Money Blocks: How Limiting Beliefs Are Keeping You Broke

 

 

 

 

Have you ever thought about your money mindset?

Examining your beliefs around money (and any blocks that may come up as a result) is ESSENTIAL if you want to sort your finances. 80% of personal finance is about how you think about money, the other 20% is the nuts and bolts that you need to organise it.

If you often feel frustrated and like there is never “enough” money, that’s a pretty big indicator that there’s something else at work here. And this may be what’s stopping you from achieving the wealth you desire and deserve.

But what exactly are money blocks? If you’re often crying “why am I always broke?”, let’s take a look at what the problem might be. 

What are Money Blocks? 

Money blocks are beliefs we carry which can ‘block’ us from achieving wealth and prosperity. 

Money blocks stem from many different moments throughout our lives. But it’s often as children, particularly before the age of 6, when our sponge-like psyche absorbs so much of the world around us (including the odd accidental swear word). And guess what? Children also pick up on the money-related behaviours of their parents – and this can go either way.

Take for example a child who is often told, “money is dirty”, or “rich people are evil”. While as an adult, you may be able to think this through rationally and realise that money isn’t actually physically dirty, your inner 6-year-old may be averse to touching money or having too much, for fear of it being “evil”. Translate this into adult-life, and you have a person who may not be able to either make, or keep, a decent amount of money – or both!

We all have blocks in our subconscious that stop us from being able to successfully control and handle money.

If you have money blocks (and if you’re reading this post, it’s very likely that you do!), you might be interested to learn more about this. 

Prefer video? Check out these common money blocks!

Money Mindset – Scarcity vs. Abundance

Your money blocks ultimately come down to your whole mindset around money, and there are two distinctive types of mindset: a scarcity mindset, and an abundance mindset. But which one do you fall into? 

Abundance Mindset

This mindset believes there will always be enough when you need it. This type of mindset is grateful for what is already present and for what is coming in the future. Focusing on this mindset brings comfort and confidence in your financial position as well as the ability to learn more skills around the subject and ultimately have more money long term.

This mindset makes us feel expansive and like anything is possible.

Scarcity Mindset

This mindset believes there is never enough. Never enough time, money, work, etc. If you’re doing well, then it must be at the expense of someone else. It can take the form of being afraid to spend or conversely spending everything and getting into debt because “when its gone its gone”, “you can’t take it with you”, and “you only live once”.

This mindset makes us feel small, stuck and frustrated, and it’s these limiting beliefs that can affect our ability to achieve our true wealth potential. 

What are Limiting Beliefs? 

All our lives we tell ourselves stories, and these stories lay the foundation for our beliefs and how we conduct our daily lives. When those stories are negative, and we believe these stories, they can literally hold us back from becoming who we really want to be. And this can filter down into our finances. Because when it comes to achieving prosperity, these beliefs can seriously affect how we receive, give, and manage money.

Where do Limiting Beliefs Come From? 

Your limiting beliefs largely stem from childhood and beyond, but they’re also controlled by your brain’s survival instinct. You know when you’re in your ‘comfort zone’, and are quite happy to stay there? That’s your brain’s way of keeping you safe. The human brain is primally wired to be risk averse, to literally keep us alive. Which obviously served us well in prehistoric times (and of course, still does in times of danger), but when it comes to daily life, it can be quite frustrating! If you’re repeating negative statements to yourself, you’re doing so from a place of fear and not wanting to move forward. But the thing is, these statements are not facts. They’re just stories. 

10 Common “Limiting Belief” Money Blocks 

As a money mindset coach, I’ve seen (and experienced) many blocks around money. I can also tell you that FOR YEARS my mindset was based in scarcity (and to a certain extent, it still is!) but I’m more aware of it now. And once you can identify your money blocks, you can begin to clear them and move forward. 

So, let’s explore 10 limiting mindset blocks around money that are commonly held. See if you recognise any of these, so that you can start to work through them and help you to prosper financially.

