Money Mindsets & Creating Financial Success
Karen Sutton-Johal | Money Mindsets & Creating Financial Success
As experts in financial success, Karen & Jo help business owners and self-employed people to make money, manage money, and sustain financial success.
Until 2007 Karen worked in the corporate world and knew there had to be more to life! She wanted choice & freedom in her life, so she left her job and built a business. Seeing the impact of debt in people’s lives as well as business owners not managing cash wisely, led her to coach and mentor others - following in her steps of success.
Jo Singh comes from a scientific and medical background and as an NLP Master Practitioner can understand how emotions lead people to make good or bad financial decisions – both in business and at home.
“If you’re scared, don’t make financial decisions from a business stand-point. Acting upon the rationale of scarcity is a great way of paying yourself into a corner.”
Key Highlights
The Four Money Mindsets: an understanding of money that is split into 4 distinct categories (which underpins Karen’s work and teachings):
1. Debt Mindset
2. Break-even Mindset
3. Comfortable Mindset
4. Be-Rich Mindset.
What is interesting about these four categories is that the people in each category are doing radically different things when it comes to money. As Karen eloquently puts it, the people who are semi-financially successful aren’t just doing what the less financially successful are doing but just doing it more and faster. No. They’re doing completely different things.
A) Learn how to flow money: once you understand how money works, the way it moves and flows, then it doesn’t (really) matter how much money you’re dealing with. The point then changes to discussing the difference between earning money and creating money.
Earning is about compliance. To earn something indicates that you are worthy of having money given to you from someone else i.e. working for someone else. Creating money is not that. You aren’t reliant on another to give out money to you.
B) Upskilling with money: handling money is a skill. Whilst the principles of money don’t change upon it’s accumulation - the way you handle it in a business scenario does.
Karen poses the question of what would happen if you inherited a business with had a £200 million per annum turnover? You’d proabably go bust. Because we wouldn’t know how to handle that much money. Learning how to handle money is a skill that has the capacity to grow proportional to how much money you accrue.
“..people in each category (4 Money Mindsets) are doing radically different things when it comes to money”
C) Giving money is a skill: the idea that you can give money away willy-nilly but there’s a skill to doing it in a way that benefits you and others. Mentions how a lot of creative tend to enjoy giving money. Also, must be mindful that there are just as many and just as big takers. Be aware of that as people will take advantage of that.
D) Living the life you want: basically a kick the arse. Don’t settle. Be aware of whether you’re happy with your financial situation.
E) Making Financial Decisions: simply put, don’t make them when you’re not in a mentally strong position. If you’re scared, don’t make financial decisions from a business stand-point. Acting upon the rationale of scarcity is a great way of paying yourself into a corner.
F) Making money: anecdote about how Karen’s daughter at the age of 9 challenged her teacher during enterprise week for the handling of the topic of making money. She explained to Karen that her teacher had a break-even mindset when it came to money. Karen elaborates to say how the enterprise week teaching told kids that to make money you have to have money. This enables kids that do have money but disables those that don’t if they work under that knowledge.
G) The figures don’t lie: being honest about your finances. What you do with your money when it comes in, can change how you relate with money on a dramatic level. And by that logic, you can reveal someone’s relationship to money by looking at their figures.
“The figures don’t lie. You can reveal someone’s relationship with money by looking at their figures.”
💡 Key Lessons
The way we use money is based on our money mindset, made from our beliefs and behaviors.
The evidence in our bank accounts or financial records are great indicators as to our current money mindset
As entrepreneurs and creators, we must learn the core money skills: managing, giving, creating, saving.
💭 Coaching Questions
What is your current relationship with money?
What choices are you making to improve you financial situation?
What long-term strategies are you putting in place to create money?