EPISODE 43:

Get Your Partner Onboard with Your Money Dreams

 

So you’re reading books about money mindset, you're listening to my podcast and you’ve probably invested in conferences or courses to change your mindset. 

And then someone you love poops on your parade.

A question I get ALL THE TIME is “How can I get my partner onboard with my money goals?”

You might live with someone who's very negative or fearful about money, personal development, entrepreneurship. That can be really tough and my heart goes out to you.  

Or your partner might just be a bit sceptical. 

Here’s how to grow and make money even when you have that in your life.

First up some Denise real talk! Your money goals are your responsibility. Your money mindset is your responsibility. You can’t wait for other people to change before becoming successful. 

Don’t let your partner's negative money mindset be your excuse about why you're not starting, why you're not growing your business, why you’re not publishing your book. 

You’re allowed to make your own money even if your partner isn't supportive. 

Mark and I have created amazing things together. We've bought houses and investments, we’re raising kids and running a business together, but it wasn't always like that. 

When we first met I was the one doing work on my money mindset. I realized that I had to be the keeper of the freedom dream for our family. 

Mark wanted to be abundant, but he thought it would come from a corporate job. He wasn't immersed in the same things that I was. He wasn't in business forums or reading business books. He didn't have any frame of reference. 

I had to let go of disappointment and resentment that I didn’t have a white knight riding in to rescue me.

Now we appreciate each other's strengths.

Mark's strength is as a completer-finisher. He's the one who makes sure the bills are paid and the kids are collected from school. I am the keeper of the flame – the holder of the vision for our family.

 

In this episode, you'll learn: 

  • How to appreciate each other’s strengths in your relationship
  • How Mark and I started out
  • How to turn money mindset into a game
  • The importance of language around money
  • Why you can’t let anyone hold you back
  • How working as a couple turbocharges your manifesting

 

Links

Hi there, it's Denise here. And welcome back to Chill & Prosper yet again. I'm thrilled to be here with you. So this is a question I get a lot, and it's about getting your partner on board with your money dreams, with your money goals, with your money mindset. And this comes from often a couple of different places. So sometimes you have a partner in your life who's very negative about money, negative about personal development, negative about entrepreneurship, and that's really tough. And my heart goes out to you for sure. Hopefully though, there's just sometimes just a few little differences. And so the other part of it comes with I want to grow this together. I want my partner to come on board. I want them to feel just as excited about business and money as me and they're just a bit skeptical. And that can be hard too, but obviously the first one is easily the hardest. And hopefully you'll get some nuggets out of this episode about how to grow and make money even when you have that in your life, okay?

                                                So the first thing to say is that I don't believe that people necessarily change unless they're motivated to change. And so think about you, think about all the work that goes into you changing and changing habits and shifting things. You're probably reading books. You're listening to this podcast and others. You probably read a lot of articles. You have invested in conferences or courses or mentorship in order to change your mindset. And even with all of that investment, it's still hard, right? It's still hard to change habits. It's still hard to shift things sometimes and get out of those patents, those recurring patents.

                                                So what we are often trying to do is change a partner or expecting them to be at the same speed as we are without them being motivated to do it at all and without them reading a single book or doing anything. And there can be a lot of disappointment. If they loved me, they would do it. If they supported me, they would do it. And so my first lesson for you on this, my first Denise real talk is that your money goals are your responsibility. Your money mindset is your responsibility and you can't have it dependent on being for other people to change. So if you are waiting for your partner to change for you to then have the courage to do your business, if you're waiting for your parents to finally be supportive of your business before you expand it, if you are waiting for everybody to be on the same page as you, you can't. You really can't because they might not be motivated to change and they might not ever change.

                                                I know that's hard, right? But you can't let your partner's negative money mindset be your excuse about why you're not starting your business, why you're not growing your business, why you are not publishing your book, or why you are not investing in things. I hear, "Oh, like my partner doesn't believe in getting help around the house. Well, I can't work on my business." Okay, but that can't be your excuse. Let your house get dirty. I really mean it. This is going to be a bit of a like Denise real talk thing, but like... So you're going to let the fact that your partner doesn't believe in getting help around the house, that means that you have to do it. And then therefore you can't work on your business. Therefore you can't write your book. It's no, your dreams are too important. Your dreams are too important.

