Anyone can learn to coach themselves. The value that I offer as a coach is to help you really see what you’re thinking and to help you tap into that internal wisdom. I help you understand why you’re not saving or why you’re not paying off debt and I help you make the changes you need to make to achieve your financial goals.
To start to work on the mindset and the thinking that is holding you back from the best YOU that you can be, you need to become aware of what you’re thinking that is causing you to obsess about your money or avoid paying the bills or to spend money that you don’t have. And I will tell you that the reason that you’re doing the things you don’t want to do or not doing the things you know you need to do is absolutely not because there is something wrong with you. It’s only because of what you’re thinking. Even experienced coaches sometimes can’t see the thoughts that are holding them back.
I wanted to show you the typical process to shift your thinking so that you can become the woman that doesn’t obsess about money but instead focuses that energy on her most valuable blessing – her family. This is the transformation process that I’ve witnessed in myself and in my clients.
Step 1: First you become aware of what you are thinking, consciously and unconsciously about the problem. This is an extremely important step. We typically have more than 60,000 thoughts a day and the vast majority of those are not conscious. There are a lot of thoughts that are impacting how we go through our day and we don’t even realize what’s rattling around up there. One thing that you can do is just notice everything around you, everything you do, how you act, how you feel, what you are thinking. Another thing you can do is to journal every day. Each day take 5 or 10 minutes to transcribe everything in your brain onto paper, without censoring it, without making it pretty, without judging it. Just transfer the data from your brain to the page. Over time, you will start to notice that more thoughts will start to surface as you learn how to become the watcher of your brain.
Step 2: Notice how you act, what you do, how you feel in situations where you don’t have the outcome that you want or you don’t experience the situation the way that you would like. Notice what you’re thinking in those situations. Notice that you may still react in a way that you don’t want to, but just notice everything that is going on. If you don’t notice it in the moment, you can always revisit the situation in your mind later and meditate on the situation and what was going on for you. Notice how what you were thinking lead eventually to the results in the situation or to your experience of the situation. Write down whatever insight comes up for you.
Step 3: Continue to notice and continue to become more aware of everything. Practice being present in the moment and don’t be afraid of whatever emotion comes up. Practice thinking that any emotion is welcome here. The more you do these steps, the more you will notice that you become more aware of what is happening for you when you’re in the moment. You may notice that you still feel the same emotion as you did in step 2, but now you are able to catch yourself and redirect your brain before you react to the situation. You may be able to control your actions at this point through will, but you may not be able to control your thinking or emotions yet at this point. That’s okay – it’s perfectly normal. You should be starting to notice changes in your behavior, how you react to situations, how you feel. Write down anything you notice that is different and anything that still feels inauthentic. Wherever you are still feeling conflicted or inauthentic or like you’re hiding – that is where your work is.
Step 4: Continue doing the other steps, but now when you notice the thoughts, consider what other thoughts about the circumstance might be just as true or even more true than the thought your brain is offering you. I tell my clients to think of it this way. Imagine you have a platter and on that platter is the thought your brain originally offered you. What we want to try to do is to think of other thoughts that we could put on the platter with that original thought. On that platter we will eventually see all of the options available to us. In the beginning, my clients always struggle with thinking of other options to put on that platter. This takes practice – this is a skill we’re not used to practicing. Just be open to any option and when you find other options, put those on the platter. We will see in the next step what we do with this platter and why it will serve you to practice this skill.
Step 5: Continue doing the other steps, but now I want you to start practicing the skills of managing your brain. When you notice a thought, I want you to just notice that it is there, but I want you to question it. I want you to challenge your brain to see if it is really true for you – this means do you want to actually believe that thought? Not only that, but I want you to evaluate how that thought is contributing to creating the life that you want for yourself. Even when thoughts feel true we can still choose to believe them or not believe them and we do this by putting them in the model to see if they lead to the results we want in our lives. This is the turning point. When we can intentionally choose what we believe, we can believe anything we want to believe. This is where you use the platter from Step 4 and you look at all of the options on the platter and you intentionally choose the option that gets you closest to the result you want. Choose wisely. This is the magical piece that allows us to create anything we want to create in our lives.
#Magical #ChooseWisely #JillTheMoneyCoach
Twenty years ago, Jill Wright was in debt and living paycheck to paycheck. Through focus and hard work, over the years she and her husband built a nest egg that allowed them to retire in 2018 at ages 50 and 53.Jill heard God’s call to help other women repaint their own financial future and was eager to answer it. She left her corporate job and became a Financial Confidence Coach. Jill loves helping women give up shame around spending so that they can stop stressing about their money.
She helps strong generous women go from feeling weighed down by their finances to feeling in control so they can focus on being present and supporting their family.