Living My Life Like It's Golden

Mastering Your Money Mindset

• Louisa Larado • Season 2 • Episode 5

Share episode

Send us a text

Enrollment is now open for the Golden Money Blueprint. Find out more or enroll here.

Summary
In this conversation, Louisa Larado introduces a three-day challenge aimed at helping participants achieve a $2,000 financial goal for Christmas. She shares her personal journey from experiencing financial success to facing bankruptcy, emphasizing the importance of mindset in financial management. The discussion covers setting clear goals, identifying personal motivations, overcoming limiting beliefs, and shifting from a lack mindset to an abundance mindset. Louisa also highlights the transformative power of gratitude and provides actionable steps for participants to empower their financial journey.

Takeaways

  • The foundation of financial success is a strong mindset.
  • Identifying your 'why' is crucial for motivation.
  • Visualization can help in achieving financial goals.
  • Limiting beliefs can hinder financial progress.
  • Shifting to an abundance mindset opens up opportunities.
  • Gratitude practices enhance overall well-being and success.
  • Mindset work is essential before practical financial strategies.
  • Awareness of negative thoughts is the first step to change.
  • Creating new beliefs can rewire your financial mindset.
  • Accountability partners can increase the likelihood of achieving goals.

Find out more about my next workshop Thriving Together: A 1/2 Retreat for Mums and Teen Daughters by clicking here

Want more? You can check out my website for more free resources or follow me on Instagram or Facebook.

Disclaimer: The information contained on today’s podcast has been provided as general advice only. The contents have been prepared without taking into account your objectives, financial situation or individual needs. Before making any decision regarding the information, strategies or products mentioned on today’s episode, please consult your own financial advisor or other professional first.

Hi and welcome to the Living My Life Like It's Golden podcast. I'm your host, Louisa Larado And on today's episode, I wanted to give you a sneak peek into our 2K cash boost by Christmas challenge. So the following is some of the highlights from

day one of our challenge where we talked all about how to master your money mindset. And this is so crucial in any change in any area of your life. But it's also the biggest mistake that most people make because they just think that, you've got to do all those practical strategies like how to earn more money or make more money or generate

passive income sources or whatever they think is the way that you are going to become more financially stable. And those things only work if you've laid the foundations and that foundation is your money mindset. So stay tuned, there is so much great content

I'm really excited because over the next three days, I'm going to be showing you exactly how to reach that $2,000 goal for Christmas. And I'm going to break everything down really, really easily for you. So you can see how you can easily make this something that's really easy for you to do.

the reason that I decided that I really wanted to do this challenge was because

Money is something that I have experienced really great success with money. And then we went through a bankruptcy. And so I know what it's like to be on both sides. And I also know how that struggle about money can really feel to you. when I went through my bankruptcy, it gave me that chance to, I guess, reflect on all the things that weren't working and to see

That was a pattern that, and there was all these new beliefs that had formed during our bankruptcy as well that just didn't serve me anymore. And it kept me stuck for a while. So after we went bankrupt, it took us a few years to rebuild. And at the time we were still earning good money. We had a great company housing, bills covered and things like that, but we were still living paycheck to paycheck. And we just didn't feel like we were getting ahead and we couldn't figure out why. And it wasn't until

I started looking into different things and a lot of it all came down to like the mindset work. Like this is the foundation for everything. And it wasn't until I learned how to change my mindset around money that then things started to change for us. And we were able to start saving up and have a house and all these things now that started to flow a lot easier.

I wanted to create this because I know at the moment there is a lot of people at the moment that are just feeling the pinch and feeling like the cost of living and the pressures of increasing expenses of everything, inflation. And it seems to be a lot harder. Like I know now going to the shops, used to spend $200 a week on groceries. Now it's at least $500 a week. And that constant pressure and the constant strain

makes you feel like you just it's that restriction for a lot of people. So I know Christmas, the lead up to Christmas can be a time where there is extra events happening. There's all these different occasions that you want to go out and catch up with people and you want to have fun without feeling restricted. You're also going to probably be doing a bit more shopping than normal. So having that extra $2,000 I thought would be a really great way to just

give you that sort of headstart and to make you feel good about your money and approach the Christmas season, feeling ease and feeling a lot better and more free about your money. So this is why I really thought this would be a fun challenge to do with the lead up to Christmas because what I'm gonna do over the next couple of days is gonna break it down really easy for you so you can see exactly how you're gonna reach that $2,000 goal in time for Christmas.

today, what we're going to do first is we're going to work on the foundation, which is the mindset work. Cause I compare your mindset to like building a house. So if you were going to build a house, you wouldn't start with like the walls and the roof. You're going to lay the foundation first and the walls on the roof. That's like your money, managing strategies, budgeting.

earning, creating additional incomes, that's all the other stuff that comes with it. But if you don't have that foundation down first, you're not going to be able to, you know, create a structure that's going to hold up. And that's why we stayed so stuck for so long with our bankruptcy, because we weren't earning good money. We were able to, you know, have all these opportunities, I was always doing additional side hustles and things like that on top of my

current job. And it wasn't until then I did the mindset work that then that's when things actually started to happen for us. So today is going to be looking at the mindset and why we're doing this challenge. Tomorrow, we're going to go more into the practical money managing strategies and methods and things like that. And I'll show you how you can put them into play to really help you reach the goal.