    1. “Money is the root of all evil”. For the record, “Evil” is the root of all evil. Money is a medium of exchange nothing more. If someone is a bad person, money just gives them larger means to achieve bad things. It is just the same way that a good person has a large means to do good. This belief is the same as; ”money corrupts”, or “money is dirty”. Money is a vehicle that can be used to effect change. Remove the emotion this injects to the subject to allow you more control.
    2. “I can’t afford it”. It is an excuse just like “when I achieve x, then I’ll do y”. It stifles your ability to think about how you could afford something or make something happen. It’s a chicken and egg scenario, especially when contemplating a purchase like coaching or a course. Yes you could get it all for free and figure it out yourself with the help of a thousand YouTube videos, but how has that been working out for you so far? If you want something different for your life, you need to do something different.
    3. “It’s selfish to want more money”. It’s difficult to achieve anything really great and help lots of people if you can’t feed yourself or your family and you are living pay check to pay check. You can make a difference however small with a charity donation but what if you could do more? If you stop limiting yourself with this mindset – how many people could you help? Does that still sound selfish now?
    4. “I’m not good with money”. This is a story you’ve made up over time. It disempowers you from learning new skills. The reality is very few people were taught true financial literacy when we were young or even subsequently. Money management however can be learnt like any other skill.
    5. “My family have never been rich”. This once again is a story that is disempowering you. It is true that if you grew up with very little money you are more likely to hold limiting beliefs around money. There are countless stories of millionaires who grew up in poverty though. You may also feel resentful of those who have money – “the rich get richer and the poor get poorer” is a phrase commonly said, often with a tinge of frustration. Yes not everyone has the same “24 hours” in a day, the same resources, or the same starting point. But are you going to let that fact empower you, or hold you down?
    6. “It is selfish to want money”. Much the same as “if I get rich I can’t be happy”. As a selfless person keen to give back and make a difference, how much more mentally and financially available could you be if you had more money? Not just for those who are most important to you, but to the wider community and even the planet?
    7. “I can either make money or do what I love not both”. This misses one of the fundamental points about where money comes from. It comes from other people and flows to you in proportion to your ability to solve people’s problems and provide a valuable service. If you can turn your passion into something others need and put in the work then you will make money. It’s not as simple as “build it and they will come”, but if you’re willing to put in the time, then they will… eventually. Alternatively, why not do something you love AND make money? Who says that you need to leap out into the unknown. Do it alongside a 9-5 and take the pressure off to perform.
    8. “Money is there to spend”. Spending in itself is not bad. But if the spending comes at the expense of saving and investing for the future, then there’s a problem here. Solve it by having some money for fun, and put the rest to work.
    9. “You have to work really hard to get money”. Solving other people’s problems and working out how to scale that might not be “easy”, but living in debt unable to help yourself let alone others isn’t exactly a walk in the park either. We are all capable of putting in effort when the requirement is great enough. There are numerous strategies to pay off debt, and if you are struggling, you can get help. Make a fast decision and then move on. Being in debt is one of the biggest things that will keep you stuck.
    10. “Money is not that important”. There are more important things in life I agree, but having enough to live on makes life much more manageable and turns a catastrophe into a minor inconvenience. Using this as a get-out-of-jail-free card so that you don’t take control of your finances doesn’t create future security.

How Your Money Blocks Might Show up 

Knowing our blocks is KEY to understanding how to turn around our finances. This might be to get out of debt, or to finally start saving and investing. There are several ways in which blocks might be showing up for you, so go through this list and see if anything applies.

Your Income

If you are constantly being overlooked for promotions, or find it difficult to ask for the salary you want, or you’re unable to make money in your business consistently and to the level you would like it to be, then you definitely have blocks somewhere.

Business

Entrepreneurs or service-based business owners may have trouble setting prices for their goods, consistently give away “freebies” when they should be charging, or allow themselves to be bartered with. This means their business cannot grow and they get stuck. Some people even give up their dream because they cannot gain any significant traction.

Debt

If you have any kind of debt, regardless of how it came about, you have blocks for sure. We either create debt ourselves for some kind of gain (such as keeping our disposable income capped so we don’t outshine anyone such as a parent or sibling who might earn less), or we attract people into our lives that are financially troublesome for us. I know you might be thinking, “why would I do this to myself”, but it’s all subconscious stuff, so you won’t even be aware of why you do it!

Overspending

If you regularly go out and spend to make yourself feel better, you have a block somewhere. It might be that you were never allowed to spend money as a child, so you make up for it now. It could be a sign of feeling depressed with your current situation (so you spend to make yourself feel “worthy” or “significant”), or guilt that you’re not around enough for your family (so you buy presents for everyone).

Hoarding

You might keep hold of every single pair of shoes you’ve ever owned, “just in case” you might need them, even though those leopard print boots were so Shania Twain in the 90s and really should go to charity or in the bin. The reason for doing this might be a scarcity mindset – one in which you think you will never be able to have more of the thing you are holding onto so tightly. This could be money, clothing, or items in the house. Clutter is bad for your psyche, bad for your money, and is most definitely a money block.

You Can’t Keep Hold of Money

Whenever you have money, something happens, such as a bill coming in, or you get a parking ticket, or a disaster happens, and the money you had rapidly disappears. This is definitely a sign of a money block.

