Money Mindset
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Ever wonder why you struggle to make more money, or why you struggle to hold on to your money? It’s possible that you’ve got some deep-seated thoughts about money, and what having money means about who you are as a person that might be holding you back. Our actions are driven by our thoughts and feelings. And a lot of these thoughts are totally unconscious, they’re just playing on repeat in our heads like a bad song.
So when you stop to consider why you have a hard time making or holding on to money, or why you struggle to talk about money, it’s probably stemming from something you’re thinking on repeat about money that you might not even be aware of. Money is definitely one of those topics that people have a lot of weird beliefs about. So how do we figure out what those thoughts are and how do we change them?
First we start with a brain dump, which is simply writing down all the thoughts in your head. Spend five to ten minutes every morning writing down everything that comes to your mind about money. Don’t self-edit, self-judge, or wonder if it’s true. Just write it all down. This will help you uncover thoughts that you didn’t even know were floating around in your head. To get you started here are a few things you can write about (really dig into these, spend a whole brain-dump focused on just one of these questions):
Once you’ve finished your brain dump whip out a pen or pencil of a different color and go back through what you wrote and underline any facts. Remember, a fact is not a strongly held opinion...it’s something that every person on the planet could agree on. For example, “It’s cold” is not a fact, however, “It’s 53 degrees” is a fact. Everyone can agree that it’s a specific temperature, not everyone will agree that a specific temperature is “cold”. It’s likely that you’re not going to find many facts in your dump and that’s okay. The point is to show you that not everything you think is true.
Same process, different colored pen. Now go through your dump and circle the things that are thoughts. Since pretty much your entire dump is going to be a thought, perhaps you just focus on the top three thoughts that feel particularly true to you. Pull out the ones that you think might be shaping your actions around money. Take a new piece of paper and draw a line down the middle. List your top three thoughts on the left-hand side in a list format.
On the right side of your paper attempt to prove your thoughts wrong. For instance, if one of your thoughts is that “all rich people are evil” on the right you could list some rich people who you know are doing good things with their money. Or even if you can’t think of anyone doing good with their money (but those people definitely exist) you could just note that you don’t know all the rich people so you can’t determine that they’re all evil. Basically we’re playing devil’s advocate with ourselves to prove that not everything we think is true.
Now it’s time to work on replacement thoughts. Note that you don’t have to go all the way to sunshine and daisies here. If your thought is that “all rich people are evil” you don’t have to go to “All rich people are wonderful”. Your new thought could be “Jane is rich and she’s a great person” or “When I’m rich I’ll be generous:” or if that feels like too much of a stretch right now start with tacking on “ and that’s just something I’m thinking” so your new statement would be “All rich people are evil….and that’s just something I’m thinking”. This helps your brain to de-fact-ify habitual thoughts.
It’s going to take a while to re-program your brain, but that’s okay. It’s a practice worth repeating and sticking with to improve your relationship with money. Redirect your brain every time you notice one of those old, unhelpful thoughts. Eventually, you’ll have to do this less and less. After your initial brain dump sessions (after you’ve answered all the questions) continue to brain dump about money once a week, just to keep yourself aware of new thoughts you didn’t catch the first time. Like meditation or yoga, this is a practice that should be continued as long as you want a clean brain around money.
Our thoughts around money drive our actions, even if we’re not aware of them. The best thing you can do for your relationship with money is to figure out what you really think and believe about it. Dig in deep, clean up those thoughts, and practice practice practice your new thoughts. Your bank account and your business will thank you!
Learn more about thought work here: https://thelifecoachschool.com/
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