Mind Training
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An Exercise for Rewiring Your Brain

Written by Barbara Huson

Last week, I heard from a client who was close to tears. Her husband’s business unexpectedly went belly up. Suddenly, they had no income. She was forced to get a higher paying job.  

“Do you think this crisis has anything to do with my decision to make more money and my lack of action?” she asked.

Obviously, it was a rhetorical question.

 I see this pattern all the time. Women who avoid money—making it or managing it—until a crisis hits. Either their world falls apart or feels like it’s about to. That’s when they finally take action.

I did it myself. I waited until a million dollar tax bill almost wiped me out.  Not smart!!

How about you? Are you avoiding financial stuff until the pain gets worse than the fear? Are you looking for a way to get moving without having your world violently (or even mildly) shaken?

If so, try this exercise. It’s called Selective Attention,a powerful tool for rewiring your brain. Focus on what inspires you and stop dwelling on what scares you. It’s a fact: What flows through your mind wires your brain…which governs your behavior.

To change what you do, first change what you think.

Instead of obsessing on all the things that can go wrong, try turning your thoughts to what more money will give you. Think about the freedom, the peace of mind, the myriad of choices financial success makes possible. Think about giving your money to causes you feel passionate about,helping your kids, your parents, people you love. 

That’s what I finally did. I started thinking about what kind of a role model I wanted to be for my daughters instead of fixating on my terror of screwing up. When I made that deliberate shift, when I forced myself to think about how I would be helping my girls, I had no choice…financial avoidance was no longer an option!   I’d love to hear other ideas for getting unstuck.  What worked for you? Leave me a comment below.

My gift to you…get my free pdf 12 Tips for Building Wealth During the Holidays. Download Now!

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I Know What To Do! So Why Don’t I??

Written by Barbara Huson

Could this be you? You’ve read volumes on investing, even attended some classes. You understand stocks, bonds, and the value of diversification. You own a few funds in your retirement account.

Still, you continue to ignore or neglect your money, even though you know better. Why?

Blame it on traditional financial education…where the emphasis is on filling your head with facts rather than fostering your courage to change.

Raise your hand if you’ve ever been given the tools to boost Self-Efficacy, the most powerful predictor of financial well-being. (I didn’t think so)

Self-Efficacy—a concept developed by the Stanford psychologist Albert Bandura—is a person’s belief in their ability to succeed in a given task or goal.

If you don’t believe you can invest wisely without screwing up irreparably, you likely won’t even try. Or you’ll stop at the first stumbling block. Or worse, unconsciously make bad choices that reaffirms your limiting belief.

Enhancing financial Self-Efficacy is the secret sauce for financial success. It’s the difference between knowing what to do and actually doing it, between being competent and feeling confident.

Yet, I doubt you’ll be shown how to shore up Self-Efficacy by most professional advisors. But thanks to Dr. Bandura’s research, here are 4 powerful techniques to do just that:

  1. Experience Success—Select a task that’s sufficiently challenging but definitely doable. Have that money talk with your spouse. Organize your financial documents. Balance your checkbook. As the saying goes, “confidence is a memory of success.”
  2. Find Role Models—Observe friends, family, even perfect strangers who are financially savvy. Watching others successfully complete financial tasks provides not only inspiration, but a template to follow.
  3. Get Encouragement—Hang around with people who will cheer you on because they truly believe in you. Those who say, “I know you can do it!” Stay away from naysayers.
  4. Manage Emotions—if you’re depressed, traumatized or anxious, the inner work is crucial. Read self-help books. Find a counselor. Join a support group. Talk to a friend. Whatever it takes to relieve your pain, stress, worry and fear.

What can you do today to increase your Financial Self-Efficacy?

If you enjoyed this Words of Wealth, click here to receive a copy in your inbox every week.

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Lifting The Financial Fog

Written by Barbara Huson

I spent most of my adult life in a financial fog as opaque as pea soup…and frustrating as hell. If you feel the same, you’re certainly not alone. 

Millions of women today are stuck in a financial fog so thick and threatening, they can’t find their way to wealth and well-being. And the consequences can be devastating…on our self-esteem as well as our future security. 

The way out of this miasma is not by learning more financial facts, but by first lifting the fog.  
 

