More Money Podcast - 041 How to Make That Bacon - Karen Yap from Makin' the Bacon

Starting point is 00:00:00 This is the Mo Money Podcast with your host, Jessica Morehouse. Hello and welcome to episode 41 of the Mo Money Podcast. Thank you so much for joining me on this Wednesday day. Today I am interviewing Karen Yap. She is the personal finance blogger behind Making the Bacon. And I've known her for several years, but I actually finally got to meet her in person when I went to the Canadian Personal Finance Conference this past fall. So I am so excited to have her on the show. We're going to be talking about how she got into personal finance blogging, her relationship with money, and her series that she does on her blog, which is all about promoting women and their careers and just women doing

Starting point is 00:00:45 awesome stuff, which I am all about. Karen, thank you so much for joining me today. I'm very excited to chat with you. I'm very excited to be on your podcast. You're my first podcast. Yay! I'm so excited that I'm your first podcast. It's awesome. So I have known you as a blogger for several years, probably for as long as you've had your blog, Making the Bacon. And it's awesome. You live in the city. Super awesome. But as much as I know you as a blogger, I'd like to know you a little bit more.

Starting point is 00:01:15 I want to go a bit deeper. So I'd love for you to share kind of how this all started for you. How did you get interested in personal finance? Let's go from the beginning. Yeah, sure. So growing up, my parents never really talked to me about money. I didn't have an allowance and I was actually not allowed to work during high school. They preferred that I work during the breaks. And it wasn't until

Starting point is 00:01:38 my last year of high school I worked. I think they were really focused on me having a good education and they felt that I know I guess having a job might distract me from trying to get the good grades so and I also like to think yeah they were pretty uh protective of me growing up like they were afraid of me taking you know public transportation you know at night by myself and I guess you know as a teenager but yeah yeah yeah and um where did you grow up again uh I grew up in the burbs like I was born in Toronto but I grew up in Mississauga so we lived in a normal like middle class neighborhood and I felt like at the time though it was weird because I felt that everyone else had more than we did but looking back on it I had a pretty good life but I guess I was

Starting point is 00:02:25 consumed by like oh these people you know they have like so many cars and these people you know have all these brand names and go on vacations all the time yeah and um yeah but the thing is like the more I think about it I think I did have a little bit of frugality in me growing up because my mom told me I did and she says that I got it from my grandpa but I don't know if there's any proof in that it's genetic it might be I have frugal genes but uh the reason why I say this because there's um one thing that strikes my mind is um you've heard of Canada's Wonderland right yeah oh my gosh no that was like the first freaking thing I did when I moved to Toronto I I'm not even joking. Yeah. From growing up in BC, we still got the commercials of Canada's

Starting point is 00:03:11 Wonderland. I'm so disappointed as a kid realizing I'm like, oh, what? We don't have that? They're like, no, it's only in Ontario. No, you have the mountains and the ocean instead. I know, but I really wanted to go to Canada's Wonderland. So I've definitely been there and it was awesome. Well, I was going to say like, yeah, instead of um the first few years of high school instead of like looking for a job and working like everybody else during the summer I went to Canada's Wonderland every summer and I had a season's pass but oh my gosh back to frugality um instead of buying my lunch with my friends I actually brown bagged my lunch and like I brought and I don't even

Starting point is 00:03:46 remember I think, you know, PB and J sandwiches while my friends bought the chicken fingers and fries and most of the time they couldn't finish it. So I would finish it for them. So I got a I got free food. I love that. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. so my interest in personal finance, I guess, didn't really escalate until after I got my first job. My mom tried to get me into investing and I would say it was about a year before I really clued in and thought like, okay, maybe I should learn about it. So yeah, I'd have to say my mom was probably like a huge factor

Starting point is 00:04:24 in driving to learn more about investing and she like told me to open up an rsp and participate in my employer's pension plan and it's kind of funny because our conversations now uh they kind of revolve around like stocks she like actually it's funny Earlier today she called me and says like, Oh, this is up and now this is down. And it's like, well,

Starting point is 00:04:48 what have you bought already? So it's, you know, your normal mother daughter conversations. That's really funny. And you know what? It's always funny when you find out how lots of people got into personal finance.

