21: Annihilate Your Limiting Beliefs
When you uplevel your life and your finances, you are going to encounter roadblocks along the way. What you might not realize is that some of these obstacles are self imposed. They stem from our limiting beliefs.
What is a limiting belief? A limiting belief is a belief that holds you back. It feels like a truth, but really, it is simply a thought. On your journey to wealth and financial freedom, it is important to closely examine your limiting beliefs surrounding money. A limiting money belief is a belief that you have around money that holds you back from having more money or prevents you from creating more money.
Before we can explore how to undo limiting money beliefs, it is necessary to examine where they come from. Most of the time, we treat beliefs as if they are truths. They feel like facts. However, every belief started as a thought. We had that thought once and then we told ourselves that same thought so many times, it evolved into a belief. Our thoughts and beliefs guide our actions which influence our outcomes. That is why it is so difficult to notice a belief. When all of the results surrounding the belief have been caused by that belief, no wonder our brains interpret that belief as the truth.
Oftentimes, our limiting money beliefs are rooted in our childhood. That means that we have spent decades telling ourselves these supposed truths. The fact that society often echoes other limiting money beliefs makes annihilating limiting beliefs all the more challenging.
The first part of overcoming your limiting beliefs is acknowledging their existence. Developing this awareness can help you examine your current beliefs and form new ones. Once you identify a belief, it is important to question it. Ask yourself if it is the truth and how you know it is true. Explore what else might be possible, even if they are things you’ve never allowed yourself to consider.
As you navigate your limiting money beliefs, it will be essential that you get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Our family and friends can over reinforce our limiting beliefs by commiserating with us. That is why looking for support through Facebook groups, coaching, and other like-minded individuals is key as you undo these limiting money beliefs.
In this episode, we also explore:
- The role that our primitive brain plays in trying to hold onto limiting beliefs and how to override that
- Common limiting money beliefs specific to physicians and how we can overcome them
- Examples of limiting money beliefs I developed in my childhood and how I overcame them
- A deeper dive into some of society’s commonly held limiting money beliefs and their origins
- The value of coaching and other support systems when creating new money beliefs
Featured on this episode:
- Connect with a community of women physicians who are pushing past their limiting beliefs in my Facebook group.
- Listen to a refresher on how thoughts and beliefs actually determine our outcomes in this episode.
- Remind yourself not to stand in your own way and tell yourself a better story here.
- Learn more about how to manage your mindset with Wealthy Mom MD.
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast—a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast, you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to uplevel your money and your life. I'm your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Welcome back everyone. So in today's podcast, I have a huge goal for you. My goal is for you to annihilate your limiting money beliefs. Why? Because once you get rid of them and create some new beliefs, the sky is literally the limit in terms of how much money you can create.
So you might be thinking, “Well, what does she mean by a limiting belief?” Let's define that first. So a limiting belief is basically any belief that you're having around money that's, well, limiting your ability to have or create money. And what is a belief? A belief is literally a phrase or a thought that you're telling yourself inside your head. And the thing is over time, these thoughts, these sentences, they become cemented into a belief. Now I use the word cemented on purpose because you literally think it's true and fixed, meaning that you cannot change it.
And so why are these so important to even identify? Because I find that a lot of my students don't even realize that they have these limiting beliefs. The reason why it's so important to identify these is because remember in episode one where I talked about how your thoughts, which become beliefs over time, create your feelings, which dictate your actions, or rather the actions you often don't take, which eventually create your results or your outcome. And why is this important? Because over time, these results, these outcomes literally become your life. And when it comes to money, it creates your current income, your net worth, et cetera.
And so what limiting belief about money are you telling yourself? Some common ones just to give you an example are things like, “I'm never going to make a certain amount of money--let's just say $200,000--because of my specialty.” I hear this a lot with certain specialties, like pediatrics or internal medicine, et cetera, or I hear things like, “I'm a single mom. I'm never gonna have the money that I want.” Because like I said earlier, these limiting money beliefs are often created when we're super young, the problem is we're adults now and we kind of forgot that we literally made these up.
