Money Matters: Your mindset is a choice!

Money Matters: Your mindset is a choice!   

What choices are you making to bring more or less stress into your life? 

Now that tax season is over you can relax, right? Well for some that may be true, for others, the process of filing those tax returns likely brought up some financial issues. Money and finances and anything pertaining to the same subject, are major causes of stress for most people.

We live in a culture that encourages debt and denies the lost art of delaying gratification. And, like color that fades on a cheap paint job, the repercussions of this lifestyle are beginning to show.

For example, researchers at Ohio State University in Columbus have found that high levels of income-eating debt-especially big credit-card bills-may be related to high blood pressure, insomnia and even problems with physical mobility, vision and hearing. Additionally, a recent survey shows that the overall, number-one greatest source of stress is personal finances. And, what do couples and/or business partners report that they fight about most often? Money.

Money is a hot-button issue for the majority of people these days. Everybody, it seems, has money issues, whether it is concern about the lack of resources, or the fear of losing it.

Meanwhile, we are showered with seductive messages to Buy Now, Pay Later. Then we have to work harder to keep up with payments, which causes even more stress, for both men and women.

The language of money is complex and subject to misinterpretation.

Often it is the early messages we received about money that influence our current beliefs. So, one of the first steps in dealing with money issues is to check out old ideas that continue to color behavior and attitudes and choices.

Couples, or business partners, who may have grown up with different values about money, need to talk about their beliefs. Not who is right and who is wrong, but what the basic beliefs are. According to the Institute of Certified Financial Planners, by better understanding their attitudes and values toward money, individuals may be more able to gain control of money instead of it controlling them.

Many books on how to deal with financial issues are available, and advice from professionals such as banks, consumer financial agencies, financial planners and advisors, and accountants, is always a good idea.

But maybe the best place to start is with a healthy attitude toward money. Money is an exchange for something. It’s an exchange for the work you do, the service you provide, the food you eat, the gas you get to put in your car, etc. When you understand that one simple fact, it can lessen the “power” of money. It allows for more freedom of choice.

You get to choose how much of your resources you want to use for that piece of clothing, car, or vacation you want.  No judgements, no right or wrongs, just a place to assess for yourself the cost or exchange you are choosing to make.

Choice is very freeing.  Choice comes from a mindset that you are worthy of choosing for yourself, instead of just feeling helpless.  When we choose consciously, we are using our powerful greater minds instead of defaulting to the old primitive knee jerk fear based minds.

Here are 3 Quick tips for a more conscious, in choice and stress reduced relationship with money.

Use supportive language:

Instead of saying “I have to pay these bills”, say instead “I am choosing to pay these bills”.

It’s simple, yet it feels lighter and less of a burden.  It reduces those stressful feelings of “have to”.

Keep a gratitude list:  Always top of my list!

Gratitude is the key to being in choice!  When you are grateful for what you already have, you feel much less governed by all the money stories of the past, the “lack” mentality and/or the “have to’s”.  Appreciation and gratitude open us up to solutions and more possibilities.

Make a plan:

Planning, in general, leads to feeling in control and in charge of your life. Making plans for your financial future leads to having a more healthy relationship with money.  It reduces stress by not being in default or reactive mode. Planning means choosing.  Choosing feels good.  When you feel good about your plans and your choices, you continue choosing for your financial health in a conscious way.

These are just a few ways to have more choice, ease and less stress in your relationship with finances and money.

Your choices can free you up and allow more peace in your decisions in spending your money and your relationship with money.      

What choices are you going to make?   

I’m all ears, let me know how it goes!

Put your comments below!

To your stress relief choices,

Jackie