It’s been quite a week for Onsite Workshop’s "Healing Money Issues," a program that Ted Klontz, Ph.D., owner of Onsite in, Nashville, TN, and I co-founded.   I wasn’t aware of the appearance until I started getting phone calls from associates on the East Coast telling me Wynonna was on Larry King talking about Onsite.  Unfortunately, I don’t have cable TV, so I’ve yet to see the show.  According to friends who saw the show, she talked openly about her work with Ted and I, as highlighted in her new book, "Coming Home To Myself." Here is a bit of the transcript:

JUDD: The book is about finding yourself really, you know, because I always say I love what I do but I’m not so sure I really love who I am. And so the book was the searching for meaning off stage. You know this. So many entertainers it’s about what we sing and about what we do on stage. Who am I offstage? I’m more than Naomi Judd’s daughter, more than Ashley Judd’s sister, you know, and so I figured it out.

KING: By yourself?

JUDD: No. No, I wish I could say I did but I wound up at a place called Onsite in Nashville in a cabin by myself for five days and we did my genealogy. They put up my whole life financially from 1995 [visually]…what you’ve been doing. Here are the patterns. This is what you have a tendency to do. And I just, I talk about holding up the mirror and it was the hardest work I’ve ever done.

You can read her online journal where she names Onsite–citing us as her life coaches. For more information on Wynonna and her new book and CD, check out her official site!

To learn more about our Financial Integration methods and how they can help you achieve more balance in life, check out our website.

Call it what you want, just do it!

One of my friends—coping with two upcoming family weddings, an elderly parent’s poor health, and looming deadlines at work—said with exasperated resignation, “I’ve decided life just consists of interruptions, and I might as well get used to it.”

While her current situation is certainly above average when it comes to stress, she’s right. We tend to be surprised when our lives are interrupted, whether by illness, a major car or home repair, or even a happier event such as an engagement or a pregnancy. Yet those “interruptions” are actually part of the daily ebb and flow of life. As my friend is discovering, we are wise to learn to expect and accept them.

An important part of expecting life’s unexpected occurrences is to be prepared for them financially. The key to that preparation is having a balanced and conscious cash flow. By balanced, I don’t mean simply not spending more than you earn. Millions of people are living paycheck to paycheck, spending every penny they make each month. That is “balanced” only in the narrowest and most literal sense of the word. In truth, it is a prescription for disaster.

When you spend as much as you earn each month, you have no margin. Any unforeseen expense—a serious illness, a major car repair, or a job layoff—creates a financial crisis. If instead, you learn to create a “conscious cash flow,” you give yourself that margin.

Having a conscious cash flow means setting aside funds for planned and unforeseen expenses. It also means allocating some amount for known future expenses, such as a down payment on a home, college funding, and retirement. The more familiar—and sometimes intimidating—word for this is “saving.”

Countless articles, books, financial institutions, and financial advisors suggest making saving a regular part of the family budget. They urge “paying yourself first.” Yet, despite the wisdom and the repetition of this advice, too many people still think of saving as what you do with the money left over after you pay all the bills.

This is backwards. Let me join the chorus and say one more time that paying yourself first is an essential element of conscious cash flow and wise budgeting. All those “interruptions” will show up in your life. It’s a question of “when,” not “if.” Planning for them financially will save you incredible amounts of hassle, stress, and money.

In today’s society, too many people carry their backup plan for emergencies in their wallets. Those unexpected expenses, they assume, can always be taken care of with a credit card. This isn’t planning, it’s wishful thinking.

It’s common for people to think they can’t afford to save because money is so tight. One way to start changing your thinking about this is to remind yourself that, if you pay for a large car repair or a medical expense with a credit card, you will have to figure out some way to pay that bill. One way or another, you will manage to fit it into your budget.

So why not figure out how to fit that payment into your budget now? Put it into savings instead of writing a check to the credit card company. The difference is that you’ll be earning interest instead of paying interest.

It takes some self-discipline and commitment to begin saving in this way. Once you get even a month or two ahead, though, you can see for yourself the value of practicing conscious cash flow. You’ll remove a significant amount of stress from your life, because when one of those “unexpected” interruptions comes along, you’ll be ready for it.