                                                What about, oh, my partner says that when business starts making money, then we can get some extra childcare. Yeah, but why is that your responsibility? And like not everyone who's listening is like has that female-male dynamic, but I see it so much in those dynamics where it's like, oh, my husband doesn't think we should do this. And I go, well, your life is too important. Your business is too important. Your dreams are too important to let that derail you. And so sometimes you just have to do it anyway.

                                                But that being said, there are some things you can do to get them on board. But that first thing is to stop letting them be your excuse because then you can go forth and do the things and they'll come with you or they won't, right? Sometimes they shift and change because they're not your gatekeeper anymore, okay? So you are allowed to make your own money even if your partner's not supportive. You're allowed to have a successful business even if your partner's not supportive. You're allowed to work on your own money mindset even if your partner's negative, okay? So that's some bit of a Denise real talk.

                                                So Mark and I, so Mark is my husband, we have created amazing things together. We have created so much abundance and we've bought houses and investments and we are raising kids and we're running a business together, but it wasn't always like that. When we got together, I was 23, he was 19. Yes. [inaudible], but I was the one doing work on my money mindset. And as I started to shift, I started seeing things that he was doing and saying. And I'd say to him, "You can't say that. You can't say that." Or I was blaming him because I was like this is the path to wealth is for us to start a business. So what business are you going to start? And he had no desire to start a business. He was very happy in his corporate job for a while. He didn't want to get out of his comfort zone and do that stuff. That's me. That's mine.

                                                So I had to realize that I had to be the keeper of that dream for our family, the dream of freedom and entrepreneurship, the dream of being able to have abundance. He wanted to be abundant for sure, but he just thought it was going to come from a corporate job. And he didn't quite believe because he wasn't immersed in the same things that I was. He wasn't in business forums. He wasn't reading business books. So of course he didn't believe it. He didn't have any frame of reference. So once I got that that I am the keeper of the flame, I am the keeper of this dream, it is up to me, and dealt with that resentment a little bit, dealt with that disappointment around, oh God, there isn't a white night to come and save me. Like I am the hero of my story. I am the heroine of my own story here. And if it's going to happen, it's up to me to do it.

                                                Now, that doesn't mean that I've been the only one to do it. It's just that realizing that that's my strength, my strength in our relationship is going, "Wow, imagine what we could have. And oh my gosh, one day we're going to live in this beautiful neighborhood." And what Mark's strength is, he's the one that does the paperwork for the mortgage. He's the one that... He's a completer-finisher. He's the one who like makes sure that the bills are paid and like we remember to pick the kids up from school. So it's okay for you to have different roles in your partnership and not everyone's going to be the same in that, right? Like if I said to Mark, "Oh cool, can you fill in and do a Money Bootcamp call for me?" That would freak him out. He would want to prepare and do slides and all that kind of stuff whereas I am someone who could just think on my feet. And you ask me to run a three-day workshop, I'll do it tomorrow. I don't care because I can talk.

                                                So we had to get appreciation for each other's strengths and not judge and not be resentful of that and allow each other to play that role, okay? But I had to get over that princess thing of someday a princess is going to [inaudible] princess someday. Well, it could be for you that you're waiting for the princess, but like that's where this... Sometimes things like Fifty Shades of Grey is so appealing to people because it was a billionaire who has no restrictions on what he can do and create. And he just came in and swept Anna off of feet and said, "I'm going to solve every problem with money." That's super appealing. I get that fantasy and I wanted Mark to be that person. And he would've been very happy staying in a six figure corporate job for the rest of our lives, but I wasn't. So it had to be me to lead the charge, okay? I know that can be hard sometimes. It really can.

                                                So I want you to ponder on that of like where have you got resentment that maybe you want them, you're trying to push them into being an entrepreneur, maybe you're trying to push them into learning about money mindset, maybe you are trying to get them to be someone that they're not and feeling disappointment and disillusionment about that or resentment or anger that they're not going to be the one, okay? So put your hand on your heart and it's like, it's safe for me to be the one. It's safe for me to be the hero of my story. It's safe for me to be the keeper of this vision for our family and it's safe for me to make it happen.

                                                Okay, so we're going to take a quick break, but then I'm going to talk about how you can like still get them to support you and compliment your dreams and not derail you because some of you are feeling like you've got this person like literally holding you back right now. And that can be really hard. So I'll see you in just a sec.