Let me give you some examples from my life that hopefully will help you figure out what yours are. Many of you may know that I was actually born in Korea and we moved to the United States when I was around two years old. We moved because of my father's job. His company sent them over and I don't know exactly what he did, but I know at some point he lost his job or at least changed jobs. And I just remember that money wasn't going so well. I remember at some point they eventually had to file for bankruptcy. And so many of you might not know that, but this actually happened when I was in elementary school. So I just remember seeing them struggle so much. I was a little kid. And so I told myself, “Wow, money's hard. Money's hard to come by.” Right? How many of you can relate to that?
Another money belief that I’ve identified for my past was when I was in middle school. I remember getting a job and I remember wanting to work was like one of the really big things I wanted for myself, because I always wanted to be someone who could make my own money, probably because I saw my parents struggle with money. And so I think I was working as a babysitter because in middle school, that's kind of all you can do, right? No, one's gonna really hire you at that age. But I remember at some point I had enough money and I had enough money to buy these amazing shoes. At least they were amazing to me at the time, looking back, they were the Bass suede shoes. Any of you guys remember that? They’re pretty ugly actually, but that's what all the fancy kids are wearing. And so I wanted what the fancy kids were wearing.
I eventually had enough money to buy these shoes. I think over there, like 60 bucks. And I remember going to the mall with my friends and then coming home. And I remember being so excited to show my mom that I was able to buy these shoes with my money. I just remember feeling so proud that I could do that. And now I should probably tell you that my family is quite religious. We went to church every Sunday. We were super Christian. And so I remember when she came home and I was like, “Mom, look at this. I bought these shoes!” I was showing her, and I was just so excited. Like I said, I was so proud of myself, and plus I had the fancy shoes now. Right?
But she was not happy for me. In fact, I remember seeing her face and I was like, “Why?” I was so confused. I was like, “Why is she looking at me like that?” And she said something like, I don't remember the exact words, but she basically said that this was not a good thing that I bought and that I shouldn't want nice things. And she made me return it. In that moment, I remember feeling so much shame for wanting something nice for myself. I remember thinking something like, “It's not good to want nice things.”
So I think the way this shows up as adults, not just for me, but maybe for you is that we don't like spending on ourselves to buy whether it's a nice thing or some form of self care, we feel guilty for spending money on ourselves. So that's kind of where that money belief came from. How many of you are now thinking about some of the money beliefs that sort of started when you were a little kid? Except that now you're an adult, it doesn't quite make sense that you have these limiting money beliefs. So the first step is really just to even become aware that you're thinking something that's limiting your ability to create money.
Now, the thing is awareness is the first step, and that might seem obvious. But so many of you are not even aware that you're having a limiting belief because you don't think it's a belief. You think it's true. Just to give you an example. You know, the one that I hear a lot and I don't mean to pick on pediatricians, but so many pediatricians tell me, “Well, I'm a pediatrician or I'm a subspecialty of pediatrics. So I'm never going to make a certain amount of money.” I'll see posts like, “I'm a pediatrician. So please give me a pediatrician, appropriate budget for a vacation.” Right? The thing is, you think it's true. You don't even think it's a belief.
Now probably some of you are arguing with me, saying, “Well, that is true. If I'm a pediatrician, I can't make more than a certain amount of money.” Is that true? Why do you say that? Maybe it's true. If you're thinking about a traditionally employed pediatrician that's being paid by insurance. I'm not saying you need to find a side gig.
On a side note, I think a lot of people think that's what I tell physicians to do. I just want physicians to remember that our knowledge is super valuable and we forget that sometimes. And so what's important about identifying these limiting money beliefs is to check in with how you feel when you tell yourself, like, when you're telling yourself that you can't make a good living or that you're never going to have the life you want because of the specialty you chose that I'm sure you chose because you love it. I'm assuming that's not making you feel good. It makes you feel maybe resigned, maybe disheartened, maybe, you know, jealous or envious, right?
And so my question to you is what is the upside of believing this? Now, some of you might be thinking, “Well, what is she talking about?” Of course, there's no upside. These limiting beliefs suck, but there is a little bit of an upside. I call this the secret benefit. Whenever you're holding onto a belief, it's not serving you, but you're holding onto it for dear life. And we are talking about money, but there are other limiting beliefs going around your brain in other areas, right? There's always a secret benefit.
