Month: June 2023

You’re listening to The Less Stressed Lawyer podcast, Episode 66. Today, we’re talking all about shame around spending money. You ready? Let’s go.

Welcome to The Less Stressed Lawyer, the only podcast that teaches you how to manage your mind so you can live a life with less stress and far more fulfillment. If you’re a lawyer who’s over the overwhelm and tired of trying to hustle your way to happiness, you’re in the right place. Now, here’s your host, lawyer turned life coach Olivia Vizachero.

Well, hello there. How are you? I hope your week is off to a marvelous start. I’m so excited to talk about today’s topic. We are continuing on in our Money Mindset series. So, I talked to you about your thoughts about money. And then, we talked about some of the problems that come up with money, specifically overspending. And then, even more importantly, underearning.

I broke down all the different ways in which you might be underearning, and we went through how to stop overspending and how to stop underearning. Today, I want to talk about another problem, which is a little bit more of an ancillary issue than the main problems that we’ve discussed thus far in this series. But I do see it come up pretty frequently from my clients.

I think it’s really important to talk about, because people who struggle with this really end up depriving themselves of some really meaningful experiences, of a lot of transformation, of a higher quality life. I know that money can get a bad rap, right? People tend to say that money doesn’t buy happiness. But money buys a lot of things that makes happiness more easily attainable.

I’m not saying money, in and of, itself makes you happier. But money provides you with access to different experiences, a lot of different support that you might not otherwise have, different help that can help make your life easier or more simplified or more streamlined. It buys you freedom, which in a lot of cases does actually lead to happiness.

But one of the problems that I see that people encounter when they’re not dealing with overspending or underearning and they have the money to spend on themselves, or they have access to the money in some way… Maybe it’s through credit or something like that, pulling money out of savings. It’s not budgeted, right? So many people struggle to spend money on themselves if it’s not “in their budget”, but they do have access to the money in some way.

What ends up happening is they don’t spend money on themselves to buy experiences or things that they want. And they don’t spend the money because they have shame around spending it on themselves. Okay, so this episode is actually inspired by a conversation that I had with someone who’s become a really good friend of mine.

We actually weren’t that close at the time. But last summer, I was in Florida, in Orlando, with my business coach and a bunch of other coaches and entrepreneurs that are all part of that business coaching program. I was walking up to the pool; it was after the event had ended. I always stay a couple extra days just to soak up all the learning, really let it sink in, and spend some time with my peers.

So, I’m walking up to the pool and one of the women who was in the program, who I had gotten to know over the course of this trip, she asked me a really frank question. She was like, “Hey, I want to pick your brain about spending money because I have a lot of shame around spending money. And I think you don’t. I think that you don’t have a problem spending money. I really want to adopt your mindset when it comes to spending money on myself.”

I said, “You are absolutely right. I don’t have shame around spending money. I’m definitely the person that you want to talk to.” So, we had a really long talk. We discussed some of her fears that she had around spending and how she was raised, which was very similar to the way that I was raised. So, I really understood her mindset and where she was coming from.

Then I explained to her how I think about spending money. We compared and contrasted our different viewpoints, and she could see how I don’t have shame because of the way that I think about it. Because remember, our thoughts cause our feelings.

So, if you’re feeling ashamed around spending, the spending itself is neutral. It’s just your thoughts that are creating that shame. Because we have different thoughts about spending. We have different emotions that come when we do.

Some of her concerns were the exact same concerns that I see time and time again, with my clients. They’re also some of the concerns that I’ve had to unpack myself. I don’t struggle with this a ton, but every once in a while it does make an appearance.

I have the tools, through coaching, to be able to unpack it, understand what’s going on, and to be able to work through it. To decide if I want to keep the shame, which I very rarely ever do. If I think the shame doesn’t serve me, of course, I want to get rid of it. And I want to transition my thinking to cultivate a different emotion instead.

So, if you feel like you frequently deprive yourself of the things that you want in life, if you’re digging deep and you’re taking that internal inventory, and you know when you do that, you find that shame is the reason that you don’t spend money on yourself.

You feel ashamed spending money on yourself; guilty, indulgent, unworthy, undeserving, impractical, irresponsible, selfish. Any of those emotions, if you feel that way, that really is the more specific version of just feeling shame around spending. Shame is this big category. And then, there are all these different other emotions that kind of fall within that shame framework.

If you feel those emotions, when it comes to spending money on yourself, this episode is definitely for you. Okay? It’s so important to unpack this, to unravel it, and to dismantle it, so you can start providing yourself with the things that you want in your life. With the experiences that you want in your life. With the type of life that you want to live.

A really good friend of mine, she’s also a coach, she actually is a money coach. She works with people on their money mindset. One of the things that she says, and I love this. Her name is Nicole, she likes to say that life is bought. I tend to agree with her. Our lives are bought.

Think about everything that you do, all of the experiences that you have. A lot of people even like to think, “Oh, some of my most precious memories were when I wasn’t spending any money. I was just fishing with family members. It was Christmas morning.”

If you think about all of that, money allows all of that to happen. Money buys the fishing poles. Money buys the presents under the tree. Money buys the time off, right? You don’t have to work extra shifts. You don’t have to work on holidays because you are financially secure. So, money really does provide us with the lives that we want to live.

And if there are certain aspects to a life that you would like to live, and you’re not allowing yourself to have that life because of the shame that you experience around purchasing that life, I want to unpack that with you. So, you can free yourself of that emotional burden, ad give yourself permission to spend money that you have on the things that you’d like.

Now, a lot of this is based on how people were brought up, or what they were taught to think about spending money. So, check in with yourself. You can think back to that episode that I just did on your thoughts about money. But you might think that money’s hard to come by, you need to be responsible with your money, you shouldn’t spend frivolously, that you should only spend money on important things or on things that you need.

And if you don’t need something, then you shouldn’t buy it. That it’s impractical to spend money on things that you don’t need. You might have been taught that being frugal is more responsible than spending money. You might have just learned subconsciously, over the course of a lifetime, that you don’t deserve to spend money on yourself, that it’s selfish.

So, if you believe these thoughts, you can quickly see, by running them through the model, that when you think one of those thoughts you’re going to experience one of those negative feelings that I just mentioned. Okay?

Then from there, you’re going to avoid that discomfort. You’re going to avoid those negative emotions and not spend. Not provide yourself with that thing that you want. You end up depriving yourself of those experiences or those objects, those things that you would like to have in your life. Get clear on what thoughts you’re thinking that make you feel ashamed when it comes to spending.

Now, here’s what I want to do. I want to clue you in on something. So many people are using these thoughts against themselves, so start by asking yourself: Why did you learn this? Why did someone else teach this to you? Who taught this to you? It was probably your parents.

It could have been someone else, but it was likely the people who raised you. And if that’s not your parents, if it’s someone else who raised you, check in with yourself. What did those people teach you about spending money?

I grew up, big-time, learning that you should be practical with money, that it’s hard to come by, that you have to work hard to make it, and that you have to work even harder to make more of it. And therefore, you should be very, very careful with it. Okay? And that it’s impractical and irresponsible to spend it on things that you don’t need. Things that are expensive, especially.

Which is funny, if you actually do a deep dive here and you look at some of my parents’ spending. My dad likes to fly helicopters, and he buys and sells them pretty frequently. He’s had sports cars and a bunch of other stuff. So, one could argue that he doesn’t even follow the rules that I just referenced with you.

But what I really learned from examining the way that he spends money, is that he only likes to spend money on things that he finds very valuable. And a lot of things that I find valuable, he doesn’t find valuable. I had to unpack that in order to unravel and dismantle the shame that I felt, or the guilt that I felt, around spending money on myself. We just have different preferences, and that’s completely okay.

It’s totally fine that my dad likes to spend money on the things that he likes to spend money on. My mom spends money on the things that she spends money on. And I like to spend money on the things that I spend money on. Now, neither of my parents would spend the money that I spend on hotels. My mom is not one to buy luxury items like purses, or things like that, or super expensive shoes, just not her thing.

She doesn’t have to understand that, I just get to understand myself and we get to have a difference of opinion on the value of those expenditures. Similarly, my dad thinks spending lavish amounts of money on really exquisite, decadent meals at incredible restaurants is just wasteful. So, he doesn’t see the same value in it that I see.

He’s not willing to spend on it… We go out to nice dinners as a family, we do that. But I like to do it at an even more extravagant level and at a higher frequency that my parents do. And that’s okay, it’s my preference. Okay? I also am currently renting a condo even though I own a house. I wanted to do that because I wanted to live in a new space, and I could afford to do it.

That was really an area of my life where I had to examine my own resistance to spending money on myself, because I kept hesitating. I finally realized, the thought that I was thinking, that was causing me to hesitate, was that I thought that I was being impractical.

My mortgage payment on the house that I own is so inexpensive. It’s very easy for me to live there. I was going to be increasing my monthly overhead so significantly, by running a condo in the city of Detroit, where I wanted to live, that has all of the things that I wanted it to have.

I don’t need to do that, right? I have another place to live. So, it’s definitely not something that I need to do. It’s just something that I want to do. And I realized, that I was thinking that I was being impractical, that I was being frivolous, that I was being irresponsible, if I was going to move forward and spend that money on myself. That was causing my hesitancy. I was feeling irresponsible. I was feeling foolish.

Then, I was avoiding those emotions by not spending the money on myself, by not moving forward with the move. I finally realized I was living in a place that I really don’t prefer. Sort of being punitive to myself, punishing myself, depriving myself of something that I really, really want, that I think I work very hard for.

It dawned on me that there is no deserving police. No one’s going to come around and give me permission to spend my own money on myself. That’s not going to happen. So, if you have shame or guilt, or you’re feeling irresponsible, or selfish or impractical, when it comes to spending money on yourself, you have to realize that there’s no arbiter of what is worthwhile to spend money on.

You’re going to have to make that determination for yourself. Because no one’s coming and writing you a permission slip. They’re not going to tell you, “Yes, absolutely. Go make that expenditure.” There is no king or queen of “right” when it comes to your spending decisions.

You have to be the one who gives yourself permission. You have to be the one that gives yourself the green light to spend the money. Okay? No one else is going to do that for you.

And that’s one of the things about being an adult, you have to make these decisions. You want to make sure you’re making a decision from a clean space. So, you want to take a look and see what your model looks like.

What are you thinking about making that expenditure? How does that thought that you’re thinking make you feel? And then, what action are you taking when you feel that emotion? And then ultimately, do you like the result that that produces in your life?

A big part of this, if you start to break from the way that you were brought up, the way that you were raised, what you were taught about spending money on yourself, you’re going to have to likely feel misunderstood. Because one of the reasons that people don’t spend money on themselves is because they’re afraid to be judged by other people.

That was a big reason, my friend, when we were having this conversation by the pool that day, she said, “I don’t like to spend money on certain things, because I’m afraid people in my life will judge me. My family members, my husband, they might think that I’m being irresponsible, or that I’m full of myself. That I’m too extravagant. That I’m leaving them behind.”

The reframe that I offered her was, “What if you inspired people? What if you showed other people that spending money on themselves is safe? That it’s acceptable, that there’s nothing wrong with it, that it can be fun, that it can be enjoyable, that bad things don’t happen when you do it, that more money is leftover, that more money comes your way; you don’t run out of it.”

That’s another reason people don’t like to spend money on themselves, they’re coming from a place of scarcity and they’re coming up against that fear. And then, they end up hoarding money instead of spending it to buy the things that they want in their lives.

So, when we talked about that, we were specifically talking about spending money on hotels, especially five-star hotels. Which are pretty pricey, even in my opinion. And as we were talking about that, she said, “Oh, my husband would just really think that it’s frivolous, that it’s wasteful. He just wouldn’t see the value in it.”

I said, “Yeah, I’m sure my parents would probably think that too, until they got here.” When you get to the Four Seasons, you’re like, hey, this is kind of nice. The surface is incredible. The linens are amazing. The pillows are exceptional. The bathrooms gorgeous. The mattress is sublime. The food’s excellent. The pool is breathtaking. Everything is next level.

Really, whatever you want is there for you. They even clean your room twice a day. They come and they do a turndown service, they put out your little slippers, they normally leave you like a little treat, and they give you a million different water bottles. It’s just really lovely.

They also wrap all of your cords, for all of your chargers, up in this really lovely way where everything’s tidy and orderly. If you wear makeup, every time they clean your room they organize all of your makeup, and they lay it all out for you. It’s just exquisite.

And my point to my friend was that if you give people a window into what it’s like on the other side of that expenditure, if they get to see what the experience is like, they may not like it, they may not think it’s worth it. But you may turn them on to a life that they would have never otherwise experienced. And they may realize this is kind of nice.

I just did that with a friend of mine. We went to Boston together and I wanted to splurge on a hotel. So, I offered to pay for it because I really wanted to stay in this one specific place. She got introduced to a lot of that five-star luxury that I tend to experience pretty frequently, because I travel so much and that’s how I like to travel now.

She liked it. She really enjoyed it. She got to see a lot of what I experienced pretty frequently. And she may not choose to spend what I spend on hotels, but just to see the value in it; that it’s special, that it’s a little something extra, or a lot something extra, and that it’s nice, that it’s fun to treat yourself, that it’s not frivolous, that there’s value in it.

So, if you’re worried about what other people think, I want to offer you that you get to invite them along with you, and they can experience it alongside you. It can be something that’s really beautiful that you do together. Now, with that being said, I’m also going to offer to you that you may just need to let yourself feel misunderstood, okay?

They may not get it. They may judge your expenditures. They may judge what you do with your money, and that’s also okay. You can just let them judge you and you can have your own back. What would you need to think, to feel loving and trusting of yourself when it comes to how you spend money, rather than creating that shame and guilt and sense of irresponsibility?

What if you thought that spending money on yourself was responsible? How might that be true? How might it be the most responsible thing you could do with your money? What would be different about your life, if you stopped depriving yourself of the things that you want?

I bet there’s even some things that maybe you don’t need, but they’d really, really, really make an impact on your life if you finally gave yourself permission to spend money to purchase them. What would be different about your life? What would change? What would get better? It’s so fun to think about.

My life is so much better, now that I moved and I’m in spaces that I love, that I feel more at home in. That’s so exciting to me. I feel more comfortable having people over because I feel more comfortable in my space. It helps me feel more connected to people.

So, it’s not just about spending money to have things, it’s about spending money to get to feel a certain way. To create certain connections or certain experiences that you wouldn’t otherwise have.

Another example of this is being able to treat people to things that you wouldn’t otherwise get to do with them, like going on vacations. I’m getting ready to take someone on vacation, in my life, and I’m so excited to be able to do it.

Now, we don’t need to go. We’re just choosing to go because I’m choosing to spend the money. And I’m so excited to get that experience with them and to get to be with them in that moment. It’s such a good use of money, as I see it.

So, what I’m doing here, is I’m offering you a lot of the thoughts that I think about spending money on myself. About spending money on things, about spending money on experiences, just to offer you a different perspective. To get you thinking about spending money in a way that doesn’t create that shame or that guilt for yourself.

Think about it. What emotions would you like to think when it comes to spending? Maybe you want to feel carefree. Maybe you want to feel at ease. Maybe you want to feel calm. Maybe you want to feel responsible or assured. What would you need to think to feel each one of those emotions? Think about that.

And then, think about the different action that you’ll take when it comes to spending money, and the different result that you’ll create in your life when you do. All right? A huge area that I see this with, is with people’s decisions about whether or not to work with me, about whether or not to invest in coaching.

They feel irresponsible spending the money on themselves. They think that it might be frivolous. That they should be able to get the same transformation on their own if they just work hard enough. If they just dig deep enough themselves, they can get the same results. And I just want to offer you, very rarely is that true.

Coaching, and working with a coach, provides you with a completely different perspective. You get results a lot faster, and you get results that you just can’t access on your own. Because you can’t see the areas that you’re struggling in.

You can’t see it with the perspective that a coach gets to bring to your life. They’re going to help you find your blind spots, work through them and problem solve, and give you the tools that you don’t currently have in order to do that. And when people finally get out of their own way and they invest in themselves, and they work with a coach, it’s incredible to see how significantly their lives changed for the better.

But people prevent themselves from experiencing that result, because they’re so hung up on spending money to begin with. They feel like they’re taking money away from their families, taking money away from their kids. That they could do something more “responsible” with it. Maybe pay off their student loans, pay off their mortgage, put more money aside in savings or in their retirement.

I just want to offer you; those are all things that you can do with your money. But what if you just invested in your own transformation? Why might that be the best thing that you can do for yourself? One of the things that I teach my clients is if you want better answers, you’ve got to ask better questions.

So, let’s start with this one: How might investing in your personal development and working with a coach be the most transformational thing that you can do? How might that be the best use of your dollars this year? All right, brainstorm that. And if you have questions about it, reach out to me.

