How Changing Your Money Self-Talk Can Actually Make You Richer

Most people’s internal narrative around money is overwhelmingly harmful and self-limiting – and self-fulfilling. Often, you need to challenge these beliefs —but how?

You might, for example, be saying things like:

• ‘Money is too hard’, and then actively running in the opposite direction from learning about it because you have convinced yourself it’s too complicated to try.
• ‘I can never save’, and then spending because you think this tiny amount isn’t that big and it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things, you can never save anyway.
• ‘Investing is too “risky”’, and then when share prices move around you think, See, look at that downturn!

Your brain wants to confirm your beliefs are correct (hello, confirmation bias) and will look for ways to prove itself right.

Think of your brain like a map, with roads and highways crisscrossing everywhere. When you create a belief or habit, a road is formed in your brain. As you use this ‘road’ more and more, it morphs into a highway. Your brain gets to know that route well and will want to go down that well-trodden path first. (Who wants to take a longer journey, when you know a tried and tested short cut?).

Building new roads

The most amazing thing, however, is that you can build new roads. Your brain just needs to be forced not to automatically take you down the path it wants to go down first.

Of course, in the beginning, forging a new path feels weird and confusing. (Why are we doing this when we know there is a ‘simpler’ route to take?!). Your brain wants you to be efficient and take the easy road. But, over time, you can make your new belief the ‘go-to’ highway, and the old one will not be the automatic default. Then, as you start to not use those old routes, they fall away like dead branches as the brain literally starts to prune them. This process is called neuroplasticity.

your brain is like playdough

Another way to think of it is that your brain is like playdough – you can shape it however you want. Brains can have the ability to change your thoughts and beliefs throughout your life; but it takes practice and persistence. You are never too old to build new habits. You can choose what to keep and what to let go of. How clever are we?!

Hopefully you can now see that your beautiful brain was, all along, cleverly absorbing so much (often harmful) information in an attempt to keep you safe. By creating all those unhelpful money beliefs and behaviours, it was trying to help you! Now you can see, with fresh eyes, all the ways that external factors, from family and school to pop culture, have played a huge role in shaping what you believe about money. It is important that you pause here and acknowledge that.

Acknowledge that any nasty and unhelpful comments you’ve made to yourself have served their purpose, but they are no longer required. They aren’t going to be the way you talk to yourself anymore. Acknowledge that you would never dream of talking to your best friend like that, so you won’t talk to yourself like that anymore either.

Being nice = better growth

Instead of shame, guilt and nasty comments, you can be kinder, compassionate and gentler with yourself. From here on in, you can say ‘thank you’ to your brain when it tries to remind you of those ‘hot iron’ moments. You can lovingly acknowledge that it is trying to help you, but also that you are choosing a different path now. You see what’s going on, and you get it, but you are moving forward another way now.

And if you need anymore convincing that speaking to yourself nicely is so wildly important, remember this: evidence has shown that plants grow healthier and faster when they are spoken to nicely (via vibrations). Not only that, but they are also more resilient and immune to pathogen attacks and they change the structures of their cell walls to be more drought tolerant. Good vibes equal better, stronger, healthier plants.

we are the same

I am convinced we are the same, just with slightly more complicated emotions. Building a better internal narrative with money makes you stronger, more resilient and allows you to grow faster. So, let’s dig.

How does the way you spend (or save) money reaffirm your existing money beliefs? Are those behaviours helpful or harmful? How do you speak to yourself about money? Is it different to how you would speak to a friend if they came to you in the same situation? If so, how would you speak to them instead?

Edited extract from Get Growing: A no-nonsense guide to cultivating wealth and financial freedom by Jessica Brady (Wiley, $34.95), available at all leading retailers.

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