And on the third day, that's when we're to be creating our actual action plan that's going to get you to that $2,000 goal just in time for Christmas. And it's only less than two months away now. So it was officially two months, I think on Friday. So it gives us a couple of months to make sure that we can reach this goal. So

First, the first activity I want you to do that's really important is to decide why you want to do, why did you say yes to doing this challenge? Why have you decided to sign up and dedicate the next three days, take an hour of your time, which is very precious to do this challenge? So what I want you to do on a piece of paper, I want you just to write down first of all, why, what made you say yes?

once you've got that reason written down, the next thing that I want you to do is I want you to then think, okay, well, why, why did you just say that thing that you said above? So we're going to go a bit deeper because it's

When we decide firstly why we're going to do something. So for example, I use so recently, I completely overhauled my way of eating. So I knew it just was not serving me. And it was something I'd put off for years and years and years because, you know, I really love all those foods that I knew weren't good for my body. Things like the gluten and the sugar and all that sort of stuff. I knew for the last few years, I was like, I know they're not good for me, but

I love them. So I'm just going to keep eating them. know. And my reasoning that I didn't change that was because I didn't have time. I just didn't have the time. You know, my kids are fussy. I don't want to have to cook two different meals. I just didn't want to have to think about getting my head around all the healthy stuff. I just really enjoyed that food too much. And it wasn't until I actually thought, okay, well, why am I going to do this? And I had to sit down and have a think about it. Well,

Initially, I was thinking, you know, want to lose weight. So that was my first why. But then I needed to go deeper. So the technique I want to show you today is called seven layers deep or we can do six or seven layers deep. Or sometimes it's called the onion technique where you're peeling back the layers of why you want to do something. So first, we say our initial why. So for me, originally, it was like to lose weight or for the money, money thing you might say, so I can have extra money ready for Christmas.

Okay, then, so then now I want you to go down on the next line and write why. So why do you want that extra money for Christmas or why did you want to lose the weight? And just see what comes up for you. So I'll give you a moment to write your next why. So why the thing about that?

we're to go again. So like, we'll use the weight loss example. So first they wanted to lose weight. Why don't want to lose weight? Cause I've started to lose my confidence, I guess, in the way that I look and I want to sort of feel good in that clothes I'm wearing and things like that. Okay. Well, why do you want to feel good in the clothes that you're wearing? I guess I want to be

like a better role model for my kids and show them that, you know, body confidence and things like that. So see how we're getting a bit deeper into really why you want to do something. So take another moment and write why, another why. And once you've done that, I want you to do that a couple more times and see what comes up for you.

Quite often we just superficially say originally like this is our initial thoughts of why we want to do something, but there's always something deeper. There's always something behind that. And when you do this exercise and you get really deep on why you want to do something, that's going to help you stay motivated. That's going to help you stay focused because this is to the core of what you really want to do. It's not just the surface stuff. It's not just the stuff we think that we should say, or, you know, we think it's the right answer or that's maybe what other people

think we want to hear. So that's why we're giving those answers. So instead, I want you to really, really get clear. So basically, do every single reason you're right, again, say why that and you should get down pretty clear to like a really strong reason why. if you have your why written down,

What I want you to do is keep that written down somewhere where you will see this throughout the lead up to Christmas. Because every time you feel that motivation lacking, you can come back to this. And this you can use for any area of your life. It doesn't just have to be about money. It can be about a fitness goal, a health goal, a relationship goal, anything, any aspect of your life you want to improve. If you get really clear on your wire to doing anything, that's really going to help you stay focused.

often really look deep into that. And when you have a really strong why, not just a superficial one, that's when you've got that drive and that motivation that will keep you focused on your goals. All right, so now that we've done that, and you've got a bit of an idea about why you want to do something, we're going to do a quick little visualization exercise. So I want you to just take a moment and close your eyes, just sit comfortably.

close down your eyes and I want you to imagine that it's almost Christmas and you have reached that $2,000 goal.

You can see that money in your bank account.

How does that make you feel?

Just take a moment to think of any feelings that are coming up knowing that you've achieved that goal.

Maybe it feels, you feel proud. You feel abundant. You feel grateful. You might feel empowered.

Let's think of any of those feelings.

knowing that you've reached that goal maybe even more.