Kiran Grover:                     Hi, I'm Kiran Grover, and I'm the business owner of Healthy Homeopathy and we are based in London. I'm a natural healthcare expert. I love art and culture and I'm also a mum of two kids, two beautiful daughters, a cat, and soon to be a puppy as well. Denise I think is fantastic. The book that I've read is Get Rich, Lucky Bitch. And it sits on my desk and I look at it nearly every day. I particularly like the idea around money blocks. I think my main block was about actually getting paid and getting paid what I really needed to get paid to have a good lifestyle and to be able to look after my kids and myself well.

                                                I think it probably stems back from my parents' attitude to money. My parents are very successful, but it's very much driven by my dad and his own business. He was an entrepreneur too. And also I think a little bit to do with culture too. I'm of Indian background and sometimes I think women have to play second fiddle to men when it comes to taking money. Anyhow, magic thing. Every time I read Get Rich, Lucky Bitch, I seem to get a new client instantly. I love its coaching, I love its focus, I love that it's practical. It's helped me in every way. Thank you so much, Denise.

Denise Duffield...:            Okay. So welcome back. We're talking about getting your partner on board with your business dreams and like even just the concept of talking about money and things like that. So let me just do some real quick logistical wins that can happen. So you can listen to things like this podcast together as a couple. If you're in Money Bootcamp, you can do Money Bootcamp together as a couple. You can play subliminal money mindset affirmations around the house. And that actually does work. It does help people to change. But the biggest thing you can do is work on your own money mindset and shift and change some of the language that you are using. And then depending on what kind of personality they're at, have conversations about it, okay?

                                                So, great example. So when I started working on money mindset and growth and giving myself permission to make more and have a beautiful life, I was starting to realize how cheap I was with myself. Mark would buy himself a really nice suit for work and I would shop in thrift stores, okay? That's all I believe that I deserved. And there was a bit of a mirror happening with Mark where if I went to buy something new, he'd be like, "Well, how much are you spending?" And I would never say that to him, right? There was just some stuff there where he'd go, "Oh, but we don't have much money." And like he'd get freaked out about it. So he was used to me shopping in thrift stores and making do, okay?

                                                We were out shopping one time and we were just walking along a really nice street and I saw this fancy store and I went, "Oh my God, look at that." And I can't even remember what it was. It might have been a bag or shoes or whatever. And he put his hands over my eyes and he dragged me away and he said, "Don't even look. We can't afford it." And I went, "Oh my God." This was a turning point in our relationship around money because I was starting to do enough work there around my money mindset that I had a massive aha. And I said, "Babe, did you tell me that I wasn't even allowed to look? I wasn't even allowed to look. I'm not even allowed to dream? I'm not even allowed to look in a..." I didn't even go in the store. It's not like I even tried it on. I wasn't even allowed to look.

                                                And I went, "Oh wow, I've got this massive aha that I don't believe that I'm worthy of having nice things. And this is interesting that you said this." And it was... I came at it from a place of curiosity and went, "Wow, this is a really interesting mirror." And so being able to call each other out on that stuff and having that shared language is really powerful. And this is where like doing Money Bootcamp together or doing this work together or even you just giving them like top line stuff of saying, "Hey, look, I'm not going to say we don't have any money anymore. I want to start saying this instead." And then you can, instead of being angry about it, you can go, "Ah, remember we're not saying that. We're saying don't even look. We say it's safe for us to dream." And you can bring your kids into it if you have kids and saying, "No, I want our kids to realize that it's free to dream, that it's safe for us to dream."

                                                And so Mark would say, "We can't afford it." And I'd say, "Well, what can we say for that instead?" Because yeah, we were broke. When we were first living together, we were super broke. And I would say, "Hey, let's not say that. Like let's just say we're super abundant and like we are getting richer every day." And I just started bringing those little things in and it became a bit of a game rather than a blame. A game, not a blame. But when it came that like sometimes I felt like he was holding me back in like not believing me or something like that, I actually had to say like really vulnerably and I said, "Babe, I'm working on my money blocks. And so when you say things like that, it actually triggers some of my fears around money and it triggers some of those feelings of not having enough."

                                                And I had to get really honest about my money pass. And I'd say, "Look, I grew up in a family where there was scarcity." And I remember hearing my mom say when I was quite young saying, "I don't know what I'm going to feed them this week," because she was broke. She was a young single mom. She had me at 17, there was real scarcity in that life. And even then like later on in my 20s when I was earning a low salary, but I wasn't starving, when Mark said we can't afford it or there's nothing in the cupboard, it actually triggered that feeling of being a little girl and hearing my mom say that and thinking we're going to starve. And from that day on, I actually became an overeater because of that, because I thought, well, if there's going to be food in the house, I'm going to eat it because I just don't... And we never starved. My mom always managed to make one sausage into like a stew. And she was very resourceful around that, but I felt the fear of the feeling like I was going to starve.

