Edmond Chan

How you can save money effortlessly using Monzo, Marcus by Goldman Sachs, and Moneybox

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I’m not a great saver. In general, I’m a spender. But I want to become a decent saver so that that I can invest it and make a good pile of money before I retire and hopefully live well before that. Given my spending nature, for me, it’s about creating systems that take out the need for willpower and that make it easy for me to spend less and save more. Monzo, Marcus, and Moneybox help me do that.

Monzo

Monzo is a new bank account that’s mobile-only and aimed at young people. It has a cool bright pink card that when you tap it or use it, sends an instant update to your phone. So I know immediately when I buy a coffee or lunch. It literally tells me as soon as I tap my card on the reader.

So how does Monzo help me save money? Two ways:

First, it is a load-on card. I have to have funds on it to use it. My main card is with a major bank (not Monzo), and my salary is paid into that. I then transfer £100 to my Monzo whenever my funds in Monzo runs low. Monzo is my spending card for everything. The fact that so little is on my account and I have to top up when I run out, means that I don’t mindlessly spend and tap on stuff I don’t even register I’m spending on. Recently, I bought a jumper for £90 but I had to transfer money from my main account to my Monzo (I don’t carry a card for my main account). This act of transferring made me stop to see if I consciously wanted to buy the jumper. (I did!). I’ve made Monzo my default Amazon card as well so that it makes me scrutinise how much I’m really sending on Amazon books (the answer is a lot).

Second, it has a round-up function on transactions, which takes a transaction (say £2.90), rounds it up to £3 (which is what is debited from your account), and puts the £0.10 into a separate saving pot in your Monzo account. Since I turned this feature on a few months ago, I’ve had 113 round ups (£0.47 average) for a total of £53.03. Not much, but better than nothing and I don’t even realise it’s happening. Effortless.

Get a Monzo account here:

Get one through this link and we’ll both get £5!

Just follow these instructions: https://join.monzo.com/r/argg9bi

Marcus by Goldman Sachs

Saving is easier when your savings account isn’t the same bank that you spend with. Say you’re with Barclays as a current account and a savings account. When you’re feeling the pinch at the end of the month, you might be tempted to transfer some savings into your spending account. When it’s a separate bank that you have to log into, then it’s a big effort to do so, and this effort is often enough to stop you doing it.

ING Direct used to fill this role for me. Its password alone was too difficult for me to remember, so I was able to set a regular monthly payment into it and not be able to touch it, as I had forgotten the password! It helped me save enough for my deposit on my flat.

Unfortunately, ING closed down in the UK. But Marcus is here to fill the void. It also has one of the highest savings interest rate out there (at time of writing it was 1.50%, which is still lame by historic standards!). But it’s a decent bank with a name that you can believe won’t go bust (touch wood).

from the website as at 19th June 2019

Moneybox App iOS

This probably the most fun of these three services. In a nutshell, Moneybox rounds up your transactions to the nearest pound and invests the change into their Stocks and Shares ISA. You decide which risk appetite you want for the funds in which your ISA invests in. I chose ‘balanced’ below:

Then this is the asset allocation ‘balanced’ gives you:

This is what I’ve saved effortlessly on Moneybox in the past several months: (It’s not huge, but it’s something, and it’s invested. It’s good because it’s effortless and even fun when you ’round up’ your transaction. You get a rewarding noise when you round up, and it gives you the dopamine hit needed to reward you and keep you going.

Conclusion

If you’re struggling to spend less and also struggling to save, then give these apps/accounts a go. Along with Yolt (to be covered in a later post), these make money fun to handle!

Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker – key takeaways

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why we sleep key takeaways

Why We Sleep is a ridiculously valuable book for anyone who doesn’t sleep much on a consistent basis. Whether that’s due to insomnia or to being a total badass who thinks that sleep is for the weak and lazy.

