Disclaimer: This is a departure from my normal blog posts. As some of you know, I hate blogs with lists and bullet points on "How to be Successful" or "Ten Ways to be Happy" or even, "Fifty Rituals that the Most Successful People Do Daily". There is not one way to success and those lists just irk me (btw, they are usually written by interns or 20somethings who follow a popular plug and play formula). With that being said, I felt compelled to write this kind of blog today. As I work with more women in my coaching business it is becoming quite clear to me that many of them suffer with an unhealthy relationship with money. And it is crippling their ability to prosper. So consider this a public service reminder blog. I'll get back to my regularly scheduled blog routine soon. Promise!
So many people don't even realize that they have any relationship with money. In fact, for most folks the word money and the word relationship aren't even in the same galaxy. People instantly think that the word relationship has everything to do with people, family, friends, and they are right to a degree. But we have relationships with everything. The formal definition of relationship is the way in which two or more concepts, objects, or people are connected, or the state of being connected.
I have a deep relationship with my couch, for example. There is a section of my couch that I call my safe spot. It's the place I retreat to after a hard day, or a difficult experience, or when I simply need to recharge. I love that section of my couch and feel connected to it in some emotional, bonding way. I feel disconnected from it when I travel. I know that sounds odd, but it's true. I bet you have an area, a safe spot, your go-to place to recharge that you feel connected to. We have relationships with pretty much everything in our environment, including concepts, and that is what I want to focus on today; our relationship with the concept of our money.
Most people have an unhealthy relationship with money. And sometimes it's not their fault. Some of you have been taught to think about money a certain way since you were a child. And as a result, instead of inheriting money, you inherited your unhealthy relationship with it. Some people have had some bad experiences around money at some point, and carry around this bad feeling their whole lives. There are even whole industries that perpetuate an unhealthy relationship with money. Take my industry, education, for example. I bet you've heard the quote, "you don't get into teaching for the money" or, "you won't ever get wealthy as an educator". People in this industry are practically brainwashed into scarcity thinking. As a result? They remain with scarcity. I would venture to think this is the same for the nursing industry, and the social services industries.
If you have an unhealthy relationship with money, you will never create the abundance you wish you had. In order to change your financial world, you need to change your feelings and paradigm about money. You need to change the way you think, feel and act about money. Here are some concrete beliefs you can adopt to begin to change your view of money:
•Your background, your IQ, your degree, your social status are completely irrelevant when it comes to earning money. Many of the richest people on the planet didn't finish college. In fact, many of them came from immigrant families with no wealth. Some of the people with the highest IQ or the best grades in college never prospered financially.
•Expect to make loads of money. Think really big: $150,000, $500,000, a million? Expect it daily.
•In the economy we live in, ANYONE can make a bunch of money. ANYONE! That's how this economy works, folks!
•If you solve a huge problem for people, you will make the most money. The question is not "What business should I create?" The question is "What problem can I solve?"
•You have the right to make a ton of money even if you are in service of people. If you give an incredible service to others, you have the right to make as much money as you can. This is perhaps one the most important paradigms to shift. Too many people believe that if they offer a service that helps another soul that they should be giving it away for free. Not true. You are just as deserving as someone who makes smart phones for folks, or the person who invented streaming Netflix.
•If you believe you will never have enough money, you will never have enough money. What you focus on the most gives you exactly what you focus on the most.
•If you really believe that abundance is available to all, you'll end up attracting your own abundance.
•If you don't pay attention to your money, you have no idea where it goes. If you want your relationship with money to improve you must pay it some attention. Think of it like a marriage. Stop ignoring it and start appreciating it.
•No one is going to make you rich. No one is going to discover you or fix you. You have to put the hard work in and know that you are deserving of success.
•Money is something that can always be made. Good health, for example, cannot always be made.
•Stop denying that money is important. In the economy we live in, money is important. You want shelter, food, clothes, healthcare? You get a tooth infection and need the dentist? You bet you need money! By denying that money is important you remain with little of it.
Developing a healthy relationship with money is critical if you are someone who wants to attract more of it. Continuing your unhealthy relationship is a choice and quite honestly a bit of a cop out. Even if you just want enough to survive and occasionally take a little vacay, adopting a healthy relationship with money is imperative to achieve that. Once you and your concept of money are solidly connected, may your relationship with each other last a lifetime (throws rice!)! Cheers to a prosperous 2016!
Michelle Rose Gilman is the founder of Fusion Academy and is a business coach and Founder of The Well-Heeled Warrior. You can visit her at her website and go say hi on Facebook