Talking about money is hard for a lot of women.

Investing, spending, saving, negotiation… all taboo subjects in many circles.

A lot of women associate money with their self worth, so it feels vulnerable to talk about it.

Asking for a raise or raising their pricing might come across as stuck up.
Or bitchy.

Women are afraid that negotiating a low price with someone may insult them.

First of all, your net worth is not the same as your self worth.

When you separate who you are from the numbers in your bank account, it’s a lot easier to talk about money.

The numbers don’t mean anything.

It’s what you are making the numbers mean that causes you pain or embarrassment or pride.

You might be making your bank account numbers mean you are stupid.  
Or you are not good at saving. 
Or you are not important.
Or you are less than.

But numbers don’t actually mean anything about you.
It’s your brain that is making the numbers mean something about you.

Keep in mind that when women don’t talk about money, it gives the power to the men who are talking about it.
When you talk about money you are taking away the taboo.
You are taking away the taboo.

You are able to learn more about money when you can talk about it.You are going to keep more and make more when you can put yourself out there.
In my family, it was more comfortable to talk about sex than about how much money we had.

And we never talked about sex.

The message from my family was that money is a big secret and can’t be used against you if no one knows your numbers.

It may be scary, but the kindest thing you can do for yourself is own where you are right now.

If you are just now starting to talk about money, you are a beginner.

And that’s OK.

Better now than 10 years from now.

Dive on in.

It’s uncomfortable, but it’s less uncomfortable the more you talk about it.

How do you talk about money?

With love.

Give it a try.

Feel free to start in the comments.

Someone who loves their money doesn’t avoid it.

Someone who has a good relationship with money honors their money by investing it so it grows.

They keep track of it.

They count it and organize it.

Avoidance never serves you when it comes to money.

Avoidance is when you don’t open your bills each month because you think the numbers are so big.

Avoidance is when you come home from the grocery store and don’t know how much you spent.

And avoidance is hiding the extra shopping bags in the trunk of your car until your family isn’t home.

You have to tell yourself the truth about your numbers if you want a good relationship with money.

You can’t change what you don’t acknowledge.

And when you have a good relationship with money, it ups your game in every area of your life.

When you love your money people want to give you money.
When you show up sparkly and enthused, people want to hire you and help you.
They want to be with you when you are not carrying the weight of money stress that slumps your shoulders and flattens your voice.

When you love your money it feels like freedom.

What feeling are you trying to avoid when you avoid your month truth?

Shame?
Scarcity?
Fear?

You are not alone.
We are all trying to avoid something.

I want to challenge you to stay in your own integrity and open your eyes to your money truth.

Stop avoiding.
Truth hurts, but avoiding hurts too.

Be still with yourself and kind to yourself.

Truth is clean pain.

Truth is pain that heals you and moves you forward.

Avoidance is dirty pain.

Pain that feels icky.
It deepens and festers.

Start with a whisper.

Tell yourself your money truth.
Be gentle with yourself, but start today.

There is debt that feels good and debt that feels bad.

Some debt can feel good… like buying your first house.

The pride of ownership and knowing that your monthly payments are going towards owning a home rather than renting feels really good.

Good feeling debt is also debt that you are fully aware of.

You know the numbers.

You are glad when that bill comes because you are happy to pay for the thing or service you got.

I am so happy to pay for my son’s surgery. I would pay ten times what it cost us to have him alive and well.

Good feeling debt feels good both that you own this glorious thing and good when you think about making the payment.

All sorts of good.

Then there’s bad debt.

Bad debt can be tricky.

Debt that feels bad may feel good at first.

Like the rush of excitement when you buy a car impulsively.

You just went in to look and you ride out with keys and a contract.

Woo hoo!

But then that rush of dopamine and adrenaline begins to drain out of your body and it doesn’t feel so great.

You don’t feel so good about the purchase because it’s something that doesn’t bring you sustained joy.

Or bad debt can feel badly when you start making payments and you have to give up other things you love.

The first step to getting out of debt is to, from this day forward, only take on good feeling debt.

Turn off the faucet of debt regret.

Then be truthful about the debt you already carry

and forgive yourself for being in debt.

If you think you made a money mistake, own that. Be ok with taking a loss if that helps you pay off the debt. That’s telling yourself the truth.

That’s being an emotional adult.

There are a lot of ways to pay off your debt, but if you 

• Don’t take on new bad debt, 
• Face the debt you have by tell yourself the truth and 
• Treat yourself compassionately, 

you have set the stage for financial wellbeing.