Sunday, June 05, 2011

Are You Afraid of Money



Hearing the word money makes many people cringe. Some people are in debt because they cannot overcome the fear of money. The single key to overcoming the fear of money is to determine the root cause of your fear. Examine life experiences associated with money during your childhood or early adult life. Negative thoughts become negative feelings. Negative feeling become negative words, negative words become negative actions. If you continuously make negative statements about your financial situation you will manifest those statements into reality. To change the way you think about money you have to be willing to make scarifies. Here are 6 steps to begin changing the way you think about money:

1. Remove the following phrases from your vocabulary: I can't, I don't have, I will never be able to, I am a loser, I am broke, I have nothing, I don't have any money, I will have to work until I am 65, I will never be able to buy a house, the more I make the more I will spend, money is the root of all evil, money just causes you to have more problems, I am not good with money, etc.
2. Be thankfu. Be thanks for and be responsible with what you have. If you cannot be thankful and responsible for what you have now, how will you be able to handle your finances if you gain more in the future?
3. Go back. Think about your childhood and identify any traumatic or painful experiences or beliefs you had about money and write them down.
4. Write down your thoughts. Write down why you felt that way. Next write down how those thoughts have affected you as an adult. Ask yourself if you truly believe those thoughts, have they just become habits or someone else's thoughts projected on you. If they are someone else's thoughts projected onto you then you can easily eliminate those. If they are your own thoughts, then you had to make a hard decision and commitment to yourself that you will stop having negative thoughts about money.
5. Take action. Each time you have a negative thought or make a negative statement about money or your current financial situation and immediately write down why you feel that way. Then write down a positive statement that is the exact opposite of that negative thought. If you need additional reinforcement buy some books on positive affirmations. You can also put an empty jar or water bottle somewhere where you will see it often and place $5 in the jar every time you think or speak a negative thought about money. Repeat this for 30 days. (Experts state it takes 23 days to make something a habit) By the end of 30 days you will have begun to change your thoughts about money. Whatever money you have in the jar after the 30 days use that money to pay a bill, put in a savings account or investment account.
6. Set goals. Set a monetary goal that you wish to accomplish and a deadline for that goal, i.e. I will pay off my Visa credit card by December 30, 2011. Once you accomplish your first goal continue to make additional financial goals and continue this throughout your life and you will see your financial situation improve and your negative thoughts turn into positive ones.

You must believe that money does not make you smarter, nicer, more successful, and more intelligent or a better person. Your character determines all these things not money. If you were a mean person when you had a few dollars you will continue to be a mean person when you have more money.

Make this affirmation, "In the past I have used my negative thoughts to create debt but from this day forth I will use positive thoughts to create wealth." I leave you with one of my quotes, "Money has the ability to generate debt or generate wealth, you make the choice".

1 comment: