Do you have a money mindset?

How do you feel about money? Are you worried you don’t have enough? Learn why having an ‘abundance’ money mindset is so important – and how to get one.

Over the course of eight weeks, Katie Phillips from Daring & Mighty is looking at our relationship with money and wealth. This week, she’s exploring the idea of a ‘money mindset’ and how it can impact the choices you make in your life.

What’s your money story?

Sometimes our ‘money stories’ (our beliefs and attitudes towards wealth) may not be serving us and we need to transform them into ones that do.

It could be that we inherited our money beliefs from things that were said to us growing up. Some of the common phrases we often hear or messages we pick up include:

  • Money doesn’t grow on trees.
  • We can’t afford it.
  • Money is the root of all evil.
  • You can’t be spiritual and have money.
  • Money is scarce.
  • You must save and not spend – just in case.
  • There will never be enough.
  • It’s wrong to desire wealth.
  • You must work hard.

Or maybe we might have made decisions based on judgements about our gender. For instance, “As I am a woman I don’t make as much money and therefore… (insert career choice)… and therefore (insert bank balance)!

Are your beliefs holding you back?

These beliefs can hold many of us back – they are fear-based stories that impact on so many decisions we make that can potentially limit our careers and lives:

  • We don’t invest in training, advertising or a better wardrobe because we’re afraid we can’t afford it.
  • We only apply for jobs with salaries we think we are worth or capable of getting.
  • We don’t push ourselves forward or look for opportunities we think are beyond us.
  • We don’t ask for pay rises and promotions because we don’t think it’s our ‘right’.
  • We don’t seek networking opportunities that we perceive as being of a higher status than our worth.

Not only do we prevent ourselves from reaching for opportunities that we assume are beyond our financial potential, but we are afraid to spend money on things that may take us forward in life, or even things we may enjoy and get precious life experience from because we have fear that money, once gone, won’t be replaced.

How an ‘abundance mindset’ can move you forward

Moving beyond a ‘scarcity mindset’, in which there is a finite amount of money available to you, and when it is gone, it’s gone, to an abundance mindset in which there is plenty of wealth available if you make the right choices, can free you from this poverty prison.

With an abundance mindset, you are not afraid to invest in decisions that will benefit you in the long term, or put yourself forward for exciting and ambitious opportunities.

Nor do you feel a need, conversely, to spend money NOW, because you are confident that you are able to continue earning money, and therefore opportunities to enjoy your money won’t disappear.

How to get an abundance mindset

If you fear that your current money mindset is one of scarcity, and may be holding you back, what can you do? Here are some tips to help you change to an abundance mindset instead:

  • Be observant – be aware of when you’re practising a scarcity mindset and make a conscious decision to change it.
  • Focus on abundance – make yourself focus on the areas of abundance in your life, and the potential for it.
  • Be appreciative – get into the habit every day of being grateful for simple things like the food you eat, your warm bed, your loving family.
  • Avoid negativity – news and negative people can easily encourage fear of scarcity, so avoid them and spend time with positive people or doing things that make you happy instead.
  • Learn to collaborate – in a scarcity model, everyone else is competition, but with abundance there’s room for everyone, so choose collaboration over competition!
  • Get organised – if your life is in chaos it’s easy to feel panicked, so take control and organise your office, home and life.
  • Be generous – practice abundance by being generous with your time, your compliments, your thoughts and even your wealth (for example by giving to charity).
  • Surround yourself with positive messages – remind yourself that you live in a world of abundance by creating positive messages and images for yourself that you can see every day.

Practice makes perfect!

Like many habits, changing your money mindset won’t happen overnight. But if you do want to open yourself up to more wealth (and the exciting opportunities that come with it), practice your abundance mindset.

Soon it will feel more comfortable and natural, and you can start reaping the rewards.

Katie Phillips is the founder of Daring & Mighty, an organisation committed to sharing the importance of having a healthy, loving and conscious relationship with yourself.