Starting point is 00:05:00 I'd say like a huge majority of those people, it was like that one person that kind of said, Hey, have you thought about that? And for me, it was my older sister. Without her, she was the one who said like, Hey, have you heard of like these personal finance blogs? And there's actually a couple that I, you know, bloggers that I'm friends with now that she suggested I read because she started getting interested in it as well. And yeah, if it weren't for her, I probably wouldn't be doing what I'm doing right now. Isn't that crazy?

Starting point is 00:05:27 Yeah, it's cool. I mean, now that I've revealed myself and to more of my friends and family and just talking to them, like about a couple of weeks ago, I was talking to one of my friends talking about personal finance. And then she's like, I'm into finance.

Starting point is 00:05:41 And we had just like this crazy conversation. She's like, yeah, people need to invest and you can't just depend on you know pensions for retirement like she was just so passionate and then i thought to myself wow i am so glad i talked to you i'm like we need to have coffee more often and just talk about money i know like i feel like yeah especially people that you know just kind of discover the world of personal finance it's so freaking exciting and that sounds so nerdy but it is because you realize the possibilities and you realize oh my gosh i had i can't believe i didn't know this yeah it's like an aha moment yeah like going back to what my friend was saying like yeah she like messaged me and like text me and say like

Starting point is 00:06:18 oh my god you've opened my eyes so i send her links of like blogs that I read and then podcasts that I listen to yours included and like oh my god like I'm now like listening into podcasts I'm like yeah I'm so obsessed like isn't this the greatest thing ever even though podcasts have been around for so long but I'm only discovering now I only discovered them like like honestly maybe a year and a half ago I don't know where it was. Yeah. And then I just got like, I'm obsessed. Like, it's just obsession for me now. Obviously. Obviously. Okay, well, that's interesting. So So you started getting more interested in, you know, personal finance and investing when you had your first, you know, job, like the at the start of your career um when did kind of the blog get involved in in

Starting point is 00:07:08 that at what point in your career did you're like hmm I think maybe I can go on to start writing about this well the funny thing is even till this day like given that I'm in my early 30s I still feel like I've never really had a career because I've bounced around like from job to job. Things like the kids in a bouncy castle, that was me. And I don't know if it was just, you know, I wanted things faster than I should have gotten them. And then that combined with impatience. But I feel like bouncing around for several jobs, I finally landed a job with the federal government. And everyone's like, you know, ooh, that's like the unicorn, the one thing that everybody wants and they can't yeah you're set for life

Starting point is 00:07:49 yeah yeah and uh it was like a couple of years into it I was kind of feeling bored and I started to blog but really the main reason behind blogging was I wanted I wanted to make more money but oh yeah everyone knows everyone knows that it takes a lot of time and effort, more time and effort than you ever imagined to make money consistently. And clearly, that wasn't the case. But then even though I wasn't making money during that time, I still found like I enjoyed writing, I enjoyed ranting and, you know, seeing people's comments and knowing that people could relate was why I started the blog. And also, back in the day, I think like many bloggers, I enjoyed writing, you know, I had the diary, wrote the poems and

Starting point is 00:08:39 wrote the story, like in the journal. And yeah, blogging just kind of helped rekindle that passion for writing. And it's funny because my OAC English teacher at the time thought I was going to major in English, but then I told her, no, I'm going to be majoring in chemical engineering, which is, you know, a complete 180 from right. There isn't really that much writing involved. But yeah, I'm really glad that I got back into it through blogging. Absolutely. It's nice to have. And I always think this because I've just had, I've had my blog for over four years now, pretty much as soon as I moved out and started, you know, living on my own and working full time

Starting point is 00:09:20 outside of school and everything like that. That's kind of when I started my blog. And I've, I really, I'm like, I don't know what I would do with all of my free time if I didn't have this to do, you know what I mean? Like it's just been part of my life for so long and it's such a nice way. It's nice to have an outlet like this. And especially like the one thing that I absolutely love about having my own blog. And you probably, um, agree with this is just the community, not just other bloggers out there that agree with this is just the community not just other bloggers out there that you could but just like other people that read your blog that you can can connect with over like social media or comments or email it's just it's really cool just to yeah talked about money with other like-minded people or people that are just as nerdy and