How to Break Through Your Money Blocks

When you can identify these limiting beliefs/blocks, you can start to pick out the reasons why they are happening to you in the first place. Take a look at events in your past, money-related or not. It may seem trivial, like witnessing your parents fight over money, or you stole some penny sweets once. The important thing to know is – how did this event make you feel? Were you ashamed of the thing that happened, or did you blame yourself for something that as an adult you know is no big deal? It might not make any sense, but remember we’re thinking like children again – think back to the 6-year-old you were!

If you want to move from a scarcity mindset to an abundance mindset, being aware of your own limiting money blocks is a big head start. If I’ve rattled you with any of my answers to these 10 most common then it’s likely you hold them. Examining them with cold hard logic and removing the emotion attached is a start to moving forward. 

Here are a few more things to think about when it comes to challenging those limiting beliefs and working towards clearing those money blocks.

Money is Energy

We’ve already touched on how money flows from one person to another. Your own limiting beliefs could be ‘blocking’ that energy, stopping it from either flowing from you or to you. To help you with any blocks you may have, it can be useful to understand that money is representative of energy and is a form of energy exchange. 

When you purchase something from someone, you’re using money to acquire something tangible (or intangible) that is the by-product of someone else’s energy. If you find yourself thinking something along the lines of ‘I don’t deserve it,’ or ‘I can’t afford it,’ you’re blocking that energy from finding its way to you. So try to view money as a means of exchange, rather than something that you do or don’t deserve. It’s just currency, after all. 

When we consider how money is energy, it can help to open ourselves up to achieving abundance. For help with this, check out the post on How to Create an Abundance Altar – great for those who love a bit of feng shui!

Rewire Your Brain for Abundance

Imagine if you believed that you did deserve it, or that you could afford it – you’d find a way to make it happen. Which brings us to flipping those limiting beliefs upside down and looking at what you could really achieve. Here are some things you could try to rewire your brain for abundance:

Affirmations

Affirmations are short positive statements that are said as if the thing you want has already happened, or are said to counteract a limiting belief. For example, “money gives me the freedom to do the things that improve the quality of my life”, “I am a money magnet”, and “good things are coming to me too”. Write these everywhere and review them daily.

Change Your Thoughts

Start by listing your limiting money mindset blocks. With each belief, what would you choose to believe instead? For example, “money is evil” could become “money is an amazing supporter in my life and does good in the world”.

Give Your Inner Critic a Name

We all have an inner critic. It’s that voice that tells you that you’re incapable of achieving something; the voice that tells you those negative stories that you believe. Giving your inner money critic a personality can really help you to distance yourself from the behaviour you no longer want to participate in. 

Let’s take “Louise the broke Loser” for example. Louise represents all of your current thoughts around money, all the things you’d like to change, and the worse version of those thoughts all rolled into one. She’s so bad with money she’d have spent Brewster’s millions in 2 hours (apologies to those born after the 1980s for the reference). She will get the blame for all your money mindset blocks from now on.

Develop Your Abundance Persona

Create your second money avatar. Let’s take “Abundance Annie, the financially secure badass”. She has an abundant mindset, she believes money is infinite, and she deserves to have money to use for the good of herself and others. She knows she is great with money and is always learning better ways to manage it. 

Money flows to her abundantly. Now Annie represents how you would like to act around money and how you would like to take control of money – your “best money self” for want of a better description. So when you feel a limiting belief rise up, or a familiar situation that might have you splurging or limiting yourself, you can say “Hey Louise, Annie’s in charge now” or “what would Annie do”.

Use Emotional Freedom Techniques

This is a method of calming down your nervous system. Money can be a very stressful topic, especially when it comes to clearing old patterns of belief. This technique is so useful for dissolving blocks. YouTube is full of tutorial videos, so pick something. And learn how to use it to help you clear your blocks.

What Are My Abundance Blocks? 

While the above are some of the most common abundance blocks I’ve come across, it would be really useful for you to work out which ones regularly come up for you. We ALL have money mindset blocks, so don’t think you’re weird if you have more than one (or all). 

And it doesn’t matter how much money you earn, the blocks always surface – and some will surface again and again and again as you earn more and improve your mindset.

I have some great freebies in this area. Take The Wealth Health Quiz to find out where you are on the “steps to wealth” and you’ll receive access to them.

 

Until next time,

 

 

 

 

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2 thoughts on “Money Blocks: How Limiting Beliefs Are Keeping You Broke”

  1. Really well written post and I have definitely found myself having at least some of those scarcity thoughts in the past.

    You will never be content if you always have the scarcity mindset as you view everything as a limited resource.

    Abundance type people are typically happier and also share the love more.

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