The Less Stressed Lawyer Mastermind is currently open for enrollment. We start in late August; August 23 – 26^th, in Big Sky Montana. I just want to invite you to give yourself permission to give this gift to yourself. The gift of coaching, the gift of transformation, the gift of living a different life; the life that you’ve been wanting to live. You get to join me in Big Sky.

Talk about giving yourself permission to experience luxury, at a very discounted rate, mind you. The rate that we have for the hotel that we’re staying at, where the in-person live event is, is extremely discounted. Which is so much fun, that people get to experience some of the luxury that I talked about on the podcast pretty frequently. You’re going to get to experience for yourself.

But aside from the luxury that you’ll get to take part in while we’re together in Big Sky, Montana, you’ll get to experience the transformation that comes when you invest in yourself. Okay? It’s the most selfless thing that you can do. It’s the most responsible thing you could do. It’s the most practical thing you can do. I truly believe that.

I invite you to spend some time brainstorming how that may be true for you, as well. Then, when you figure out that I know what I’m talking about, go to TheLessStressedLawyer.com/mastermind and apply to join the August class. All right?

I hope this episode helped you. I hope it helped unpack some of the shame that you might feel around spending money on yourself. I just want you to know that that’s optional. Anything that you’ve ever learned about spending money on yourself, is just someone’s opinion. And you don’t have to keep carrying it with you.

If you don’t like what you were taught, you get to leave that. You get to put a pin in it, put it on the shelf, and you never have to think that again. You can choose to think whatever you want about spending money on yourself. You can choose to think that it’s a good idea or a bad idea, or the best idea you’ve ever had. All of the options are available to you. Choose wisely, my friends. The life that you live, ultimately depends on it. All right?

That’s what I’ve got for you this week. Next week, we’re going to talk about setting goals when it comes to money. Which people hate to do, but it’s very important that you do it. So, I’ll talk to you all about why people don’t like to do it, how to overcome that, and then why it’s so important that you do set goals in the first place. HINT: It makes it easier to achieve them.

All right, my friends. That’s all for now. Have a beautiful week and I will talk to you in the next episode.

Thanks for listening to The Less Stressed Lawyer podcast. If you want more info about Olivia Vizachero or the show’s notes and resources from today’s episode, visit www.TheLessStressedLawyer.com.

You’re listening to The Less Stressed Lawyer podcast, Episode 65. Today, we’re talking all about underearning. You ready? Let’s go.

Welcome to The Less Stressed Lawyer, the only podcast that teaches you how to manage your mind so you can live a life with less stress and far more fulfillment. If you’re a lawyer who’s over the overwhelm and tired of trying to hustle your way to happiness, you’re in the right place. Now, here’s your host, lawyer turned life coach Olivia Vizachero.

Hello there. How are you? How are you holding up this week? I always like to start off my episodes by just bringing you guys along with me, giving you a behind-the-scenes look at my life. If I’m being really honest, life has been full on 50/50 lately. That’s actually a concept that I teach my clients to expect that life is going to be 50/50; 50% good 50% not so good. That split is really unavoidable.

It might not always be 50/50 all at the same time. Maybe it’s 80/20 sometimes, and then other times, it’s 20/80, it just depends. But that, over the course of a lifetime, you’re going to get a 50/50 split of things that are great and things that are not so great.

Now, all circumstances are neutral of course. You know I teach that as well. But you’re going to encounter circumstances, 50% of the time approximately, where you’re going to think that the circumstance is not so great. For me, I’ve really been living in this. There’s so much amazing stuff going on in my life; that’s the 50% great.

And then recently, I just felt so compelled to tell you guys this, because I shared about it on social media. But I know I’ve talked about him on my podcast before. I actually just had a client reach out to me and tell me that they were listening to one of my episodes, and that he made a guest appearance because you could hear him purring. But I just lost my sweet, sweet Bear. He’s one of the two cats that I have.

Talk about 50% ass! Just really an unpleasant, unfortunate… For me, really heartbreaking experience. It’s the first pet I’ve ever lost. I wasn’t allowed to have pets growing up. So, my two cats that I have were my first pets ever. I unexpectedly had to put him to sleep.

As a coach, it’s been such an incredible example of when you encounter a circumstance that you want to think negative thoughts about. I want to be sad. I want to be heartbroken. I want to feel grief. I want to feel all those negative, complicated emotions. I don’t want to think positive thoughts and feel positive feelings about the situation. I want to have that negative experience.

So, as I’ve been going through this, I’ve really just been tender with myself, giving myself room to be human and to grieve. But it’s been just a really neat experience, as a coach, to watch the thoughts that I think and to see how they create the emotions that I experience, and then what I do from those feelings.

The unintentional action that I might take. Wanting to buffer away the negative emotion, wanting to escape it. That’s just our natural human tendency. Then having the intentionality within me, the discipline within me, to be able to interrupt that and to take a more intentional action instead.

So, I’m going to do a whole episode, at some point, on life being 50/50, and talking all about when something happens, and we want to think that it sucks… I definitely want to think that this sucks. I miss him terribly. My house feels very, very empty without him.

But I just want you to know that the point of coaching, which a lot of people get confused by this, the point of coaching isn’t to feel amazing 100% of the time. You’re going to encounter situations that you want to feel negatively about. You’re going to want to think negative thoughts. You’re going to want to feel negative feelings. All of that is just part of the human experience.

Now, we get to control our thoughts. So, there are going to be a lot of situations in life where we don’t want to think negative thoughts about something and we don’t want to feel negative emotions, and we can change our thoughts in those moments. But there will be those times where you’re going to want to think negative thoughts and feel the negative feelings that come with them. That’s totally okay to do that, you just want to be intentional about it.

I’m being very intentional here. I know that my thoughts are causing my feelings, and I’m giving myself permission to think those thoughts and to have that negative emotional experience. Okay, so that is the negative side of things over here. Just keeping it real. It’s not all rainbows, daisies, and sunshine.

But there is a lot of fun, amazing stuff going on. It is summer here in Michigan, and I could not be more excited. It’s my favorite time of year here. I absolutely love Michigan summers. I have been really giving myself a chance to enjoy the warm weather.

Enjoy my life and just have some downtime. Let my hair down and just soak up friends and family in a way that I haven’t really given myself an opportunity to do so this year. Because I’ve been really intentional about working a lot and hitting some business goals that I’ve set for myself. But I’ve been having a little bit more fun than I’ve had, I’d say, like the past six or 10 months. So, that’s been really amazing.

The other thing that’s really amazing, is that I just reopened enrollment for The Less Stressed Lawyer Mastermind. So, if you want to get in to the August class, before we kick-start things with the in-person event in Big Sky, August 23 – 26, you have one more chance to join.

Enrollment is going to be open until spots fill up. Spots are limited, so there’s only a certain number of people that I’ll be accepting into this round of the mastermind. Get your applications and you can go to TheLessStressedLawyer.com/mastermind in order to apply.

Ultimately, enrollment will close, at the very latest, July 21 at midnight. But I do expect this cohort to fill up, so when it fills enrollment will close. So, don’t wait until the last minute to apply.

There you have it. You can see there’s the good things, and then there’s the not-so-good things. And that’s just part of the human experience, my friends. It is okay. None of it will kill you. You can weather it all. If you’re going through what feels like an emotional time, or you’re experiencing some hardship right now, I promise you, that’s part of the human experience. It’s part of life. It’s okay. You were built for this. You can make it through.

Now, changing the subject a bit. Continuing on the Money Mindset series that we’ve been talking about. In the last episode on the Money Mindset series, we talked about overspending. Which is one of the main problems that I see people encounter when it comes to money.

Today, we’re going to talk about underearning. And if you want to talk about suffering, that is completely unnecessary, this is an excellent area. This is directly on point for that. Underearning is so, so common and so, so avoidable. Today, I want to talk about the different ways that people underearn. And then, we’re going to explore why exactly you might struggle with each one of those ways, and what you need to do in order to overcome each one.

I’m going to give you a framework that you can apply to each one of the ways that you might be underearning, so you can figure out why you’re underearning in that way. And then, what exactly you need to do in order to stop underearning in that way. So, today’s episode is going to be really comprehensive.

Okay, so here are some of the ways that I see people underearn. First things first, you don’t bill all of your time. If you work in a billable hour job, and you don’t enter all of your time, that’s a massive way people underearn. Or you put in all of your time, but you write it off before the bill goes to the client.

Another way people underearn is that they send the full bill to the client, but then the client balks at the bill and then you end up discounting your bill. Or they don’t pay you quickly enough, and you worry that the bill is too expensive, so you end up discounting your bill.

I also watch people do this constantly; they discount their rates. Whether someone asks for a discount or not. I see it actually most frequently when no one’s asked, and yet people still discount their rates. So, you discount your rates.

I also see people undercharge. They just don’t charge enough. They don’t charge what they could be charging based on the demand that they have for their services, or based on what’s common in the market. They charge a lot less than that.

Another common way people underearn is that they don’t raise their rates. They either never raise their rates, or they raise them too infrequently and then they don’t raise them enough when they do raise them. So, not raising your rates is a surefire way to underearn.

People will also not follow up on accounts receivable. Because they don’t like talking about money and they don’t like having uncomfortable conversations with clients. So, they won’t follow up on accounts receivable and they let money fall by the wayside. Because they don’t stay on top of it, they normally end up accepting less than the total amount owed. Or they don’t collect any of it, and they just write it off as a loss.

If you’re not in a position where you’re on the receiving end of client funds, other ways that you will underearn are by not asking for a raise. Or by staying in a job with a lower salary. Maybe you’ve asked for a raise, and they have refused it, they won’t give it to you. They say they don’t have the money available, and you continue to stay in a job where you’re underearning instead of moving and going someplace where you could be earning more.

Another way that people underearn is that they don’t maximize the bonuses that are available to them. Number one, by not advocating for themselves strongly enough. And number two, not understanding their organization’s compensation structure. So, this is especially true if you work in private practice, and you have a compensation model that’s based on developing business or things like that.

If you don’t understand the compensation structure, you will typically underearn. You won’t maximize the money that is available to you, if you were to leverage that compensation structure in your favor.

And then last, but not least, you guys, no, I will never stop talking about the importance of this developing business. I’m going to do a whole series on developing business. But this is a massive way that people underearn. They just rely on their salary.

They don’t develop a business, which leaves them with a lot less leverage. A lot less negotiating power when it comes to salary increases or bonuses. You just leave money on the table, because you’re not taking advantage of that extra compensation that would be available, if you were bringing in your own book of business.

So, those are the ways that people underearn. If you identified any that I didn’t mention, by all means… Oh, actually, I just did a webinar on this topic, around how to be better with money. One of the things someone said, which I thought was so clever, another way that people underearn is that they don’t submit reimbursements.

If you work at an establishment that reimburses you for certain costs; maybe it’s your mileage, maybe it’s lunches, client lunches, whatever, travel expenses. If you don’t submit your receipts to get reimbursed for those, that’s another way that you underearn.

There’s definitely someone out there, that you work with, that submits all that stuff. They get it paid for because it’s company policy or firm policy to cover those costs. And here you are not submitting that stuff. So, it’s a way that you impact your bottom line, pretty subconsciously or unconsciously, but it also leads to underearning.

If you go through that list… Number one, if you spot anything that I didn’t mention, send me a DM on LinkedIn or Instagram. I’d love to hear about the ways that you’ve identified underearning in your own life, in your own career. I can cover that in a future episode.

Number two, I want you to take an inventory, real quick. How are you currently underearning? Which of those actions are you guilty of? What offenses have you been committing? This isn’t for you to judge yourself or beat yourself up. We just want to create awareness here. Are you billing all of your time? Are you writing time off? Are you discounting your rates? Are you discounting your bills? Are you undercharging? Are you not raising your rates?

Are you not following up on accounts receivable? Are you not asking for raises? Are you staying in a job where you’re underpaid? Mind you, that is always a thought, that you’re being underpaid. But it may be a thought that you want to think. Depending on what your salary situation is. And then, are you developing business or are you avoiding it? Are you submitting those receipts to be reimbursed for? So, identify the ways that you’re currently underearning. Let’s start there.

Now, I’m going to ask you an even more painful question. So sorry, in advance, for this one. But it really is an important question for us to ask and answer. If you had to guess, how much is your underearning costing you? If you had to guess. Your brain’s going to want to offer you an ‘I don’t know’ thought. It’s going to want to say, “I don’t know how much.”

But push past that initial response and just take a guess. If you guessed, what would you say it’s costing you? What’s the amount? In brass tacks dollars and cents, right? Now, I like math. I always like to say that there’s two issues: there’s math, and then there’s mind drama. I love solving for the math.

Because one of the things that we’re going to talk about in this episode, you’re going to see that mind drama is the reason we underearn. We think negative thoughts about the intentional action we would need to take, like not discounting or raising our rates or asking for a raise. And then, we feel negative emotions about doing those activities because of our negative thoughts. And then, we avoid those negative feelings by taking the action that causes us to underearn instead. All right?

Now, when you’re not focused on how much this bad behavior is costing you… And that’s not a judgment on the behavior. I’m not trying to make you wrong. I’m just saying, if you want to earn more, it is bad behavior. Because it’s going to lead to you earning less.

So, if we want to stop associating the greatest amount of discomfort with doing the intentional action that would allow you to earn more, we have to increase the pain of your underearning. I find one of the best ways to do that is to make the pain quantifiable. It’s for you to really understand, how much money are you leaving on the table? How much are you underearning?

And then, for you to think about what could you be doing with that money if you were making it? That pain becomes so much more acute. And then, the most severe pain isn’t with taking the intentional, uncomfortable action. It’s with underearning and leaving that money on the table.

So, the discomfort switches, and you care more about making that money than you do about embracing that discomfort. Okay? That’s what we want to do. We want to get clear on, how much are you underearning by? How much money are you leaving on the table?

I did some simple math for you. If you are someone who doesn’t bill all of your time, or writes off your time, here as some simple math. Okay, so let’s say you charge $350 an hour. That’s the average billable hour rate across the US for all attorneys.

So, if you’re charging $350 an hour… I think that’s the high average. There’s also a low average. Which, let me double check that. That is the high average. The low average is $167. Okay, and that’s just from a Google search. So, we’re going to trust Google with this, let’s not get too particular.

But if you’re not within that range, or on the high side of this range, or on the low side of this range, it doesn’t matter. I’m just giving you facts and figures to go by, okay? Don’t use this and weaponize these numbers against yourself. I’m just trying to use them to create some awareness.

So, if you bill $350 an hour, and approximately, you write off or don’t bill four hours of your time each week, okay? If you work 48 weeks a year, I’m giving you four weeks of vacation, and holidays and all that good stuff. That leads to $70,000 that you’re not making.

If your billable rate is $200 an hour, maybe you’re at that lower end of that spectrum. You don’t bill four hours a week. That leads to 200 hours, or just under 200 hours. I think it’s like 192 hours, but we’ll round up to 200 hours. You’re leaving $40,000 on the table.

Now, a lot of my audience is from big law, so maybe these rates aren’t even remotely close to what your billable rate is. I have clients that charge up to $1,600 an hour. Depending on the client and the work and all that stuff. So, I’m not going to go all the way up to $1,600. Actually, now that I said it, I’m going to go all the way up to $1,600.

But let’s start in the middle first. If you charge $800 an hour, and you don’t bill four hours per week. You either write it off after you’ve entered it, or it never makes its way into the system. You’re leaving $160,000 on the table. And you guessed it, if you were to double that hourly rate, and you’re at $1,600 an hour, you’re leaving $320,000 on the table every single year.

So, if you do this over the course of a 20-year career… I’m going to do the math on that real quick, hold on. Oh my god, I’m so glad I did this math really fast. It is upsetting, to say the least. If you do what I just described to you, you write off your time or you don’t enter all of your time, and you do it consistently over the course of a 20-year career.

If your billable rate is $350 an hour, it’s going to cost you $1.4 million over the course of 20 years. If your billable rate is $200 an hour, it’s going to cost you $800,000 over a 20-year career. If your billable rate is $800 an hour, it’s going to cost you $3.2 million. And if your billable rate is $1,600 per hour, it’s going to cost you $6.4 million. All right?

Is this getting painful and uncomfortable enough for you yet, to stop underearning and to start entering your time and to no longer write it off? I sure hope so.

Another common thing that I see people do, like I explained a moment ago, is to discount their bills. So, they bill all of their time. They send the bill out. But they end up giving a discount, either before it goes to the client or after. And maybe you just have a policy where you do this. It’s just normal course of business for you; you give a 10% discount.

If you do that, and you typically bill out $500,000 worth of work per year, you’re leaving $50,000 per year on the table. Over a 20-year career, that’s a million dollars. If you do a million dollars a year, and you give a 10% discount on your bills, that’s $100,000 per year that you’re leaving on the table. Which, of course, is $2 million that you don’t earn. Two million dollars that you leave on the table over the course of a 20-year career.