Starting point is 00:10:00 passionate about it as you are yeah i find it's also like a huge ego booster too like if you're having a bad day and then somebody tweets like oh oh my God, I love your post or your post resonated with me or just like, you know, you have a new follower on your social media. I'm like, oh my God, the world is great again. Oh, I know. Like whenever I get an email from someone that, you know, says like, oh, I really liked your article or your podcast or whatever, I will absolutely read it out loud to my husband and be like, look what I said. Isn't that so nice? It's a very nice ego booster for sure. Get groceries delivered across the GTA from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express. Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75

Starting point is 00:10:40 in PC Optimum Points. Visit superstore.ca to get started. So how long have you had your blog now? I would say it will be four years in June. Wow, that's awesome. Yeah, which is I think around, I would say maybe the average amount of time. But to be honest, it feels like I was constantly restarting over and over again. Yeah, because it definitely seems like your blog's focus more is now like careers, women in careers, which I love because I feel like people should be writing more about that for

Starting point is 00:11:18 sure. Yeah. So yeah, it wasn't until late last year, I decided, made that conscious effort of, okay, I'm going to treat this like a business. I'm going to go at it full throttle, try to do it every day. And yeah, it's amazing when you see the difference when you put in the effort, you actually see the results. Whereas going back to my career with the government, unfortunately, it wasn't that way. I would go above and beyond and try to network with people

Starting point is 00:11:49 and it just didn't seem like anything was going anywhere. It was almost as if you were pigeonholed. Once you got in and at that specific position, that's where you were going to stay. It was almost like, it seemed like, okay, well, be happy that you're there. So just like, just to stay there.

Starting point is 00:12:09 So let's talk a bit about that. You know, it seemed like you had kind of like, oh, dream job. Most people would consider you're set for life with a job for the government, but you obviously weren't happy. You weren't fulfilled and you wanted to change, which is totally understandable. I totally agree that if you're unhappy in your job, you should get out because it will start to seep into your daily life. So what did you do to kind of turn things around?

Starting point is 00:12:35 Um, well, I just, it all started, I think, having to do with taking a part-time course in web development because I felt, well, I'm not learning anything in my current job right now. I should just seek outside resources. And there I met people who had changed their careers. And yeah, it was just nice to hear other people's stories the way they were feeling about their career too. So there was like a sense of community. So I'd have to say that was kind of what triggered it. And then from there there I started to take more courses um those weekend workshops uh with ladies learning code and yes yeah and I thought like those were really cool because you know it's it's women leading the um courses and then they have like female mentors and the majority of

Starting point is 00:13:22 people who are taking the courses women so it's also nice again to like share like oh why are you taking this course or you think of a career change and again you know just that sense of community and being able to uh relate to each other was what I found I guess my current job was lacking or sorry not my current job I love my current job yeah yeah your past job previous job yeah of course. So you found that it was really kind of vital to make the next step to kind of jump into a career that you would be more fulfilled in to kind of just go outside of your comfort zone, take some courses, see if that's what you like to do. And also you did a lot of networking and went to events to meet other people in that field to see if that's what you wanted to do, right? Yeah. Which I think is awesome because most people will maybe just do a lot of research online, but they won't. It's so valuable to, yeah, actually talk to people that are working in the field to see if that's something you want to do. Yeah. And I think you're also an introvert

Starting point is 00:14:20 too, but given the fact that I'm crazy insane, I think I'm the epitome of introversion. It was very difficult because I was going to these meetups by myself. Oh, that's so hard, isn't it? It's so hard. And the fact that I didn't have any tech experience, I didn't have a tech background, I worked for the government. So I'm sure, you know, like I felt I wasn't worth talking to. I felt like people didn't really feel the need to talk to me because, you know, I wasn't in the

Starting point is 00:14:52 industry yet. But now that I am, it just feels more like it's a fit. Yeah. But prior to that, it was very, very awkward. I felt like it was like speed dating and I wasn't prepared, right? I just didn't know how to initiate the conversation but it got easier with time right like the more you do it the easier it gets yeah kind of but then also the same time I feel sometimes like when I go to these things people already like know each other

Starting point is 00:15:16 and then like when you don't know anybody it's just kind of like awkward and scary I'll just hide behind the food I know I know those It's not easy for sure. And especially when I first moved to Toronto and really wanted to switch careers, I was working in sales, wanted to move into a digital marketing role. I did go to lots of those networking events and I went alone. And man, was it tough. Especially I find it's tough. And especially as a woman, I find it very tough to talk about myself and elevate myself and say, oh, I'm awesome at this.