Take a deep breath and you can open your eyes and just write down on your piece of paper any of those feelings that just came up for you.

just a couple of words and have that under your why and why the reason we do anything in life, any, anything, ultimate goal is cause we want to have these feelings. We want things to feel good. We do stuff to take ourselves out of pain and into feeling good. Like really that's the ultimate goal of everything that we do. So when we are going to be creating,

this focus on what we want. We have access to those feelings probably in other things. We don't need to wait to reach this money goal. And the more that we are tapping into those feelings that we know we want to get from this goal now, the more that you will be attracting more of those feelings and the easier it will be to reach your goal. So say a feeling that came up to you had reaching that $2,000 goal was gratitude. When in your day-to-day life can you already tap into that feeling? If one of the feelings that came up to you maybe was feeling

empowered or what other things could you be doing each day that feel that feeling? So the more that you're consciously aware of the feelings that you want to be feeling, the ultimate goal and then how you can access them in your day to day life, the more likely you are to create more of those feelings and the easier that goal will flow for you. So that's just a few little things to think about and you can keep that somewhere where you will see it regularly. Just as a little reminder,

throughout the challenge. So now that we've got that, I want to congratulate you because signing up and actually taking the time and showing up is making the decision that you are ready to reach this goal. So usually a tricky thing is to actually set a goal and make that decision. So I sort of helped you by making the goal for you, which is $2,000 in time for Christmas.

but you actually saying, yep, that's something I want to do. And I've decided to do, and I'm showing up and I'm going to take time out of my day and make this a priority. Then that means you're so much more likely to reach that goal. Cause often in our days, we'll think of these ideas and these thoughts of things that we could be, that we should want, or we think, yeah, I'd like to have this or I'd like to have that, but we don't actually do anything about it. But by taking action and making it a priority and actually showing up and deciding.

you know what, this is something I'm going to work towards. And that is, you know, half of that already won. So well done for doing that. So you're already on the right path. So what, what usually happens though, when we set ourselves any goal, any sort of goal, that's maybe a bit out of our comfort zone or may seem a bit difficult. And again, this is for any area of your life, not just money. What's going to happen is our brain is designed to keep us safe.

So we've still got that, you know, the caveman brain that hasn't evolved as much over the centuries. And it keeps us in that survival mindset. So it wants to keep us safe. So anything that poses a threat to us. So that might mean trying something new, doing something you haven't done before, learning something new, taking a risk. Every time it sees that sort of threat that takes you out of that comfort zone and that safety net.

then what happens is it sparks that fight or flight response and it keeps us so we think, my gosh, I can't do this. And all of a sudden you'll have all these ideas and these beliefs showing up in your brain that are telling you why you shouldn't do it. Why it's a terrible idea. Why it could happen. Why it won't happen for you. Why it won't work. And you'll probably have loads of things that start coming up for you. So what you need to do when you

And this is normal, this is normal, happens to every single person in the world, the most successful people, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how practiced you are at all this mindset work, it's still going to happen. But the key is to become aware of these thoughts and realize they are just thoughts, they're just beliefs, but they are not actually true. So now that you know that this is your goal, your $2,000 goal in time for Christmas, what I want you to do

is take a moment on your piece of paper and write down any limiting beliefs or ideas or what that little voice in your head is telling you why you can't reach that goal. And just write them down for me. Just jot down, don't overthink them, don't judge them. Just literally list them down one under the other. So it might be things like, I'm really bad with money. I don't earn enough money.

I'm really bad at managing money. make money, but I spend it too quickly or I'll just love shopping too much. So it's probably not going to work anything down. So try and get about five down. If you can write more than five, then that's great too. But take a moment just to jot those down. And then what these are again, these are just beliefs. These are just ideas. And we all have them about any area of your life.

But I can tell you one thing, they're not true. None of these beliefs that you have just written down are ultimately true. There is no divine source in the universe that have said, written this in stone and says, you are going to be bad with money. You are always going to spend more than you earn. You are always going to be terrible at managing money. Money is just too hard. Money is evil. Whatever is coming up for you. So out of all those things that have just come up.

What your brain does is it looks for evidence to prove that they are true. Again, trying to keep you in that comfort zone, trying to keep you in the safety bubble. And again, this applies to every area of your life. So if by your brain saying to you that you're bad with money, what it then does is it looks to seek evidence of times where you actually weren't bad with money. So for example, when I went bankrupt,

That was a big belief. I'm bad with money. Obviously we have money, we lost it all and I'm the one managing the money. that therefore there's a big lot of evidence that tells me I'm bad with money. And what then you do, it's like where your focus goes, that's where your energy flows. So you might've, that's a thing that's commonly said and it's so true. Cause whatever you choose to focus on, it might be like one day you go and buy a car that you've never seen before.

