BONUS: Elevate Your Money Story and Overcome Your Blocks
BONUS: Elevate Your Money Story and Overcome Your Blocks with Vanessa Bowen of Mint Worthy
Going deep into roots of money beliefs and blocks. Uncovering them and planting seeds of new truth. Catch it all on this very special bonus episode of the Women's Empowerment Podcast...
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[00:42] Introducing the wonderful Vanessa of Mint Worthy
Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA) & Neurolinguistic Programming Practitioner (NLP) and founder of Mint Worthy, a personal finance coaching platform that helps women shift their relationship with money and take control of their finances
After a decade in corporate finance and public accounting working with international businesses in Canada and the US, Vanessa decided to pursue her passion for personal finance, shifting her focus on empowering women to live life on their own financial terms
Vanessa equips women with new ways of managing and controlling their finances and teaches strategies to truly reach their financial goals. She helps women uncover their money blocks and release the deep rooted subconscious beliefs that create our habits, decisions, and behaviours around money. Vanessa coaches women on how to break through these mindset barriers to discover life-long financial freedom
[2:45] Vanessa tells us a little more about her story…
Vanessa's story with money started like a lot of other peoples. She grew up with very little information about money management and finances.
She then became an accountant and didn't know what to do with her paycheque. She did what she knew, and spent the money! This brought her into debt, until she met her mentor who talked to her about budgeting and money management.
Vanessa's financial passion grew as she started to grow her knowledge and her side passion project/hobby. She helped her circle of friends with their money journey.
Eventually the passion project grew so big in her heart that she took the leap and left her corporate job to transition to her full time coaching business: Mint Worthy.
PART ONE: Girl, Get Over Your Money Blocks
[6:08] Women & Money.
Why is it that women don't talk about money? What are some benefits of having money conversations with our girlfriends? How can we encourage women to start having more conversations around money?
Women hold a lot of shame and guilt because no one ever taught women about money, and to be honest we're conditioned to believe that money is a man's world. We believe that men are the ones who deal with money and who can take care of money.
As women we limit ourselves, like saying, I'm not good at math, so I'm not good with money but all you need to know about math when it comes to money is adding a subtracting, and that's what we have a calculator for!
I think the reason why we don't talk about money is because of these limiting beliefs that we are conditioned with or that we put on ourselves. And there is so much release of guilt and shame when we have these conversations, and I think this is the perfect place to start. Having these conversations with your girlfriends.
The minute you start talking about money, you realize you're not alone. You're girlfriend likely has the exact same issues. It's a beautiful opportunity for us to learn and grow. And it's platforms like this that provides that opportunity to break through those blocks.
[8:07] What are money blocks and where do these money blocks come from?
All of our money blocks are basically those deep limiting beliefs that we hold and they impact our habits, our actions, and our decisions around money.
These subconscious beliefs, whether they're true or not, once they're in our subconscious mind, we take them in as truth. Most of our deepest blocks are actually from our childhood.
When you were born, did you have any thoughts or judgements about money? No, it was a clean slate. As we grew older we became conditioned. So a lot of our deepest blocks are actually from our childhood. Mostly because we were in our subconscious state; from 0-7 or 8, your brain hasn't fully developed so our brain is in a subconscious state.
If you see your parents fight about money you will start to believe: money ruins relationships, money causes fights. Or when we were little girls we watched all of the princess movies, and saw Prince Charming come to the rescue, so as adults we believe that we need a partner to feel secure.
Then of course, we get older, and we take on societal blocks: you have to work hard to make money; everything is about money. So now we become conditioned by society, and on top of that we create our own blocks as women. We hold a lot of blocks around worth: I'm not good enough, I'm not enough, I need to compare myself to others. Something as small as that keeps us stuck, it holds us back, we don't go after our dreams, we don't advance in our business or our careers. And that blocks us from the money that we desire.
Unfortunately, we're all walking around with blocks that have impacted us from different areas and phases of our life. And that's why it's so important to Do The Work, because we don't always know what we're walking around with, unless we go deep.
[10:51] Let's look at a few examples of common limiting mindset beliefs around money, how can we release these abundance blocks?
You have to work hard to make money; hard work equals success
We need a partner to be secure
Money can't possibly flow easily
The beauty of the subconscious: One of the easiest ways to reprogram it is through faith and repetition. So the more you repeat the limiting beliefs, the more they become your truth.
But of course you can reprogram that truth. And one of the easiest ways to do that is to investigate the block and determine whether it's true or not. What's happening for most of us is that we're just walking around with false truths and we've created them to be our truths.
So one of the easy ways is to investigate the block, what was the first thing you heard or experience that created the block? Investigating that makes you realize, that I was born as a clean slate when it come to money, so this is conditioned within me, from what point in time or what area of my life?
Once you investigate it, you can then create your own new truth. This is where it sometimes can be difficult for people because if your money block is deeply rooted, you may only see it as a truth. But one of the easiest ways to shift that is you just find evidence. You can find evidence in your life, and if you can in your life, it makes it easier to reprogram in your subconscious. But if you can't find it in your life, think of someone you know who has this truth.
The more you can fill your subconscious mind with this evidence to proves that limiting belief is not true, the new truth becomes true. You're able to create this new truth and speak: money flows to me easily and frequently. I attract all the money that I dire. And then you start to reprogram this new truth into your subconscious. It's work, but it works.
[14:06] On this show, I like to offer really tangible and practical techniques and takeaways. What are some money mindset methods we can start today?
