Debts are “neutral and just there,” you could feel peace of mind today no matter what your debt. Here’s how.
I’ve been coaching a lot of clients lately on money issues and I wanted to share with you some of the most important ways to shift your mindset about money and debt to help you live your most irresistible life. Don’t let debt get in your way of your dreams.
Money’s a topic we all have some “issue” about because of our particular money blueprint, or money beliefs. Beliefs are always optional. So, don’t stay stuck believing your problem-based thoughts about money.
When it comes to debt most of us stress ourselves out unnecessarily and waste a heck of a lot of time.
Time’s more valuable than money because it’s more limited. Look at it this way, there’re 24-hours in a day. What if each day you were given 24K to spend, 1K each hour. I bet you’d choose more wisely what you’d do with the money (time). But we don’t think this way when it comes to time. But we sure need to.
What if you looked at each hour of time as if you had 1K to spend? I doubt you’d want to spend it worrying about your debt.
That’d be nonsensical. You’d just be going into more financial debt. And you’re going into more debt anyway-- time-debt. Think of how you could be spending that time if you weren’t so invested in worrying about debt. You could create something magnificent and feel amazing even though your financial debt is the same!
Our thoughts are going on in the background all day long. Take a guess as to how much time your mind goes to worrying about debt?
Is it two hours a day? That’s 2hours and 2K wasted if you think about time as money. If you worry about your debt on and off throughout the day for up to two hours-- in this way or that way-- you could be, metaphorically speaking, spending 2K a day worrying about debt. Wow! Wake up call. Stop the financial and money bleeding now by changing your thoughts and focus.
When we focus on what we don’t want instead of what we do want — we always create more of what we don’t want. Such a bummer. But good to know because you can change it.
If you focus on your debt often, you’re creating more worry, guilt, shame and stress, more obstacles to solving your debt issues, and possibly more financial debt and absolutely more time-debt.
Instead, I encourage you to be 100% aware of what you're thinking about your debt.
Thoughts are optional and circumstances such as debts are neutral whether you believe it or not. You get this on an intellectual level, but you need to start to feel this truth in your bones to move away from debt stress.
If you don’t have financial debt keep reading because this can apply to any kind of debt. Maybe it’s a friendship that you’ve neglected, or your personal life because of the busyness you allow in your world.
Be solution-focused. When you think in solutions you are always moving forward.
Too many of us focus on the problem and not the solution. Start to get as solution-focused as possible. Instead of thinking about how much debt you owe and stressing, make a solid plan to stop the debt and make strong decisions to commit to paying it off. Then forget about it. Let the plan do all the work. It can be off your plate mentally speaking.
Instead of thinking thoughts like:
I can’t believe how much debt I owe.
How could I have incurred so much debt?
I don’t know how to handle money.
And other lies your brain will tell you, think solution-focused thoughts like these:
I am totally capable of making a plan to get out of debt.
I am a badass with money.
Debt means nothing personal about me.
If I spent money on things I wish I hadn’t I will take an honest inventory. I’ll evaluate whether it’s true that I wish I didn’t have this debt. If it is I will write down my new money-spending philosophy and what I learned from spending this way.
(Note: A lot of clients feel terrible about the debt they have—until I ask them what they spent the money on. A lot of the time, it’s a mortgage, a degree, or a life-changing training or coaching program. Sometimes it’s debt from buying clothes or other items they deem less valuable now than when they spent the money. But what’s the upside to judging your debt? Absolutely none. It just creates a vicious cycle.
Practice these thoughts:
I am committed to following my plan to stay out of debt.
Debt is neutral.
I am always in control of the money I have and the money I owe.
The amount of money you owe will not change whether you worry or not. So, you might as well not worry.
Just decide how you’ll think and feel about debt from now on and then make a plan and move on. Ironically, the more you worry the more you’ll spend, unhealthily restrict, or avoid money altogether. None of these options feel good. They’re always coming from a place of scarcity and they don’t help you dig yourself out of the hole any faster— you just feel more stuck.
I want you to really understand your thoughts about debt and what feelings and actions those thoughts are causing you.
Then purposefully decide what you want to think about debt. It doesn’t matter if you have 250 or 5K in debt. Once you truly get on board with the fact that debt can’t hurt you (only your thinking about it can), then you’ll be set free. You’ll create more time, emotional energy and brain space to create a life you love. You’ll be able to create something magnificent, just by not worrying about debt. What would you rather do?
Some of the things my clients have gone on to do with the time they’ve saved by no longer worrying about money and taking back cognitive and emotional control over their lives is to:
· create an awesome business and make loads more money. Rendering the debt a non-issue
· spend more quality time creating an amazing relationships with their partner and kiddos
· find the love of their life
· take more risks and move to a place they’ve always dreamed of, or change careers
· write that book they’ve always wanted to create
· take a dream vacation
· think up a bunch of creative ways to make more money and pay down debt more quickly and efficiently
· ask for a raise and show up 100% as a professional in their career
· say goodbye to other aspects of life that aren’t working
How would you spend your time if you weren’t wasting energy on debt-worry? What amazingness would you create?