Maybe you don’t collect 100% of what you bill out. You don’t follow up on those accounts receivable. You give a discount down the road, in hopes of just getting any money versus no dollars. Or you just let certain bills languish and you don’t follow up.

If you’re only collecting 80% of what you bill, if you’re billing $500,000 a year, that’s $100,000 that you’re not collecting. If it’s $1million that you build out each year, that’s $200,000 that you’re not collecting. And then, over the course of a 20-year career, that’s $2 million, and $4 million, respectively.

How about if you don’t raise your rates? I see so much resistance, that my clients have, to raising their rates. So, let’s say you forego raising your rates by $25 in a year. And on average, you bill 1,500 hours each year. You leave $37,500 on the table.

If you don’t increase your rates by $50, and you’re at that same number of billable hours, 1,500, you leave $75,000 on the table. If you don’t raise your rates by $100, you leave $150,000 on the table.

Now, maybe you work a little bit more than 1,500 hours per year. Maybe you’re at that 2,000 mark. If you are, the same breakdown, as far as the numbers. If you don’t increase by $25 per hour, you leave $50,000 on the table. If you don’t increase your rates by $50 per hour, you leave $100,000 on the table. And then, if you don’t increase them by $100, you leave $200,000 on the table.

Again, if you want to see what this costs you, year in, year out, over the course of a 20-year career, you’ve just got to times all those numbers by 20. If you’re billing 1,500 hours per year, and over the course of a 20-year career you don’t raise your rates by $25 each year, you’re leaving $750,000 on the table. If you don’t raise your rates by %50, it’s $1.5 million. If you don’t raise them by $100, it’s $3 million. If you’re doing a 2,000-hour billable year, the numbers are $1 million, $2 million, and $4 million, respectively.

This is a lot of money. It’s just $25 an hour. But over the course of a legal career, over decades, this really adds up. Maybe you’re practicing longer than 20 years. Maybe that’s totally undershooting the amount of time that you’re going to be engaging in this underearning behavior. If so, all that means is that you’re leaving more money on the table.

The same is true if you’re not asking for a pay raise. So, if you go year in, year out, without getting a pay raise, or you’re getting a very minimal cost of living increase. And you’re not getting what you could otherwise get if you were advocating for yourself, that money compounds, right? So, you can’t get further the next year if you didn’t make that progress that you could have made this year.

Over time it leads to compounded underearning. Also, most people receive the largest salary increases when they switch jobs. When they move from one company or firm to another one. I believe the average is 26%, is the salary increase on average when you switch organizations. So, one of my cousins, Emily, her favorite line is, “Y’all, it pays to quit.” It really does; statistics back this up.

So, if you are staying in a job and you’re not happy with your salary, it may be time to move. Consider that. Or even if you’re pretty happy but you want to maximize your earning potential, you’re probably going to move more than you may initially have thought. Specifically, so you can take advantage of those larger pay increases from moving from place to place.

All right, so now that we’re clear on how you might be underearning, you should have your list in your head. You should have spotted, when I named all of those different ways out, which ones you’re guilty of. And you should have a clearer idea of what your underearning activities are costing you, in no-nonsense dollars and cents.

I want to talk about why exactly you’re engaging in these underearning practices, and how to stop. So, we’re going to take them one by one. Before we do that, I want to give you a framework so you can understand what’s actually going on with each one of these issues.

You’ve heard me say this before, but there’s only ever three problems going on in any given issue. So, you’re thinking negative thoughts. In this case, you’re thinking negative thoughts about the intentional action that you should take. Okay?

You’re feeling negative feelings, and then you avoid those feelings, or you react to them in an unintentional manner. And there are positive actions that you would need to take that you’re not taking. Therefore, you’re not getting that result that you would get if you took those positive, intentional actions.

Those are the three problems on a really high 50,000-foot view, service level approach to underearning: you’re thinking negative thoughts. You’re avoiding negative feelings, and you aren’t taking positive intentional actions.

Now, the solution for underearning, no matter how it is that you’re doing it, is basically the flip side of those three issues. So, you need to change your thoughts. You need to think more positive thoughts about the intentional actions that you should be taking.

Contrarily, you need to think negative thoughts about the underearning activities that you’re currently engaged in rather than thinking positive thoughts. Or I’ll even go so far as to say, resigned thoughts. For instance, a lot of people think that they have to discount their rates. That’s a resigned thought where you’re relinquishing control and agency that you actually have over your billing.

So, we need to change that thought about the unintentional action that leads you to underearn, and we need to think a different thought about discounting your bills. Maybe you need to think that you don’t do it or that you don’t need to do it; you have to change the thought. The first step to solving your underearning issues is to change the thoughts that you’re thinking.

The second step to addressing your underearning is gagging and going through the discomfort of taking that intentional action. So, you’re going to have to be willing to feel your negative feelings. You’re going to have to allow them to be there, and you’re going to have to wade into them and move through them with intention.

Which brings me to step three. You’ve got to take that positive, productive, intentional action, in spite and despite the discomfort. All right? In spite of it, and despite it. So, that is the overarching framework for how to resolve your underearning issues.

Now, we’re going to go, step by step, through each of the ways that you underearn, so you can see this at play. Let’s say you don’t bill all of your time. I’m going to do an entire episode on billable time and the issues around it. But there are two main reasons that people don’t bill all of their time.

Number one, they don’t enter all of their time, because they just hate time entry. They dread it. They think it’s boring. They don’t consider it real work. They see it as being administrative. They think their other work, the more substantive work, is more important so they deprioritize entering all their time. Then they fall behind on it, and they have to reinvent the wheel and recreate their time for the entire month.

I used to be guilty of this when I worked in big law. Actually, when I worked and practiced law, in general. In big law and in some of the smaller civil work that I did when I worked at the boutique sized firm, as well. So, I was a terrible offender of this.

It leads to underearning because you don’t capture all of your time. And then, when you try and recreate your time for the month, you just don’t capture everything because you’re doing it at a time that’s far removed when you actually did the work. So, it’s not going to be fresh in your mind. Things are going to fall through the cracks, and you’re going to miss hours.

That’s one reason that people don’t bill all of their time. You can see that it comes from negative thoughts; a lot of the thoughts that I listed. That you don’t have time to do it or that it sucks. Or that you don’t feel like it, and other work’s more important.

And then, those thoughts are going to trigger you to feel negative feelings. Feelings like, feeling bothered or dread or pressured or stressed or overwhelmed. And then, you are unwilling to feel those feelings and you avoid them by not entering your time.

Entering your time is the intentional action that you would need to take in order to not underearn. That’s the action that you don’t end up taking. So, you can see, there’s that framework at play: Negative thoughts you’re thinking. Negative feelings that you’re avoiding, or reacting to. And then, intentional actions that you’re not taking.

You would have to change your thoughts, feel those negative feelings on purpose, and take that intentional action of entering your time every day even if you don’t feel like it, in order to stop underearning.

Another reason people don’t bill all of their time is that they feel guilty or worried about what a client is going to think. So, maybe you think that it shouldn’t have taken you as long as it did take you to complete a task. Then you don’t bill all of your time for that task.

Or you’re worried a client, or a supervising attorney is going to be upset with you for spending as long as you did spend. So, you don’t bill all of your time. Or you just feel guilty about what your billable rate is. And you feel badly for charging a client that much money. Maybe you get in your head about what a client can afford versus what they can’t afford.

And so, for these reasons, this guilt or this fear, this worry, you don’t enter all of your time. This also might be the same reason that you write off your time. Okay?

Now, these negative thoughts that you’re thinking about entering all of your time, are causing this problem to begin with. Then they’re making you feel those negative emotions, and you’re avoiding those negative emotions; that worry or that fear or that guilt. Then you don’t enter all of your time or submit the bill without writing your time off.

In order to stop underearning, you’ve got to change your thoughts about entering all of your time. Instead of thinking that you can’t enter all of your time, or that it should have taken you less time, you want to tell yourself, “It took me as long as it took me. My clients are willing to pay for this. It’s still valuable to them. Regardless of whether I think it’s expensive or not is irrelevant. It’s not my job to give another attorneys client a discount that that attorney didn’t approve.”

That especially happens when you don’t enter all of your time for a client who isn’t your client, someone else’s client. You’re basically giving that person’s client a discount that that attorney didn’t approve, and they don’t know that you’re doing it.

One of my rules is, if you’re going to give a discount, make sure the client knows about it so you get the goodwill. Now, I am not suggesting that you discount your rates or discount your bills. I believe that your clients will pay your full rate. All right?

I have a “No Discounts” policy in my business, and it’s never been a problem. But it comes from me making the decision ahead of time that I don’t discount my rates, ever. No matter what. No matter what circumstance arises, I never, ever discount. That’s just a foundational concept, a cornerstone in my business. You get to have the same exact thing in your practice.

One of the thoughts that I teach my clients to adopt is, “I don’t discount, and I always get paid.” Those are just really great foundational self-concept beliefs to hold about yourself. Because remember, your thoughts create your results. So, those are really powerful thoughts to practice thinking. Because you’ll go on to create those results, if those thoughts become practice thoughts of yours.

Now, in order to enter all of your time, when you’re feeling guilty and worried, you’ve got to be willing to gag-and-go through that guilt and that worry, in order to put in all of your time and to resist the urge to write off that time. Okay? You’ve got to take the intentional action of entering every single hour you worked. All right? And you’ve got to change your thoughts.

You’ve got to be thinking about the time that you enter, differently. If you discount your bills or you discount your rates, the same thing is at play here. You think thoughts about not discounting that are getting in your way. What are those thoughts that are coming up for you? Do you think you have to give a discount? Do you think clients expect a discount? Do you think they will go and work with another attorney if you don’t offer a discount?

In fairness, especially if you’re fully booked with clients, if you’re at your capacity for work… I have a whole episode on understanding your capacity, so go listen to that. I’ll link it in the show notes. If you’re at capacity and you’re full, and you’re still discounting, this makes absolutely no sense.

In fact, even if it’s true, that if you charge a client’s going to go work with someone else, good riddance. You literally want them to because they’re taking up a spot in that capacity of yours. And you want that to be filled with a client who’s going to pay your full rate. There is a client that will pay your full rate.

You have to believe that, in order to receive that client into your practice. But I promise you, they are there. You just have to believe. Even if you’re not in full belief, believe a little bit. Take my word for it. Trust me. Borrow my belief. Someone will work with you at your full rate, but only if you require them to.

That is a really fascinating thing about discounting. When you discount, you create more evidence that people will only work with you at your discounted rate. Or will only continue to work with you if you continue to discount your bills. You don’t create evidence to the contrary, that people will continue to work with you even if you don’t discount, right? So, be careful with the evidence that you’re creating.

Also, people aren’t going to fight you. Sometimes they will, but a lot of times they won’t. If you’re going to offer a discount, people will take it. If you offer a payment plan versus having to pay a retainer up front, people will take you up on it. The only reason people pay you the way that they pay you is because you let them pay you that way. All right?

So, be really clear about that. How are you enabling this? How are you allowing some of this behavior that maybe you don’t care for? Maybe it’s even triggering a lot of frustration in your practice. Check in with yourself. It’s easy to blame your clients, but you’re the one who is allowing this to happen.

It’s time to take radical ownership here and be onto yourself if you’re guilty of engaging in these underearning practices. You’re allowing this to happen. So, if you’re discounting and people are paying discounted rates, it’s only because you’re letting them.

You also might be undercharging. If you’re undercharging, check in with yourself: Why are you doing it? What negative thoughts do you have about charging more than what you’re charging, that are holding you back from charging more? Do you think no one will pay a higher rate? Do you think no one would pay for services at that amount? Do you think that you’re not good enough, not qualified enough, not experienced enough, to warrant charging that much?

If you think these thoughts, you’re going to feel afraid. You’re going to feel guilty. You’re going to feel inadequate. You’re going to feel unqualified, and insecure or uncertain. And then, you end up avoiding those feelings by refusing to charge more; you continue to undercharge.

It’s a way that you avoid all that discomfort. So, check in with yourself: Are you guilty of these thoughts? The thoughts that you think about charging more and increasing your rates are probably very similar if you’re not increasing your rates each year. Okay?

That’s not the right frequency to change your rates. I say, let demand drive your rate increases. If you’re consistently full with clients, and you’ve got more work than you really have room for, continue to increase your rates until you start to get nos, until you start to fall underneath your capacity. If you’re at capacity, that’s when you want to increase your rates. And you can just continue to do it until you start to get resistance.

It’s also the best time to increase your rates because it’s when you need the money the least. A terrible time to increase your rates is when you are in a desperate or graspy or insufficient, insecure place in your practice. If you’re in need of clients, it’s really not ideal to increase your rates then to try and make up for lost revenue. Because you’re going to come with an energy that’s going to be really repelling to clients.

So, you want to be unattached when you raise your rates. And you want to be in a place where you care more about getting the higher rate than you care about getting the client. Okay?

Now, if you aren’t raising your rates, check in with yourself. What are those negative thoughts that you’re thinking about increasing your rates? Maybe you think your clients won’t stand for it. That they’ll be upset. That they won’t want to work with you anymore. That they’re going to hire someone else. They’re going to quit.

Maybe you think you’re not worth a higher rate. Maybe you think you can’t charge a certain rate because people who have been at your firm longer than you don’t charge more than that. That is a really common way that people underearn. Who cares what anyone else charges? Don’t worry about them.

If you have control and autonomy over what you charge, set your rates according to your demand. And by gradually increasing, year in and year out, rather than setting your rates based on what other people charge. People will pay what you require them to pay. Don’t worry about what someone else is doing. Only compare yourself to yourself.

So, if you’re guilty of undercharging and not increasing your rates, what would you need to think in order to actually increase them? What would you need to believe?

You would need to believe that people are willing to pay more than what they’re paying right now. You need to believe that it’s safe to charge more. You need to believe that your clients like working with you, and that they’ll continue to work with you because they know the value you bring. You need to believe that you will continue to bring more value than what you’re charging, even as you charge more.

You need to believe that other clients are out there who are willing to pay a higher rate, even if your current clients are not. You need to believe that you are in demand and that you’re worth charging more. That even with charging more, it’s still an overdeliver and an undercharge.

That’s one of my favorite ways to think about how I charge and what I charge. That even as I continue to charge more and more and more, I’m still overdelivering and undercharging, based on the value that I provide my clients. Based on what they get from working with me.

A really fun way to engage in that mental exercise for yourself, is to think about, “What’s the value that my clients get from the services that I provide?” For a lot of my clients, the value that they offer their clients, maybe they offer them peace of mind. Maybe they offer them certainty. Maybe there’s a specific monetary amount.

Whether it’s a tangible or intangible benefit, a lot of times it’s either worth far more than what you’re charging, or it’s invaluable. It’s priceless. In which case, you can charge more. And people will still value the service that they’re getting from you, the service that you’re rendering, and they’ll be happy to pay a higher rate.

You’re also going to have to feel those negative emotions, that I listed, that are coming up for you, when you think about increasing your rates and charging more than what you’re currently charging. To be willing to embrace those negative emotions, gag-and-go, and increase your rates anyways; in spite of and despite them.

And take that intentional action of actually increasing your rates. Doing whatever you need to do in order to facilitate that activity. It might be informing your clients. It might be making the decision and honoring it. It might be not discounting, and going back to your original rates when you send out a bill after you’ve decided on a price increase. Okay?

Whatever it is, there’s those intentional actions you’re going to have to take. You want to identify them and be really clear on what they are.

Now, when it comes to following up on accounts receivable, if you’re not doing this, check in with yourself. What are those negative thoughts that you’re thinking about following up on that outstanding invoice, that leads you to not follow up? Maybe you’re thinking that someone doesn’t have the money and they’re not going to be able to pay.

I love coaching people on this limiting belief. People always come up with the money for the things that they prioritize. All right? So, you can look for evidence of this. I assure you; you will find it. People always find the money.

The people who aren’t paying your rates are spending money on other stuff. Absolutely. They’re not just spending money on the essential life stuff. They’re spending money on other things, too: vacations, restaurants out, beer, wine, cigarettes. Those buffers. Those coping mechanisms.

People spend money. They probably have different subscriptions. Maybe they have cable, maybe they have HBO. Maybe they have an expensive lease payment. Maybe they’re paying for private school or kids travel soccer. It doesn’t matter. Maybe they’re paying for elective beauty procedures. It doesn’t matter. People find the money.

So, you’ve got to make them find the money, by following up on accounts receivable and being the squeaky wheel that gets the grease, okay? If you’re not following up, you’re doing it because either you think that they’re not going to pay you, that they don’t have the money, you’re feeling guilty.

Or maybe you’re feeling compassionate in a way that really doesn’t serve you. Empathetic in a way that really doesn’t serve you here. You’re prioritizing someone else’s discomfort over your own. You want to be onto yourself if you’re doing that, and you want to resist the urge. Charity starts at home, here. You’ve got to put your own needs first, in order to make sure you don’t underearn.

