The Inner Game Of Money with Neil Strauss

How to Replace Your Limiting Beliefs About Money, And Start Pursuing Your Goals

Neil Strauss holding the Inner Game of Money session

In the article, you will learn:

• How to move past and let go of your limiting beliefs around money, so you can increase your chances of becoming wealthy, and be more comfortable reaching for your most ambitious goals.

Introduction

Money isn’t the solution to fix your insecurities

People think money and fame can fix what’s wrong with them or fill in that hole, but money will just amplify what’s already there, and make you miserable. Only coming from the place of abundance, not desperation or scarcity, can help you get rich.

Your limiting beliefs are what’s holding you back from achieving your goals

Your beliefs affect everything. If you say you’re going to do something and if you don't do it a couple of times, it’s not a behavioral problem, it’s a belief-based problem. Anybody can be wealthy and famous if they can get out of their own way.

Reflect on What You Associate with Money

Step 1: When I say the following words, what thoughts or phrases come into your mind right away? Use a pen and paper to write them down. The key is to be honest with yourself throughout the process. My answers are typed in the brackets.

1. The Rich* (“The Rich has more authority and superiority”, “The Rich are smarter and more capable”, “The Rich usually has something valuable to offer to the world”, “The Rich are usually busy, like Elon Musk and Bill Gates”*, association with the bad financial salespersons)
2. The Poor (“The Poor can also be happy”, “The Poor needs to do labor-intensive work to survive”)
3. Work (“Work is boring, tough, and mundane”*, “It’s just a job, you don’t have to love it as long as you get paid”, “I only feel passionate for the work that is meaningful, exciting, and challenging”, “You need to work and equip a lot of skillsets to survive in this world”*, “Working in a big corporate is secure and can easily earn good amount of money if you follow the orders”, “You need to work hard, and don’t be picky about your work to be successful”, “Working hard is the only way to make money”)
4. Retirement (“If you work hard, you can retire in your 60s”, “It’s hard to retire now, as the living cost and inflation is getting higher”, “Don’t retire, keep working on what you love, like Warren Buffet”, “Retirement means you can finally settle down and take a rest”, “You can only do what you love after you retire”)
5. Investing (“Investing can be risky”, “Investing is a way to earn passive income”, “Investing is complicated”)
6. Spending (“Think twice before you spend”, “It isn’t good to spend on luxurious items, they are not useful and makes you a shallow person”, “Saving money is better than spending money”, “Never spend more than what you can afford”, Grandpa is generous on spending money on friendships and relationships*)
7. Financial Advisers (“Financial advisers are people who want to steal money from me”, “Financial advisers are nasty people who don’t have actual technical knowledge”*)
8. Borrowing (“Borrowing money is too risky, a lot of people go bankrupt because of this”, “You don’t want to owe others”)
9. Saving (“Saving is good, save as much money as you can”, “If you save enough money, you can retire and have freedom”, “Live frugally and save most of your income”)
10. Taxes (“Taxes are how the government robs your money”, “Rich people know how to play with tax loopholes”)
11. Budgets (“Limited amount of money to spend”)
12. Business (“Business is cool, it’s all about giving value to others”*, “If your business is charging more than what it brings to the table, you are stealing”)
13. Bosses (“Your boss is the authority, he/she always knows what’s the best business decision”*, “You need to obey what your boss say and execute his/her order immediately”, “If you disobey your boss, you will get fired”, I will be rebellious if I think my bosses are wrong or not smart enough)
14. Employees (“Employees aren’t free, they need to follow the system”*, “Employees are a small tool within a big company”, “Being an employee is just a learning experience”)

Step 2: Circle or put a star (*) next to the 5 statements that are either:

1. The most truthful or accurate
2. You have the strongest feelings about

Reflect on the very first experience with money

Use a pen and paper to write your first experiences with money.

1. I would have a small amount of pocket money each week to buy snacks in primary school in Australia every Wednesday. (It felt happy but seems not enough)
2. I stole money from my primary school to buy snacks. (Shameful after my sister and parents found out that I had extra money, I lied about finding it in the playground, but I actually stole from class activities where they used real money. I felt excited to buy whatever I want to eat at that time, I felt freedom)
3. I can only buy a toy once in a while, I can still remember my parents buying a power ranger toy from Target. Usually, grandpa buys toys for me. I use tissue, paper, and blue tacks to “create” my own toys (I felt happy even I don’t have as many toys as others)

List Out Your Current Money Scripts

Look over, and think about everything you’ve written down, and the feelings you have while doing it. Then write down 3–5 sentences about “After what has happened to me about money so far, what is the belief system about money that has been part of my life thus far?”, and rate each statement on the scale of 1–10 how factual true it is. Then rate each statement on a scale of 1–10 how much does it serve you (untruth statements can also serve you).