Now, when it comes to money, I find that often the secret benefit is that you are off the hook, meaning that you don't have to be responsible and you don't have to be willing to do anything. Now this might sound harsh. And some of you might be disagreeing with me because some of you might be thinking, “Well, I'd love to think that I'm responsible or that I could do something about it, but I simply can't because XYZ.” And so I am literally questioning all of those thoughts that you're telling me right now, while you're not really telling me. But I think you're telling me inside your head anyway. The secret benefit, once again, when it comes to money often is that you don't have to be responsible for your money because it's someone else's job, or you already picked your specialty and this is the amount of money you're going to make. So there's nothing else you can do. Do you see what I'm saying?
But there is a huge cost for believing these limiting beliefs. And as it comes to money, that cost is the freedom of true wealth. So maybe now you're thinking, “Oh, I better drop that limiting belief,” but how not as easy as it sounds. It seems like it would be easy to just kind of replace it with a replacement belief or a new belief because it takes something. And let me explain why it can be so hard to get rid of these limiting money beliefs.
Think about it. Assuming you're someone at least in your thirties or forties, you've probably been believing these beliefs for decades. Not only that it's part of your current identity. Also, you probably have friends that also have similar limiting beliefs or have commiserated with you about yours. So you have to literally create a new identity for yourself. You have to be willing to be wrong, and you have to be willing to go against the grain and possibly alienate people.
Well, I get people who are scared about this. And even though they want to believe something new about money, especially if it's going to give you more money, they're afraid to shed the old identity. Every time you grow and become the new, better version of yourself, you have to be willing to get rid of parts of your old self.
Now, of course, I don't think this is a bad thing, but it can be scary to your primitive brain. Remember your primitive brain does not like change. It doesn't like new things. It automatically labels them dangerous. You think about the way our brains have evolved. If you are not accepted socially, that could literally have meant that you could die because you needed people in your tribe to help protect you. And so if you're not agreeing with people, because the thing is, you know, in our society, there are these what I call commonly accepted limiting beliefs about money. Except society doesn't realize they are limiting beliefs. We think it is the truth.
Just to give you a big example of a super pervasive limiting money belief is that money comes from time and effort. And even though a lot of us believe that because we people, “Oh, just make more money.” They assume they have to work more hours, spend more time, put in more effort. But the truth of the matter is all of us have the same amount of time. So how can it be that some people have a lot more money if money comes from time and effort? But we're sort of taught this insidiously from the way we're trained through school.
So one way to sort of help you shed these limiting money beliefs is to really get clear and sit with what believing that belief has created for you in your life and to kind of take responsibility for it. A lot of us honestly don't want to take responsibility for this because it requires us to honestly not change the way you think and kind of stay with inertia.
Another thing is I see so many people fighting for their limiting beliefs, meaning arguing for them. And I'll just say that if you fight for your limiting beliefs, then you get to keep them. But if you're listening to this, then I'm guessing you're the type of person who doesn't want to fight for the limiting beliefs and you want to get rid of them ASAP.
So what I usually start with is I asked my students, “Well, what would you rather believe about money? Would you rather believe that your money is limited because you're a pediatrician or would you rather believe that it's possible that despite being a pediatrician, you can actually be a multimillionaire? Is that possible?” And this is what coaching essentially does. I ask questions to sort of help reframe your thinking. We ask questions like, “Is that really true?” Because we have just assumed that these limiting beliefs are true.
Let me give you an example of some of the new beliefs that I've personally created, and you're welcome to borrow them or take them as your own. This is what's actually wonderful about beliefs. Whether they're limiting beliefs or amazing beliefs, no one holds the rights to believe. You're welcome to choose and take whatever beliefs that are going to work for you. Okay?
I remember reading this financial coach talk about how money is easy for her. And I was like, “Wow, that is an amazing belief. And I would love to believe that.” And I will say that 90% of the time, I truly do believe that money is easy. Not always but enough so that when my brain wants to trick my brain into thinking that money is hard. Actually, I have a really great example of that. When the pandemic hit, I was interviewing for dermatology jobs and my goal was to work part time as a dermatologist and also continue to work on my business. I was not planning for my business Wealthy Mom MD to be the sole source of income for my family. Matt and I also really wanted to start investing in real estate.