And all of a sudden you see on the street all the same cars popping up everywhere. Because that's now what our attention and our mind is focusing on. That's what then we start to see in our reality. And that's because your brain cannot process the millions of bits of data coming at it at any one given time. It's very selective and it will choose exactly what to focus on. So it might be another really great example of this that I have in my house all the time.

is when my, might be my kids or my husband are going looking for something in the pantry and they're saying, mom, where's, or where's the sauce? I can't see it anywhere. I'm like, it's there on the second shelf, right in front of you. I know where it is. I can't see it. And that's because they've already made that decision in their head that they can't see it there. They're not going to find it. Only mom can find it. And then as a result,

their brain doesn't process that information. And I'll go there and I'll be like, here it is right in front of you. And this happens to everyone, I know, but it's your brain's way of focusing on the information that is relevant and filtering out all the rest. So when we have these beliefs and these ideas and these thoughts, again, just that they're simply beliefs, ideas, thoughts, they are not truth, they are not set in stone. So.

Right now your brain is looking for evidence of why are you bad with money? Why do you always spend more than you earn? Why do you shop more, shop too much and don't use that money towards other things that you would see a better purpose for you. So now you've gathered evidence of why these beliefs are true. So therefore your brain thinks, yep, there you go, tick, it's true. But what you can start doing now instead, now that you have this knowledge, you know that these are just ideas and they're not set in stone.

And the same way that you have created these ideas already, you can then create the ones that you prefer, the alternative version. And you're, you do it the exact same way that you created these limiting beliefs, but you've actually got to put a bit more effort into it now. Cause like I said, our default is going to be set to that limitation. So I want you to now learn how to switch it back to the other, the abundance and

Before I go into that actually, let me just quickly touch on the difference between lack mindset and abundance mindset. So I think this is really important. And most of us right now, or most people spend more of their time in a lack mindset than an abundance mindset. And what a lack mindset is, basically you feel bad. It's things that make you feel bad. You feel worried, you feel stressed, you feel overwhelmed, any sort of negative feelings or a sort of...

with a lack mindset and any feelings of just feeling joy, flow, ease, fun, abundance, gratitude. That's when you're into that abundance mindset. So, you know, if you're doing something you just love and your loser concept of time and you just sort of in flow, then that's when you are in that abundance mindset. But unfortunately, our society that we are currently living in means that we spend a lot more time in an

a lack mindset than an abundance mindset. You just need to, you know, turn on the TV or listen to the news or scroll through social media. And you're bombarded by all the bad stuff going on in the world. You know, there's the election campaigns in the US and all the other things. There's constantly bad stuff that we're presented with. We go to work and it's stressful and people are complaining and they're whinging and it's like the norm to be complaining.

And then you're in this busy, fast paced world where it's normal again. It's being normalized that we have to be so busy and we have to be always on the go and we have to have this never ending to do list. And what happens is we have this, our brains actually have an addiction now to cortisol, which is that stress hormone. And the times, if you ever had that time or that moment where you've got a bit of downtime in your life and you're like, I can just, you know, do something that I want to do.

How often do you actually spend that genuinely doing something that really lights you up and brings you joy and not just mindlessly scrolling through your phone or turning on a show that you can watch mindlessly and switch off? And the reason that we do that is because our brain is so addicted to that cortisol here that the second that it's not there, it will be looking for more reasons to add something else that's gonna stress us out or create that bit of unease in our lives.

So it's really, you have to be really conscious and mindful of retraining yourself to have that time where you can be in more of an abundant state than that lack state. Cause the ultimate goal is you want to be predominantly in your abundance mindset and not in your lack mindset. Because at the end of the day, the more you're in your lack mindset, the more stuff that will show up in your life that create lack, the more you're in your abundance mindset, the more things you'll see that will show up and create more abundance in your life.

And so obviously the goal for everyone is to feel good. So we want to be in that abundance mindset. So good news though. again, awareness of all of this is the key because so many people are just going through life without being consciously aware of all of these things. But we're going to start rewiring that. So there's a great thing called neuroplasticity.

And it is your brain's ability to create new neural pathways. So we're basically essentially rewiring your brain. So at the moment, your default might be like, it might be, I'm bad with money. I spend too much or whatever those default thoughts that are coming through that you don't even have to think about. They're just there. We need to retrain them. what we're going to do, so next to all those limiting beliefs you wrote down, I want you to put the desired belief you would like to have instead. So it's usually the opposite.

If mine was, really bad with money, then my alternatives is going to be, I'm really great with money. I'm amazing at managing my money. If mine was, I always spend way more than I earn. alternative thought might become, I always spend, I always have more than enough leftover after I spend money I spend and I've still got money left over. So take a moment and jot down any of these beliefs now that you can.

now switch over. So the alternative next to them.

So once you've done that, then the next step is going to be looking for evidence of when the new belief is true. And there will already be evidence of this now, but you can definitely add to this over the course of this week and even into the next couple of months. So for example, if my old default belief was I'm bad with money, the evidence was, well, I went bankrupt, so I must be terrible with money.