This fog is made up of a matrix of issues–suppressed emotions, limiting beliefs, childhood wounds stemming from cultural conditioning, parental messages, unhealed trauma and hidden shame. 
    

When any of these issues are triggered, we feel threatened.  Our logical rational brain shuts down, activating our primitive, lizard brain. We instinctively go into fight, flight or freeze mode.  

The result: we are unable to absorb practical information, reluctant to enter the market or deferring decisions to another, terrified of making mistakes.

Until we address our internal issues, allowing us to rewire our neuropathways, managing money will remain a struggle for even the best and brightest. I know this from my own experience and my work with thousands of women. 

I’d love to hear your experience with lifting the fog by doing the inner work. 

If you enjoyed this Words of Wealth, click here to receive a copy in your inbox every week.

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Humility or Self-Sabotage?

Written by Barbara Huson

Decades ago, a coach gave me a powerful assignment.  It’s something I’ll never forget.

For 2 weeks, I was to simply observe my conversations, without changing a thing. Just notice what I talked about, the words I used, my typical reactions…you know, the stuff I was sharing with others.

What I saw was not pretty.

I had a habit of putting myself down…without even realizing it. I’d constantly dismiss my skills (“Oh, that’s no big thing”), deflect praise (“I thought I was awful”), and diminish my successes (“But I could’ve done so much better”).

What felt like humility was, in truth, an act of self-sabotage. Every word of self -depreciation put another dent in my self-esteem.

 “What you share you strengthen,” explains A Course in Miracles. I was strengthening my self-doubt while crushing my confidence.  No wonder I was struggling.

What about you? Could you be minimizing your achievements, underestimating your value, chipping away at your sense of worth?   I invite you to find out.

Spend a few weeks simply noticing what you talk about. Then ask yourself this question: Could I be undermining my success by what I’m sharing with others?

Leave me a comment below to tell me what you observed.

If you enjoyed this Words of Wealth, click here to receive a copy in your inbox every week.

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A Lesson in ReWIRING

Written by Barbara Huson

I have always found myself yearning for more…more money, more success, more sales, more ­­­­______ (fill in the blank).

I proudly considered this constant yearning a healthy sign of a robust ambition—until I began studying neuroscience. Then I realized how truly unhealthy this kind of thinking actually is.

Here’s why. We literally sculpt our brain by what we dwell on. The more we think a thought or feel an emotion, the stronger that neuropathway becomes in our brain.

By constantly hungering for more, I was inadvertently telling my brain “I don’t have enough.”

The more I repeated that thought, the stronger the “not enough” neuropathway grew, until I’d unconsciously do things that kept reinforcing my experience of “not enough”.

Slowly it dawned on me. How can I expect more, if I repeatedly focus on what I had not yet attained?

Clearly, I needed to shift my focus to rewire my brain. So I decided to experiment. Every time I felt myself coveting anything, I stopped, took note and shifted into appreciation for what I currently had.

More money? I took a peek at my bank account, and gave thanks for the amount presently there. More success? I gratefully reviewed what I’d achieved up to now. The moment the thought creeps in, “but it’s not where I want to be…” I stop and refocus on how far I’ve come.

I invite you to join me. What if you shifted to gratitude for what you already have, rather than gazing into the future, longing for more? 

I’m not asking you to give up your desires.  But I am suggesting that you view your desires through the appreciative lens of how they’ve been at least partially fulfilled.

Then watch what happens. If your experience is like mine, you’re in for a few miracles!

Leave a comment below to let me know if practicing gratitude for what you already have creates miracles in your life.

Interested in learning more about reWIRING your brain? Click here for details on my 5-month reWIRE Mentorship group.

If you enjoyed this Words of Wealth, click here to receive a copy in your inbox every week.

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How the Wealthy Think…and You Can Too!

Written by Barbara Huson

Q.  How can I SAVE money to create wealth (which means cutting back spending) and still have a feeling of ABUNDANCE, not a mentality of LACK (which means the desire to SPEND).  

A. Oh the devious ways we fool ourselves by how we choose to think.  

If you think like a Consumer, then cutting back spending to sock away savings will absolutely feel like scarcity or deprivation, while spending offers the pleasurable (but deceptive) pretense of abundance.   

