Daily writing prompt

Which topics would you like to be more informed about?

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There are so many people out there telling you how to make money these days. Courses, videos, podcasts, books…

The problem with all these digital creators on the internet is that they’re trying to teach you practical skills on how to set up your sales funnel and start selling something their way. And you’re not them. You’re wired differently. And the result of all these “lessons” can be that you feel even worse – ashamed or guilty because you can’t even get started. And it’s not because you lack skills. There’s something that’s worrying you. And let me tell you something: there’s nothing wrong with you! It’s just that the way these people sell is by addressing your money-related anxiety, but they’re not providing you with treatment for it. Because anxiety needs psychological help, not training in new technical sales skills. You may need new skills, of course, but that’s only after you’ve finished your “unfinished business” that’s on an emotional level, somewhere deep in your psyche.

You can be really brave and have amassed a lot of amazing skills, and still be broke. And do you know why? Because the secret to making money is “protected” by some painful experience in your past that you’ve created limiting beliefs from. And here’s the trick: in order to see the limiting belief that’s holding back the flow of money to you, you first need to let go of that painful emotion.

But who likes to feel fear, anxiety, shame, disappointment, disgust, humiliation, guilt, or anything on the negative emotional scale? Nobody, right? So that’s the real “problem” you need to solve first: to let go of that painful emotion in order to see what’s behind it. Then you can see the limiting belief that is preventing you from making money more consciously, rather than driven by fear.

These and other similar things, described in more detail and combined with practical exercises, can be found in the book Mind over Money: Overcoming the Money Disorders that Threaten our Financial Health from the authors Brad Klontz and Ted Klontz. This book and Ted personally helped me identify the money disorder I have, and I’m not going to lie to you – the healing process was really painful. But it’s a process – it takes a while, but then you’re reborn. Just like many other psychological transformations: very helpful, but not particularly enjoyable. But it was worth it.

So, if you’re feeling some uncomfortable emotions just reading this, your path forward is not to the next online “guru,” but to the right financial psychologist. You can try your usual psychologist, but the truth is that most therapists haven’t actually worked through the topic of money themselves, so they can’t guide you through your financial disorder healing process.

If you feel anxiety, regarding the topic of money, you are on the rigth track. The first step is to find the right financial psychologist you can trust.