Is that true? Ultimately? No, was for maybe that time in my life, but now that is not true. So my new belief, I'm excellent at managing money. Okay, well where's the evidence that shows me that? And I'm going to write down examples in my day-to-day life where I'm excellent at dealing with my money. So it might be, always pay my bills on time. I'm excellent. I set my accounts up so that all my direct debits and things flow out. So it just works for me. I've made sure that

You know, we always have enough money in our house to have enough to pay for groceries and everything else. Even if that, you know, means moving money from around in different areas, I know that there's always going to be enough and that we don't ever have to go into debt again. I'm looking for evidence of to show me and to prove to me that it's the new reality. And you're going to do that for each of those limiting beliefs. And again,

This doesn't just apply to money. You can use this technique in any area of your life that you want any improvement in. But it's a really great exercise. And then every time between now, or now that you're consciously aware of these thoughts that are coming up, you'll start to become aware when they run through your head. If you go out on the weekend and you're going to go shopping or something and you're thinking, no, well, I'm bad with money, so I shouldn't do this.

then you can start thinking, okay, well actually know that that's just an idea. And then you can start becoming aware and consciously retraining yourself and then thinking those new thoughts instead. Takes a bit of time and practice, but it's gonna say, this is gonna be a really good tool that's gonna set you up for success. And this was one of like the turning points doing this exercise for me with my money mindset, because before then I felt like I was constantly in like, we were always running out,

bills will come out and there'd not be enough money left over. So I'd be transferring money out of our savings all the time. And it just wasn't working until I did this. And then I was like, now I know. And it really helps change everything. It really does. So again, it takes a bit of time and patience. I'd give it a go, but you can see what comes up for you.

The power of belief is something that that scientists have been researching for a while and to see the impact that actually has. And, you know, if you think I can't do something, of course you're not going to be able to, but again, having that bit of belief and thinking, you know, I probably can like,

I remember years ago, probably about five years ago, I decided I wanted to run a marathon. prior to that, back like even, you know, I hated running growing up. It was the worst thing ever. I just couldn't think of anything worse. And my kids are the same now. Every time I've got to do any like cross country event or something, a long distance run, they're like, no, not even trying. I it. And I remember being the exact same, but.

When I tried to get us, it got slowly into running. I thought this is something I want to start working on. And the idea of doing a marathon, we're just 42 kilometres or something that was just so like crazy. But I decided, you know what? I believe that I can do it. Even though I didn't know how I was going to do it. It was a belief that I had. And I did end up running a marathon. another really great example of belief I found fascinating is the American psychologist, Carol Dweck. She's

She was the founder of the whole or the first psychologist to really bring into light the whole growth mindset theory. So she's been doing a lot of research over the years. She's like in her eighties now. So it's been a long career of researching her different examples. And an example of her that I absolutely love is she did this experiment and...

where she used to go into lots of different schools, high schools and things like that. So a lot of her focus on kids and their ability to, you know, have that growth mindset and these beliefs, I guess, within themselves. And so what she did is she, and she went to, she tested this on hundreds of kids at different high schools and they were from a range of different backgrounds, socioeconomic areas, races, academic levels.

And what she did is she gave them all a set of 100 keys and that she put them in a locked room. And she said to them, have one minute to unlock the door. And obviously a hundred keys, the chance of that happening is going to be very slim. she did that. And obviously the majority of the kids did not succeed within that one minute of time. So then she ran the experiment again.

The only difference was this time she gave each of the kids in the experiment a superhero cape and it might've been like Batman or Superman or Wonder Woman or whoever. She didn't say anything about the cape. She just gave them the cape for them to wear, set the exact same challenge. And she found that most kids managed to find the right key. So instead of a hundred keys, same timeframe within that minute.

And just that act of putting on that superhero, it like empowered them to have that belief that, you know, that what the association, I guess, with superheroes and you believe in oneself, if you're a superhero, of course you can, you know, reach a goal in one minute, even though it seems so crazy. And it's that idea that once, you know, you got that belief that it's so everything sort of starts to flow. So.

Belief and my, this is why this stuff is, I do so much foundation work on your mindset, because it really is crucial to every single aspect of any sort of change you want to see in your life or reaching any goal that you have.

if you decide you can, then you are like almost there pretty much. It's just putting a few actions into place now to reach your goal, but actually making the decision deciding, I can do this. That's like two thirds there already. And then it's just putting all the practical stuff together after that.

Another really great technique to keep you in that abundance mindset over your lack mindset is to start focusing on what you're already having your life that makes you feel abundant or grateful. So the power of gratitude has been spoken about and scientists have studied it for many, many years. And the reason it's

something that it always boils back down to is because it literally is the foundation for everything. And it really does make a difference. And I know personally, the periods of my life where I've done like I had a regular gratitude practice versus the times where I'm like, not too busy, can't be bothered, don't feel like it. Like the reflection of my life and the different stages of my life is crazy. And I know that, you know, it's evident to those people around me that

You can tell when I'm in that gratitude mindset versus, you know, the periods of time where I was in that lack all the time. And it's reflected in every aspect of your life. It's not just your mindset because I know for me, it reflected in making poor food choices, always having low energy, not getting enough sleep, having that low self-worth. It's like the cycle continues. But when you come back to gratitude, it is such a...