Matthew is someone we should listen to. He’s professor of of neuroscience and psychology at UCLA and before that he was a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. He also works as a sleep scientist at Google Life Sciences (Verily)

The main takeaways from Why We Sleep

  • Consistent sleep deprivation is really, really bad for you. By sleep deprivation, he means anything less than a solid 8 hours of sleep. Walker links consistent sleep deprivation to cancer, dementia, obesity depression, and anxiety. Also, the shorter you sleep, the shorter you live. All in all, really, really bad.
  • We have a chemical called adenosine that is continually produced from the moment we wake up. It builds and builds throughout the day until we can resist sleep no longer. This is called sleep pressure.
  • Caffeine blocks the receptors that register the adenosine build up and this is why coffee temporarily makes us feel more awake and alert. If caffeine is still in your system at bedtime, it will likely keep you from feeling tired.
  • Caffeine has an average half life of 5 to 7 hours. This means that 5 to 7 hours after your last coffee, half the caffeine is still left in your system. And in 10-14 after your last coffee, a quarter of that caffeine is still in your system.
  • Drink less caffeine! And definitely not too late i.e. not after 12pm

Professor Walker’s top 12 tips for getting a better night’s sleep

  1. Stick to a sleep schedule. Get up and go to be at the same time every day. Walker highlights this as the most important of his sleep tips.
  2. Exercise is great. At least 30 mins most days and not too close to bedtime.
  3. Avoid caffeine and nicotine. They make it hard to get to sleep and can affect how deeply you do sleep.
  4. Avoid alcohol before bed. It will stop you getting into REM sleep and you may wake up in the middle of the night when the effects have worn off.
  5. Avoid large meals and drinks late at night. This can cause indigestion which interferes with sleep.
  6. Avoid medicines that disrupt your sleep
  7. No naps after 3pm.
  8. Relax and unwind before bed like reading or listening to music
  9. Take a hot bath before bed
  10. Dark, cool, gadget-free bedroom
  11. Get enough sunlight exposure. This helps regulate sleep patterns. At least 30 mins of natural sunlight each day and preferably in the morning. Turn down the lights before bedtime.
  12. Don’t lie in bed awake.

For me, the caffeine control has been incredible in helping me get more sleep.

Walker describes sleep deprivation as:

the greatest public health challenge we face in the 21st century in developed nations. If we wish to avoid the suffocating noose of sleep neglect, the premature death it inflicts, and the sickening health it invites, a radical shift in our personal, cultural, professional, and societal appreciation of sleep must occur.

I believe it is time for us to reclaim our right to a full night of sleep, without embarrassment or the damaging stigma of laziness. In doing so, we can be reunited with that most powerful elixir of wellness and vitality, dispensed through every conceivable biological pathway. then we may remember what it feels like to be truly awake during the day, infused with the very deepest plentitude of being.

Pick up a copy of Why We Sleep here.

Get more sleep!

What does it mean to eat well?

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For lots of people, eating is something to get done. For these people, food is fuel.

But what if we ask the question: “What is the best that eating can do for us?” the idea that ‘food is fuel’ becomes a deprived way of looking at eating. (Pint of Huel anyone??)

At its very best, food nourishes the body and nourishes the soul too.

Body. At the very least, what you eat should be nourishing for the body. It should be nutrient-dense, packed full of vitamins and things that help your body function at its best. It should give you energy, help your muscles repair and help your body’s complex chemical make-up be at its optimum.

Soul. It should delight the senses. From what goes into your eyes, to what it smells like, to what it tastes like, to the texture of your food as you eat it. Some of the best food experiences are those that remind of us of what our mum cooked for us when we were kids. For me, that was freshly cooked, deep-fried samosas with chili sauce, or crispy noodles, or scaldingly hot spring rolls.

Think about where the term soul food originates from. It’s food that nourishes and feeds the soul.

What should we eat?

We should be eating as good quality food as we can afford. We wouldn’t put crap oil into a Ferrari would we? No. So why would we do the same to our bodies?

Imagine we just ate things that were terrible for us? Say bad pizza, sugary cereals, solid junk food, for a month. I guarantee you’d feel terrible.

