I’m a huge fan of spontaneous content. And honestly, this episode is as spontaneous as they come. 

I was actually just cleaning my house. I was at the moment that I had the idea that I needed to sit down and record this, I was in my office where I also have a wardrobe, putting away some jumpers and some clothes. And I literally dropped the clothes on the floor, plugged in my microphone, plugged in my hard drive and sat down. 

And here I am. Just to paint a picture of the context of what is happening here. 

The reason why I wanted to share that with you is because this is something that I’ve wanted to speak about for such a long time, but I have so much fear around. And it’s honestly not fear of the actual message itself, but fear that I won’t be able to articulate or communicate what I wanna say in a way that is going to still maintain the integrity of the work that I do as well as, just get the honest truth across. 

But I’m absolutely going to do my best to talk to you today about one of my biggest fears and limitations in business.

And some of the confusions that I have experienced about this topic that have held me back that have caused me stress that have honestly been my biggest points of comparison and despair and putting myself in situations where I’m doing things that I don’t necessarily want to do. 

And this is something that I’ve struggled with for such a long time. And this topic is money.

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A little bit of a background story 

I’ve mentioned this quite a lot in my content over the years, but I am someone who is so far from being motivated by money. It’s not even funny. I am not someone who feels any type of way when I see my bank accounts growing or I have a really big launch. Even when I’ve had six-figure months in the past, for me, it really doesn’t give me any type of emotional feeling of pride or that I’ve made it or anything like that. 

What gives me satisfaction is branding, is community, is people. And that’s a part of the hesitation of why I don’t like to communicate this is because I don’t want this to come across as self-righteous.

I honour the fact that every single person is motivated differently and there are some people who are motivated by money and it’s not necessarily a bad thing. There is nothing wrong with money itself. 

However, the reason why this has caused me such grief and anxiety is that one of my biggest fears, and this is the biggest fear that has to do with money is because I’m not motivated by money. And because I don’t like to necessarily share about money or celebrate money as much that my business doesn’t have the capacity to grow and to serve and to help people as much as the coaches or the teachers or the mentors who just throw money and figures in people’s faces. 

I just don’t care about it enough to be the front runner of the conversations that I’m having with people about growing a business and achieving success online. And yet my biggest limiting belief around that is because I’m not talking about money and that is the simplest concept for people to grasp. Am I “losing out” on students and clients to the coaches who are. 

And this actually came about from a conversation that I had with a friend yesterday because there’s a very similar, I guess, fear or misconception in the health and fitness space. You know what money is to business and business coaches, weight loss and bikini bodies are to the health and fitness industry. 

You know, for such a long time, we’ve seen people who talk about 28-day shreds or losing the last five kilos or whatever.

It may be, weight loss, focus, goals, aesthetic focus goals. And it is just obvious in the health and fitness space that those videos or podcast episodes do better than the ones that talk about, you know, fixing your hormones for better digestion or something like that. 

And where we kind of dissect this is because it is just a part of human nature to see and to focus on the result. You know, we are so attached to what we are comparing ourselves to, the type of lifestyle we wanna achieve or what we are being influenced by. And we think, you know, I’d be happier if I lost weight or I got in shape or I looked differently or had more money. 

And this is just so much of an easier concept to grasp than “I wanna talk about helping people to diversify their interests online and build a sustainable long term business.”

What people hear when I say all that or what I assume people hear, is I’m gonna teach you how to do the work. Versus another coach that says, I’m gonna teach you how to get 10K months. 

You know, what do you hear when you hear those things? 

When I say I’m gonna teach you how to create content and build an audience like it’s work, it’s effort, you have to show up. But when someone comes along and says, I’m gonna teach you how to make 10 K months. It’s like, damn, I want 10 K months. Like I can think of all the incredible things that I can do with that

This is where the limitation or the fear for me gets deeper

There are so many money coaches out there or business coaches that do focus on money that tell you if you don’t then you have something wrong with you. For such a long time, not prioritizing money or, you know, kind of being to a certain degree, a little triggered by the fact that everyone is so hyper-focused on money.

