Do you believe you can be rich?

Does financial success always seem to be frustratingly out of your reach? Does it feel like whatever you do, you never quite earn the money you want? Find out why it may be time you changed your beliefs!

In the latest of our Love yourself wealthy series by Katie Phillips of Daring & Mighty, we find out how your beliefs can help move you forward towards the success you want – or hold you back from it. And learn what you can do to change them if you need to.

Do your beliefs match your dreams?

Last time, I encouraged you to give yourself permission to dream big; to see yourself in possession of £10 million pounds. This week, I’d like you to probe a little more deeply.

Hopefully you now have a clearer picture of the life you want. But are your beliefs in alignment with those dreams? You see, the biggest thing that stands in the way of many of us achieving what we want in life, is our own thoughts. Your future will inevitably unfold, but just how it does, and what direction it takes you in depends on what you’re thinking and feeling right now.

And if you think or believe that you can’t really get the success you want, or won’t ever be rich, then chances are you won’t. And not because it was never possible, but because you never believed it was, and therefore never took a step towards it.

So if you want to enjoy success and financial abundance, it’s essential that you identify the thoughts that will help you achieve it, and start acting as if those beliefs are already yours.

What beliefs will help you reach your dreams?

Mike Dooley, in Leveraging the Universe proposes an interesting exercise on this topic. He suggests that you hold your dream in your mind, and then make a list of the beliefs that would obviously and logically be helpful to have.

Think about our last exercise. What did your life and business look like? What beliefs would you need to naturally hold if you lived that lifestyle? For example, if you were a successful entrepreneur, your list of personal beliefs may look something like:

  • I am worthy.
  • I’m deserving.
  • There’s enough for everyone.
  • My thoughts become things and events of my life.
  • Amassing wealth is easy.
  • I am brilliant and clever and tuned into trends.
  • I was born to thrive.
  • I’m a money magnet.
  • I’ve always been lucky.

It doesn’t matter if you don’t currently believe these things – simply identifying beliefs that you’d like to have is the first step towards installing them. The next step comes with changing your behaviour.

We often think too small

Too often we unwittingly manifest our own life circumstances by thinking too small. We base our beliefs on the kinds of experiences we’re already having, the things we know we can already achieve. But instead we need to think about what we want to achieve and be.

You see, we can create huge change in our lives by acting as if the beliefs we want are already ours, and as a result start changing our behaviour.

To give you some examples of ways this can happenyou might enrol on a course, join a membership club or buy a self-help book to help you be the person you want to be, or maybe you start dressing for the success you want (you can read a powerful example here of how buying a more expensive wardrobe helped a businessman to become more successful).

Even just small changes such as carrying a different bag, or making better food choices can strengthen our new belief system, and encourage other changes – creating a positive, upwards cycle.

A quick exercise

To help you see just how powerful small changes can be in moving you closer to the life you want, try this simple exercise:

  1. First, think about the change you’d like to see in your life. It may be getting a promotion at work, a new job, going freelance or earning a particular amount of money from your business.
  2. Then write a list of the beliefs (similar to above) that you would have if you had already achieved your goal. How would you feel and what would you believe about yourself?
  3. Now think about changes you can start making today to act as if you already have the belief. For example, if your belief is ‘I am healthy and full of energy’ what can you do to realise this? Eat a healthier diet? Get more sleep or exercise? If it’s ‘I am in control of my time’ how can you learn better time management strategies now?

Believe and make it happen

The biggest changes in our lives start with the tiniest adjustment in how we think and feel. So if you want to break free of the limits you feel that are placed on your life right now, you need to start small.

Understand the beliefs that you would have if you had achieved the success you want, and make changes in your life now to help you start making them real – and stop holding yourself back!

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.