If you’re feeling overwhelmed by money issues and financial decisions, you probably have work to do on your money mindset. Don’t worry, you are not alone in how you are feeling. You are also not alone in needing to work on yourself in this way. I have spent a lot of time working on my own money mindset, and there is still plenty more to do! Even Denise Duffield-Thomas, bestselling author of “Get Rich, Lucky Bitch” in her blog, says, “it felt like it was never going to be my turn” as she knew that there was work to do on herself.
Let’s start at the beginning. When you were a child and first came into contact with money, what stories were you told? You might have
There are many more stories that I have heard over the years. Think about the stories you have been told, from as far back as you can go, working forward gradually to the present day. Then take each story in turn and think about how the story serves you, whether it is putting limitations on you to stop you achieving the most out of your life or making you self-sabotage when money does come into your world.
Living month to month, being afraid to spend money, never seeming to have enough no matter what you do are all signs of a scarcity mindset. Living with this may well mean that you charge clients less than you should or accept a lower salary or bonus, but don’t worry, with a little work, you can change your money mindset to one of abundance. As I’m sure you can imagine, an abundance mindset is the opposite of a scarcity mindset, where you will always have more than enough to meet your goals.
Knowing where your money needs to go and what your financial goals are is the first step towards abundance. Begin with a monthly spending plan, not forgetting to leave yourself some fun money for yourself. You can then begin to plan for the longer-term and your future financial goals.
I first came across this idea in Jason Butler’s book, Money Moments. Many of us spend emotionally, whether we’re happy or sad. One way to avoid this kind of emotional spending is to put the item back and leave it for an hour or so. This will give your brain time to process whether the item fits with our values and is a worthwhile use of the cost. You can do the same thing when you’re online.
You may have seen this word recently. It’s what happens when we look around us at other people and compare our lives with those of others. It is especially easy to do and also dangerous on social media. Those perfect lives that everyone has on Facebook or Instagram. Remember, they are only ever showing you what they want you to see. This can also stop you feeling gratitude for what you have.
One way to help move your mind from this to seeing how great your own life is, is to begin a gratitude journal. Each evening before you go to sleep, write down three things you are grateful for. Apart from anything else, it finishes the day on a calm, contented note, which will also aid your sleep. However bad things are, you should always be able to find three things to be grateful for, even if they are as simple as the air you breathe, the food you eat and the clothes you wear.
Money blocks are the things that we tell ourselves about money that stop us from achieving or help us to self-sabotage. They shape the way we think about money and can have a disastrous impact on our financial situation, because what we think effects the actions we take and therefore, the results we get.
We need to identify these money blocks and change the negatives into positives. There are a number of ways of doing this, but you might want to work with a therapist, financial coach or even use something like EFT (tapping). Whichever route you choose, having an abundance mindset will be a great place for you to achieve your life goals.
Your starting point to supercharge your money mindset should be your financial plan. We can help you to create and develop this. Drop us an email to client.services@smartfinancial.co.uk and we will be in touch.