game changing thing to do. So the simplest thing to do this, and this is something that we all have available to us. And you can do it at any time of day. You don't even need to write it down. It is a lot more powerful when you write it down. Like there's, I know there's been some research on like the power of actually physically writing it down to help create those new neural pathways that like speeds up the process.

but if there's points in your day where you don't get to that, just reflecting and taking a moment to think on what you're grateful for is so powerful. And my favorite example of the gratitude practice was years ago when I was doing life coaching and I had one of my coaching clients come to me and her and her husband were having really bad marriage problems to the point where...

they were looking at possibly getting separated and it was more he wanted that and she wasn't really interested in it at the time. during our coaching session, we were just reflecting on it. And obviously you can't change anybody else. can't, know, obviously there's things you want to change about somebody else, but you can't, you can't do that. They've got to do that for themselves. But I said to her, why don't you just like write down a gratitude list of all the things that you were grateful about?

for your marriage, even though you're in a crappy situation right now and it doesn't feel good and it's not working and he's, you know, suggested getting a separation. Why don't you just take a moment and reflect on actually what's worked? What are you grateful for? And she went home after our coaching session and she did her list of all the things that she liked. And she was meeting her husband for lunch later that day. And she went to...

And I didn't tell her to do this, but she went and she gave him the list of all the things that she wrote down. And she's just said that that experience of sharing that with him as well was like the such a game changer in their marriage and they work through their problems, but it was just taking that time because they obviously just, you know, you don't sometimes stop and think about what's working and what's right. And when you write down gratitude, the more things that you

right down or the more you practice gratitude, the more you're in that state of being grateful. Like the gratitude is like the top of your, of all the different like vibrational frequencies of all the different emotions. Like gratitude is like the, I'm pretty sure it's the very top or the second from the top one. Because when you're at that vibration, you attract more things into your life that make you feel grateful. And so that definitely worked for her relationship and they're still married to this day. And that was

that was probably about eight years ago that we did that session together. Sorry. I know it wasn't all me, but just the power of gratitude to turn that around though. was definitely a turning point, I guess, for them and having that awareness and then them keeping that as something that they did as a part of relationship. And so what I want you to do, another task I'm going to set for you, you don't need to do it now. You can do it over the course of the week is

Just start thinking of things that already make you feel grateful right now, things that make you feel abundant. And often it's like the little things that we don't even give much thought, we just take the granted. So, know, those days people are like, I've had a crap day, I've got nothing I can be grateful for today. I'm like, well, are you breathing? Do you have a light you can switch on that gives you electricity? Do you have water that flows from your tap? Can you have a hot shower?

Do you have a bed you can sleep in? Do you know there's so much in our lives, even if you've had what you think is the worst day ever, that a million people in this earth would kill to have an experience that you just had where you had all these great things that we just take for granted. And by focusing on what you are grateful for,

you'll start to see more things come up. And so it might be hard at first, especially if you haven't done a gratitude practice for a while, it might be something that's a bit difficult for you at first. But the more you do it, the more easier it gets. And, you know, for me, I like doing it in the morning when I wake up, if I'm making a coffee and I take out a journal and I'll just write a few things down then while the coffee's making. So that's a really good habit to associate it. It's good to have something you can associate one habit with another.

Or if you know that's something you do, that's when you do your journal, you can do it on your phone. Sometimes we do it as a family at dinner time, we'll go around and say a couple of things we're grateful for. I've done it in the past when I'm putting the kids to bed and we talk about what we were grateful for. So you find a way that works for you and you can do it on your own. You can do it as a family practice or with your partner, whatever works for you. But it is such an underrated practice, but it is probably like the most

powerful, transformative thing you can do. So I'm going to challenge you for this week, every single day to think of at least three things you were grateful for and actually take the time to write them down. Writing down three things you're grateful for that will take you one minute, maybe two. But like I just said, if you've got every, if you're healthy, if you can walk, if you can run, if you, you know, look around at what you have in your life.

So anything, so those times in your day where you might be feeling low energy or stressed or worried, all those feelings that are putting you in that lack, come back to gratitude. It's a tool that you can use at any time. You don't even need to write that down. Just come back. I was chatting to some friends last night and we were talking about how they were feeling so impatient as they're getting older. Just things like waiting in lines. And I'm now one of my practices I do.

is when I am having to wait for something, I'm like, all right, well, I'm going to use this to do some like breathing or breathing techniques or gratitude and just thinking about things in my head. And it just changes everything. it turns, you know, there's this experience in our day that we can either take to think, get frustrated and worried and stressed about, or we can say, all right, well, I've got nothing else to do. I'm just going to use this time right now to breathe.

to reflect on things that have happened in my day. And it really will change your mood and it will change your mindset. And what all of this stuff is doing is it is really gonna give you that foundation to reach any goals with money or any area of your life.

but starting with a really strong mindset. And these few techniques that I've just shared with you are gonna give you just a few little tweaks that you can start doing and some practices that you can do. And the more that you practice this stuff and the more that you do all these activities that I'm sharing with you, more things will start to flow into your life. And the easier it will be. And when you are feeling

You can easier come out of those moods. Or when you notice yourself getting stressed or worried. Like today, for example, even I was working on doing some stuff with my business. And as I was doing it this afternoon, I was like, I'm feeling like this is, I'm not feeling it right now. I don't want to do it. So it's acknowledging that, okay, well this point in time right now, that's not working for me. I'm not feeling in flow. So I'm going to stop.