Starting point is 00:15:49 Yeah. Because you just don't do that normally, you know? And that's something that I feel like you, as I'm realizing as I get older and older, it's you need to do that. You have to talk yourself up. Otherwise, no one will care. Because unless you tell them why they should care, they won't care. Yeah, if that makes sense. I don't know. I think maybe it's one of these things where I would need to like listen to a Rocky montage and like pump myself up before. Yes. Yeah. Or just a glass of wine helps for me. One glass of wine will do the trick. And then I'm

Starting point is 00:16:22 a bit like, all right, hey guys, let's chat. So what I love about your blog is you have been doing this series called the, is it the Making the Bacon series, right? Yeah. Initially it was like, how are you making the bacon? And then I was like, oh, that's too long. So now I just decided to keep it short and just be like making the bacon with whoever, so-and-so.

Starting point is 00:16:42 Yes. But yeah. Which I love because I was featured on there thank you very much but you highlight um women that are doing really like how were they making their money what are they doing their careers that are interesting so in sport you're sharing inspirational stories so other people can relate and you know have the courage to do it themselves yeah um how the reason why I started it was just basically, again, going back to my previous job.

Starting point is 00:17:08 I was like, oh, I don't know what I want to do with my life and what other jobs are out there. And yeah, I guess it was one of those, like when you have an aha moment or an aha idea for your blog, like, hey, what if I do this career series? And then yeah, I just contact people thinking their job is interesting and would want to know more about it. And'm sure um a lot of the readers are probably thinking oh hey like i never knew like that was what uh this particular job consisted of so yeah

Starting point is 00:17:33 i think it's interesting you know just reading about yeah all the different jobs and then how people got into them and what they like about it and also um especially like the struggles they face because you know like every person i think uh faces some sort of struggle in their career at one point absolutely absolutely and if they say they haven't they're lying they're so lying yeah it always kind of makes me you know think of you know my younger sister has a semester left at university and then she's you know graduated with a bachelor's degree and she's at the point where she's starting to think about her future, what she wants to do as a career.

Starting point is 00:18:09 And she's getting, you know, a general arts degree. I mean, I graduated with a fine arts degree in film production, so she's almost a little better off than I was, I think. And I try to think,

Starting point is 00:18:19 you know, something like that, like your series would be so useful for, you know, these women that are in university and at the point where they're starting to think of like where do I actually want to take my career because it's hard when you are in university and you're just studying writing papers you're not necessarily thinking or you don't necessarily have the resources to find out what real jobs

Starting point is 00:18:40 are outside of those walls yeah I think even going further back in high school, because you enter university at such a young age, how are you supposed to know what you want to be when you grow up, when you haven't even worked in the professional world? You don't have the experience and you figure, okay, just based on the high school subjects I like or the high school subjects I'm good at,

Starting point is 00:19:03 I'm going to major in this. Only to find that the majority of people, they end up switching. Well, I ended up switching my degree. So I'm going from chemical engineering to science. And then I didn't realize I don't even like science. I don't even really like working in the lab, unfortunately. So I don't know. It's just one of those things where I think I don't know if high school

Starting point is 00:19:23 could ever become more practical in the future to try and give people more of that option to actually like really experience what it's like in the work. I don't even know. I think there was a co-op program in my high school, but I didn't even bother to take it. Like I shouldn't. Thinking back, I should have tried that work. I think we may have had that program, but it wasn't like highly publicized. And I don't think it was like learn what, you know, yeah, a chemical engineer actually does or a digital marketer does. It was very like this is what a nurse does.

Starting point is 00:19:55 I'm like, I'm pretty sure everyone kind of knows, you know, like there's enough TV shows about hospitals. I think we get it. There should definitely be a little bit more education. Yeah. In terms of teaching people what jobs are actually out there and and to be fair it is kind of difficult because you know jobs are changing all the time i mean my role didn't exist like social media did not exist when i was in high school and that's a big part of my job right now so yeah and then like my job was actually like. It didn't exist early on with the company. I think it was just recently made up, maybe a few months before I started.