Ted Klontz, Ph.D. and his son, Brad Klontz, Ph.D. just wrapped up a two-show taping for Naomi Judd’s new television talk show, "Naomi’s New Morning."  The show is billed by Naomi as a "groundbreaking, unbiased one-hour, weekly series."  The show premieres on the Hallmark Channel Sundays, beginning Sunday, November 27th with Ted and Brad. The show Ted and Brad taped was on how they transformed what was a terrible father/son relationship into a model one.  The second show, to air in January, has Ted and Brad talking about the book I co-authored with them, The Financial Wisdom of Ebenezer Scrooge, (HCI, 2005) to be released November 15, 2005.

I was surprised, pleased, and excited to watch The Oprah Winfrey Show yesterday where Wynonna Judd talked about the strides she has made towards both personal and financial balance as a result of the Onsite Healing Money Issues program, sponsored by Onsite Workshops, Nashville, TN.

I co-founded the Onsite: Healing Money Issues program, with Ted Klontz, owner of Onsite Workshops.  In the two years since our first program ran, a new niche has been established for our services.  Ted and I are working or have worked with several celebrities as of this posting. They were referred to us by an agency in Nashville that is sold on our ‘financial integration’ approach to holistic financial planning.

Of course, privacy is very important, and we would never disclose a client…high-profile, or not!  However, country-music legend Wynonna Judd had such a transformative experience with our services that she decided to write about the experience in her new book, Coming Home To Myself. She mentions the Onsite program over 30 times!  In the book, Wynonna describes us as her “life coaches” and lists us by name on her website as such. Today, she is more radiant than ever!

In the book, she explains why she approached money and spent it in the ways she did and some of the unique methods we used to help her improve her relationship with money.

You can check out highlights from Wynonna’s Oprah appearance or read her online journal where she names Onsite–citing us as her life coaches. For more information on Wynonna and her new book and CD, check out her official site!

To learn more about our Financial Integration methods and how they can help you achieve more balance in life, check out our website.

I am proud and excited to announce the launch of our new website.

A lot of hard work has gone into it, and I hope you all will enjoy the new layout and interface. Hopefully it will make learning more about me, my colleagues, and KFG much, much easier.

Check it out!

In a word, NO.

While there will always be short term fluctuations from natural disasters, wars, and economic corrections, in the long run, the market shrugs them off.  We have not changed any portfolio asset allocations because of either Katrina, Rita, or even in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.  Our 24 year history of managing money has taught us never to panic or take a ‘knee jerk’ reaction to such happenings.  Those that do are often left flat footed.

Klontz-Kahler announced today they will offer one Financial Integration Residency Program for CFP’s and therapists in 2006.  The 6 day program will be held May 21 – 25th, in Rapid City, SD.

The program trains financial professionals and therapists how to integrate exterior and interior money skills in their practices that will transform the lives of their clients.  Participants learn how to uncover their client’s hidden money beliefs and how to use technologies that will actually change their client’s behaviors around money.  The heart of the workshop experience is the exposure and use of experential tools that will help practitioners communicate financial information in a way never before experienced.  These are tools that participants can take back to their practice and impliment immediately.

The workshop is facilitated by Ted Klontz, Ph.D., and Rick Kahler, MS, CFP , two of the pioneers in the financial integration evolution of the financial planning profession.  Tuition is $4,900.  Call 605-343-1400 for more information or email Rick Kahler at rick@kahlerfinancial.com.

The next Healing Money Issues Workshop will be held October 14th to 20th, 2005, in Nashville, TN.  The workshop is co-facilitated by Ted Klontz, Ph.D. and Rick Kahler, MS, CFP.  The workshop was  featured in the Wall Street Journal and Wynonna Judd’s new book "Coming Home To Myself," and is an innovative integration of the ‘nuts and bolts’ of financial planning and experiential therapy.  A recent scientific study to be released in January, 2006, shows the program effective in reducing anxiety and depression around money, while increasing financial well being.

The 2006 offerings will begin on February 10th, April 21st, June 9th, and October 13th.  You can register for the program by calling Onsite Workshops at 800-341-7434.