What many money experts or money, minded and spiritual teachers and business teachers will have me to believe through their message is because I think this way I’ve got money blocks. I’ve got limiting beliefs. 

If you are being triggered by money, you have to change your relationship with money. And if you are not necessarily wanting to go for the next big thing on a financial strive, and there’s something wrong with you, you’ve got a block, you’ve got a limitation, you’ve gotta fix that. You’ve gotta fix yourself. 

And that’s why for such a long time, the pure fact that I just wasn’t motivated by money made me feel like there was something wrong with me. So this layered limitation was not only is there something wrong with you because you’re not prioritizing money and you obviously have fears around it. 

Coupled with my thinking that am I not able to grow my business as fast because I don’t focus on money – That has been for me, such a big struggle, until recently.

THE DATA SPEAKS FOR ITSELF

I’m such an analyzer. I love to analyze anything. I love to analyze myself, my community, everything. And I’ve tested in the past during launches which particular post actually gets more conversions, the ones that are focused on, let’s say, growing your audience or building a personal brand versus the ones that are focused on money. And the reality is that the ones that do have financial focuses or social proof around them definitely do better.

And again, I’m happy to like celebrate my clients, and my clients do incredible things. But to make that the focus of my marketing, to make that the reason why somebody wants to work with me doesn’t sit right. To me personally, I feel like there are so many variable factors that even go into being able to make money. And I’d rather teach you the foundations of what’s eventually going to get you there than make any promises around “if you work with me for this particular period of time, you’re going to make this amount of money.” 

It’s just not possible to give those kinds of guarantees. 

I believe that this is the reason why so many people end up giving up on their businesses. They’ve chosen to work with these coaches that have given these promises and maybe they’ve put themselves into financial hardship because they’ve been kind of berated into these programs or had a false sense of security that they were going to achieve a specific result. And then when it doesn’t happen, not only are they in a crappy financial situation, but then they also don’t believe in themselves because of course you will be led to believe “it’s not the system, it’s you. If you didn’t achieve it, it’s you. There’s something wrong with you.”

I don’t think it’s getting better. I actually think it’s getting worse because more people that I speak to have had more negative experiences with coaches and with mentors, not “following through” on the things that they promised. 

This is kind of that cycle that I go through. 

I see something and I feel so bad for the students that are negatively affected by false expectations or high expectations of Financial returns on their investments because of what people have said that it’s possible for them to achieve. Not realizing that if you took a particular sample size, it’s not actually every single person that goes through the program is guaranteed to achieve this result. 

And then the fact that that’s triggering me, then I go into this cycle of “you are being triggered maybe cuz you’re too lazy to actually make the money that these people are making. Maybe cuz you are not motivated by money.” And for me, it always comes back to making me feel like I am lazy a lot of the time. 

Because I know that if I sold more, I would make more money.

And then I think, am I hiding behind the fact that I’m just not motivated by money? Or is it the fact that I’m just lazy and I’m just not willing to do the work?

BECOMING THE COOLEST PERSON I KNOW

When you start to think in a certain way, that confirmation as starts to happen, but this can actually be a positive thing. So when I did start really building a better relationship with myself, I decided to write my own rules. I am not motivated by money and I am not going to make anybody else make me feel bad about the fact that I’m actually happier to do less and make less money.

I could show up and I could sell more. I could launch a product every single month. I don’t wanna do that. 

I don’t want to play the game where I feel the pressure that just because I haven’t made a million dollars yet I’m not as successful as X, Y, Z, or just because I don’t want to make money the hyper-focus of my marketing messaging that I’m not going to get as many clients as you know, this person and that person. 

It’s not a scientific fact that if you aren’t motivated by money and don’t wanna talk about it, then there’s something wrong with your brain and you need to work on your money mindset. These are just things that a lot of people agree on. And so therefore it has somehow become a truth. 

I wanna help people, I wanna solve problems. I want to make life better for other people. And that’s not where most people are coming from. 

So, please know, it’s okay to just make less money. It’s something that’s held me back for a long time. Just do what feels good to you.

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