                                                And so language is so important. How you talk about money is so important. And if you can have a place of curiosity about where your money blocks have come from, but ask your partner about their money blocks too. They might have had experiences completely different to you or similar to you, right? So here's another example about this curiosity. So we moved around a lot. And I mean like every four to six months we were in a new house. And so we never accumulated a lot of stuff in our house. You know when you go to someone's house and they've got like spice that's been there for 20 years, that never happened in our life because we were always moving and my mom was really good at decluttering and she was really good at moving, and the more boxes you have, the more money it costs to move, right? So she'd be like, "Well, we don't need that."

                                                So when Mark and I started living together and we were in a house for a while, he would look at the cupboard and go, "There's no food in the cupboard. There's nothing to eat." And I would look at that and go, "Look at all this stuff that we have. How am I going to deal with all of that when we have to move at a day's notice?" So it's that whole thing of like is the glass half empty? Is the glass half full? And of course the answer is the glass is refillable. It can be whatever you like.

                                                But that was just one example of how I had to say to him. Like when you say that there's nothing in the cupboard and I can see 20 meals that we could make because that was my mom, right? She was resourceful. She could make, oh cool, I've got a tin of peaches, a French onion soup mix packet and some brown rice. Cool, that's apricot chicken and a little bit of chicken, right? That's a whole meal. Whereas he would look at that and only see the scarcity because he grew up in a house where they only moved twice his whole childhood or maybe even three times. His mom had a freezer in the garage. His mom always like probably bought too much stuff because she might have had a pendulum swing from her family. She might have grown up in the depression, okay?

                                                So you can see how these patterns play out again and again in relationships. And your job is to acknowledge the pattern, break the bad ones, create a new legacy for you and your family. But it comes from that place of curiosity. It comes from that place of curiosity and going, "Hey, what comes up for you when you look in the cupboard and it's bare? What comes up for you when we actually have a healthy savings account but you are looking at that going, we're going to be homeless on the street." And that's so... It's just such a more empowering way to get on the same page together as a couple, to have shared language and shared awareness of each other's triggers, okay? You might love spending heaps of money, but your partner's very frugal. Okay, well, where's the curiosity of that? Do they really... Like maybe they did have bankruptcy as a kid. And so they feel anxious if they don't have a certain amount in savings. They feel like they'll be homeless on the street. Where did that come from? Instead of feeling angry and resentful about it. Okay? Super, super important.

                                                Okay, so what's another way? Painting a picture of your future together. Constantly talking about what working on your business means, what working on your money mindset means, what investing time and energy and money into your business could mean for you in the future. And so this was something... Like I'm good at this anyway because I like thinking about the future, but I realized that Mark didn't have that same ability to vision like me because, again, growing up for him, his mom loves reminiscing about the past. So for her, everything's about creating memories of the past and having talismans of the past and looking at photos and looking at toys and things like that. So he wasn't very practiced in thinking about the future because everything for him, it was all pleasure about the past.

                                                And so suddenly he is married to someone who's like, "One day we're going to live in a multimillion dollar house." And he'd go, "What? How? I don't understand. What? But we've never been able to do this before." So I had to just like paint the picture for him and how that would work for him and what would be good for him. And like I'd say, "Imagine not having to go to work and like being able to work on a business together and choosing our day." And he was like, "Oh, I don't know how that would work." And so then you can practice those little things, right?

                                                So he had a day off work one day. He probably didn't take a day. It was probably like a bank holiday or something because he never took days off, but we'd go to the beach and I'd go, "Wow, look at this. It's eleven o'clock on a Monday. Imagine if this was our life every day." And it was just little things like that to paint that picture. How cool is it going to be when we can travel first class? And so we'd get on the plane, we'd go to the back of the plane in economy and I'd go, "Imagine one day when we're sitting at the front. How cool is that going to be?" And like we'd walk in and I'd go, "When you walk in the plane next, pretend we're about to go to the left. Like just have a look." Remember, don't even look. Dreaming is free.