Maybe you’re thinking there’s no point. You’re never going to collect anything, so why even waste your time. You might think that the money doesn’t make that big of a difference. That you made enough off of them already, so you don’t have to chase the rest of the money. You might think that you hate talking about money.

If you’re thinking these thoughts, the chances of you following up on accounts receivable are very slim to none. So, you’ve got to change your thoughts. You’ve got to think that you’re willing to do this. That it does make a difference. You’ve got to think that thought, that I introduced you to earlier, that you always get paid. That you don’t leave money on the table.

You also are going to have to gag-and-go through the discomfort that’s associated with following up on accounts receivable. You’re going to have to feel pushy. You’re going to have to feel needy. You’re going to have to feel rude. You’re going to have to feel intrusive. You’re going to have to feel worried that the client might judge you, or not like that you’re following up.

I always like to tell people that the clients bring it on themselves. If they don’t pay on time, and you’ve got to follow up with them… You, of course, don’t have to follow up with them, you’re choosing to follow up with them. But if you choose to follow up with them, you’re not doing anything wrong. You’re not making them feel uncomfortable. If they feel uncomfortable, it’s because of their thoughts about their own behavior, or their thoughts about your behavior.

You’re not in control of their thoughts. Their thoughts aren’t your business. It’s really irrelevant what they think, okay? But they brought this on themselves by not paying you in a timely fashion. So, don’t go making yourself feel guilty or embarrassed for following up. You’re completely within your rights, as a service provider, to follow up on accounts receivable when you’ve done the work, you’ve provided the value, the clients reaped the benefit, and they owe you money.

Okay, if you’re not in an accounts receivable situation, because you’re an employee, and you work for an organization. Maybe you worked in-house, or at some other type of establishment. Other ways that you underearn, that are different than private practice, are maybe you’re not asking for a raise.

This could also certainly apply to you if you’re working in private practice. Okay? If you’re not asking for a raise, check in with yourself. What are your negative thoughts about asking for a raise? Do you think you don’t deserve one? Do you think your boss is going to be upset if you ask for one? Do you think it makes you look ungrateful? Do you think they’re probably going to say no? Do you think now’s not a great time to ask?

Those thoughts are going to hold you back from asking and earning more. You’ve got to change them. You’ve got to think, “Now’s as good a time as any. I’ve earned it. I’m worth more. I provide more value; therefore, it makes sense for me to receive a raise.” You might need to think, “They might say yes. They will say yes.” That you’ll never know if you don’t ask. You’ve got to be thinking more positive thoughts about asking for the raise.

You’ve also got to be willing to feel negative emotions. So, guilt or feeling entitlement or feeling worried, those negative emotions are emotions you have to be willing to feel. You also might have to feel pushy or rude or inconsiderate, if you’ve got negative thoughts about you asking. You also might have to be willing to feel negative emotions if they tell you no.

You might have to be willing to feel disappointed, offended, hurt, discouraged, resentful, frustrated, rejected. All those negative emotions too, that we prevent ourselves from experiencing when we avoid asking for more money.

Maybe you’re not asking for a bonus, or you’re not negotiating a higher bonus for similar reasons. If that’s the case, you’ve got to change your thoughts. You’ve got to embrace the discomfort that comes from asking.

And then, you’ve got to gag-and-go and take the intentional action of asking for what you want, in spite of and despite the discomfort. This is really going to require you to care less about other people’s opinions, and to prioritize yourself and what you want.

Now, maybe you’ve asked for a raise, and they’ve told you no. Or you’ve asked for more money and you’re not getting it. Or you’re in a job where the compensation structure doesn’t suit you, it leads you to underearn, and you could be working somewhere else with a more conducive beneficial compensation structure.

That means you’ve got to leave and move to a different job. If you don’t do that, and you keep staying in a job with a lower salary or disadvantaged compensation benefits, you want to switch jobs. But if you’re not switching jobs, if you’re not looking, if you’re not applying, if you’re not moving on to a position that would enable you to earn more, you’ve got to ask yourself why.

What are the thoughts that are getting in your way? You might be thinking that you should stay. That your employer has done a lot for you. That it makes you look ungrateful. That it’s good enough. That it’s wrong or greedy of you to want more. Those negative thoughts are getting in your way.

Maybe you think that there isn’t a position out there that will allow you to earn more. I promise you, that’s just not true. There’s always a position that will allow you to earn more. You might think you’re not qualified for it, so you might feel inadequate or insecure. You might feel uncertain about whether or not you’ll get it, and that uncertainty drives you to just maintain the status quo.

So, get really clear here. If you’re guilty of this, staying put when you know it’s time to leave, and that’s causing you to underearn, you’ve got to change your thoughts. What do you need to think instead, about the intentional action you need to take? About looking for a job and about switching jobs?

You might think you’re not going to find as good of a gig. That you’re not going to find as nice of an environment. You’re not going to work with better people or as good of people as you’re currently working with. Those are other limiting beliefs that are holding you back.

So, that doubt that’s going to come in, along with all the other discomfort that comes from the thoughts that I just mentioned, those are going to present as roadblocks that keep you in your place. You’re going to have to change your thoughts and embrace that discomfort, in order to move on to a position that’s more conducive to you earning more.

Last but not least, if you’re not developing business. Actually, not last but not least, let’s talk about reimbursements first. If you’re not submitting your receipts for reimbursement at the job that you work at, ask yourself why? What are your thoughts about submitting receipts for reimbursement? Do you think it makes you look petty? That’s a thought I used to think, actually.

Do you think, “Meh, I really don’t need the money. It’s not that big of a deal.” Check in with yourself. What thoughts come up for you? And then, what flavors of discomfort come up for you? What negative emotions do experience when you think about forcing yourself to submit those receipts for reimbursement? For asking for what you’re technically entitled to?

Or maybe there’s not even a company policy, but you could be asking to be reimbursed and compensated for your financial expenditure. A lot of times, my clients could have their employers pay for their coaching; this is such a great example of this. But they never ask, they leave money on the table, and they end up paying out of pocket for something that the company or the firm might cover.

Now, I’m a big advocate of paying out of pocket. I think when you have your own skin in the game, you show up a little bit differently in that coaching relationship. You take it a little bit more seriously. You value the time and the financial investment a little bit differently when it’s your own money that you’re putting up and spending, to get the ROI that you get from coaching.

However, you could receive compensation from your employer for this expenditure. If spending the money on coaching is something that’s holding you back, check in with your employer and see if they’ll cover the costs. Sometimes they will.

But you might feel guilty about asking. If that’s you, you’re going to have to gag-and-go through that guilt. Or you’re going to have to change the way that you’re thinking about making the ask in order to be able to make it. Okay?

So, check in with yourself. If you’re not submitting things for reimbursement, there’s a couple of reasons why. You’re not thinking the right thoughts. You’re not being willing to feel the negative feelings that come up for you. And you’re not taking the intentional action you would need to take, in spite of and despite the discomfort.

Now, last but not least; for real this time. If you’re not developing business, and you work for an establishment that compensates really well, or at least better than just your salary if you do develop business, you’re leaving money on the table. This is a way that you’re underearning.

Maybe you would get a higher salary because of the business that you bring in. Your firm, your company, would value you more, so you’d receive higher salary increases. That might be one way. Or you’d receive bigger bonuses based on the firm or the company’s compensation structure.

If this is you and you’re not developing business, check in with yourself. Why are you not developing business? Maybe you think you don’t have time for it. Maybe you think it’s too hard. Maybe you think no one wants to hire you. Maybe you think it’s uncomfortable and you don’t know where to start.

If you’re thinking these thoughts, you’re going to feel overwhelmed and pressured, confused, uncertain, unprepared, unqualified, nervous, embarrassed. Exposed maybe when you think about putting yourself out there and marketing yourself.

So, if those thoughts are prevalent for you, and you’re experiencing those negative feelings, you’re not engaging in business development because those thoughts are getting in your way. And you’re avoiding those emotions instead of embracing them. In order to develop business, and take advantage of that compensation structure that you are able to access and leverage when you do develop business, you’re going to have to change your thoughts about business development.

You’re going to have to believe that people want to hire you, and that you do have time to develop business, and that you’re capable of developing business. That business development is fun. That it can be easy. That you’ll be good at it. That it’s a skill you can develop over time, even if it’s a skill that you feel like you don’t have right now. Okay?

So, you’ve got to change your thoughts. And then, you’ve got to be willing to embrace the discomfort of developing business that comes from those negative thoughts that just happen to linger. They just don’t go away completely as you start to practice new thoughts.

You’ve got to take the intentional action of developing business. You’ve got to know what you’re offering people. You’ve got to meet people. Tell them what you do, add value ahead of time to your audience, and make offers to help them when it makes sense. Basically meaning, if they need your help, you’ve got to tell them you can help them, and you got to let them know how to work with you. How to take the next step to move forward.

And in order to take those actions, you’re going to have to be willing to feel uncomfortable. So, you’ve got to gag-and-go through that discomfort and just put yourself out there and start developing business.

These are the ways that you underearn. Find and identify them in your own life. How are you underearning? What is it costing you? Get clear on the negative thoughts you’re thinking about the intentional action that you would need to take in order to not underearn. See what negative emotions come up for you when you think those negative thoughts. And then, be very clear about the intentional action that you’re not taking.

The solution here, once you’ve identified the thoughts, identified the feelings that you’re avoiding, and identified the intentional action that you’re not taking, is to flip the script. And to change your thoughts. Embrace that discomfort and take that intentional action anyways, no matter how you’re underearning. That is the solution.

That framework works for any of the ways in which you may be underearning, okay? So, go out there in your life, apply this framework, and shift from the problem to the solution. Change those thoughts, embrace those feelings, and take that intentional action, in spite of and despite the discomfort.

It is going to be life changing for you if you do this. Okay? Alright, that’s what I have for you this week. I want to add one more final thing before I go. If you struggle with underearning, in any of the ways that I mentioned or in a handful of the ways that I mentioned or in all of the ways that I mentioned, I highly, highly recommend you join the August class of The Less Stressed Lawyer Mastermind.

We will be addressing each and every one of these underearning issues in the August 2023 cohort. So, make sure you’re in it. We’ll get very clear on exactly what your thoughts are. I’ll help you identify the mindset blocks that are holding you back from earning more. And then, I will help you learn how to take uncomfortable action, in spite of the discomfort, so you can be intentional. So, you can stop underearning. Okay?

It is going to be extremely comprehensive what we cover in this upcoming round, when it comes to underearning. If you’re guilty of doing this, you do not want to miss it. It is literally costing you, I gave you the numbers already, it’s literally costing you tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. And it’s costing you hundreds of thousands of dollars, or millions of dollars, over the course of your legal career.

You literally cannot afford to not solve your underearning issue; to not address this problem. The cost of the mastermind is peanuts compared to the money that you’re leaving on the table. The mastermind is $5,000 for the six-month program. Including the three-and-a-half day in-person event in Big Sky, Montana. The $5,000 doesn’t cover your travel to Big Sky or your hotel accommodations. But it covers, basically, everything else. Okay?

So, the $5,000 expenditure, that you would need to make in order to invest in yourself, in order to invest in learning how to overcome your underearning problem, pales in comparison to the money that you will start to earn. The money that you will recoup. The money that you will stop leaving on the table if you join this program. You will learn the tools, that I’m going to teach you during our six months together.

Get out of your own way. Don’t be penny-wise and pound foolish. Spend the money now. Make this investment in yourself and your future. Build this skill set. Learn how to solve your underearning problems, once and for all. It’s going to pay dividends, literally, if you do this. All right? Now remember, spots are limited, so don’t wait. Get in and apply now. You can do that at TheLessStressedLawyer.com/mastermind.

Your future self is going to thank you. The future self that has an extra $100,000 to play with a year, or $50,000 to play with a year. Fifty thousand versus five thousand is nothing. Five thousand dollars versus $100,000, nothing. Five thousand dollars versus a million dollars, nothing.

Get out of your own way. I know it can feel icky or uncomfortable to invest in yourself, and to come up out of pocket and spend the money, but seriously, it makes absolutely no sense to continue dealing with this underearning problem year in and year out. Let’s address this issue once and for all.

I cannot wait to see you in the mastermind. I can’t wait to help you with this problem. I think one of my absolute favorite things to coach on, is teaching people how to make more money. You work hard, you don’t need to work harder to make more of it. You need to work smarter, okay?

And one of the best ways to work smarter is to learn how to overcome your underearning tendencies, once and for all. You learn this once; it’s going to last you a lifetime. It’s going to be the best $5,000 you’ve ever spent, I promise you.

Alright, my friends, I will talk to you in the next episode. we’re going to continue talking about money. I’ve got a couple more episodes left in this series. So, if you haven’t subscribed yet, make sure you hit the subscribe or follow button. Tune in next week, where we continue with the Money Making Mindset series. All right?

In the meantime, I hope you have a beautiful week. I’ll talk to you in the next episode.

Thanks for listening to The Less Stressed Lawyer podcast. If you want more info about Olivia Vizachero or the show’s notes and resources from today’s episode, visit www.TheLessStressedLawyer.com.

You’re listening to The Less Stressed Lawyer podcast, Episode 64. Today, we’re talking all about power in numbers and the benefits of group coaching. You ready? Let’s go.

Welcome to The Less Stressed Lawyer, the only podcast that teaches you how to manage your mind so you can live a life with less stress and far more fulfillment. If you’re a lawyer who’s over the overwhelm and tired of trying to hustle your way to happiness, you’re in the right place. Now, here’s your host, lawyer turned life coach Olivia Vizachero.

Hello, my friends, how are you? I have a special little treat for you today. So, I’m interrupting the Money Mindset series that I’m doing to bring you this special episode. I just spent a long weekend with really good friends of mine in Montana doing reconnaissance and planning for The Less Stressed Lawyer Mastermind live event that’s going to be taking place in August, August 23^rd through the 26^th.

One of the things that we did while we were there, we turned it into, essentially, a working retreat. And since meeting up, we’ve been talking about how we all came to know each other, which was through joining a group coaching program with our business coach, Stacey Boehman. We’ve been talking all about the power of being in a group, what the experience is like, why it’s so beneficial to our clients, and why it was so beneficial to all of us as we were students of another coach in a group program.

So, all four of us now run our own groups. And what we wanted to do was have a really candid fireside chat, essentially, about our own experiences in a group coaching setting. Some of us, myself included, had some aversion to being in a group setting initially, and how we overcame that, what the benefits were in our own lives personally, professionally.

And then also, what all of us, as coaches, experience with our clients. The benefits that we see be imparted on our clients, what their experience is like, how it’s transformational for them, how it’s so meaningful for them, and the different takeaways and benefits that they receive from being in a group coaching program, like the one that I run, The Less Stressed Lawyer Mastermind.

So, the four of us came together and recorded an episode, just like I said, a candid conversation that you guys get to listen to. And all four of us are sharing it on our own respective podcasts. So, it’s myself and three of my closest entrepreneur friends; Laura, Andrea, and Priyanka.

I’m so excited for you to meet them in this episode, for you to get to know them. And for you to hear a couple different perspectives about being in a group coaching program, in addition to the perspective I’ve given you throughout the course of these episodes, since I talked about the mastermind quite a lot.

So, buckle up and tune in to this fun conversation that the four of us had. I hope you enjoy it and learn a thing or two.

Laura: Hey, guys! Okay, so I’m here with my business besties. So, we’re going to go around and introduce ourselves to you guys. Because, guess what? We’re really smart, and we’re all having this podcast on our separate podcasts. I mean, #efficiency.

So, for those of you that don’t know me, I’m Laura Conley. I’m the host of the Yummy Mummy podcast. And I am a life and weight loss coach living in Boulder, Colorado, with my two little babies and my husband. He’s 41, my son is three and my daughter is five. So, Andrea, why don’t you go next? Take it away.

Andrea: Hey, I’m Andrea Nordling. I am a business coach for holistic nutritionists and health coaches. I live in Minnesota. Husband, as well. Two kids, 13 and 10. And I have The Profitable Nutritionist™ podcast.

Laura: So fun. Priyanka.

Priyanka: Hello, hello. I am Priyanka Venugopal. I’m a mind and body health coach for high achieving professional moms. I have two little beans; one is big, he’s seven and he’s driving me bananas, like right now. And then my four-year-old who is super easy. I’m having all the struggles. I live in the Washington DC area, and I am the host of The Unstoppable Mom Brain Podcast.

Laura: I love that. So good. Olivia.

Olivia: Hi, everyone. My name is Olivia Vizachero. I am a life coach for lawyers. I run The Less Stressed Lawyer, and I help attorneys who are over the overwhelm live lives with less stress and far more fulfillment. I’m based out of Detroit. And I’m the host of The Less Stressed Lawyer podcast. I’m super excited to talk to all three of you today about all the things that we’ve learned from being in communities with one another.

Priyanka: I’m so excited. So excited for this. This is going to be so fun.