Starting point is 00:20:32 Exactly. And so what do you do now? Well, I can't really disclose what I do on a daily basis, but I could kind of give a general description. It's a bit of tech and a bit of business together um so we have a lot of servers in different countries so i'm responsible for um researching like the countries and setting up servers over in those countries virtually monitoring them making sure they're gathering data and also managing the costs of those servers so yeah it has a bit of a personal

Starting point is 00:21:03 finance aspect yeah It's funny because And again, that's probably a job that most people wouldn't even be aware of, but it's like, no, most companies have that position in them, right? Exactly. Wow. So, you know, wrapping up, I would love to, because you have interviewed so many people for your blog for this, making the bacon series what are some of the kind of key things that you've learned or just some tips that you would give to you know millennials or students um when it comes to career advice um well let's let's say that this is not coming from expert but this is uh what i tried and I found to work for me.

Starting point is 00:21:45 Just basically going to meetups and listening to like talks, just listening to people about their different experiences. I found taking the workshops and courses and again, also meeting people through those things. I think the biggest thing would have to be be relentless to develop a thick skin and to not give up. But be smart and strategic about quitting. When something you know isn't working and you feel

Starting point is 00:22:15 it won't work, then I don't see a point in putting... It's okay to focus your efforts elsewhere. And also know that you aren't alone so it's pretty obvious that like social media the internet and blogs have shown that there are a lot of people going through the same thing so absolutely yeah and I know I think that's a really key thing that you said like don't it's okay to quit and I feel like honestly growing up my mom and this and

Starting point is 00:22:42 that like I understand where my mom was coming from. But when I was younger in high school, I was a bit of a – not a job hopper, but I didn't really take my customer service job super seriously because I got paid minimum wage and whatever. She used to always put the importance of, I know it's not super fun. I'm talking like I used to work in A&W. It was greasy and there was fries all the time. Yeah, it wasn't a great job. It was what it was. But she used to always kind of put the importance of like, don't quit. Please don't quit. You need to save for university and also it's teaching you a lot and this is life. Sometimes you're not going to like your job. But as I've gotten older, I've kind of realized, you know, it's okay to quit when you know

Starting point is 00:23:27 it's time to quit. If it's having an effect on you, like your mental health, then it's time to go. Yeah. And that's okay. There's nothing wrong with quitting. No. Key takeaway. Key takeaway.

Starting point is 00:23:40 I know. I know. Sort of a negative, but it's also positive. Honestly, like I've, whenever I've, you know, finally decided to quit something and then I've done it, something positive has always happened after. It's scary when you're in that moment where you're like, oh my gosh, I don't know what lies ahead, but usually something really positive happens after. So. And that was episode 41 of the Mo Money Podcast. Thank you so much for listening. I really appreciate it.

Starting point is 00:24:05 Make sure to check out the show notes for some more information about Karen, her blog, and her blog series about careers and women and people just doing awesome things at jessicamorehouse.com slash 41. And also, before I go, I just wanted to give out a few shout outs to some iTunes reviews. I really, really appreciate when people give me reviews on iTunes. It lets me know what people want to hear more of, less of, and if I'm just doing a good job. So make sure to do that. Again, go to the show notes, JessicaMorales.com slash 41 for a link if you're not already on iTunes.

Starting point is 00:24:39 But here are some reviews that I've gotten recently. So the first review is from Gidowska. They say, this podcast is great for Gen Y or millennials. Jessica has smart conversations with a great range of guests. Looking forward to future episodes. Well, thank you so much. The next one I have is from Tech Savvy Ish. I Googled how to write a review because I wanted to share how much this podcast has changed my life.

Starting point is 00:25:02 Thanks for making that Google. That's awesome. I've always had financial goals, but I wasn't very focused. I would pay more than I should on my debt, but I wasn't making huge debts. After I began to listen to this podcast last year, I crushed some serious goals. And I'm on my way to financial freedom. Thanks, Jessica. Thank you.

Starting point is 00:25:18 That is freaking awesome. And I can't wait for you to reach your financial freedom goals. That's super, super cool. And one more from Kujo222. Jessica's interview skills are excellent. She's great and engaging conversations with interesting guests. I am so happy to have found this Canadian-based personal finance podcast. Keep it up.

Starting point is 00:25:37 Thank you so much to everyone who has left me a review. If you haven't yet, please do. I will read it on a future episode and just give you a virtual high five or thumbs up or whatever. So thanks again for listening and I will see you here next Wednesday. This podcast is distributed by the women in media podcast network find out more at women in media.network

More Money Podcast - 041 How to Make That Bacon - Karen Yap from Makin' the Bacon

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.