When you let go of worrying about debt, your entire world opens up and you can think clearly and creatively about what magnificent thing you want to create with that time.
What magnificent thing would you do if you truly believed debt was neutral and you had a plan to pay it off?
I go through this exercise with my clients when they come to me with debt worry. I look at how their current thinking has gotten them into debt and how changing their thoughts can get them out of it.
Once we identify a new belief that will serve instead of harm, we go to work at making a plan of action to pay off the debt.
Once you’ve got this plan, guess what? You never have to worry about that debt again. You commit to the plan. It’s something you pay every month and you don’t even need to reevaluate your plan, depending. If it’ll take you a while to pay off your debt, look at it once a year when you do your taxes to assess if there’re any changes that need to be made. If you’ve got a shorter-term debt, you may never even need to think about it again. You know when it’ll be paid off—you’ve planned it all out, and you just let it go.
It can be that easy. Your debt won’t go down go any faster the more you think about it. But your quality of life will.
Here’s how to do thought models on debt:
C = Circumstance: write down the facts only. What’s the exact amount of debt you have?
Remember: circumstances are always neutral. Every single time. And it doesn’t matter if you spent money on a home, an education, a vacation, or clothes, etc. You may like your reasoning for spending money on somethings and not others. But it’s still neutral. No debt is more or less neutral than another. Just let this inform you about your new money philosophy, make a plan, commit to it and move the hell on.
Your time and your energy are too precious to waste on regret.
When you get solution-focused you don’t have to worry about past decisions because you’re aware of how you’d like to do things differently. You have a regular process of thinking through why you’ve gotten the results you have, you decide on purpose how you will think moving forward, how you want to feel, come up with a plan, take action on that plan until you get the desired results.
T = Thoughts: write down your current thought you have regarding your debt/ thought you’d like to have.
Remember: Thoughts are just sentences in your mind. They’re neither true nor false. Just perceptions and they’re always optional.
F = Feeling: write down your current feeling regarding debt/ feeling you want to have.
Remember: feelings are always triggered by thoughts.
A = Actions: write down the current actions you take and don’t take as it relates to debt / actions you would like to take or not take.
Remember: We always take action from a feeling. So, feelings fuel our action either positively or negatively.
R = Results: write down your current results regarding your thoughts, feelings and actions related to your debt / results you want
Remember: Results always give us evidence that our thoughts are true- even when they aren’t. It’s easy to get stuck in this cycle and therefore choosing what to think on purpose is imperative to your ultimate success.
Take a look at these two thought models from a compilation of years of working with clients on money mindset and notice the difference in the feelings, actions, and results they create versus what you may be experiencing:
C: 100 K debt
T: I’m scared something will happen and I won’t be able to pay
F: worry
A: avoid looking at thoughts around debt, feel bad- then buy something nice to deal with the worry (aka: retail therapy), busy self with other “busy-tasks” not “result-oriented tasks” as a way to avoid processing emotions and instead resisting facing the negative emotion of looking at current thoughts and my current results, don’t do something magnificent because using that time to stay in the worry-avoid cycle with interspersed moments of resolve without follow through (creating a decreased level of confidence), take problem-focused action or inaction over solution-focused action, complain about debt a lot, tell self I can’t do things I really want to do, don’t take a training or spend money on things that would take me to the next level and help me create more abundance in time, love or money.
R: Prove thought true -- you’ve scared yourself into believing that you won’t be able to pay your debt (not because you can’t but because of what you were thinking, feeling and doing). In not making a plan for your debt-- your debt doesn’t get paid off, you feel stuck and use this result as evidence to prove that you should have been scared all along and that you’re not good with money.
Verses this intentional model:
C: 100 K debt
T: I am always in control of the money I have and the money I owe
F: Confident
A: Make strong decisions about how much money to put aside for paying off debt, make a plan and follow through until desired result, take care of my money, stop worrying about debt and use that time to create something magnificent with this mindset shift
R: Money and debt aren’t problems for me and I’ve freed up more emotional energy to do magnificent things with the time I used to spend worrying
Can you see how this second thought model is devoid of all the drama? The 100 K debt is neutral.
With less worry, you make more time to create something magnificent (money or otherwise), you have less stress-related health problems, you invest in yourself, your relationships and the things you really love about life. You become a badass solution-focused “smart with money” abundant woman. Now that you are a solution-focused junkie, you can apply these skills to all other areas of your life. You own your life. You run your brain. Your brain doesn’t run you. Your circumstances, debt or otherwise, are no longer in control over your results. And anything truly is possible in your world.