As you know, the pandemic happened and no one was hiring dermatologists. In fact, dermatologists had to close their practices and, you know, they suffered a loss of income. And literally I remember sitting in my office one day thinking, “Wow, well, all that money I was counting on now is unavailable.” And immediately, my primitive brain started feeling anxious because I literally was worried that we were going to run out of money. And so thank God for my coaching tools, because I was able to take a breath and stop myself and literally check into my thoughts. Like, what was I starting to believe?
One way to know that you're believing some of it isn't serving you is literally like, look at how you're feeling or examine how you’re feeling. Because negative thinking and negative believing creates negative emotions and feelings, which always creates negative results. And so I caught myself in this negative way of thinking about money because I totally was going down the path of, “Well, I can't get a job as a dermatologist, which means we're not going to have enough money and we're going to run out of money and there's nothing I can do about it.”
And so you can kind of see that my brain was immediately going into, “It's not my fault. I can't do anything about it. It's the pandemic’s fault; everyone's fault but my own.” And I'm not saying I was like blaming myself or to blame yourself. But if it's out of your control and if it's something you can't do anything about. What coaching has allowed me to do is to see where I still have power. Obviously I can't get rid of the pandemic. I'm not that powerful, but I do have control or at least more control over how I can redirect my brain in terms of thinking, which redirects how I'm feeling, which redirects my behavior.
I finally sat down and said, “Okay, what would I rather believe about my ability to make money right now?” And I reminded myself that I believe that money is easy. So if I believed that money is easy, then what can I do about money? So instead of saying, “There's nothing I can do about money because of the pandemic,” try asking your brain a question, like “How can I create money despite not being able to get a job?” I think a lot of us feel like if we can't make money, the way we think we can make money, then there's no other way we can make money. We sort of stop thinking. But if you keep asking your brain questions, guess what? Your brain wants to answer that question.
So I literally just sat with questions and asked myself every day, “How can I create money? How can this be happening for me?” Because if you start thinking this is happening to me and why is this happening to me, that's the wrong question to ask. Basically, it gives up all your power. If you keep asking yourself, how is this happening for me and really taking the stance that life is happening for me, then from there, you can create new beliefs and new possibilities.
So what I ended up doing was really tuning into money as easy, and honestly taking a risk of going all in on Wealthy Mom MD and also going all in on my telecom practice. And then also going all in with investing in real estate. Because for over a year, I had a huge limiting money belief when it came to investing in real estate. I told myself that we didn't have the money to invest in real estate. How many of you think that sounds like a fact? How many of you are telling yourself something similar when it comes to investing in real estate? I literally thought that was not a belief. I thought that was the truth. But then I later realized that actually that was a belief, which is totally crazy. That was crazy to me when I realized that because even as a coach, your brain will want to believe things and think that's the truth.
The real fact of the matter was we have money. It just wasn't sort of available and liquid cash. It was tied up in retirement accounts. I think many of you have heard the story before, where we ended up moving some money into a self directed 401k, and then we were able to tap into that cash to eventually buy our first property this year. So out of the pandemic, not only have I actually increased our family's income, we also invested in real estate. And if I had continued that line of thinking that money was hard, that there was no way for me to make money because there were no jobs then, well, who knows where we would be right now? I mean, we do have an emergency fund, but that would have run out at some point, right? And I'm happy to say that we have not had to tap into that emergency fund at all.
Now, the last thing I want to say before I close this podcast is I totally get how difficult it can be to really shed these money beliefs. Because the truth of matter is you've been believing them for decades. And like I said, you kind of have to go against the grain to really start creating money sometimes. And so this is exactly why I created my course Money for Women Physicians and also why I do one-on-one coaching. Honestly, having a coach by your side to really help you examine these money beliefs and to create new ones, because some of us don't even allow ourselves to even think about what could be possible when it comes to money.
I'd love to know what new money beliefs you are creating. Drop me an email. You can email [email protected] or if you're in my Facebook group, Wealthy Mom Physicians, I would love to see what you're creating. So go ahead and post in the group. Until next week, have a great day.
Hey, if you're a woman physician who is ready to take control of your money, you've got to check out my program Money for Women Physicians. It's part course and part group coaching and a hundred percent guaranteed to put more money in your pocket. Go to wealthymommd.com/money to learn more.
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