Cindi´s Take: Counsellor & Wellness Practice Business Development
What does the concept of money mean to you and your Practice Building?
What about the word ´money´? Instead of a sense of feeling empowered, inspired, and at peace, did you reactively shrink back with flickering judgments about commercialism, greed, scarcity, or excessive materialism? We have to ask ourselves, why is it that so many of us identify with one polarized view over the other?
Abundance is Essential to Practice Building & an Intentional Life
As a Life Counselor and Mental Health and Wellness Business Coach, the idea of abundance is a necessary part of creating a balanced business and intentional life. But there are many kinds of commodities in which we can experience abundance that often fall off of our perception charts. Many of these actually hold more importance to us than money. For example, we can have an abundance of vitality, time, health, kindness, friends, love, creativity, faith, clients, ideas, family, integrity, opportunities, purpose, and yes, there can be an abundance of ´money´. So why is there such controversy around this topic of money?
Well, our family system, our culture, our perceived social and economic status, our country, the media, and our interpretation of our faith also teach us how we have come to see and experience this concept of money. It is understandable that we should be confused in a society that inundates us with messages that ´desire´ somehow equals an actual ´need´ and that also teaches that money can purchase the object of most of our desires.
As I work with Private Practice Practitioners, we often need to peel down ways in which association and intention are side-swiping our lives. This word ´money´ and other words such as “business” often have a nice list of judgments plastered all over them. People can come to simply believe that our current experience is our likely future reality. Past experiences often do create present day judgments. Concepts like shame, hierarchy, conquest, oppression, scarcity, insecurity, greed, avoidance, competition, materialism, and isolation, the concepts of fear, judgments and failure start to immediately surface. These feelings and views leave people feeling so constricted and in anxious, that they get put on a shelf to address at “later”. We would rather put on pink glasses and try to think of things that create a sense of connection, support, encouragement, confidence, power, clarity, value, compassion, inspiration, and peace. As such, we resolve to leave things somewhat buried, hoping that out of site is out of mind. But the fragrance of “lack” lingers in the air, with a polluting stench that would bother the best of us “avoiders”. How do we unravel this?
Lets start here. What if I told you that money had no more power than a Pop-tart? What if money was neither a positive or negative commodity on its own, but carried the energy of YOUR intention with it? What if you were not at the influence of money, but rather that it was effect of your beliefs? Plainly put, our intentions are a mirrored extension of our beliefs.
If you have found yourself in polarities of judgment that money is either good or evil, perhaps allow yourself pause. It is a common false assumption that poor people are sad, and rich people happy. Some people may appear to not have much financially, but are living a balanced, meaningful and enriched live, and not lacking or struggling either. They are rich in a willingness to share what they have. Meanwhile, some people have a great deal but share little and have less balanced abundance in the rest of the categories in their life and struggle in other ways. Consider the energy you are projecting on money. Regardless of the side of the fence you sit on, if you perceive money brings “greed or isolation”, or “happiness and peace”, and given that you have the choice, do you want those energies to be tied to your relationship with money? Do you want to be in addiction or reaction to something that actually has the same power as a Pop-tart? How might your views be impacting your practice building?
Let´s get clear: such things as happiness, security, peace, confidence, and the ability to truly know our authentic identity is an inside job and are internal decisions, regardless of the circumstances we live in. For each of us, what might life look like if we aligned with money (and all forms of abundance we value) and have it work FOR us, to assist us rather than define us. What if we arrived at a sense of balance between need and want, and between giving and receiving, between lack and excess, and between our inner and outer world. With this balance, with money or without money, our internal sense of self, peace, image, or happiness would remain fully intact regardless of our external challenges. We might discover the middle road of true sustenance!
We all know that if we change our beliefs and intention, a domino effect will actually begin to occur. Any belief can be intentionally shifted so if we falsely believe it is money that will somehow bring us a positive experience like peace, confidence, self-identity, or respect, essentially, we are agreeing to hand over our internal power to something outside of ourselves. Bugger is, we are also often confused about what is best for us or we have illusions about what will make us happy. And, god forbid, should circumstances change (which they always do) and we are then left powerless over things we believe we “need” that are outside of us to control and keep. If we are at the affect of an external thing to miraculously bring us happiness, we are perpetually in a place of needing more, to fill that internal belief of “lacking.” How might life look if we also learned the skills of finding happiness in who we already are and in what we already have? It makes me think of the movie, “Its a Wonderful Life”. What if everything else beyond what we already are and have was simply icing on the cake!!
The Biology of Belief is a best selling book that revolutionizes the idea that it is our thoughts primarily manifest the state of our physical body and the assumption that predetermined DNA is the key manifestor is a fallacy. Additionally, “The Dark Side of the Light Chasers” is another amazing bestselling book that has the capacity to blow your mind and transform our lives by dismantling our own “judgments” that keep us stuck. Together, these two books can jumpstart internal shifts so that outer shifts can begin to manifest in your life. When you use your perception to unlock your potential, you will access your true internal and endless power source! You will have found your authentic and REAL YOU! Do what you love, and strive to be someone that you adore and I guarantee that abundance of all sorts of balanced abundance will meet you there!