I'm going to take break and I'm going to do something else that I enjoy instead. And you know what? can come back to that at the later time. And that's just sort of what you need to be doing. You need to be aware of those times in your day where things just aren't working or is there things in your day you're doing just because you think you have to, but you don't really need to have to and they're making you feel stressed or resentful or worried. So.

That's just a few things I want you to become aware of. And another final strategy I want to give you tonight to work on your mindset is, like I said, the goal is to stay out of lack and more into an abundance. But right now, depending on, you know, if you're watching the news or if you are subscribing to things or watching YouTube videos that bring feelings of...

anger or resentment or stress or worry, then unsubscribe from them. Turn off the news for a week. listen to music that uplifts you, that makes you feel good instead if that is a habit that you're doing. you don't, you don't need to be amongst every bit of news that's out there. If it's constantly feeling straining, if you spend a lot of time on social media, then

Curate your feed so that it uplifts you and inspires you. And if that means I'm following every single one of your Facebook friends or Instagram people and only seeing things show up in your feed that inspires you or makes you feel good to watch. So maybe you love watching funny dog videos or love watching

I don't know, anything that uplifts you and inspires you, make that what you're gonna be seeing on social media instead. Instead of we've all got those friends that comment on things, or if you're part of like community, Facebook groups, where there's always someone that's whinging about something going on, and then you end up finding yourself reading all these comments, and you're like, what am I doing with my life? Instead of doing that, then,

Try the latter, try curating your feed or even have a break from social media for the next week. If you want to, you don't have to, but that's just an idea. But be really mindful of what you are consuming. Even TV shows, even books you're reading. If it is lowering your vibration and it is making you feel worried and stressed, then that might not be the right fit for you if you want to be in this abundant mindset.

instead do try and make a conscious effort to do more of the things that you actually enjoy this week too. So it might be instead of scrolling through social media, cause we all say we don't have time to do stuff, but we all have, I bet if you look on your screen time.

Most of us would be spending a minimum of 30 minutes a day. And that's very conservative on social media at different points of our day. So could that time be spent doing something that just lights you up that you love? So it might be things like listening to some music and having a dance around the house. It might be going for a walk or calling up a loved one or whatever it is that you know just brings you joy that fills you up.

Go back to those feelings that we did at the beginning when I said, you want to do this? Why did you say yes to this? Go back to those feelings and decide why, what are some things you could do right now to help you get into those feelings? And like I said, tomorrow we're to move more into the practical side of things. But today I just want to give you the real foundation.

And I'll give you one more analogy before I give you your action task for today. So like anything, I want you to imagine you've got two gardens and you've got one that is like this beautiful manicured garden. Like every blade of grass is meticulous, beautiful flowers, it's colorful, it's vibrant. It makes you feel good when you're inside this garden. And your other garden is just overgrown. It's full of weeds.

basically no one's looked after it for about a year. So the grass is up to my neck and there's weeds everywhere. There's, dead flowers and all sorts of stuff. Now, if I wanted my, this weedy overgrown garden to look like the beautiful idealistic garden. And I say, right, what I'm going to do is I am going to, I'm going to water this garden and I'm going to fertilize this garden.

just by doing those two actions alone, is that gonna give you a beautiful manicured garden like the one on the left? And the mistake so many people make in terms of money mindset or money strategies, and where a lot of people go wrong is they think, yep, I am going to learn how to manage my money. I'm gonna learn how to, all these different money making strategies, all these different money generating strategies, you and that's what I did at first.

I read the Barefoot Investor and I learned how to manage my money really well. And then I did a course in share trading. So I learned how to generate income through shares and I learned how to, you know, I had additional businesses. So I was generating money from all these different sources. So, but nothing was changing. We were still running out of money all the time. And that was because it was like I was just fertilizing and watering the garden. So yeah, it might rain up a bit. So I might've had a bit of extra money, but it's never going to look like.

the beautiful garden because I haven't got rid of the weeds yet. I haven't got rid of the weeds yet. And the weeds is your mindset. It's all these beliefs in your brain that are telling you why you can't do it. It's all this limitation. It's all this lack thinking. It's all these ideas that we have that either other people tell us that we've heard our parents talk about money, our loved ones talk about money, these fears that we have about money.