Laura: I’m not. This is going to suck. I am just sort of going through this. You guys are just only okay. But yeah, so we are going to talk about community, connection, collaboration, why we think it’s important, and some of the stumbling blocks that might arise, In hopes that you guys, our listeners, get something out of this.

Because I, personally, do think it is one of our basic human needs. I think it is what makes life so sweet and special. And I rarely, rarely, I mean, this could be because I’m an extrovert, we could talk about that too. But I rarely come home from a retreat in Montana with you girls and wish I didn’t. Or a coffee with a friend, even if I’m kind of dreading it. Or a walk, or whatever it is, I rarely come home from connecting with another human and regret it.

So, I just want to shout it from the rooftops, especially post COVID, that I do think that this is something important, like food or water or shelter. So, Olivia.

Olivia: I totally agree with that. And just to give people who are listening context, I’m getting ready to host an event. Actually, Andrea is, as well, in Big Sky, Montana in August. Whenever I host these retreats, I go out and I do a reconnaissance mission. And the four of us all went last weekend.

We went to work on our businesses, brainstorm together, and run ideas past each other. Just really be in an immersive environment where we get to focus on ourselves and that connection, exchanging ideas, deepening our relationships, and being able to share parts of ourselves with one another.

Through that experience, of the four of us coming together and meeting up in Montana, we realized just how much of an enriching experience it is for all of us. And the fact that all four of us run group programs for our clients, same exact thing. So, I think it was the Andrea who got the idea to do the episode?

Andrea: I think it was Priyanka.

Priyanka: I was actually just going to say, I felt like these kinds of weekend getaways sometimes it turns into friends just getting together, like a girls weekend, right? Like a girls night out, a girls weekend, or a group that just gets together in a way that’s for fun. And this was that, but I also really feel the reason that I even thought that this would be such a great experience for our audience to hear about, is we had some hard conversations.

When you think about a weekend getaway and a girls night out, you don’t always have challenging conversations that is going to level up your results that you have in your business, in your life, for your body, for your mind. And I feel like the four of us got together, and we had brain exploding conversations, that I think pushed all of us.

And that was what I thought was something worth sharing. That it’s not always easy to put ourselves in groups and to share vulnerably. But because the four of us all have similar goals, in that we want to expand our reach, we want to expand our orbit. I feel like we did that, because we put ourselves together with other people that had similar goals. That doesn’t happen very easily.

Laura: Yeah, I was actually a little nervous about that. And even my coach called me out. It was like, “Oh, okay. Yeah, let me know how that goes.” I mean, she didn’t say it in those words, but I think she had the same thought. Of like, “Oh, it’s totally going to just be a girls weekend.” And I do, to your point Priyanka, I think it is so important to have those girls weekends for sure.

But how rich and how lucky are we? And we’re not just lucky, because anyone listening, you guys can put yourselves in these rooms, too. But to be able to put yourself in a room where somebody loves you enough that they’re willing to ask the hard question and have the hard conversation in the name of your future self, in the name of your growth is pretty freaking special.

Andrea: Oh, my gosh. Oh, I just jumped it in on you Priyanka. I’m sorry. I’m curious, for you guys, if you have the same experience. I love my friends I’ve had for a really long time. I have history with lots of people; love them. But I don’t have these kinds of conversations that we have with anybody else in my life. And I wonder, I don’t know… I’m wondering, as you’re saying that, Priyanka and Laura, as you were saying that, I was just thinking about it.

I’m like, “Ooh, is it because we have just the best group ever? Or is there something to be said for kind of like, I don’t know, a curated, goal-focused group?” It’s a different experience. We’re all here working on some version of the same goal. And you can just leave all of the past behind. There’re no stories and nobody knows your backstory, unless you want to tell it to them.

It’s not that we don’t do that, but it’s really the ‘future you’ that you’re talking about, that you’re exploring. I don’t know, it’s just so different. I don’t even know how to articulate it. But I think you guys know what I mean. It is so different.

Olivia: Yeah, I think one of the things that we see in all of the groups that we run as well, it’s like everyone there has a common aim. Whether you’re trying to lose weight, you’re building a business, or like me, I focus on working with attorneys or former attorneys, people have this shared experience.

And I was really thinking about, in anticipation for us recording this, what have I found so beneficial about also being in rooms with people who are really similar to me. And I agree, I definitely don’t have a lot of these conversations with the other people in my life. But I also think it takes pressure off of the other people in my life.

Because I stop looking for the people in my life who aren’t like me, like our family members or friends from back home, they’re not entrepreneurs. They don’t understand the same struggles that I face every day, the challenges, or the goals that I’m working towards. So, they can’t really converse with me in as meaningful as a way as you guys can.

I think whenever you’re inserting yourself into a group where there’s that common goal, whatever the goal is, if you’re dealing with the same struggles, you’re encountering the same obstacles, you’re going to have these questions. And it takes that pressure off the rest of your relationships.

So, whether it’s your spouse or your mom or your sister or your friend, you can just enjoy those people, rather than needing something from them that they’re really not capable of providing you.

Priyanka: That’s so good. Yeah, that’s so good. And also, I’m curious how you guys feel about this, but when I am talking to my husband, for example, about a goal that I have, he kind of wants to motivate me and push me. Like, “Yeah, you can do it.” And he might be very practically minded around what my obstacles might be. So, my husband is a good sounding board, he’s meant to be a partner. But he’s very practically minded.

And when I’m with the three of you, what I’ve noticed is, I will be sharing, to me in my mind, a massive obstacle. What seems like the biggest shit show, that’s about… Sorry, I don’t know if we’re cursing or not… But the biggest pile of crap, right?

Laura: Not on mine, I’m going to have to edit that out. I’m going to have to charge you for that.

Priyanka: Edit out the crap. So, when I’m talking to all of you…

Laura: You can’t say “crap”!

Priyanka: We’re not going to say that? Now we’re really holding back. I don’t even know what we’re going to say, because we talk about a lot of that. So, talking about our serious obstacles, you’re not, all three of you guys, are not telling me what is practically available to me.

When we were in Montana, and I’m telling you, “This is what I’m struggling with. This is what I’m dealing with. These are my obstacles,” the three of you would ask me questions, and the conversation would go in a direction where you had my highest belief in your mind. You were like, “Priyanka, you are so capable.”

If you look at your, like what Andrea was saying, your future self, the future part of you is like, “This is solved, and this is done.” The way that you guys kind of had that conversation with me is from that lens. And I don’t get that anywhere, except being in business coaching containers, and in coaching containers that have that highest belief. The four of us have all invested seriously in group coaching containers. And I think that that shows that we take this seriously, which I think was the foundation for us to even have some of these conversations.

Andrea: Yeah. For me, that did not come easily. I would be curious what you guys think about that. But I really resisted investing in any sort of community for a very long time.

Laura: Yeah, I want to go to that topic. Because I think that that’s huge for a lot of the people listening. It’s definitely a barrier, and it’s worth getting over because of all the benefits. I just, real quick, want to speak to what Priyanka was saying, because it came up when Olivia was talking and even Andrea before that.

This idea that when you put yourself in a room with other people with a shared vision or shared goal, you have… Say you’re a Yummy Mummy, you have 29 other Yummy Mummies, or however many are in the group, holding the vision. It’s kind of a cheesy way of saying it, but you have 29 other women holding the vision for you, even if it feels like unrealistic.

I think back to our basic need as humans. I think why connection is such a basic need is to feel not alone. And it can feel so lonely when it comes to weight loss or being stressed at your job or wanting to build your business as an entrepreneur in the nutrition world, or whatever. And so, I think if you are in a container where you don’t, number one, you don’t feel alone. And then you have 29 other people, or however many, whatever, holding that vision for you, it circumvents the doubt and the disbelief that comes up.

I have big goals for my business, and if I’m in doubt, you three are holding the vision for it. I can be in doubt and disbelief and wanting to cry and quit my business and go to the pool every day with my kids, and you guys just sort of think it’s cute. You’re like, “Okay, yeah, that’s cute and normal.” And you help me through it, versus if I were just on an island, I probably would be at sunset pool right now. So, I think that’s a huge benefit.

And so, I kind of want to sell our audience of people listening on why these communities are so amazing, why this connection is so amazing, so that they want to have the motivation to get over their own B.S. Which I think all of us, or at least you three… I was going to sleepaway camp when I was seven. I loved groups from the get-go.

But if we can sell the audiences on why being in a group is so worth it, and then talk about kind of some of the obstacles that we had to overcome, maybe we can convince some people to get in a group setting. So, I just wanted to kind of put that out there.

Priyanka: Just one real quick thing to kind of follow up, and I definitely want to get back to Andrea’s initial thing about investing in a group, for sure. The one thing that, Laura, what you were just touching on, is this idea of being in a group and supported by the group vision. I think the other thing that I have found, and I noticed this when I transitioned from one-on-one to a small intimate group, that I did not get with one-on-one, when I had one-on-one clients, a client can be in their problem, right?

They’re looking at their pile of crap, and they’re trying to navigate it and trying to move forward. But when you’re in a group setting, and you see that you’re not alone in the crap, that it’s not a unique defect of yours. It’s not that you’re uniquely incapable, that you’re not uniquely not skilled at solving this problem. That “Oh, actually, I just have a human brain like every other person in this room. I’m not alone in the struggle.”

I think that being validated in that is deeply impactful in solving the problem. When you feel like you’re alone in not solving a problem, that is a barrier that I think is really hard to overcome. And being in a group, I think, naturally; I love obliterating things; it just naturally obliterates you putting yourself on your own island, which I think is priceless.

Olivia: I totally agree with that. And as the three of you were talking, one thing that really jumped out at me, and I do want to make sure that this is really clear for the people who are listening, the four of us are all coaches, right? So, I don’t want people to hear this and think, “Oh, I can just gather three of my friends. And we can have this incredible experience.” If that’s possible for you, amazing.

But all four of us are professionally trained to be able to hold belief, and to be able to identify someone else’s limiting beliefs, and to be able to ask those questions that really probe at the heart of the issue. So, there’s two components here: There’s the community support that you get from being in a group setting, absolutely.

But it’s also being curated by a coach. Which is what the four of us all do for our respective audiences. It’s that we curate this experience where we’re holding belief, we’re teaching a group how to hold belief collectively for other people.

As much as it’s amazing to rely on your friends, we have the extreme good fortune to all be coaches, and friends as well. So, we’re able to create this experience that I think a lot of people don’t get, unless they invest in coaching containers run by a coach. Which is definitely how I first invested in a group coaching experience, was paying, and working with a coach and joining a community that someone else curated, that was already set up to enable my growth.

Laura: That’s huge. Because I don’t know, Priyanka, if you’ve seen this in weight loss. And I know that this happens in the workplace and with business. If you get a group of friends together, and you can. You can get a group of friends together, and you guys can have this shared vision. But then what happens? This is what used to happen with me with weight loss.

I used to get all these games going, and all these bets going, with all my friends who wanted to lose weight. And then, we’re all rah, rah, and then they’re not doing it. And I’m like, well, fuck. I’m like, “Well, they’re not doing it, so I’m going to quit too.” It’s this false accountability, it doesn’t actually work.

And then you are the one suffering because you thought you did it, and then they’re quitting, and you’re using it as an excuse to quit too. So, to your point, Olivia, I think friend groups and accountability groups can be great, but I just haven’t seen them really work unless you’re invested energetically, financially, timewise too.

Priyanka: It’s fun, when you have that group of friends that you’re having a shared common goal with. There’s an aspect of fun that gets infused into the process. But I think when you have not invested, and by investing I don’t just mean financially. I think you have to decide to invest your time, your energy, and your bandwidth as well.

In the shared goal, the first thing that’s going to go is somebody’s going to drop off. Somebody’s going to drop off. And if we’ve attached our results with the accountability of a group, it’s a surefire way to not hit your goal if you haven’t invested seriously. I think that’s kind of what we’re talking about why we invest seriously. But Andrea, you were saying you hesitated.

Andrea: Oh, yeah.

Priyanka: What was the whole hesitation?

Andrea: No, no, no, no. Let me clarify. Not hesitating on joining up coaching container or a group, but I just didn’t think I needed the group. I was like, “I just want this strategy here. I just want that coach. I want to learn the things. I don’t actually need to know these people. I don’t need to know them, I have friends. I’m good.”

I’ve been trying to really pinpoint what the thought is here, as we’ve been talking, because I want to be honest about it. I guess the thought was, “If I engage in the group,” this is going to sound terrible, “I’m not going to get anything from it. And this is going to take a lot of time.” So, it seemed like a big investment timewise. I already have friends. That’s great.

Priyanka: How did you get over that? How did you get yourself across that line?

Laura: But hold on, she’s totally telling you the truth too. Because I don’t think I even fucking knew you until round three of the container we were in. You were just over there in the corner, and then I’m like, “Wait. Who’s this sleeper cool chick?”

Andrea: Doing my thing. I know, right? My open time was not on… I was closed for friendships, totally closed. “I’m very busy. I’m very focused. Nobody bother me.”

Laura: And very important.

Andrea: Totally. I was an idiot. Because this is the best part of the group, is having the group. Yeah, so I just thought that was a fluffy extra, life if you need accountability. As I’m hearing you talk about accountability groups, I’ve never identified with needing external accountability.

So, I think that’s what I thought a group was. Like, “Oh, a group is for people that don’t get themselves to do things on their own, and I totally do, so I don’t need that.” I just mentally opted out on any benefit that that could possibly bring to me. And I was so incredibly wrong. Because the friendships that we have made…

I mean, it doesn’t even have to be a friendship. Luckily, we are all actually friends. Like, I believe we will be friends forever. We do amazing things together. We get to enjoy as our businesses get bigger. As we do all this cool shit, we get to celebrate with each other. And I think that that’ll continue forever.

But I’ve met so many people amidst these communities I’ve now been part of, that maybe aren’t going to be friends of mine forever, but still those relationships are so valuable in other ways. And I’m so glad that I got out of my own way and got over myself to experience that.

Priyanka: How did you get over it? What did you finally tell yourself when you were like, “You know what? I’m considering this investment. But I don’t know whether the group is going to be valuable for me.” How did you get yourself across that line?

Andrea: So, I always thought the group would be valuable. I just didn’t think I would really participate in the group. I think it was very selfish. Like, I’ll get what I need, but I don’t need to engage. If I’m being honest, some version of that. I mean, that sounds awful, but it was some version of that. I was like, “I’ll just do my thing over here, The lone wolf, that’s cool.”

Priyanka: The cool chick. The lone cool chick on the side.

Andrea: But nobody knew I was cool because I was so quiet about it. I wasn’t telling you how cool I was. I was being so quiet. Okay. So being in-person, the honest answer there is being in-person. When we started doing in-person events together and COVID was over, that was a game changer. Because given the opportunity, I will totally jump in a group. I just would not prioritize that online.

And I do think I really missed the boat. Because I don’t think there’s any comparison to being in-person versus being online, as far as connecting with people. I think in-person, hands down, is a completely different experience. However, when you’re intentional about it, you can have an experience like that online. You just have to be intentional. And I wasn’t until we were in-person together.

Laura: So, it just kind of happened naturally for you. Once you were in the group, you’re like, “Okay, I’ll just do this group, and I’ll take the things that I can get business wise.” And then when you were in person, it sort of just took care of itself.

Andrea: Totally.

Laura: But I know that we have some people on this Zoom call that want to share about what they might have been scared about, in terms of actually joining a group. Because there does take a level of vulnerability of putting yourself in that space. Olivia, do you want to speak to that?

Olivia: Yeah, I see this with my clients too. I, if I’m being completely transparent, and I think this is like the honesty hour for sure, for all of us. At least the three of us, not Laura, because she loves groups.

Laura: Plus, I love to lie too. I don’t like telling the truth. Just kidding.

Olivia: I really love to be in my expert energy. And most people don’t see me as shy. But I tell people all the time, in a group setting I’m a little bit of a wallflower. Just because I love to always be the expert. I don’t love to need things from other people. I don’t love to have questions. I like to appear like I have it all figured out. So, I can definitely hide in a room. Priyanka is also raising her hand.

Priyanka: That’s me. That’s so me.

Olivia: Yeah, she gets it too. I think when you’ve been a high performer in your past life, I’m a former attorney, you get used to that role. And I see it with my clients all the time. Not everyone, but there are certain people in my group, and they love to be in their helpful expert energy as well. They don’t raise their hand, and they don’t end up getting as much value out of the opportunities.

So, for me, and I think this is true for everyone here, but my program is set up where people can continue to reenroll. And one of the things that I learned, through my own process of re-enrolling in the coaching container that we were all together in, was that as I got more familiar… I was like Andrea; I came for the content. I came for the tactics and the skills, and the strategy from the coach.

But then, as you stay in the same container, time in, round after round after round, you’ve already kind of learned that stuff. So, if you want to keep growing, I think the way you utilize a program changes. So, for me, it kind of dawned on me two things: Number one, and I see this with people too, if you get bored in a group coaching program, and you’re not raising your hand, that is a red flag that you are hiding.