                                                And so you know how sometimes you have to walk through first class to get out of the plane? I'd say, "Hey, just have a look at this. One day that's going to be us." I'd go, "Which seat would you like to sit in?" And he'd go, "Oh, I don't know." And now he's so good at that. Now like we're about to do a launch, every time we're about to do a launch, I see him and he's writing the goals in the shower steam. He's going, "Oh, it's going to be a $1 million. Oh, this is what we're going to buy when we do it. Imagine when we can have this." And that was practice, okay? It was practice. So don't assume that your partner's going to be like naturally good at dreaming or personal development or seeing the possibilities or even the fact that you are immersed in it and they're not. You have to bring them along.

                                                Okay, so just to recap, your money stuff is your responsibility. You cannot let them be your excuse about why you're not living your dream life. You cannot let them hold you back. I'm not going to scare you. Sometimes people do break up with this because you realize that your dream for your life is bigger than theirs. And it's just too important to you to let go of. But for most of you, it's just like there's going to be little nuances of being curious about their money blocks. Talking honestly about the concept of money blocks so you have shared language so you can keep each other accountable for it. Mark's done that to me sometimes. He's gone, "That's not like you. There's always more money." I go, "Oh yeah, thanks." But it's because we've got that shared language. And then paint that picture of what it could be like and work your way up to that to getting them to come on board.

                                                So, big love and hugs to all the couples out there doing the work. It's so much fun when you can do it together. It turbocharges your manifesting for sure. And it can take a little bit of work to get there, but I believe that you can do it and I believe it's possible for you too. All right, stick around. I've got one little final thought after this very short break. Bye.

Teddey Hicks:                    Hi, I'm Teddey Hicks, a coach and intuitive eating counselor, and I live in Maryland. I run the Food & Body Love Membership where ambitious women learn to stop battling food and live their best lives in the bodies they have right now. I joined Bootcamp in 2017. And to be honest, I didn't know much about Denise before I joined. I was just drawn to the program because I knew I needed to work on my money mindset and I loved Denise's energy. Bootcamp helped me discover all the deep money blocks I had that were preventing me from gaining any traction in my business or feeling like I deserve to be happy. Since joining I've completely transformed the way I think about myself and my value as a coach. I know I can build a business in a way that works for me. And I have big inspiring goals that I know I can reach. Now I know I can have absolutely anything I want.

                                                The best thing about Bootcamp is having tangible tools that help you shift your money mindset like decluttering, tapping, and forgiving, that you can use again and again as you move to new levels of wealth and success. I highly recommend Bootcamp to anyone who wants to break through their money blocks and be successful. No matter what your current income level or experience in business, the supportive Bootcamp community will elevate you to achieve absolutely anything you want. I am so grateful to Denise and all the lucky bees who inspire me every day.

Denise Duffield...:            Hi, [inaudible]. And my final thought is about friendship. And I realized the other day that the only entrepreneur I ever knew growing up was my stepdad for a brief period of time who had a business. And he used to say to me, "There's no friends in business. There's no friends in business, Denise." And I really took that to heart for a long time. And it was only recently that I started to feel safe collaborating with some of my friends on different business things. Running retreats with a friend or like I want to do a show with a friend and I want to do a tour with a friend and how much that there's no friends in business thing really stuck with me, okay?

                                                So your aha around that might be, it's safe for you to collaborate with friends, it's safe for you to work with friends, it's safe for you to say no to friends. It's safe for you to go into different businesses with friends or it's safe for you to make money with friends. It's totally up to you. And so it doesn't mean you have to go into business partnerships, but it could just be an aha that you have that is similar to mine. Friends and money can mix. It's safe for you to have friends and be successful. So maybe that's where you went to that if I make more money, I'll lose all my friends. And so it's safe for me to have money and friends. It's safe for me to be in richer circles. It could be something like that.

                                                All right, so hopefully that's helpful. And if there's any little ahas or stories that have come up for you, if you're in Money Bootcamp, I'd love to hear your aha. Do a post in the group. Otherwise, share this in some of your groups and have that discussion. And let me know what your ahas are around friends and money. Are they like oil and water? They can never mix. I've heard that before too. And I will see you next week on another episode of Chill & Prosper. Take care. Bye. 

About the Show

Chill & Prosper is your weekly dose of money mindset, marketing and humour from best-selling author and entrepreneur Denise Duffield-Thomas.

Denise's philosophy is that there is ALWAYS an easier way to make money and that's what she's here to help you do. Each week, you'll get actionable advice to help you make more money, with less work. There's no need to hustle - let Denise show you how to embrace the Chillpreneur way.

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