On a routine ‘chucking’ expedition at my house the other night, I found my mothers old jewellery box in amongst the crap that I had stuffed lazily into our lounge room cabinet. What was exciting, was what I found INSIDE the jewellery box - it was so heavy I almost dropped it as I pulled it out of the dusty corner - I hadn't laid eyes on it all year.
There I was: 9 O’clock at night, standing amongst a pile of junk, in my mismatching pyjamas, grinning from ear to ear like a moron and fist pumping the air with happiness…
No, I’m not insane and I’ll tell you why in a minute. But first:
** Spoiler alert
I’m about to say some things – to do with our attitude to money – that might sound a little 'woowoo' and strange, at first.
See, to give you context – I’ve just started reading this amazing book by a once-was-nobody-turned-millionaire-life coach, Denise. She specializes in teaching women to change their attitude towards wealth and money so that they can manifest more of it into their life – instead of ‘repelling’ it.
Ever felt like you just REPEL money from your life?
Yeah. I did
Denise (millionairebitch) claims to have initially been living a very modest lifestyle, renting a tiny apartment with her husband, shopping strictly in op shops (second hand / thrift stores) and struggling to make ends meet.
She then managed to deliberately turn this around and won a 6 month all expenses paid trip around the world with her husband, then a life coaching scholarship, a self-publishing home study program, a $1500 ticket to attend a seminar in Vegas and now pulls in at least A MILLION (per annum) through her business...
FCK off, right?
But I believed her.
Notice how some people seem to just be lucky and ‘win’ everything, while others, literally receive bill after bill and struggle to even buy themselves a coffee - never quite having enough left over for them.
This Denise woman (AKA millionairebitch) basically says - from what I’ve read so far anyway - that our money situation is based on a few things:
- Our level of self-love and self-respect for ourselves
- Your limiting beliefs (that have not yet been acknowledged and released)
- Your attitude towards money. Are you the type to scoff at and then walk over a 10 cent coin on the street – and keep walking? Or are you the type to pick up that 10 cent coin and kiss it and smile and thank the universe for always taking care of you?
I was definitely the ‘walks over 10 cent piece and scoffs’ type.
I never forget, years ago, being out with a friend getting coffee. As we were walking back to the car, there was a 20 cent piece on the ground that I spotted, first - and then walked right on by. A second later, my friend said something like: “Oh there’s 20 cents! Mine!”
I half laughed and said – "pffft, yeah you can have it"
She got really cross with me, like she might slap me and said: “No! That shouldn’t be your attitude towards money; you should always pick up money in the street and appreciate it!”
I thought she was nuts.
It took me 2 years to figure out what she meant – or that she might be right.
She’s now 24 and bought her first house – and I’m still over here somewhere, struggling with that same feeling of:
“BUT WHERE DID ALL MY MONEY GO?”
That old attitude I had towards money (discounting & not appreciateing what I already had) was why I think I struggled for so long to have money. If I came into money, I seemed to spend it as quickly as I got it - I’d suddenly hit my car and need to pay damages or have a forgotten phone bill to pay, and OFF IT WENT AGAIN.
Like: “BYE, FUCKER. SEE YA NEVER”
I was sabotaging myself without even realizing it. Could have been because deep down I thought: “Nope – you don’t deserve this, your limiting beliefs say so and I KNOW ALL ABOUT THEM.
Or; the fact that I had too many bad money memories ‘blocking me’ - that I needed to acknowledge and forgive.
It’s quite confronting to think, well – shit. I’ve got X amount of dollars in my account it’s not exactly err anywhere near the amount I’d like to have at this point in time, but it’s absolutely and entirely, MY FAULT.
It’s all to do with your mentality mate!
Not your boss for underpaying you, or your jerk ex husband for ripping you off with child support, or your need to constantly splurge on nice things.
I decided to do a little experiment. I obediently did as Denise told me and:
- Made a (bloody sizeable and mortifying) ‘money forgiving list’ where I jotted down every (money related) memory/event/situation that I could think of that stirred a negative emotion within me:
- Like when my older brother lent me $800 3 years ago and said there was absolutely no hurry to pay him back, just whenever I was ready. Then, 6 weeks later, after having an argument, he demanded back the entire $800 immediately, right before Christmas. It left me broke for Christmas, it was kinda shitty;
- Or the memories of shopping with mum when I was younger and the way she’d prep me in the car on the way home about not telling Dad exactly how much we’d bought and to pretend the prices were LESS than what we really paid;
- Or that time in Grade 5 my dad decided to punish me for cracking my school laptop screen by not having it fixed for me. Instead, he personally carried in this big old computer monitor to hook my laptop up to and use as a screen instead. THE REST OF THE TERM I had to sit there, alienated, at the back of the class, looking like I was too poor to have my laptop fixed.
- Other than my forgiveness list, I also started to acknowledge every cent that had come to me recently, which I had ungratefully steam-rolled over with my ‘woe is me, I’m poor’ story. On it I wrote - $300 cash from Gma (early bday present) $80 overtime on my pay this week, and the $400 tax refund I just got. I realized, that actually, I’d just recently come into nearly $1000 - without even realizing it.
Really, I’d been quite the ungrateful b*tch.
I also included a list of things that I’d recently gotten for free (that wasn’t monetary) like free flights and accommodation to Melbourne next month, dinner brought for me last Friday, the coffee my friend at work bought me.
I was surrounded by abundance and totally unappreciative of it.
With each thing on my ‘money forgiveness list’ - the shit memories surrounding money - I had to acknowledge how it still made me feel, then ‘release’ it through a special mantra.
Then I sat back like; I’m cured! And immediately thought:
'Kay, now where’s my money?'
Just kidding, takes a bit longer than that
These negative money memories (above) leave an emotional charge in our body and can turn into self-sabotaging beliefs that lead you to manage your money poorly.
What do you frequently think to yourself - or feel - whenever you spend money? Anxiety? Resentment?
I started to again notice my thoughts -every time I spent money - and made sure to keep them positive.
At the grocery checkout, instead of whinging internally about how much your food bill costs; give thanks that you can afford wholesome and fresh food to nourish your body.
Back to my jewellery box; finding it was part of my little money manifesting experiment. I’d been diligently following Denise’s above steps and hoping and waiting for a sign that I was on the right track and being ‘heard’. I hoped I’d find a 10 cent piece on the street or something...
I planned to go overboard with appreciation, making sure I picked it up, smiled, said a silent thanks (to the universe) for sending it my way.
Later at home, I was reading about the power of decluttering your life to allow new things to come in, so I went on a little decluttering expedition and turned my room upside down. This is how I found my mother’s old jewellery box.
I was so stoked with my find! I did as promised and celebrated my little treasure chest of coins and immediately promised to bank it on Monday, no matter how small a figure it amounted to.
Turns out I had $17.00 worth of loose change there.
So, focus on feeling affluent, keep your thoughts about money positive, track every cent that COMES IN to you and appreciate it. This is the way to manifest more wealth into your life!
HAPPY MANIFESTING x