Let’s talk about money!

I’ve recently had an influx of clients wanting help with their mindset around money and it got me thinking about this. I don’t know many people who were taught about money from a young age, I don’t know many people who openly talk about their financial situation and are comfortable doing so, I know a lot of people are in a huge amount of debt, and I know a lot of people stress about about money.

In most circles talking about money is kind of taboo, people feel uncomfortable talking about.

I want you to ask yourself why?

There are many reasons… however in my opinion it doesn’t matter the reason, what we need to to do is change this. I believe that we should be taught about money at a young age, we should be taught how to spend in a healthy way, how to save, the value of it, we should have open conversations about it as adults so we can all learn and evolve in our relationship with money. At the end of the end of the day we all need money to survive so why not have a awesome relationship with it.

So today I thought I’d share my money story in the hopes that we can start to talk about this topic openly and start to change our relationship with money.

I grew up kind of poor. We often didn’t have much food, I wore a lot of hand me downs and a lot of our clothes were either too small or way too big (because it was a hand me down) or had holes in them. To get anything new it had to be put on lay by and paid off or I had to wait until Christmas or my birthday, even then it was sparse compared to others. Buying or paying for anything whether it was food, clothes or a school excursion was a huge stress for my family and I. My mum had debt up to her ears and each pay check was pretty much gone before it was even deposited. So you can only imagine the beliefs that I formed about money and my worth as a child. No one every taught me about money. The only things I ever heard as a child to do with money were, “We don’t have enough”, “We have no bloody money” or “I can’t afford it.”

Going into my adult years, I followed in my mum’s footsteps… I never budgeted, I acquired a lot of debt, I lived pay check to pay check and refused to take a good, long hard look at my finances. Throughout my adult years buying things gave me a lot of anxiety for many reasons, the biggest being that I felt guilty after I bought things because I felt I didn’t deserve it, the other reason being that even if I had enough money to buy it, deep down I believed I didn’t have enough and catastrophised what could happen if I made the purchase. So shopping was not a very enjoyable experience for me and lead to a lot of indecisiveness and internal conflict.

Today my story is very different, I budget, I have savings, I am debt free, I have invested money and continually work on my relationship and beliefs with money. I still get anxiety about money from time to time, however I invite it as it means there’s a belief there that I still need to work on and change. For example I just went away on a girls trip to Nusa Lembongan (OMG!!! it is AMAZING! I highly recommend if you’re ever going on a holiday to Bali) and I spent way more than I expected to, there were many moments when my mind was getting fearful for spending that much but I worked through it and left the island feeling rejuvenated and that I was completely worth every rupiah that I spent.

Now I have some questions for you…

Do you budget?
Do you know how much money is in your back account/s?
Do you know how much debt you’re in?
Do you have anxiety around money?
Do you feel money holds you back from getting what you want out of life?

If you answered yes to any of these, you’re not alone. Majority of people have money issue’s in some shape or form, they just don’t talk about it.

Now I’m going to share with you how I got over a lot of my anxiety and issues around money.

1. I budgeted- it wasn’t as scary as I thought and it actually gave me a great sense of control. I made sure that I added in play/fun money, money for gifts and sometimes I went over my budget and that was ok. I used this budgeting tool to help me. It’s AMAZING!
2. I saved for a $1000 emergency fund- the emergency fund is for an emergency so that I didn’t have to use a credit card to pay for an unexpected expense like a car issue or a new washing machine (I saved this before paying off any debt).
3. I payed off my debt from smallest to biggest– its a lot easier to keep momentum paying debt off this way because you get to see it go quicker. I cut up all my credit cards while I was paying them off, so I couldn’ t use them.
4. I got rid of all my credit cards– once they were paid off. I have been debt free for over 4 years now and it feels great. I will never get a credit card again.
5. I worked on my money/financial beliefs- I changed my beliefs around not deserving it, and that there’s not enough through hypnosis. I saw my online therapist to help me and also have done and still do self hypnosis when needed and work on my beliefs at a conscious level as well.
6. I changed the way I talk about money in my day to day existense. For example, If I’m invited to something and it’s out of my budget for the week and it’s not super important to me that I go. I will say, “thanks for the invite, unfortunately I won’t be able to come as I’m saving my money at the moment.” In the past I would have said, “I’m sorry I can’t afford it.” Can you see the difference in the message I’m putting out? (what we put out we get in return).
7. I learned about money– I used to hate money, I found it boring, now you can’t stop me learning and talking about it. I’m always reading a book, listening to a podcast or watching some youtube video about investing, saving and the energy of money.

Here are some of my fave books on money:

• The Barefoot Investor: The Only Money Guide You’ll Ever Need By Scott Pape (this one is great for all the Aussie’s).
• The Total Money Makeover By Dave Ramsey (American based, but anyone can get a lot out of it)
• Love Your Life Not Theirs: 7 Money Habits for Living the Life You Want By Rachel Cruze (Rachel is Dave Ramsey’s daughter, she puts a female spin on what she’s learned from her dad and what works for her, it’s short and to the point.)
• Get Rich Lucky Bitch By Denise Duffield Thomas (This book focuses on shifting money blocks and changing what you attract, I LOVE Denise, she’s an Aussie and is real, I’ve done her course too).
• Ask and It is Given: Learning to Manifest your Desires By Esther and Jerry Hicks (This is a spiritual based book on the law of attraction, It has a cool story on how Esther gets her information. If you’re not into the woo woo stuff I suggest you put her channeling to the side and listen to the overall message, it’s a game changer!)

Today I take my personal and professional experience helping people to overcome a range of issues that life presents including their relationship with money. If you would like to know more about how I might be able to help you I offer a free 15 minute chat, you can book in here or contact me here.