When you think like a Wealth Builder, you understand that every cent you put in savings is money you’re giving to YOU (not Starbucks or MasterCard), so that ultimately you can purchase what you please without pressure or worry.  

To paraphrase the old saw, a Wealth Builder tells her money where to go. A Consumer wonders where it went.  

The difference between the two mindsets is not deprivation but delayed gratification. And it’s easy if you think small and automate.  Every month have some money, no matter how small, automatically transferred from your checking to your savings account. You don’t miss what you don’t see.   

What if there’s nothing to spare at month’s end? Try giving up something small, like a daily latte, and bank the savings. One woman funded her IRA with lose change from her purse, coins she found in pockets doing laundry, and cash from the coupons she redeemed at the market. 

I recommend two types of savings accounts. An Untouchable for emergencies and unexpected expenses.  And a Touchable for fun stuff, like a vacation or shoe sale—which keeps you from dipping into your emergency savings, yet not feeling deprived.  

Bottom line: Instant gratification is such a cruel illusion. I’ll never forget meeting an elderly woman who lamented: “I always got such joy from shopping. But now that I’m old and I look back on all the money I wasted, I wish to God I had saved more.” 

How do you balance feeling abundant with the discipline of spending less and saving more? Leave me a comment below.


Thank you, Tracy Beth & Maria Aum, for the Q.

If you enjoyed this Words of Wealth, click here to receive a copy in your inbox every week.

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What’s Anger Got to Do with It? Plenty!!

Written by Barbara Huson

Unexpressed anger is perhaps our biggest barrier to financial success.

We women tend to hold a lot of repressed anger, though few realize it. I’ve certainly experienced it in myself. I spot it in most women I coach.

Anger is a natural human emotion. Healthy when expressed in a timely manner. Toxic when regularly stuffed. Suppressed anger clogs up your thinking, drains your energy, weighs you down like a concrete block.

Yet for some, the mere thought of expressing anger feels frightening, if not forbidden.

So how do you release anger…safely and effectively?  Here’s what worked for me.

Write an Angry Letter.  Write it to another, your parents or ex-husband perhaps. Then write one to yourself. Write it by hand, not computer. 

Even if you hardly feel any irritation initially, start listing what you might be annoyed at.  Let yourself get into it. Liberate your fury, your rage, your frustration. Write until you’re done. 

Fold up the letter and put it away.  Within 3 days, reread it. Is there anything you want to add?  If so, write more. Continue until you feel complete. 

When you’re finally finished, burn the letter…ritualistically.  As it burns, say to your anger: “Thank you. You served me once.  I no longer need you. I release you. You are free. I am free.”

As one client told me after writing her letter: “At first it was scary. I felt really rageful. But I also felt a release that I had never felt before.” 

What if you’ve done a gazillion anger exercises and damn it, you’re still angry? Ask yourself: What is my payoff for holding onto anger? Why don’t I want to let it go? Believe me, the anger is giving you something. But it’s nothing compared to the lightness you’ll feel once it’s lifted.

If you write (or have written) an Angry Letter, I’d love to hear how it was for you. And please share below any other ways you’ve successfully released anger.

If you enjoyed this Words of Wealth, click here to receive a copy in your inbox every week.

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The Inner Work of Wealth

Written by Barbara Huson

I was newly divorced, raising 3 daughters, when I got tax bills for over $1m. My ex was responsible, but he left the country…leaving me with very little in the bank.  My father refused to lend me the money. I was angry & terrified, but had no choice. I had to get smart about money. 

I tried going to classes, reading books, but nothing made sense. I felt immobilized. Nowhere in those books or classes could I find a solution for my paralysis.

So I took matters in my own hands. I stopped focusing on the practical mechanics of money and started plumbing the deepest recesses of my psyche. Writing in my journal proved profoundly revealing. But most of all, it was freeing.

I became aware of a familiar voice that kept telling me how stupid I was. Instead of ignoring it, letting it hold sway, as I usually did, I began a dialogue with that voice, asking it where it came from and what it wanted.