I have people say that to me. They’re like, “I don’t always love listening to everyone else deal with their stuff.” I’m like, “Amazing, what would you like to get coached on?” And they’re like, “I have to get coached?” I’m like, “I get the desire to hide…” But that was true for me, too.

I was like, “Oh, my next level of growth is to feel exposed and to feel embarrassed and to allow myself to be seen and known in that imperfect version of myself, the version that needs help.”

And then also, just learning to utilize, and see the people that are in this group with me, as a valuable resource. Sort of like what Andrea was saying. It’s like, I didn’t really think I could benefit either. I was happy to contribute, but I didn’t think I was going to get a lot in return. But the only way that that’s true is if you don’t engage in the process.

If you talk to people, then you will learn from them. And they will share different perspectives with you, and it will be super beneficial. But you have to allow yourself to be vulnerable and exposed. And for me, that was really life changing work, if I’m being really honest. I think it was this ancillary benefit that came from joining a group program.

But I think that is where my true growth was. Of learning how to stop being such perfectionist and needing to have everything figured out, and allowing myself to be as much of a student as I like to be an expert.

Priyanka: I feel I was like shaking my head so much as Olivia was talking. Because I think, particularly as in my physician life, I always had the mindset of, I need to have all the answers. And it was just a part of my identity, was being someone that always had the answers. If you come to me with a problem, I will give you an answer. And it should be the right answer. It should be the best answer. It should be an answer that changes your life.

I think the biggest transformation for me, and what I’ve had to contend with coming into a group, is I am coming into this group container not having all the answers. That’s actually why I’m putting myself in these containers. Because I want to grow past the answers I have already come up with. If I had solved my problem, I would have already solved it. So, I’m putting myself in a container saying, “I don’t have certain answers. Being in this group is going to push me to figure out those answers.”

And I think the vulnerable part for me was knowing that I’m asking for help. There was a part of me that felt like I’m supposed to have figured this out by myself. Especially, again, high-achieving professionals. This was, again, my identity for so, so long. That asking for help is kind of weak. Does it mean you’re kind of lazy? You should have figured this out. Maybe you’re just not disciplined, that you didn’t figure this out.

And the idea of asking for “help,” I think implied, in my mind, that I hadn’t figured something out that everybody else had. So, that’s what felt vulnerable for me. I didn’t mind sharing my story. I didn’t mind sharing even the mistakes that I had made. But when it was like, wait, I’m saying that I don’t know the answer to something? That would strike a chord. And as an entrepreneur, I have not known the answer from day one. Because I’ve never been an entrepreneur before, before starting this business.

So, for me, my vulnerability was saying, “I do not know the answer.” But also knowing, this is an opportunity to go figure it out. I think that that’s kind of what helped me bridge my gap. That putting myself here is going to help me figure it out, which was so helpful for me.

Laura: Yeah, I think that our whole culture is set up like that. Like, can you lose weight on your own? Maybe. Can you build your business on your own? Maybe. Can you become less stressed as a lawyer? Maybe. I don’t know.

I mean, I had tried it by myself, the weight loss thing, 72 different times, literally. And I still had this voice in the back of my head, “Yo, you could do it on your own. You can do it on your own. You could do it on your own.” It wasn’t until I put myself in a group that I actually did it, once and for all, nail in a coffin.

And I don’t know where we think we’re getting this badge of honor that we can do it on our own, or we should be able to do it on our own. Okay, for me, I actually love groups. So, it’s like, whether you love a group or not, it doesn’t really matter. I mean, that’s kind of just an added bonus, I guess, if you love groups. Because you should obviously just put yourself in a group, if you want to achieve anything.

Maybe you do have a goal, and maybe you can do it on your own, but what about this idea of making it easy? It’s so much easier. And that’s another badge of honor, I think that we want to wear. Like, “I do it on my own, I get a badge of honor. And it’s really hard, so then I get a badge of honor.” And I’m like, “What about the badge of honor of putting yourself in a group, asking for help, and making it easy?”

Because when you put yourself in a group, it’s so much easier to achieve your goal. So, for me now, it’s like, “Okay, yeah, maybe I can do it on my own. I’m not really exactly sure. But let’s even give it to me; Okay, I could do it on my own. Why would I want to do it on my own? It’s going to be harder; I want it to be easier. And for me, it’s going to be way more fun, and that’s all I’m about, if I do it in a group.”

To your point, Priyanka, it’s like, yeah, we could do it on our own. Yeah, maybe we should know all the answers, but we don’t. We’re literally human beings, we are designed to do life together. Like literally, we are tribal freaking species here. We are. It’s our biology. Okay. Olivia talk.

Olivia: I think one of the other reasons… My brain, I get so logical. I’m like, “Okay, but why does it happen faster or easier in a group?” And one of the transformations for me, number one, I am not a hand raiser. So, there are things, even if I was working with someone one-on-one, that I might not feel comfortable bringing up, okay?

Two, like Priyanka said… What I mean by that, is someone else might bring it up, and you’re like, “Oh, my God. Thank God, you asked that question. Because I’m too embarrassed to ask the question, but I’m so glad you did.” And then you learn from that, because someone else is maybe a little bit more brave than you.

Or people bring stuff up that you don’t even realize is a struggle for you, and you’re like, “Oh, I would have never thought to bring that up.” It would have never come out of a one-on-one coaching container because you didn’t realize that that struck a chord or resonated with you.

But I think the thing that was most transformational for me, I would say my first group experience. It was with the Life Coach School, with Self-Coaching Scholars and being on those calls. And I never, ever, ever raised my hand, and I would just listen to other people get coached. I see this with my clients as well, it’s why I’m such an advocate of group coaching now.

Because you don’t have the ‘can’t see the forest through the trees perspective,’ when it’s someone else’s issue. If you’re dealing with the same or a similar thing, but someone else is working through it and getting coached on it, the answer and the path forward is so abundantly clear. It’s like, “Oh, my God, this is so obvious. You just do that. You just think this way. That’s a thought, and that’s the circumstance. This is where you’re going wrong.” And you’re just like, “Duh, don’t you get it?”

And then you have this little breakthrough moment where you’re like, “Shit, if that’s true for them, that’s probably true for me too.” And then it clicks. And I think you just start to… One of the things that I teach my clients to do is use other people as examples.

What do other people get upset about? What do other people get hurt about? What do other people get overwhelmed about? And to watch their thinking around it so you can see they’re causing this experience for themselves. That’s just such a takeaway that I got from being in a group program. And I think I learned those lessons so much faster because I didn’t have the emotional tie to their situation. The A-ha’s happened so much more quickly.

Laura: It’s so much faster because you’re not in it. When you do get coached, you oftentimes, this is me at least, I have to go I can watch it because sometimes I just blackout, so to speak. So yeah, when you’re watching someone else get coached, you’re not in the blackout space. You’re in a space of total reception. You can receive all the goodness.

And to your point, Olivia, too, I think, yeah, you might be struggling with something, you might not be able to articulate it, and you might struggle with that thing for a week or a month, and you don’t even know that struggle is on the horizon. But then all of a sudden, you have the answer to that struggle, when you find yourself in it in a week.

So, I think it’s cool. It’s almost preventative in a way, too.

Andrea: Totally preventative. I hear my clients say that all the time. They’re like, “Oh, my gosh, this coaching call was so great. I don’t have to make that mistake now. Because I heard about… I didn’t even know that was coming, but now I don’t have to make that mistake. Totally preventative. I love that.

Priyanka: Yeah, there were two things that I’ve noticed come up in my groups. One is, I’ve had so many times, a client will separately message me and say, “If you had changed the time and the place of what that person got coached on, that was me. And I had no idea that that was a struggle that I was having.” A lot of what I coach on is working mom life. So, like, relationships and work life; time, productivity, and connection with your partner, with your kids.

And there are certain times that I think people feel, I think it’s a vulnerability in sharing a perceived weakness, whether it’s in their relationship, or maybe at work. And when they hear somebody else get coached on their marriage, on their kids, on their time, or on their productivity, they feel not only seen and heard, but they really feel like they just got an answer to something that they didn’t know was a problem.

Like, “Wait a second. Oh, I have been feeling so disconnected.” That’s what that is. When they hear somebody else being coached, kind of to your point Laura, they are able to receive the coaching because they’re not the one being coached. They’re able to observe it so much more clearly.

They’re like, “Oh, that’s what that feeling has been for me. I’ve been feeling overwhelmed. Oh, I’ve been feeling so disconnected from my partner. I’ve been feeling so stressed at work.” And all of a sudden, they’re able to take the coaching that somebody else gets, and change the time and the place, and they can absolutely apply it to their life. Which has been so, so, so, huge.

Laura: So good. I want to know, we’ve talked a lot about ourselves, we’ve talked about our clients to a lot. But do you guys have any fun stories from your clients of how they’ve changed by being in a group? Or what have you seen, the impact of the group dynamic on your clients specifically. Because clearly, we are benefiting from it.

Olivia: Yeah, I think two big takeaways: Number one, with my clients there’s a sense of isolation. Even if you’re not a solo attorney, and you work in a firm, or you work for a corporation, as in-house attorney, you’re really stuck in this ‘keeping up appearances’ space. And you are never really able to be fully vulnerable and talk to people about what you’re struggling with.

That was definitely my experience when I practiced law, as well. I felt very isolated. So, I think number one, just having a sense of belonging and support, and being able to be honest and open. That is a game changer for people on your isolation levels, your connectedness, and how you feel going through your career.

I think the other thing that my people struggle with so significantly, they think they are unicorns. And they have so much shame around struggling with the things that they struggle with. They think it’s only them, they’re the only ones with these problems. And when I work with people one-on-one, I would say over and over again, till I’m blue in the face…

I coach on this literally every day, multiple times a day. I talk to people about procrastination. I talk to people about people pleasing. I talk to people about perfectionism. This is my mainstay of the coaching that I do. Everyone that I work with struggles with this stuff, but they don’t see it themselves. So, I think they think that I’m just blowing smoke up their ass; I’m not. But I think that’s how they take it.

And then they hear other people actually struggle with it when they’re in a group setting, and it creates the sense of, not normal, because I don’t really believe in there being a “normal” thing. But that there’s something not abnormal about them also, like they’re not a unicorn.

They struggle with the same things everyone else struggles with. It’s very common. There’s no reason to be ashamed. And most of what my people, and I think this is true for all of us, the reason they’re struggling with something is because they’ve never learned it before.

Laura: Exactly.

Priyanka: Absolutely.

Andrea: Totally.

Olivia: And my people have so much shame, they think they should have known it or learned it before. And I’m like, “You wouldn’t expect to know Spanish if you had never been taught Spanish. And you wouldn’t expect to know calculus if no one had taught you calculus.” So much of what I teach, whether it’s emotional management or time management, goal setting and achievement, all of that stuff, setting boundaries. If you’ve never been taught it, you’re not going to know how to do it.

So, you want to put yourself in a room where other people just like you also haven’t learned it, and you get to learn it together as quickly as possible.

Laura: Yeah, I feel like this question should bring us home and wrap up our episode. So, let’s definitely hear from Andrea, she was going to talk about it too.

Andrea: Yeah, I think for my clients, community, being in a group, they literally share resources. This is something I see all the time, is people not reinventing the wheel. So, I coach on business, and specifically, people come to me because I’m not on social media.

A lot of people are drawn to that, on building a business without being on social media. So, my community tends to be kind of the anti-establishment. These are my people. I love it for lots of different reasons.

So, inside of that community, just having people with shared values and shared ideas and goals, like we’ve already talked about; huge. But just pragmatically sharing resources. Like, how do you actually do this? Who do you work with for SEO? I had someone…

Oh, my gosh, just the most amazing conversation recently in our group around collecting testimonials. And she’s like, “Oh, I have a great process for getting video testimonials for my clients. I’ll share it with you.” And it’s like this huge google doc of exactly how it goes.

Things like that. That’s like, “Yes, we don’t have to all be by ourselves, figuring things out on our own. Laura, like you said, there’s no badge of honor in figuring it out.” Of course, you can figure out how to get testimonials. And you can take years and years to get your process. But having somebody be tried and true, here you go. So great.

So, sharing resources, huge win for the community, for my people. And I have experienced that. I know we’ve all experienced that. We love that. So, that’s a big one. And then, kind of like Olivia said, I think just normalizing the ups and downs of whatever goal we’re working towards. So, for us, it’s business.

Whether it’s health goals, relationship goals, personal goals, or whatever it is, when you’re surrounded by people that are invested in personal development; they’re reading books about personal development, they’re interested. There’s just a different conversation that’s going to be taking place in that group.

Of course, it’s facilitated by a coach. Hopefully, they’re going to have their own tools and their own frameworks, like we all do, which is really helpful too. But just being around people that are asking different questions, than maybe in the rest of our life and the rest of our relationships. That’s just a goldmine, for sure.

Laura: Oh, it’s so true. I remember going on a girls trip with a new kind of group of friends about a year ago, and I remember coming home feeling like really let down, I admit it. Because the conversations just were not dynamic. And for my besties, I’m not talking about you. I’m talking about another trip.

Priyanka: It’s not you, it’s them.

Laura: Yeah, but I remember feeling really let down, just because the conversations were not dynamic. They didn’t light me up like these ones do. So, I think that’s so cool. Priyanka.

Priyanka: I think for me, putting myself into a group, what I’m really seeing for my clients, and what I really want for the universe of humans, is being willing to get shit wrong all the time and not quitting. I, again, because of what I was saying to you guys before, I’ve always kind of prided myself on having the right answer, knowing the right thing, not needing help.

And the biggest pivot I’ve had to make, both in reaching my ideal weight and in really becoming an entrepreneur after being a physician, is the willingness. The willingness to just get it wrong all the time. And a concept that I teach is leveraging mistakes. So, how can you be so willing to get it wrong and so willing to keep going, and then leverage every single mistake you’ve ever made?

If you don’t ever quit, and you leveraged every single mistake, do you know how far you would get? It’s like, your goal is inevitably done. Like, done and done. So, I think it’s that piece. I am so much more willing now… I mean, I still hate getting stuff wrong, let me be totally honest. I hate getting stuff wrong. I hate when I mess up. I hate it.

Laura: What are you making it mean about you though, Priyanka?

Priyanka: We’re human, but I think, again, what if that might be my tendency forever, to hate making mistakes? And also, I hate my mistakes, but I’m just willing to do it. I’m so willing to do it and leverage it and put myself out there and be embarrassed, feel like crap, and then solve the problem. I would rather solve the problem and be embarrassed than not solve the problem and just sit in my quiet bubble and live with the undesired result.

Laura: That’s so good because it’s you’re making it. And when you, whoever’s listening, Priyanka, Olivia, Andrea, our audiences, whatever, but when you put yourself in these containers and these rooms, in these groups, it’s like you’re making it almost impossible to quit. Which is so valuable. So valuable.

And so, for me, with my clients, I think one of the thoughts that they have, and they continually say over and over again is, “If she can do it, so can I. If she can do it, so can I.” And they’re constantly like passing the torch back and forth, I swear to God. Especially with weight loss. Because I’m always teaching it’s two steps forward, one step back. Or three steps forward, seven steps back, whatever, right?

But there’s always somebody that’s holding the torch, right? And it just this dynamic, cool thing of, again, holding the vision and believing in each other. So, it just doesn’t get dropped and you can’t quit. That’s what I would have to say, in terms of just how impactful…

I’ve even said to clients… Because I’ll get clients sometimes, they’ll be like, “Please work with me one-on-one, please.” And I’ve even said, “I don’t know if this is forever. Maybe I’ll do one-on-ones later in life,” or whatever. But right now, for me, it feels a bit out of integrity for me, with weight loss, just because of the results that I’ve seen. So, I’m so committed to the groups because of that.

I feel like this really brings us home. Why don’t we go around and tell the audiences how they can find all of us. Because they probably became obsessed with all of us, and they want to stalk us now. So, Olivia, tell us how we can find you.

Olivia: Yeah, you can find me I’m on LinkedIn and Instagram. LinkedIn, under my name, Olivia Vizachero. Instagram, under the handle The Less Stressed Lawyer. That’s also the name of my podcast and the name of my website. The Less Stressed Lawyer.com

Laura: So good. Andrea.

Andrea: Love it. Okay, I’m Andrea Nordling. You cannot find me on social media. I’m hidden from everyone. No, actually, this late breaking news: New LinkedIn profile has been created. I know. I know. By the time this episode goes live, I’ll get my shit together, and you’ll be able to find The Profitable Nutritionist™ on LinkedIn. The Profitable Nutritionist podcast. TheProfitableNutritionist.com.

Laura: Love it. Priyanka.

Priyanka: Oh, good. So, I am The Unstoppable Mom Brain everywhere on the internet. That’s my website, TheUnstoppableMomBrain.com. It’s my podcast. And it is exactly what I go by on Instagram. So, The Unstoppable Mom Brain, all over the place.

