This is a guest post written by Fiona Chapman. Fiona is a mindset writer and blogs about living life on your own terms. This blog is all about money mindset and how it might be holding you back.

For women who have stayed at home (like me) after choosing to have a family, losing your full-time salary or having to reduce your hours to part-time – with part-time pay to match – can be the final blow. As if knowing that women generally earn less than men isn’t bad enough, losing that independence when you have children is really tough, and can have a knock-on effect on your self-worth.

If you’re a woman who wants more for herself – more money, more freedom, more fun – then you’ll understand how frustrating it is to be brimming with great ideas to improve your situation, only to fall at the first hurdle. And the second. And the third.

But why do you keep failing? What is it that stops you from making (and keeping) more money?

When it comes to money, your mindset can be the biggest contributing factor to how you manage it. How you keep it, how you spend it, and how you earn it.

Let’s look at how your mindset might be holding you back from being the woman you know you are meant to be.

What is a Money Mindset?

Your money mindset is how you view money and whether you see money as being something that is easy to come by, or as something that is really hard to get hold of, keep, and make more of.

However, it goes a lot deeper than that.

When it comes to anything that relates to money, your perception of a situation is already shaped by all your experiences and relationships with money (and connected people) throughout your life.

Like how you feel uncomfortable when it comes to paying the dinner bill, or how you baulk at the total of your grocery shopping. Or conversely, how you love spending but have no clue of the state of your bank balance.

These experiences shape your mindset and come to affect how you make decisions and ultimately, the paths you choose to go down (or not).

Scarcity Mindset vs. Abundance Mindset

If you find it really hard to make money, keep hold of it, or perhaps even spend it, you’re likely coming from a scarcity mindset; a state of mind created from your early childhood and the beliefs you grew up with.

Scarcity Mindset

For example, if you grew up without much money, food was always scarce, and your parents always said things like ‘money doesn’t grow on trees,’ or ‘I can’t afford it,’ you probably developed the belief that there was never enough to go around.

Abundance Mindset

An abundance mindset, on the other hand, is where you believe that money is unlimited, and is all around us (which is actually true!).

Money is a direct representation of energy exchange.

When you buy something, you are buying the energy that has been put into a thought or idea through creation, planning, building, and execution.

When you sell something and receive money in return, the person buying your product or service is buying the energy you have used to provide what they want, or need.

Money Personalities in Relationships

There are different schools of thought on money personalities, from the basic spender/saver/borrow types, to the Sacred Money Archetypes (developed by Kendall Summerhawk) which include terms such as Accumulator, Romantic, Nurturer, and Ruler. It’s quite fascinating and if you’re interested in achetypes I highly recommend you check it out.

The problem is; if you and your spouse are on different wavelengths when it comes to money – say one of you is a spender and one is a saver, this can cause quite a bit of conflict.

And if you’re already struggling to make enough of your own money, stop it falling through your fingers, or get on top of debt, it can make you feel frustrated, disempowered, and not good enough.

Particularly if you desperately crave that financial independence you had pre-kids, but lost the confidence you had back then along with your sense of self.

How Your Money Mindset Could be Holding You Back

Being stuck in a scarcity mindset can often correlate with feelings of ‘not enough-ness’ – which can filter through into your overall opinion of yourself, your confidence, and your overall self-esteem.

And when you’re trying to build a business, get a better job, or negotiate a pay rise, those feelings of inadequacy (and dare we say it; imposter syndrome) will stop you from putting yourself out there, knowing your worth, and having the confidence to believe you deserve it.

Instead, negative thoughts will plague your mind like an imp whispering in your ear, narrating that same old story about how you’re not worthy.

Struggling to Earn What You’re Worth

If you have no clue what to charge for your services (or command for your skills if you’re employed), it can feel like navigating a forest thick with trees, brambles, and undergrowth.

How do you know what you’re worth? How do you know if you’re overcharging, or not charging enough?

Not knowing how to position yourself can lead to errors of judgement, or worse – no action at all. Or maybe you’ve made some progress, but in a moment of self-sabotage, you decide to shut everything down, retreat into a shell, and emerge after the winter to try again.

Not Believing in Your Own Abilities

Imposter syndrome is very real for so many women in the online space. We’re all trying to make something of ourselves, but the competition, the low self-esteem, and our scarcity mindset can trick us into believing we’re just not good enough.

The thing is – we’re all good enough, in our own way. And skill is subjective. Yes, there may be people who can do it so much better than you. But, conversely, to someone who has absolutely no clue how to create social media posts, or struggles with time management, or doesn’t know where to start when it comes to doing anything online, to them – you are the expert.

The thing is – I can tell you all the above – but until you believe it yourself, you’re going to continue crashing at each hurdle and starting again.

How to Switch Your Mindset for Abundance

Changing your money mindset IS possible, but it does take work. It involves delving into your past experiences around money, and rewriting any limiting beliefs you have developed over the years. It’s not just your childhood that affects it – it could be any experiences around money that have shaped your perspective in your life up until now.

It is entirely possible to change the way we think by rewiring our brains and rewriting the old stories we’ve told ourselves repeatedly over the years.

If you’ve struggled with your money mindset – feeling like you’re not good enough, like you can never make enough money, or like you feel like you don’t deserve more – then it’s time to change that.

Affirmations can really help with this, and I’ve created a free downloadable PDF that you can save as your home screen wallpaper when you subscribe.

I’ve written a whole post around abundance and affirmations, so if you’d like to read more, head over to the Find Your Freedom website and read the full post here 50+ Abundance Affirmations for Wealth and Freedom.

Conclusion

The main takeaway here is to realise that you ARE absolutely worthy of having more for yourself.
So if you ever have moments of doubt about your own worth, just think about how you view money and whether that’s something that you need to change.

Fiona Chapman

I do hope that you have enjoyed Fiona’s guest post. If you’d like to talk about how your money mindset could be holding you back from becoming debt free and building wealth, be sure to book a complimentary call with me.

You can either leave a comment below or reach out to me via the ‘Contact Me‘ page.