Imagine on the other hand that we ate things that were great for us? Look to the Greeks or the Japanese who routinely live long, active lives. Their diets contain:

  • Fish that are rich in protein and Omega oils
  • Dark green leafy greens
  • Fruit and veg

How should we eat?

“Before you eat or drink anything, consider carefully who you eat or drink with rather than what you are to eat or drink: for feeding without a friend is the life of a lion or a wolf.”Epicurus 

(sourced here)

We can surely do better than eating in front of the TV with our plates on our laps. Think about past mealtimes that you cherish. It might be family roast dinners, long brunches with friends, BBQs with friends and families, weddings with long tables of people you know and people you’re getting to know. It might be nostalgic school dinners or in the mess hall with your peers. Whatever it is, it’s likely that eating with other people is more optimal for your enjoyment and well-being than eating alone.

Does eating well need to cost a lot?

Not really. Okay free range chickens might be beyond the budgets of some people, but fresh food is available to everyone. Real markets sell fresh fruit and veg. You can get great food in tins as well. Tinned tomatoes are very often better than any fresh ones you can get (like for a puttanesca sauce).

You don’t need caviar, abalone, lobster, wagyu beef to eat well. You just need some knowledge and a will to do so. Check out this article about Jack Monroe from Lifehacker and then check out her site as well.

Does eating well require elaborate recipes?

Definitely not. Lots of great dishes require less than 5 ingredients.Cacio e Pepe has 5 or 6 depending if you put butter and oil in it, and why wouldn’t you?!

It’s mostly about timings, keeping flavours intense, putting interesting things together.

How about this for a nice meal:

  • Greek salad (cucumber, ripened on the vine tomatoes, red onion, feta, kalamata olives, capers, olive oil, cider vinegar, dried oregano)
  • Pan-fried salmon, with crispy skin
  • Sourdough bread with salted butter
  • Glass of wine of your choice

Add in a few people to eat with, some music and some laughter, maybe at a long table outside in the sun and you’re eating very well!

What does eating well mean to you? Let me know in the comments!

If you were asked to introduce yourself, would you sell yourself short vs what the objective reality was?

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Angelique told me about something that happened at her work. She was in a meeting where a new senior hire from the Product Team came to introduce himself to her team.

Everyone in her team introduced in turn introduced themselves back to the new hire. When it got to Angelique, she said that she was a bit nervous, and stumbled a bit, and when she sat down afterwards, she was mortified. Bear in mind that Angelique is an experienced professional, with nearly seven years at her company, and is also a veteran public speaker. If it can happen to her, it can happen to all of us. It could certainly happen to me.

Lots of career advice I read says that we should all have a short description of ourselves ready to be deployed whenever someone asks about us. It should be memorised. It’s good advice.

However, what would you actually say about yourself? If you’re anything like me or Angelique, it would be self-deprecating, full of caveats, loaded with the passive voice, and almost apologetic. I think it’s a fallacy that we’re all in need of reining in our salesy-ness. If anything, we need to become more salesy when it comes to talking about ourselves, to counter our natural self-deprecation.

Why do we do it to ourselves? Sell ourselves short? Jordan Peterson talks about our inner critic and how we let it talk to us horrendously. We wouldn’t let anyone talk like our inner critic to somebody that we cared about. Why do we let it talk to us like it does? Why do we listen to it?

Knowing that this internal berating is going on should free us to be more objective about ourselves. Let’s look at two examples of how Angelique could describe herself. Both describe the same thing, but one sounds weaker than the other.

Weak version:

Hi I’m Angelique and I’m a developer here. I’m originally from Wollongong, a city about 2 hours south of Sydney. I’ve been here about 7 years now. Yeah, that’s me. Great to meet you.

