stay up on, just on my education, continuing education. Now I do a lot of online stuff so that I can still be abreast of what's new and what's going on. But I don't have those travel expenses. One of the things I did when I was employed at the prison at the BA and I just can't believe that people don't do this. I use my,you know, how they give you in continuing education money. I used it every year and I have people listed. I've never used it. I'm like, why not [Naseema: You're missing out.] Yeah. I'm like, book you a trip to Vegas around the conference and let them pay for it and I always use that money. Even when I found that, oh it's getting close to a year, I haven't used that money. I call the human resources or human yes that's it, HR saying can I buy these books and enroll in this online course? They'll be like yeah give us the receipt. So I have a whole lot of books behind me that was paid for by my company because they want to use that money on you. It's like you were saying, they want you to use your continuing education dollars. So, I utilize it repeating and they not would ask if other people could donate this to me.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:44:45 I also use that money sometimes to pay for my classes that I was taking numb like in the doctor program because that's continuing education. I do the least everything that was at my fingertips. Now, I'm self-employed, I paid for that. But as I set up the business core, I put that as part of my employee benefits package and I'm an employee in my company. So yeah.
Naseema McElroy: 00:45:15 Being self-employed also, I know you were talking about investing, being self-employed also gives you some very unique and business opportunities where you can fund a retirement account with a lot more money than you canrather than being employed somewhere. There are a lot of options. What you're talking about is learning from different platforms, that's something that Dave Ramsey doesn't cover at all and maximizing self-employment is one of the amazing tools that'll help you on your journey to financial freedom faster, because you can really accelerate how much money you put into retirement and other savingsblessed by pulling triggers on, you're self- employment status in the tax benefits around that. I think that's amazing and another thing I wanted to touch back on is when you're talking about people coming out of nursing school, not only just paying off your debt really fast, even if you don't have make a lot to put a little bit in towards investing and really tried to figure it out on what you can invest in. Try to, even if it's just $20 a month, I don't care. Start there, start somewhere and then try to increase that gradually. Get started investing as soon as you come out of school. As soon as you get that first check. Heck, if you can even start investing in school. That's like one of the things that most people who whilst people regret later on in life, especially people who have done well financially, is that, they wish they would've started earlier investing and that's actually one of my biggest mistakes too. I always, I just want to piggyback off of what you were saying and like those two things: knocking that debt out and just start investing. It does not have to be a lot but just start investing early on. At least, yes, at least. But like I said, I don't care if it's $20. I mean, I just see so many people that have not invested year after year and been nurses for 34 years and don't have anything. It makes me cringe. So please just get started and try to familiarize yourself with your company's investment policies or if you're just working for yourself, make sure you open up your Roth IRA or in traditional IRA, whatever, and just get started there. So, you know, that's my big tip.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:47:49 I don't only learn about finances from Dave Ramsey. When I graduated and I heard Dave Ramsey on the radio for the first time. I heard him constantly saying that millionaires read a book and more. I never read, I hated to read in school, but I needed to do to pass. But what I knew was that I want it to be somewhere that I wasn't at that moment. I wanted to be somewhere in my life and I didn't know how to get there, so I was just eating up to anything that could help me be in a better place. So I will tell you that I have a library behind me right now. I've read it over a hundred books because that may be an answer. I read and I took that to heart and I have read so many books that have just really changed the trajectory of my life. Yes, so don't be so easily entertained by the TV and even the radio. A lot of my family knows like, "oh gosh mom, can we just listen to XM radio song" because I don't know, but listen to audiobooks. Yeah, I'll listen to a podcast. I felt like I wasted so much time. You never changed. And nowI tell my children, you watching that? Those entertainments out there, they have their life, they have their money, you better pick up a book. So, I've created readers in my home because reading is a big part of our life. Yes. So I'd say pick up a book, read a book and books. It doesn't have to be by somebody's tale. Nowadays, there are different writers with a lot of humor or your spirit is pursuing really serious. If you feel like you pick up a book and the language is just too.., I don't understand. There are books that are on your level, there are books that are not. And so there's no excuse for not reading. I have read things that I never thought I would read in my younger years, but that all work together and just to help me be more confident and a smarter person, not only in five minutes but just in life. Also, reading increases your vocabulary lists where I try to teach our children a lot. Learn to be a reader. If you're not ready to be a reader, be an investigator. Don't just take something firsthand from someone. Because unfortunately, a lot of things that people say are from hearsay. It's not even that they've done any research themselves. So, you know, wemay not know and they steer you wrong, even if they're well meaning had to, even at my age I haven't helped my parents because of the things that they didn't know. I just, that's why the things that I'm really, I feel really good about that I was able to help them just with things, that financial decisions and a will and something as small as, you know, you don't have to buy that. It's kind of morbid, but you have to buy a car from the funeral home. That's $5,000. Yes. [NAseema: Please have. Exactly. Please have those conversation. Please have those conversations because they're super important.] Yes. So mom's like, mom's like the same, the same one that I'm looking at as I take a picture and I found the coffin online for $895. They'll deliver it for two days. She didn't know about that kind of stuff. But the more well rounded you are on everything, the more you'll be able to help someone where ever they are, you'll be able to help them with their situation, whether it's nursing or whether it's finances or just things in general in life. So be a reader.
Naseema McElroy: 00:51:56 Yes. Also, we always come from a place of service because if you're helping and serving others you can't help but excel. So I love that. So Nakeetsha, you have shared some excellent points here. Your testimony is amazing. Your story is incredible and I know people are going to be inspired by hearing you speak and people are going to be reaching out to me like where can we get in contact with Nakeetsha. If you don't mind sharing how people can reach out to you and the things that you like to do to help people,nurses in finances in particular.
Nakeetsha Dryer: 00:52:37 Well you can reach out to me at my email address, which is stewardshiponeononecoach. As I said, I believe that everything starts with stewardship. So that's stewardshiponeononecoach@gmail.com and I am a Dave Ramsey certified master coach. I did follow a lot of the budgeting, how to get that kind of things and I can steer people in the right direction that they're passing one and you're ready to invest. But I like to make sure that people have a good foundation and they're being good stewards not only of their money but just do it in the gifts that God has given. Now, I look at the career in nursing as a gift that God has given me and I want to be a good steward over this gift of nursing. So therefore for me, that means get it in the area that I'm best suited to help people. Those are some of the ways that I'd like to help people. Whatever your profession, wherever you are or your stewarding gifts and opportunities that have been given to you and those opportunities alone can help you get to where you want to be financially.
Naseema McElroy: 00:53:56 And there that is, I think that you said at all. I love it. And I want to just thank you so much Nakeetsha for taking time out to talk to me and to share with my community. Like I said, the things that you have mentioned today are priceless. I am super inspired by all that you have done and I am so looking forward to your debt-free scream and I am looking forward to seeing all the ways that you're going to blossom even more in your career and just in life in general. And I'm just so fortunate that I have gotten to know you over this last year or so. I appreciate you being in my community and being in my world and I appreciate you being a guest on this podcast.