Here are my answers:

1. More money means more security. If I don’t have enough money, I won’t be able to survive in this world where everything has a price tag. The more I earn from my job, the more secure my life would be. The more I save, the better. (7)(8)
2. Money reflects my value to the world. I believe that the more value I give to the world, the more I can earn. But it’s sad that after posting 31 articles, it doesn’t create much passive income. (7)(8)
3. Keeping a lot of money is a form of greediness, investing money in relationships, helping people, creating cool products, or purely investing in the market is a good use of money. But I’m also afraid that I won’t be able to attract women with less money, or won’t be able to start a family and have kids, or have my own house (stability). (8)(8)
4. Even though I work long hours, and have no time to work on my side hustle, I cannot quit my full-time job, because once I quit, my resume would be terrible, and I cannot find a new secure job with a high income. All I can do is work hard in my job, from paycheck to paycheck, and hopefully, my company will give me a raise or promotion to earn more. (6)(7)
5. I believe in investing in the stock market. (8)(9)
6. Why don’t you work hard in your side hustle and earn money? I’m afraid that if I put everything into what I love and still fail, it’s too heartbreaking and it feels like the market has disapproved of my value. I am afraid people will think that I’m not good enough but still share knowledge with the world, I’m afraid they would judge me. Not getting started is the best excuse for not failing in life. (6)(6)

Recreate Your New Money Scripts

Now read your statement to a friend, and ask them to rate how truthful and how much it serves you on a scale of 1–10. Then average your score with your partners’. Say you rated a 10, and your partner rated a 5, then it’s a 7.5.

Then write down a new money script, where you and others would think it’s 10 out of 10 for the truthfulness and how much it serves you. It should be a new revision of your old money script.

Use questions to challenge your old beliefs. Ask yourself if there were exceptional cases that happened before. For example, if your limiting belief was “The more money I have, the happier I’ll be”, ask yourself “Can rich people be miserable?” “Can poor people be happy?”; and if your belief was “Money reflects my value?”, you can ask yourself, “Can you work on something super valuable but still have no money?”. The answer would probably be “Yes”.

Don’t use the words “need”, “must”, “should” in your new money script, because it shouldn’t be disciplinary, nor sound overly common sense. Also, don’t use “I’m not doing this before…” or “I’m going to do this…”, because they are not an underlying belief, it’s just self-criticism and resolution, and behavioral analysis. Replace it as belief statements, like “I believe that money is xxx”.

Be aware that a lot of people’s new money script is just the same as the old version but with nicer words. We need other people to help point out our blind spots.

Here are my new money scripts:

1. The more assets (products, stocks, real estate, books, video courses, business, etc.), strength-based skillsets, and connections that you acquire or create, the more “secure” your life would be. All the processes might feel “insecure”, but the insecure way is the secure way. The savings and paychecks that you have right now don’t equal security.
2. Your salary and the money you earn don’t necessarily relate to the value you create. It depends on the companies, the platforms, and the purchasing power of your customers. Value is simply how useful you are to others, times how many people you impacted. You are priceless as a human. Be willing to constantly put out everything you have to the world. Trust that it will reciprocate.
3. Money has a certain value in life, but women look for character more than money, starting a family and having kids require money but you are sharing with your partner, and you already have sufficient money to raise a fine kid.
4. Working in a company isn’t about paycheck to paycheck, it’s about learning new knowledge and skillsets to put into your arsenal as an entrepreneur. It’s not about getting a raise or promotion (but having a fair assessment is crucial). You give all you have in your full-time job because that’s how you can get the most learning out of it, and leverage your talent into your passionate side business in all your spare time. That is your destination.
5. You have put products and content into the world, and you HAVE earned money from it. You are just not putting out enough only, the world wants more of you. Go for it. Would your products and content be useful to you a year ago? Yes, then share it with the world, people would love them, you would be proud, and your grandkids get to know more about you.

Changing Your Old Money Scripts Into New Empowering Ones

Whenever your old money scripts pop up, remind yourself, “These are my old money scripts, and I’m gonna replace them with my new money scripts.” By self-correcting, you are going to help end the psychological brainwash. Have new self-talk towards money.

By replacing old beliefs with new money scripts that are true and can serve you, you will start pursuing your goals with more drive.

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