I remembered my father telling me, often and in no uncertain terms, that managing money was a man’s job. So of course, I was terrified that if I tried to take charge, I’d botch things up badly. I’d make mistakes, blow it all.

My inability to understand money was actually an act of self-protection.

 “If we seek something we’re afraid of, attainment of it won’t be what you really want,” A Course in Miracles warned me.

Deep down I didn’t want to get smart. I didn’t want to take charge. I did not want to risk losing everything.

But once I understood my unconscious assumption (women are incapable of managing money) and its source (my father), I was able to discredit it. My paralysis disappeared. Learning about finances actually came quite easily.

The financial industry eschews the Inner Work of Wealth as “touchy feely.”   But I’m here to tell you, financial success doesn’t come from what you do as much as it comes from how you think. 

Or as author Clark Moustakas put it “When a person acts without knowledge of what (she) thinks, feels, needs or wants, (she) does not yet have the option of choosing to act differently.” 

Until I was aware of my false beliefs, I was virtually unable to act differently.

What false beliefs about money are holding you back? Leave me a comment below.

If you enjoyed this Words of Wealth, click here to receive a copy in your inbox every week.

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Fear is Good! Really!!!

Written by Barbara Huson

Inspired by those “Life is Good” t-shirts, I am launching a new campaign. And I invite you to join me. I’m calling it: Fear is Good. 

As I see it, Fear has gotten a bum rap and a bad rep.  Maybe it’s leftover from our Neanderthal heritage, when hungry predators were a constant threat.

But times have changed. And so has Fear’s function.  

Problem is, few of us have figured that out.  We feel the Fear, and instantly take flight. We don’t realize that, in modern times, fear is rarely a sign that our survival is being threatened.   

Nowadays, the only survival being threatened is usually our egos. Fear has a new purpose—to warn us of approaching Greatness.

And as I’m discovering, we’re as afraid of our Greatness as our ancestors were of carnivorous beasts…maybe more.

So, I’m on a crusade to change that.  Let it be known…Fear is the clearest signal we will get that we’re on the precipice of greater success, greater prosperity, greater happiness, greater impact.

Imagine if you finally realized that Fear is nothing to fear. As for my Fear is Good campaign, there’s only one requirement to become a member.

Every time you get scared, you shout, at the top of your lungs: “I go where I fear!”  And off you go…in the direction of your fear, in the direction of your Greatness.

Fear is Good!  Can I sign you up? Leave me a comment below.

The Secret “The Secret” Forgot to Tell Us

Written by Barbara Huson

I’m a big fan of The Secret. I just watched the video again the other day.

Thanks to this wildly selling video and subsequent book by Rhona Bryne, the Law of Attraction has gained national attention. And that’s a very good thing…to a point.

The Law of Attraction states that you attract whatever you want into your life through your ability to feel good, think positively, and focus only on the desired outcome. Simply put, if you want to be rich, don’t focus on lack.

But here’s the problem. How many times have you said you really want wealth, believe riches are on the way, refuse to focus on anything but abundance….and still,  nothing happens?   Your bills go unpaid while your bank balance dwindles.

What The Secret failed to mention is that the Law of Attraction is only part of the equation. There is also The Law of Congruency.

This law states that your declared intention must be congruent with your unconscious decisions.  For example, you may say “I want to be rich,” but if you distrust wealthy people, don’t believe you deserve it, or see money as the root of all evil, then wealth isn’t really what you want.

Or as A Course in Miracles explains: “What you ask for you receive. But this refers to prayers of the heart not the words you use in praying.”

This inner discord explains why affirmations or positive thinking, as powerful as they are, don’t always work.

If you don’t have what you want, chances are your spoken goals are in conflict with your authentic desires, and deep down, you don’t actually want what you’re asking for.

The solution—try asking yourself a question: Why don’t I want it? Or put another way: What’s my pay-off for not having it?

What do you say you want in your life but can’t seem to manifest?

If you enjoyed this Words of Wealth, click here to receive a copy in your inbox every week.

Meet Barbara Huson

When a devastating financial crisis rocked her world, Barbara Huson knew she had to get smart about money… and she did. Now, she wants to empower every women to take charge of their money and take charge of their lives! She’s doing just that with her best-selling books, life changing retreats and private financial coaching.

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