Strong version (and still more than true):

Good morning, my name is Angelique. I’m from Sydney, Australia. I was an art director at Fairfax Media, for the AFR (the Australian Financial Review). I transitioned into developing on the Methode CMS platform, and then I was recruited into the FT, to work in the Methode team here. I’ve been here about 7 years now and I’ve learned a great deal, and it’s a great team to be on. I also founded and co-chair the FT Women’s network, which runs monthly events and helps hundreds of women develop their skills in networking and so on. Great to meet tyou!

Which one sounds better? The second one right? I don’t think it sounds boastful. It’s all 100% true and factual. There’s not any exaggeration there but it still has hidden points in it that convey strength and value to any listeners.

  • For example, Angelique was recruited from Faixfax to the FT. This tells people that she was in demand and worth the effort to recruit from the other side of the world.
  • She might not be born and bred in Sydney itself, but most people here won’t know where Wollongong is, and will be thinking about that whilst you’re speaking about something else. She did live and work in Sydney so that’s more than true. Why confuse people otherwise?
  • She did found a women’s group, one that is successful, and so why wouldn’t she put that in her intro.

How would it work for you? What would you normally say about yourself? Are you selling yourself short? How can you make what you say about yourself stronger whilst still staying true to reality?

Write a short paragraph about yourself like the one about for Angelique and memorise for the next time you need to introduce yourself.

Definitely feeling the benefits of implementing some of Aubrey Marcus’s book “Own The Day, Own Your Life”

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I love airport bookshops. It’s like the best of books distilled into a few shelves. I can never resist even though it will double my carry on luggage.

The domestic terminal at Melbourne Tullamarine had some enticing books: 12 Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson (which I’ve read but only on Kindle, so I bought a paperback there and then), First Man In by Ant Middleton, who I’ve only recently discovered on Channel 4’s SAS: Who Dares Wins, and Own The Day, Own Your Life by Aubrey Marcus.

I snapped it up alongside Peterson’s. (Will get Middleton’s book soon.)

The premise of Aubrey’s book is that by making the right small decisions throughout our day, we optimise our health, mindset, productivity and overall well-being. This helps us to win our day, and if we do this day after day, we win our life.

The section I really like is on supplements. Now Aubrey is CEO of Onnit, a health company with a big focus on supplements, so you’d think of course he would be recommending supplements. But on the other hand, it’s reassuring that he does recommend them given that that’s his livelihood. But the best thing is that he doesn’t say that only his company’s supplements are the ones to get. Lots of company’s produce these supplements.

The ones he recommends that I’ve started using are:

Greens blend. He describes this as like ‘raiding the shelves at Home Depot when you’re trying to maintain your house’. It’s full of good stuff that your body needs to be healthy. I looked on Amazon and found this one by Hion which was very well rated. The ingredients are: “Wheatgrass, Barley Grass, Maca Root, Flax Seed, Green Tea Extract, Lucuma, Spirulina, Chlorella, Baobab, Acai Berry, Raspberry Fruit Extract (20% Ethanol 80% Water) 10:1.” That just sounds good for you doesn’t it?!

Krill Oil. This apparently is fish oil on steroids. Not actual steroids! But just an amped up version of fish oil. This is the one I bought on Amazon. The description states:

  • Superior source of EPA and DHA because the polyunsaturated fats are packaged as phospholipids, which can be used immediately by your body
  • More stable than fish oil because it includes astaxanthin, a powerful antioxidant, that protects the fragile fats from oxidising

Vitamin D3. I was already taking this. I use this one by Nutravita and I bought it on Amazon. From the blurb on Amazon: “Nutravita Vitamin D3, (The Sunshine Vitamin) provides the preferred form of vitamin D3. Vitamin D3 is the more potent form of Vitamin D, because it is the specific form made by the human body.“

I’m going to start taking magnesium as also recommended in the book.

So how do I feel after a few weeks of taking them? Really, really good. Full of energy and almost feeling a surplus of strength and energy. That may well be down to other factors, including sleeping well, doing lots of running, and also lifting heavier weights than normal. But I do think that small improvements stack up on top of each other over time. It all counts!

Do you take any supplements? And if so, which? Let me know in the comments!