Welcome to episode 46 of the money mindset shift! Today we are asking, are you forcing yourself into submission? OOOooo. It’s a topic, that’s for sure. So remember to give yourself grace and space as we dive into this today!

So how did we get here? How is this even the topic?

Nichole Joy, the original Digital Doula, friend, and client – spoke some time ago when she was beginning her curly hair journey, about her hair and ways we force ourselves into submission.

At the time, this really resonated with me because I had been catching up on my doctor’s appointments. And while I trust my doctor, I had left an appointment realizing that, I don’t ask questions.

I have thoughts and questions before I go in. But then once I get there, I turn into the little girl who keeps her mouth shut and does what she is told.

It was an interesting realization, but I hadn’t made the click with submission until Nichole was talking about it on her Instagram stories.

This got me thinking a bit more.

In what ways do we do this with money?

I think we need to begin by talking about what we mean by submission.

The Oxford Languages dictionary defines submission as “the act or fact of accepting or yielding to a superior force or to the will or authority of another person.”

I want to add to this that there is a layer of denial of self that can occur.

It is one thing to follow the advice of a doctor whom you trust, and it is another thing to completely ignore your own intuitions and understanding of your own body – if we use my doctor example.

With money, this can look different ways.

Like trusting society when it told us to go to college to get a good job and take out loans. For some of us, that was an aligned decision. It didn’t just feel right because they were told to do it. They filtered it through their own authority, and were like “yeah. That’s what I’m going to do.”

For others of us, it was not an aligned decision. Some of the people in our lives who told us this, also genuinely believed it was the right thing. That it would help us in the long run. But ultimately, our trust as incoming students, and the trust of those we trusted, was used to line pockets. We were presented with a false choice – go to school and get loans, or we were told that we would never amount to anything or never get a good job and buy a home and achieve all those life markers we were told to achieve.

And even those of us who did get jobs in our fields, good paying jobs too, are still stuck with ever increasing loan balances.

This is just one way it plays out. And I am definitely here to advocate for a full and complete jubilee. Education, Medical, etc. Goodbye loans and debt! 100%.

But I do want to highlight, is that denial of self, the denial of our own authority.

We sometimes do it to ourselves, but often times it is under the pressure of others. Or of systems.

And the pressure for our lives to look certain ways is part of that.

Buy the house with a two-three car garage. Buy this particular kind of car, but also one of these. Dress this way. You know you need that new tech device.

This applies to business too. You have to have a VA. The styled photos. A branded website. Better hire this coach and listen to everything that they say.

When maybe that isn’t actually what you want.

I did this.

I sold $1 tarot card readings because that is what other people were charging, and there was push back from the community if you charged more.

I created offers based on what mentors told me, even if I didn’t want to actually do those things.

So you get stuck spending on things to make yourself feel like you are achieving things – but it is hollow because it isn’t actually what you want. They aren’t actually things that light you up.

And we mentioned life achievements, mile markers, etc., business ones, because all of this take money. We live in capitalist societies. We live in consumerist societies. So it all comes back to money.

So taking all of this into context brings us back to the important question – what do YOU actually want? What kind of relationship with money do YOU want? And what does that mean to YOU?

You are the magic. Get in touch with your desires, your feelings. That’s part of this whole Evaluate Shift Heal process that we go through.

And again, it can be hard to separate your desires from what you are told to like. We don’t exist separate from society. We exist in it.

So, I do invite you to journal on and think about – where can you accept yourself? Who you are? Lean into YOU.

That’s definitely been the theme of the last 3 episodes. But this is a life long journey. And something we do need to put conscious effort into, because we are inundated with opposing messages everyday. All of the time. 100%. Again, we live in capitalist consumerist societies, you’re gonna be inundated with these messages.

So, again I invite you to journal on – and think about – where can you accept yourself? Who you are? And lean into YOU.

If anything from this episode, or the two before it resonated, share it! You can tag me on Instagram @shelbymelissa , or join The Money Mindset Shift Community on Facebook and share your thoughts there!

And I look forward to talking with you again, in the next episode!