Affirmations are very powerful BUT you have to make sure you're using them the right way. An affirmation is not just like, let me throw out a pretty phrase every day, and say it ever day and close my eyes. That's not affirmations. You have to be intentional with your affirmations and you have to work your affirmations.
The purpose of affirmations is to reprogram your subconscious through faith and repetition. You need to repeat it and have faith in what you're affirming for your life.
First let's talk about the repetition: In order to talk to your subconscious repeatedly, you have to talk to it in a way that it understands. So when you're actually creating your affirmations, you have to create them in a way you subconscious understands, not in a way that your conscious mind understands.
Important things you have to make sure your affirmations have:
#1. PRESENT & POSTIVIE
They have to be in the present tense (I am, I have)
Don't use any negatives (I don't want debt)
You affirmation has to be positive (I live with expectation)
#2. FAITH & BELIEF:
You have to believe what you're saying; you have to almost trick your subconscious you believe that you have it.
Other ways to activate money mindset today…
VISUALIZATION EXERCISES:
Your subconscious doesn't know what is real and what isn't. Spend some time every day to visualize your future
SAMPLE YOUR DREAMS:
Test drive your dream car, and while you're doing that ground into the emotions and scenes of the experience. Bring this into your every day life by bringing it into when you drive your current car.
[19:46] When I mentioned to the listeners that you were coming on the show, I asked them about what questions they had for you, and the word “DEBT” came up a lot:
What advice do you have for shifting the feelings and thoughts of frustration, guilt, and shame some people have about their debt?
We all have or have had these feelings, you have to shift your perspective. If you're spending money and in consumer debt, then you need to address the money blocks of the emotional spending. Obviously the shopping is somehow fulfilling an emotional void for you. Work on that.
But, for some of us who are in debt because of investing in yourself: school, or starting your own business for example. When you're in debt for this reason, you cannot express gratitude for where you are now and express shame and doubt for how you got there.
Some one of the easiest ways to shift the energy is to write a thank you letter to debt. Express gratitude for your debt for being there for you and for supporting you and living your dreams.
What are some action steps we can take to get out of debt?
One of the easiest ways is to call your credit card company and ask what they can do for you. You might be able to lower your interest rate or get cash/points back.
Another way is to actually sort your debt based on the highest interest rate to the lowest interest rate. What you want to do is tackle the debt with the highest interest rate first. You want to make sure you're paying as little interest rate as possible. With the other debts, pay a little more than the minimum, and once the highest debt is paid off, snowball that payment into your next highest debt. It's the easiest way to get out of your debt fastest.
Pay the minimums NO MATTER WHAT, so that you don't negatively impact your credit score.
PART TWO: Internal Money Journey
Switching our money mindset and connecting to money in a new way starts with us, and our internal money journey.
[25:52] What is the difference between internal and external sources of money and abundance?
Internal is basically what we can control, and external is what we can't control.
External: Job, business, cash coming in
Internal: Where your relationship with money comes into play; how you want to relate and energetically connect to money. Think about how you talk about money.
[27:50] On your blog and Instagram you talk a lot about manifesting and vibrational frequency. This is a very popular topic on the podcast as well! What is one impactful way we can become a vibrational match with abundance?
As women, the main thing that blocks them from attracting and manifesting is their level of deservingness and worthiness. When you go really deep into your blocks is that we don't feel deserving of our desire; for many different reasons. We're basically limiting our own level of worth. The easiest way to shift that vibration is you have to feel deserving.
You have to feel like you deserve your desires, and when you feel deserving of them, that's when you're vibrating at the same level as them. You have to be in an energetic alignment, and that means you have to believe in your heart that you deserve it.
[30:58] How can we tune into our internal journey of accepting, attracting, and receiving?
I always look at money that flows to me as a gift from the Universe. It doesn't matter if a friend is buying me coffee, or my employer is giving me a bonus. When you flip your perspective and realize that everything that comes to you is a gift from the Universe, meant for you, positioned just for you, you always have to say “YES!” Because in essence, by saying “no” you're really rejecting the Universe and block future abundance.
Start small. Any time someone says they'll buy you a coffee, you say yes. When someone compliments you, say thank you!
[35:10] Where we can find Vanessa:
Website: www.mintworthy.co
Instagram: @mintworthyco
[35:34] How we can support Vanessa's business:
I feel for me, the vision that I have and see is empowering women to stand up when it comes to their finances. Be engaged, ask the questions. DM or email me. Don't hide, don't feel ashamed. Don't feel like you're the only one. I think the more we see women rise, the more we see women be bold with their finances, the more we can see this financially empowered movement.
PART THREE: Rapid Fire!
[36:30] #1 What are you currently reading? OR Favourite book?
The Illusion of Money by Kyle Cease
[37:27] #2 What do you love most about being a woman?
I love how strong and powerful we are. Although we are emotional creatures, we are so strong and powerful. We can handle anything. And I think it's our strength even in the midst of struggle that makes us so beautiful.
[37:46] #3 What does “empowerment” mean to you?
For me it means, living beyond your limitations and your comfort zone. Fearlessly going after your dreams and not stopping with anything.
[38:05] #4 What are you currently working toward?
On the mindset area, what I'm currently working toward, and it comes from the book I'm currently reading, is literally releasing the need for money. Really releasing that need, and that's something I've committed to as a personal journey. Releasing beyond the blocks and releasing the mental and emotional need for money.
Podcast Host
Valerie LaVigne
Valerie is the creator and founder of Valerie LaVigne Life and the Women's Empowerment Show. She helps busy and empowered women create healthy habits so that they can become the best version of themselves and transform their lives. Learn more about Valerie here!