Laura: Oh, that’s so good. So easy. Okay. And I am Laura Conley. You guys can find me at LauraConley.com or LauraConleyCoaching on Instagram. My podcast is the Yummy Mummy Podcast with Laura Conley. That does it. Does anybody have any last things they want to say? It was totally fun.

Olivia: I have one thing I want to add. I think the theme, that I noticed from most of us at least, is you really needed to put yourself in a group program to figure out how exactly it’s valuable for you. Trust that it will be valuable. But it’s going to be one of those things that you’re not exactly going to know how it’s going to change your life until you’re in it.

And if you tend to be a hesitator; I’m not, I’m pretty impulsive. I’ll just make a quick decision and go for it. I think Andrea is probably pretty decisive, just from what I know about her, too. But if you find yourself hesitating, I just really want to encourage you to listen to the four of us. We’ve all had such extremely positive experiences from going through group programs.

Take, if you feel like it’s a risk, take the risk and just invest. You’re going to get so much out of it, but you have to go through it in order to learn that.

Andrea: It’s so true, too. It’s going to be the mystery. It’s the mystery present in that you don’t know what you’re going to open at the end. I know that I’m going to do this, and I don’t know what my prize is going to be at the end. But I’m going to learn something about myself and get something really great out of this. I don’t even know what it is, yet.

Priyanka: I also think, just one last thing, that high achievers love the feeling of certainty. And I think sometimes the reason we hesitate specifically, if it’s foreign investment, like financial investment, if you’re not used to investing in yourself, is you’re waiting to feel certain.

And I think the biggest, most bitter pill I had to swallow was, you can’t actually have certainty. I know all humans want it. High achievers want it. But what would it look like if you felt certain in yourself? Knowing that you are going to figure out how to get your ROI, in whichever group you put yourself. That’s what you get to control. You don’t actually get to control anything else.

I’m curious, do you guys feel like you hesitate when you feel uncertain? When we’re trying to feel certain, that’s why we hesitate. What if you just didn’t worry about feeling uncertain? Just take action.

Laura: Yeah, it’s totally just a part of life. Yeah. No such thing as certainty anyways. All right, you guys that does it.

All right, my friends. I hope you enjoyed that fun, little behind-the-scenes chat between me and my friends, Laura, Andrea, and Priyanka. I hope you learned a little bit more about what it’s like to be in a group coaching program.

If you are listening to this, and you’ve been wanting to work with me, and you’ve been curious about joining The Less Stressed Lawyer Mastermind; you’ve been intrigued by it, you’ve been curious about it, you’ve been interested, and you’ve been on the fence. Now is the time to get out of your own way to notice that desire to feel certain. To recognize, like Priyanka said, that certainty isn’t guaranteed.

You’re not going to feel that way, you’re going to have to do it 90% excited and confident that it’s the right fit for you. And that just that 10%, 20% uncertain, because you’ve never done it before. And that’s normal. So, if you’ve been on the fence and you’ve been thinking about joining, enrollment is getting ready to reopen on June 19.

Make sure you go to TheLessStressedLawyer.com/mastermind, and apply as soon as doors open on June 19. I can’t wait to have you in the next round. It is definitely the program for you if you’ve been listening to this podcast, you love what you hear, and you’ve been learning a lot just by listening. I promise you, there’s so much more that you’re not getting from the podcast that you will get when you’re inside that group program.

You also don’t get all those extra benefits from being in a group when you’re just in consumption mode all by yourself, listening through the other end of the speakers. You miss out on that community. You miss out on learning from your peers. You miss out on that support. You miss out on that accountability. So, make sure you take advantage of being in a group program where you get all of those benefits. All right?

Like I said, enrollment opens on June 19. It’s going to be your last chance to join the August 2023 Mastermind class. So, don’t sleep on it. Make sure you go apply. I can’t wait to see you in August, in Big Sky, Montana, where the four of us all just got back from visiting. So, you’ll get to experience what we just experienced. And let me tell you, it is absolutely incredible. It’s going to blow your mind.

All right, my friends. That’s what I have for you this week. Next week, we will pick back up with the Money Mindset series. And until then, I hope you have a beautiful week. I’ll talk to you in the next episode.

Thanks for listening to The Less Stressed Lawyer podcast. If you want more info about Olivia Vizachero or the show’s notes and resources from today’s episode, visit www.TheLessStressedLawyer.com.

You’re listening to The Less Stressed Lawyer podcast, Episode 63. Today, we’re talking all about overspending. You ready? Let’s go.

Welcome to The Less Stressed Lawyer, the only podcast that teaches you how to manage your mind so you can live a life with less stress and far more fulfillment. If you’re a lawyer who’s over the overwhelm and tired of trying to hustle your way to happiness, you’re in the right place. Now, here’s your host, lawyer turned life coach Olivia Vizachero.

Well, hello there. How are you? I am marvelous. I just got back from Big Sky. I don’t know if I told you guys that in the last episode, that I was getting ready to head there. But I did, I went out there for sort of like a reconnaissance mission to plan the upcoming live event for The Less Stressed Lawyer Mastermind that’s going to take place in August.

I ended up bringing a couple of my girlfriends with me. We’re all entrepreneurs, so we sort of made a working retreat out of the weekend. And got to relax and enjoy each other’s company, but also really brainstorm about our businesses, bounce ideas off of each other, and just learn from one another. It was just so incredible.

I think people see me, and they know I’m a little glam, so they tend to underestimate that I love the outdoors as much as I do. But I cannot begin to tell you how breathtaking Big Sky was. It was incredible being there. The weather was really nice. Little drizzly, but it was still very charming.

But more than anything, I cannot wait to be there this summer when it’s fully gorgeous and warm, and everything is fully in bloom. And all the snow, there were a couple spots with some snow left on the ground, so all the snow will be gone. It will just be full-on gorgeous summertime nature in Montana. There’s going to be nothing like it.

So, if you’re going to be there with me, you are going to get to soak up all of the Mother Nature goodness right alongside me, along with the learning and the community. That’s really the neat thing about these live events that I do. Is that you get to be there with everyone, in person, and you get to bond and brainstorm and bounce ideas off of them, just like I did with my girlfriends this week.

I think the thing that is still blowing me away, now that I’ve been home for a day, it’s just how many trees there are. I live in Michigan and northern Michigan has a ton of greenery. We get the colors changing through the seasons here, and that’s really beautiful. But man, I don’t think I’ve ever seen as many trees as I saw in Montana. And there’s just something about it that is so grounding and calm.

And it just warms me up, that there are still places that are so untouched and haven’t been modernized or haven’t been industrialized. I just think that’s really beautiful, that we have the opportunity to go and enjoy places like that in the US. We don’t have to travel that far to see something so beautiful.

I’m excited to introduce some other people to that, as well. If you haven’t been to Montana before, if you haven’t been to Big Sky, then you’ll get the chance when you’re inside the next round of the mastermind. Fun fact, you will actually have one more chance to enroll coming up. And I’ll share more about that in the next episode.

But I just want to put that on your radar. If you watched enrollment close for the last round of enrollment, and you were like, “Oh, I wish I would have joined, and I didn’t join, and I kind of got in my own way, and didn’t move forward and say yes and apply,” and now you’re kind of kicking yourself.

Especially if you follow me on social media and you saw all of the amazing behind-the-scenes moments from my trip to Big Sky, and you’re like, “Man, I want to be there, in person, with Olivia. For the learning, but also just to soak up Montana in all of its majesty.”

Then you’re going to have one more chance to do that in the next couple of weeks. So, stay tuned for that. Make sure you’re on my email list. You can go to Mastermind.TheLessStressedLawyer.com and sign up for the wait-list. Just to make sure that you get all the details as soon as I roll those out. All right?

Okay, so with all of that being said, little life update from me. We’re going to continue talking about the Money Mindset Series that I started in the last episode. So, in the last episode, we talked all about your thoughts about money. And if you followed the prompts in that episode, you should have a much clearer understanding of what you’re currently thinking about money.

I also gave you a lot of different new thoughts to think about money, instead. So, you can start to try some of those thoughts on. Play with them. See which ones resonate with you. See which ones maybe you need to spend a little bit more time working on. But you should be starting to create some new neural pathways when it comes to thinking about money.

I also explained the importance of mindset, in the last episode. And remember, the reason mindset is so important, is because our thoughts about money create the results that we have when it comes to money. Our thoughts always create our results. Because our thoughts cause our feelings, our feelings drive our actions, and our actions produce the results that we have.

So, that’s true in any area of our lives; when it comes to managing your time, when it comes to setting boundaries, when it comes to working less, when it comes to how you act with money. Whether it’s how you make money, how you spend money, how you save money, all of those things. It’s caused by our thinking. The results that we have are directly caused by the thoughts that we think about money.

You are starting to see the importance of cultivating a positive money mindset. If you’re thinking negative thoughts about money, and your relationship with money and how you steward money and what’s possible for you, as far as money is concerned, you’re going to have a lot of negative results in your life when it comes to money. You can see the importance of cultivating that more positive mindset, so we can cultivate more positive results when it comes to money.

Now in this episode, and the next episode, I want to talk about two of the main actions that I see people indulge in as it relates to money. Neither of which serve them. Now, remember, these actions are caused by your thinking. So, if you’re thinking negative thoughts, you’re going to feel negative feelings, and it’s going to drive you to take negative action. This is still a thought problem. All right?

You’ve probably heard me say this before on the podcast, but there are really only ever three problems that you encounter: a negative thought you’re thinking, a negative emotion that you’re avoiding or reacting to, and intentional actions that you’re not taking.

So, the only three solutions are ever; to change your thoughts, to allow yourself to experience the negative emotions, the discomfort, and to take the intentional actions that you haven’t been taking. Those are always the three solutions.

Two of the negative actions that I see people engage in when it comes to money are overspending and underearning. In this episode, we’re going to focus on overspending. And then in the next episode, I’m going to talk all about underearning; the ways we do it, why we do it, and what you need to think and do in order to stop under earning.

When it comes to overspending, first things first, we want to know what kind of behavior we’re actually talking about here. Now, overspending is both subjective and objective. And here’s what I mean by that. What constitutes overspending to one person, may not count as overspending to another person. So, overspending is going to be subjective.

Overspending doesn’t just have to do with how expensive something is. You decide what constitutes overspending to you. I might spend money on something, and you might think that that’s a ridiculous expenditure. That doesn’t mean that I’m overspending. I’m just spending more than you are on something.

What makes it overspending, is whether I’m spending more than I want to spend, or whether I’m spending more than I planned to spend on something. So, it’s going to be subjective to me. I get to decide what constitutes overspending for me.

Now, the objective standard is whether or not I surpassed whatever I’ve decided upon. Okay? So, that part is measurable, and it’s going to be objective. If I said, “Oh, I’m only going to spend 20% of my income on my housing expenses.” And I ended up spending 40%, then I’m overspending, right? That’s objective, that I’m surpassing the limit that I set for myself.

The amount, let’s say it’s $3,000 a month that I’m willing to spend either on my mortgage payment, or my rent payment. And for some people that might seem like crazy high. For some people, that might seem like small potatoes, right? That’s where that subjective piece comes in. So, I might say, “I don’t want to spend more than $3,000,” and I end up spending five, then I’m overspending. That’s objective, I’m spending more than what I set.

But the fact that I decided that three was my limit, not five, that part’s subjective to me. That’s a decision that I make unilaterally, there is no right answer on the amount to spend on living expenses. Okay? Same thing with hotels. I love to splurge on a hotel.

So, what I’m willing to spend might not be what you’re willing to spend on a hotel. That’s okay, that doesn’t mean that I’m overspending if I’ve planned to spend as much as I’m choosing to spend. What would be overspending, is if I budgeted a certain amount for hotels throughout the month or throughout the year, and then I ended up spending three times that. Okay?

I want you to think about that. I want you to give some thought to what overspending means to you. How do you define that? Like I’m always teaching you on the podcast, you always want to define “enough”. What’s enough money? What’s enough spending? You want to know what your answer to those questions are, so you can measure whether or not you’re operating within the parameters that you’re setting for yourself.

And if you’re operating outside of those parameters, then you’re probably overspending. Now, I do think it’s important to understand that subjective and objective piece of overspending. But brass-tacks, end of the day, as simple as I can explain it to you, overspending just means you’re spending more than you intentionally planned to spend or would like to spend. All right?

And it’s going to look like this. It will either look like you spending more than you want to spend, but you actually have the money. Okay? Or it’s going to look like you spending more than you actually have; aka living outside of your means. So, check in with yourself.

If you’re guilty of overspending, which camp are you falling into? Do you have the money, but you’re just spending more in certain areas than you’d like to be? And you’d like to reallocate how you’re spending? Maybe you’re splurging on things, and you’d like to put that money into savings.

Or you’re living outside of your means. And if you are, the solutions to create the results that you want to create when it comes to money, are probably going to be slightly different. So, you just want to be aware: What exactly does your overspending problem look like?

Now, let’s take an inventory. Real quick, let’s get clear, and be honest with ourselves here: How are you overspending right now? Let’s get very specific. Let’s identify all the ways that you’re doing this. And then, we’ll explore why you’re doing this.

The ways that I see people overspend, it can be broken down into two larger categories. And then, there are a bunch of specific habits that I see. So, let’s start with the two main categories. The two main categories: Number one, is you didn’t make any decision about how much to spend. So, you just keep operating on autopilot, on default, really unintentionally.

You’re spending money. You weren’t making any decisions about whether or not you should or should not be spending that; you’re just kind of living and flying by the seat of your pants. And you end up spending a lot more than you plan to, because you didn’t make any decisions ahead of time.

That’s one way that we end up overspending. You don’t make any decisions, you don’t budget, but you still spend more than you’d like to spend, if you had taken the time to make decisions about your spending.

The other way people overspend, more generally, is that they decide how much they’re going to spend on something, and then they feel restricted. And they end up rebelling against that feeling of restriction. And they overspend. They bucked the system, so to speak.

Now, whether you fall in the first camp or the second camp, in either category, what’s happening is your thinking thoughts, and then you’re experiencing negative feelings, and you’re avoiding or reacting to those negative emotions. All right? I’m going to give you some different examples of that in a second.

You want to be onto yourself here, though. Which camp do you mostly fall into; are you making a plan, or are you not making a plan? Based on which camp you fall into, we’re going to start to see different emotions arise. Are you feeling more restricted? Or are you trying to use money to solve other emotional issues? And that leads to that unintentional spending. Because you haven’t made a plan, and you just end up doing the thing that’s the most comfortable in the moment.

Speaking of budgets and feeling restricted, I want to give you an analogy here that really was so helpful for me. I used to think that budgets were so constricting and restrictive. And I had this breakthrough, because I used to think the same exact thing about time management and making a schedule and having to stick to it. That also felt very constricting and restrictive to me.

And what I realized is the reason that making a schedule for the day used to feel constricting and restrictive, was that I was trying to fit more than 24 hours into my schedule. So, I didn’t have time to get to all of the things that I wanted to get to, because I wasn’t doing the math right.

When we’re arguing with how much of a time allowance we have to play with, we’re going to feel restricted. We’re going to feel disappointed that we’re not getting to more. And we’re going to try and buck the system and fit more things in than we actually have room, for based on the amount of time that we have.

And people make the same exact mistake when it comes to money. Let’s say you have $100,000 to spend, and you want to split it between five different things. Well, you can make it really easy, and all five things get $20,000. That’s one way to not feel restricted. You can divvy it up, and one category can get 40%, another one can get 30%, another one can get 20%. And I think that brings us to what, 90%. And then you’d have five and five leftover for the other two. So, that’s another way to do it.

But what I see people do is they want to fit $50,000 into each of the categories, even though they only have $100,000 to play with. Or they want to fit $30,000 into each one of the categories even though they have $100,000 to play with.

So, they’re spending more or budgeting more than what they actually have as an allowance to spend in each of these categories. And that’s why their budgets end up feeling restrictive. Because they don’t like the amount of the allowance that they have to play with in the beginning, from the get-go.

Same thing happens with time. So, if you don’t like the idea of budgeting, check in with yourself here. Is it because you’re wishing that you had more of an allowance to spend than what you do? A really good friend of mine said to me that, “You’re the one who makes the budget, it shouldn’t feel restrictive. Just make a budget that doesn’t feel restrictive.”

And it dawned on me the reason that I hadn’t liked making budgets in the past, and the reason why they did feel so restrictive, is because I always wanted to be playing with more money than I actually had. And when you’re doing that, you’re always going to set yourself up for disappointment and frustration, and you’re going to feel scarce and restricted and insufficient.

So, we want to get really clear on how much money we have to play with. And that’s the allowance that we’ve got to divvy up. We’ve got to, just like with time management, with money, we’ve got to make sure that the math works. That’s the only way that we’re going to prevent ourselves from overspending.