They're all the weeds in your garden. So until we start pulling out the weeds first, then we can water it, then we can start fertilizing it and mowing the lawn and doing all the extra things. But until you do that, nothing is going to change. You might see a little bit of improvement, but it's not going to be long lasting. It's not going to create that long lasting stability. And it's like a quick fix. It's not going to change greatly. Okay.

So I just want you to think of that and why I've spent the whole almost hour just talking about mindset. Cause it really is that real crucial step. And I could talk about so many more aspects of mindset that I haven't even touched on today I could take a week talking about it alone, but as a foundation, it's a really good starting point. So let me leave you with some,

actions for you to complete tonight. You might've done some of them during the session already, because I've spoken you through them already. But firstly, I want you to be clear on your why. Why do you want to reach this goal? And then you can go that bit deeper, ask yourself it a few times, five or six or seven times to get really clear on truly why you want to do it. Once you've done that, put it somewhere where you can see it, make it really clear.

this is gonna keep you focused and motivated. So put it on your fridge or put it in your bathroom mirror, wherever you're gonna see it each day. Maybe have it as a little reminder that pops up on your phone throughout the day or on your screen saver. Once you know why you're gonna do something and that focus is going on that why, you're gonna be more likely to follow through with the action steps we're gonna be touching on over the next couple of days. Now your second action step for tonight or before tomorrow.

is to list down any limiting beliefs or ideas that come up to you about money. So this could be ideas about, you know, all the things that we just spoke about. And then the next step is then to refrain all of those ideas. So you might have done a couple while we were doing the call tonight, but if you've got some more that come up for you, or you probably will think of start thinking of a whole load more, list down as many as you can think, and then refrain them.

And you want to refrain them to help you support this $2,000 money goal that we are going to be looking at working towards over the next couple of nines. And then once you've refrained them, start writing down the evidence. Where in your life have you already shown that you can do these things? Or if there is no evidence that you are doing these things yet, then...

think, okay, well, what are some examples of other people that are similar to me that are doing these things? And if they can do those things, then why can't I? If it's already proven that it's possible in this world to do these things, then is there any reason that I can't? So start reframing all those ideas. Next action step is to unsubscribe or unfollow or turn off anything.

especially over the next week, or at least a minimum over the next three days during the challenge, but the longer you do this, the better. That just doesn't feel good. You feel lowering your mood, lowering your vibration, taking away from that abundance thinking mindset. So try and, if it's curating a newsfeed, if it's completely switching on social media or having a day's break at least just to do more of the stuff that makes you feel good, then do that.

And your last bit of action step or homework for tonight is to make an abundance or gratitude list of all the things that you already have in your life. And like I say, try and do a minimum of three each day, definitely over the next three days. You'll probably notice a big shift in your day if you start it with a bit of gratitude. I definitely notice the days I've done it compared to the days that I don't. So see how you go with that.

Now a few other little things you can do if you like. So if you've enjoyed this content and you know somebody else that you think would enjoy it as well, feel free to share the challenge with them. Now they can still register over the next couple of days and if they register at any time before.

Tuesday or when the challenge finishes on Tuesday, then they'll still be able to access the replay. So even if they haven't watched this call, they can go back and they can watch this on the replay and then take part in the challenge as well. And it's also been proven scientifically, you're so much more likely to achieve any goal if you have an accountability partner, someone to keep you accountable. So if you have a friend or a loved one that's doing this challenge with you,

then you can work on it together, but you'll also be a lot more likely to follow through and complete the challenge as well. So benefits both of you if that's something you were doing. So feel free to invite someone,

last thing is make sure you complete all your action steps before tomorrow.

So hopefully you have got a little bit out of tonight's work. There's a lot of stuff you have to do for homework. remember tomorrow, we're all going to be talking about the actual practical stuff. So how you can actually set up your money then we'll be going into the different action steps to take to make sure you reach this goal.

Louisa Larado (53:33)
Now hopefully you enjoyed that sneak peek into

what we spoke about during the 2K challenge. Now it's actually not too late to still register for this challenge. We've still got two more days to go. So we're gonna be looking over the next two days at the actual practical money managing strategies to reach the 2K goal. And then the following day we're gonna be going with the exact action plan and the steps you need to take to reach your 2K goal. So...

If you would like to register and join the challenge, not only will you have access to all this content and the replay of it so you can watch the video back, you'll also have access to our private Facebook group where we can support and connect with each other and just have a bit more accountability. if that is something you want to join and become a part of, then head over to louisalarado.com slash challenge.

or you'll find the link in the show notes to register your spot. again, share this with a friend if you know somebody else that would also benefit from taking part in this challenge and listening to this message. Now, if you've enjoyed today's content, also make sure you are subscribed or following along to the Living My Life Like It's Golden and podcast. And I'd love to hear a review or a comment that you have about today's episode.

Thank you so much and I'll see you on the next episode.


People on this episode

Head Shot

Louisa Larado

Host