We are often surrounded by ‘shoulds’. Some of the most common ones I hear are ‘you should be better with money’, ‘you should be better with savings’, ‘you should be better with finances’.
Often when I speak to clients about their relationship with money they start off by stating they’re good with their money….then proceed to tell me they struggle with savings.
You see the expectation we have in society is that we should be better with our money and we should be better with savings, when this isn’t the reality. Think about it, we learn how to manage our finances predominantly from our parents and they learnt how to manage money from their parents and so on. In schools there is limited education around money management. One of my recollections of ‘money’ from a young age was putting money into my Dollarmite account!
When you struggle to save, often there’s a money block that’s preventing this. For some their money belief maybe ‘money’s hard to come by’ which means that earning money and obtaining money comes with lots of perceived effort and little gain (this used to be my money block). When it comes to spending money an approach of ‘I deserve it’ might be taken. For others, the belief might be ‘money tends to comes easily’, so every last cent is spent because they believe they can easily obtain more money. We often refer to this as a feast of famine approach to money and having zero money in the bank account isn’t uncommon. In other cases a trauma may have occurred which can result in the belief ‘I’m not worthy of having money’, so money is spent or given away as soon as it’s received. Alternatively, if you’ve had money ‘borrowed’ when you were younger and never repaid this can result in you spending all your money for fear of it being taken away.
If you think about your own savings habits, what comes up for you? Is there a particular incident around money you can recall? What was the approach to money your parents took as you grew up? Was it a feast or famine approach? Was money accumulated and held onto? Reflect and see what comes up for you.
steps to get you started
Building savings is one of the key foundations to building wealth and ultimately financial independence. If you’re keen to build savings whether inside your business or personally try the following steps:
- Acknowledge there is a challenge or money block occurring.
- Acknowledge that it’s safe for you to have money. It’s safe for you to set boundaries around your money, especially where you are constantly being asked for financial support. It’s safe for you to have money in the bank and for that balance to grow.
- Set up a new bank account, one that is not easily accessible (online access with no debit card).
- Set up an automatic transfer to be deposited into the account from where your income is deposited. Start with as little as $10 per week so you can get comfortable with having a balance and this balance growing.
- You may find initially you end up dipping into this account and that’s ok, just start over or keep going. Over time you will start to get more comfortable with watching the balance grow. What you’re trying to do here is rewire your brain to not only get comfortable with having money sitting there you are also bringing curiosity to the money block that was previously preventing this.
Working with a financial coach can help you to uncover money blocks and the beliefs holding you back from being financially independent. If you would like to explore this further, please book in for a free 30 minute chat.