On a poll in my private Facebook group, The Career Revolution Community, I discovered that many of the members have one common goal: to figure out their finances. So I decided to speak with a former client of mine: Kristy Runzer, founder of On Route Financial, about financial wellness. Kristy’s company focuses on Money Mindset work, Financial Planning & Coaching as well as Financial Education. These three components allow you to live a healthier financial life.
Kristy has been a financial planner for 5 years and started her money mindset journey a few years ago. She was a financial planner who knew all of the skills and tools to create a financial plan for the future, but she still was not getting to her definition of success. Why? Because her negative money mindset was holding her back. Having a healthy money mindset (AKA allowing your mind to be in the right space to receive and maintain abundance) is the foundation towards financial wellness. The negative self-talk around money was self-sabotaging for Kristy. For Kristy, associating her money with her self-worth was a regular and unhealthy practice.
“My net worth and self-worth were one in the same. Basically, if I wasn’t hitting my financial goals in my business, if I wasn’t making enough money off sales…I felt like a failure and I would doubt myself” –Kristy
The first step towards financial wellness is to recognize what is holding you back. You have an empty wallet, but what is the real issue? The wallet is the symptom, not the cause. Kristy advises that in order to identify the cause, start paying attention and notice why your wallet is empty. Do you just spend when you have money? No matter how much you make do you always feel like you do not have enough? Say you're one of those folks that always seems to be emptying out your wallet. The first step in determining your money mindset is to be present, as much as possible, in those moments. What is going on in your mind? What’s happening in your day? Are there events triggering you? Many people have tendencies to spend when they’re in an emotional state. I have a client who I had track her mood every day in conjunction with her spending patterns and we found some serious correlations between mood and spending (books were her guilty pleasure when she was feeling down)!
Kristy advises that when you’re on a spending spree the best self-care strategies are vast and dependent from person to person. You need to figure out what works for you. Some things you can explore are money stories. These are very insightful in understanding your beliefs and habits around money. We form beliefs and habits based on things that happened in our lives. Ask yourself, what messages did you hear about money growing up? What did you observe your family doing and saying about money? What messages do you receive from society and friends when it comes to money? Did you compare your family’s wealth to others around you? Some messages might have been: ‘Money doesn’t grow on trees’ OR ‘Rich people are greedy’ OR ‘I will only make money if I work hard’. What belief did you form because of these messages? It’s pivotal to understand what beliefs you formed and whether you actually believe them or not. You might not say that you believe these things, but you’re still acting like you do.
What are the action steps that you can do to re-program these beliefs? Kristy had the limiting belief: “If I don’t hit my financial goal, my business is failing” but she wanted to get to a point of believing that “I am super successful no matter how much money I make”. Going from what you actually believe and what you want to believe is really hard so it’s necessary to take baby steps and create baby step beliefs as you go along that will get you to what you really want to believe. So in this example, you might say “Okay I didn’t hit my financial goal this month, what can I do to re-tweak a strategy”. Something I emphasize with my clients is transforming ‘I should…’ into ‘I would like to…’. Using the sentence stem, “I would like to…’, instead of “I should…” is a useful way of re-framing your beliefs in pursuit towards creating healthier beliefs for yourself. “I would like to…” allows you to take ownership of what you want – it’s empowering and trumps the infamous “I don’t want…’statements. Be real with what you want.
“Some of your money messages will hold you back from what you really want.” -Kristy
Some other useful tips to changing beliefs is voicing these beliefs - write them down or speak to someone about it. Start watching videos or listening to podcasts that can re-educate you around financial abundance and make the topic less scary.
A lot of financial planning is about starting with the end in mind. So figuring out what you want and working backwards from there. Connecting with the essence of what your financial goals are is important. If you want to buy a house, it’s not really about the house, it’s about what the house may bring which could be security, warmth, a family life…you name it! Going beyond the numbers and figuring out what your financial goals really mean to you gives your goals some clout and gives you the motivation to get out of bed every morning!
Job resentment seems to be a hot topic for people these days too! People are resenting their jobs and wanting to venture off to do their own thing. You might not like your situation but you’re staying for the money. Kristy advises to be curious about this resentment and what that’s about. THAT job can fund your passion, the side-hustle or the business. Try look at it as a short-term thing. You’re doing what needs to be done in order to fund the dream. So acknowledge this and be clear with what you want. The resentment is usually there because you are not clear on what you want.
Get clear on what you want, focus on the vision and on one thing at a time. Keep showing up, keep growing and don’t be afraid to invest in yourself.
If you’re feeling stuck about money and want to take action but don’t know where to start, Kristy is offering all my my followers (that's YOU!) a free 60 minute Coaching Session where you will gain an action plan that can jump start you for the next 3 months. Click on this link to receive your complimentary coaching session with Kristy!
Need to figure out what your passion and purpose is so you can capitalize it? Perhaps it's time to hope on the phone for a complimentary strategy session with me as well. Click here to grab your 30 minute session with me.