Now, like I said a moment ago, many people overspend because it’s an effective way to avoid negative emotions that they experience. Let me give you some examples of this. For instance, you may want something badly, even though you’re “trying to stick to your budget”. And that wanting, that feeling of deprivation, is really uncomfortable for you to experience. To just sit in, and to be with. To have it come along for the ride, so to speak.

So, instead of just experiencing it and allowing it to be there, what you end up doing is you avoid feeling that feeling by buying whatever it is that you want. Maybe you want to splurge on a first-class ticket, but it really doesn’t align with the budget that you’ve set for yourself, as far as your travel expenditures go this year.

Or you haven’t made a budget, but if you’re being really honest with yourself, and you checked in, you know in your gut, that you’re probably spending more than what it makes sense for you to spend, at this point in your life, at this point in your career, based on the income that you have coming in.

And yet, you buy the first-class ticket anyways. It’s because you feel restricted. You feel deprived. That discomfort, that FOMO, of wanting something that you’re telling yourself you can’t have, feels very uncomfortable. So, instead of just feeling that feeling, and allowing yourself to feel deprived, to feel disappointed, to feel frustrated, to feel restricted, you rebel, and you make the purchase, you make the expenditure.

A close cousin of these feelings, of deprivation and FOMO, is also the experience of feeling entitled. So, remember, there’s always a thought driving these feelings. With entitled, it’s going to look something like, “I deserve this. I’ve earned this. I should have this.” And then it’s going to trigger that negative emotion in you. And then you’re going to end up reacting to it ,and you’re going to spend the money in an unintentional manner.

So, you want to be onto yourself. Feeling entitled to something feels pretty good in the moment, but if you look at the action that you take from it, it’s rarely an emotion that serves us. I’ll actually go so far to say it probably never serves us, to feel entitled and to take action from that place. I think deserving is also akin to entitlement.

If you feel very deserving of something, pay attention to how that feels in your body and then look at the action very specifically, the action that you take when you’re feeling deserving. Is it intentional action? Is it action that aligns with the ultimate results that you want to create for yourself at the end of the day? Especially when it comes to how you spend money and the money that you have, and the money that you save, all of that.

Now, we don’t just experience feelings of deprivation, FOMO, entitlement, we also use spending money as a way to escape other negative emotions that we experience day in and day out. I see a ton of people use money and spending money as a way to avoid and escape feeling overwhelmed or stressed.

And in order to get out of those emotions temporarily, they distract themselves by making an expenditure. You might buy stuff off of social media. I don’t know if you’re anything like me, but those targeted Instagram ads are just so spot on. So, it can be very tempting to just click on the ad and then go buy the thing.

You get a hit of dopamine; you get a little bit of excitement when you make the purchase. And then something gets delivered to your house. And you get to feel the same excitement all over again. So, it’s like killing two birds with one stone, when you’re making these expenditures.

You might be feeling frustrated that a deal didn’t work out the way that you wanted it to. Or you’re annoyed with the way opposing counsel has been acting in these deal negotiations. Or you’re frustrated with a client who won’t leave you alone and is really dissatisfied with how the case is going. And you keep having to have the same conversation over and over and over again. Or your boss keeps just burying you with work, and you’re feeling really pressured and behind and inadequate, like you can’t keep up.

A really easy way to escape these negative emotions is to buffer them away by spending money. Maybe it’s not Instagram ads, maybe it’s Amazon. You love to head on over to Amazon and hit that ‘Add to Cart’ button or the ‘Buy It Now’ button. Maybe you love going to Target, and you love just roaming the aisles and finding things that you really don’t need.

Or maybe you’re a little bit more like me, and you like to splurge on luxurious items. You’d like to live a little lavishly. Now, I’m not trying to shame anyone who likes to do that. I also love to live lavishly, and to splurge and to enjoy luxurious things. But you just want to make sure that you know and like your reasons for the spending decisions that you’re making. All right?

You want to make sure that those spending decisions are coming from a clean, intentional place. Not as a way to avoid other discomfort that you’re experiencing. I used to do this myself, when I worked in big law and I was really unsatisfied with my career, with what I was doing, with my future, as I saw it at that moment. I used to use vacations as a way to escape my dissatisfaction with my life.

I also would splurge on expensive meals. So, between spending money on plane tickets, or expensive hotels, or oysters galore or bottles of champagne or nice wine or bone-in rib-eyes, and all of those things. Those were how I used to splurge. Those were the ways that I would go to, in order to give myself some temporary gratification and excitement. And to temporarily escape all the negative emotions that I was experiencing day in and day out through work.

And in my personal life, I had some personal issues that I also needed to contend with. And it was a really easy way for me to escape some of the negative emotions that came up in my personal life, as well. Dissatisfaction with relationships that I was in, feeling frustrated, or out of control sometimes, because I literally can’t control other people. But that was news for me at the time.

And I was trying to control other people in my life, failing miserably at doing so. But because I was failing miserably at doing so, I was feeling a lot of frustration and disappointment and resentment. And I was using spending money as a way to escape those negative emotions, as well as all of the negative emotions that would come up for me at work.

So, as I list these items off, I want you to check in with yourself. What are you guilty of? Where do you overspend? And why do you overspend? Get very specific. The more specific you get, the better you’re going to be at remedying this behavior. At being able to identify it and interrupt the pattern.

Because what you should be starting to see is that your bank account ends up being a reflection of your habits. If you have a habit of seeking and giving yourself that instant gratification, your bank account is going to reflect that. Your credit card statements are going to reflect that. You’re going to be left at a deficit, quite literally. Okay?

So, check in with yourself. Where are you spending? One of the trends that I’m seeing a ton of is this indulgent spending on DoorDash, or Grubhub, or Uber Eats. It’s a really easy way to spend unintentionally. Or the subscription services that we love to subscribe to, and then we never pay any mind to them after we sign up for them.

But we sign up impulsively, and it feels good in the moment. It feels really productive and useful. And lo and behold, later, if we were to take a closer look, you’d be able to see ‘I did that impulsively. I did that, and I got that instant head of gratification. I was able to do that and temporarily escape some of the negative emotion that I was experiencing.’

Even with the delivery apps, just avoiding the emotion of feeling tired, or exhausted or bothered. It’s much more convenient to have something just delivered to your door. But when we do that, A, we end up spending a lot of money that we don’t realize what we’re spending. And you can just feel a little bothered and go pick it up, or cook dinner, right?

If you’re feeling pressured or scarce on time, you’re going to have to allow those emotions to be there, instead of react to them or avoid them by ordering the delivery item. Now, again, this is not to villainize and say that there’s one right way to spend money. And then there are other wrong ways to spend money. This is truly subjective.

You have to decide what you’re okay with and what you’re not okay with. And your answers are going to be different from another person’s answers. There’s nothing wrong with that. That’s completely okay. But you want to know for yourself, where are you spending money? How are you spending it? And do you like your reasons for spending it?

Are you using it intentionally or are you spending money as a way to avoid a lot of the discomfort that comes up for you? Both in just feeling restricted, or in all of the other negative emotions that I mentioned earlier; that can come from your work life, your personal life, all of the above.

Now, the way to gain the most clarity here is for you to not just list out the ways in which you overspend. But also, to make a list of the negative emotions that you experience, that drive you to overspend. The negative emotions that you end up avoiding through your overspending.

Go ahead and list them out. What feelings drive you to spend money in a way that is misaligned with the results you want to create in your life around money? And then when you get clear on those emotions… Remember, if you struggle to articulate the one-word emotions that you experience, head on over to the Google and just type in “feelings wheel” and start to look at one, and see if any individual feelings jump out at you. Okay?

And cultivate that list of emotions that you experience, that you end up avoiding through your overspending. And then, take a look at the thoughts that you think that cause you to feel those feelings. That is the way to create the most awareness here, to really address your overspending habit at the root.

As you do this, very quickly, you’re going to see that your thoughts don’t serve you. That there are negative feelings that you’re currently avoiding. And those are the exact emotions that you’re going to have to be willing to embrace, in order to address your overspending problem. Now, if you’re having trouble figuring out the negative thoughts and feelings that drive you to overspend, I want you to complete a model, okay?

And remember, the model is basically like an equation for your life. It has five different variables, five different components: Circumstances, Thoughts, Feelings, Actions, Results. We’ll start by plugging in a life situation that you’re dealing with. Maybe it’s life generally, maybe it’s something that you’re dealing with at work, your job. Any situation that you have some emotion around right now.

So, put that in the Circumstance line. And then ask yourself: What am I thinking about that? You’ll identify the thought. And then when you see that thought, ask yourself: What emotion do I feel? What’s the one-word feeling that I experience when I think this thought? And it’s going to be a negative thought and a negative feeling, all right?

When you’re thinking this negative thought and you’re feeling this negative feeling, you will be able to see how, in your action line, you’re avoid feeling that emotion ,or reacting to experiencing that emotion. And then the action that you take is that you overspend instead. And it will produce the current results that you have in your life when it comes to money; your bank balance, your credit card balances, the amount you have in savings, all of that.

It should start to make very apparent sense to you why you have the results that you currently have. So often, I watch people say to themselves, “I should be somewhere different than here. I should be further ahead. I shouldn’t have these results.” But then I always look at their action line. Then I check in and see the thoughts and the feelings driving that action. And it makes perfect sense.

They’re thinking a negative thought, they’re feeling a negative feeling, and they’re taking negative unintentional action, like overspending, and it’s producing the negative results that they have. It all matches perfectly. In fact, they should have exactly the results that they do have, when it comes to money. Based on the thoughts that are thinking, the feelings that they’re avoiding, and the actions that they’re not taking. Right? It all makes perfect sense.

Same thing, if you’re thinking about the Circumstance, not spending money on something. So, if the Circumstance was to not buy X, Y, or Z. Maybe you want a new car, but it doesn’t make sense for your current financial state. So, the Circumstance would be: Don’t buy the Tesla. And you’re thinking, “But dammit, I really want a Tesla.” So, you’re feeling deprived.

Or you’re thinking the thought, “Oh, man, I work so hard. I deserve a Tesla,” and you’re feeling very entitled. So, what do we end up doing when we’re thinking these thoughts or feeling these feelings? You’re feeling deprived or entitled, or that sense of FOMO, like you’re missing out, you end up avoiding those emotions and you end up spending the money. You end up buying the Tesla.

Or buying the handbag or splurging on the dinner or splurging on the hotel or going on vacation, when you can’t really afford it. Whatever the case, may be, you end up buying the thing. And then you have the exact result that you end up having, right? Your current bank balance, your current credit card balance, your current results with money.

I want you to work through these models yourself, so you can start to see, does this thought serve me when I think it? How do I feel? And when I feel that way, how do I act? And what result does it produce? If it produces a negative result, it’s not a result that you like, then that thought doesn’t serve you and we’ve got to change it.

The solution here, to overspending, is threefold. Number one, you’ve got to change the way that you think. You’ve got to change the way that you think about money generally, which we talked about in the last episode. But you also have to change the way that you think about your life, about work, or the situations that you have a lot of negative thoughts and feelings about.

You’ve got to change that type of thinking, so you’re not putting yourself in that avoidant, escapist, buffering pattern. You also have to change your thoughts about not spending the money. Because if you keep creating a situation where you’re making yourself feel deprived, over, and over and over again, it’s going to be so much harder to curb your spending, when you’re dealing with all of that discomfort.

The truth of the matter is, remember this, I’ve said this once, I’ve said it a million times, I’ll say it again: There’s always discomfort both ways. So, there’s going to be discomfort in spending the money, and there’s going to be discomfort in not spending the money. Only one of the two routes gets you closer to the life you ultimately want to have.

And I always suggest you embrace the discomfort that gets you closer to that life that you desire. So, you’ve got to change your thoughts. And then you’ve got to embrace the discomfort that comes up for you. So, sometimes some of our negative thoughts are going to be sticky. And they’re going to linger, which means the discomfort that comes from thinking those thoughts is also going to linger.

You need to become better practiced at experiencing that discomfort, rather than trying to escape it through overspending. Like I said earlier, you want to list out those negative emotions. And you’re going to have to make a deal with yourself. You’re going to have to say, “I’m willing to feel these feelings, in order to produce the results I want, when it comes to money. In order to not overspend, I’m going to be willing to experience these negative emotions.”

And then lastly, the third solution is to take the intentional action that you need to take, to produce the intentional results you want to have. Now, there are a lot of different actions that you can take, in order to produce the intentional results you want to have. Instead of me giving you a long list and overwhelming you, I want you to brainstorm for yourself.

Start by asking yourself: What results would you like to create for yourself when it comes to money and having more of it? How would you like to spend your money? What would you like your spending habits to be? Let’s get really clear on that. And then when you do get clear on that, you’ll be able to start to see the types of changes that you would need to make, in order to create that result when it comes to your spending. Okay?

And now, remember also, that this is a practice, okay? Overspending, you’re not going to go from being bad at overspending to being amazing at it overnight. And that’s okay. You’re not going to be perfect at this, at first. This is a practice. So, you want to commit to getting a little bit better at this, day in and day out over time.

If you make that commitment to yourself, just like I tell you guys to do with time management, you’re going to make consistent 1% improvements, and it’s going to make a world of a difference over time. Now, I said I wasn’t going to give you a full list, but I will give you a couple of things that I do for myself.

Number one, making decisions ahead of time when it comes to my spending is very, very helpful. It keeps me from making indulgent decisions in the moment. So, are there certain things that I don’t buy? Are there certain things that I don’t spend on? Can I have a 24-hour rule in order to get myself out of that instant gratification cycle?

I like to do that and just add things to my cart. And if I want to come back the next day and buy it, by all means, I can. I basically never want to. I get hyped up in the moment, I get excited to buy something, and if I just give myself a day, the impulse passes.

Speaking of impulses, another thing that I do, just knowing myself, I love to hide money from myself. So, I set up automatic daily deductions from my checking account that just goes into a separate savings account, that’s not linked to my bank account in my bank. It’s through a separate service; I use Qapital. That’s with a “Q”; it’s an app.

They deduct certain amounts each day, I do the roundup feature on all of my expenditures, but I also have a certain amount taken out every day. You can set $1 a day, $5 a day, $20 a day, $50 a day, whatever makes sense for you. And then, that money gets taken out. I don’t have to do anything. It’s a way for me to hide money from myself, and just put it in a place that’s a little bit more remote. That really helps me.

I also like to practice constraint. I might only spend on certain things, at certain times, or I might only make purchases from certain places. A great example of this would be you only DoorDash twice a week, rather than every day. That’s a great way to make a decision ahead of time and practice constraint.

Or you always fly Comfort Plus instead of First Class if you want to curb your expenditures. That’s not a decision I make. I am hooked on First Class now, so I budget for it. I make a plan to factor that into my expenditures for the year, because I like to travel in that manner, and I give myself permission to do that. So, it’s not a way that I’m avoiding a negative emotion. I’m doing so intentionally, and I plan for it. I also might be more restrictive in another area to accommodate that expenditure.

So, you’re constantly in a state of give-and-take, right? Like I said, there’s always deprivation two ways. You want to be really clear that you’re picking the type of deprivation that gets you closer to the life you want. Those are a few of the things that I do. But I want to really encourage you to brainstorm.

Think about the results that you want to create. You’re going to know your overspending better than I’m going to know your overspending, because you’re intimately familiar with how you spend your money. And if you’re not, because you’re burying your head in the sand, it’s time to unbury your head and start to take a look at where your money’s going.

So, when you gain that information, when you start to see what you’re doing with your money and the ways in which you’re overspending, you can start to make decisions ahead of time and practice constraint, in order to remedy some of the ways that you’re overspending. But just remember, there’s always those three key solutions. You’ve got to change your thoughts about money, about a situation you’re encountering, about not spending on the thing that you want. You’ve got to change your thoughts. You’ve got to allow yourself to experience discomfort. And you’ve got to take intentional actions that are aligned with the intentional results that you want when it comes to money. If you do that, you will really significantly curb your overspending. This is a habit that you can absolutely overcome. It’s just going to take some practice, some trial and error.

This is another great area for you to practice the evaluations that I teach. What’s working? What’s not working? What do you need to do differently? What’s working, What’s not working? What would you need to do differently? You can do that every week, and you can narrow in specifically on overspending, if this is really a bad habit of yours. Take a look.

“Last week, what did I do that worked, when it comes to spending money and not overspending? What didn’t work? And what would I need to do differently next week, in order to remedy what I did that didn’t work?” If you do that, that’s how you’re going to make those consistent 1% improvements.

That’s what I have for you this week, my friends. Next week, we’re going to talk all about underearning. It is a topic that I am so, so passionate about, and I can’t wait to cover it with you. In the meantime, I hope you have a beautiful week, and I will talk to you in the next episode.

Thanks for listening to The Less Stressed Lawyer podcast. If you want more info about Olivia Vizachero or the show’s notes and resources from today’s episode, visit www.TheLessStressedLawyer.com.