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Last week’s Prosperity Quick Tips about disappointment evidently really hit home for a lot of people. I received an unusual amount of email about it. So today, let’s take another step forward.

If you have an emotional pattern that shows up in your life stories such as disappointment, betrayal, abandonment, or any other uncomfortable emotion, then on a deep-down level you harbor an expectation of that experience. Because of the way the Law of Attraction operations, that expectation will lead to a result.

The same thing happens if you have a pattern of having life stories end in satisfaction, success, or getting your needs met. You will have an expectation of a favorable result and that’s what you will manifest.

The "cure" is obvious–alter your expectations. But that’s easier said than done.

Long term emotional habits become part of your identity. If disappointment is your habit and expectation, you would actually feel some discomfort if suddenly a series of events ended with a favorable outcome because you don’t perceive yourself as a successful person who gets what he or she wants.

What has to change is your self-concept. You have to be willing to be a successful, fulfilled person and your thoughts, beliefs, emotions, and behaviors need to be congruent with that self-concept. That’s the tough part.

Because so much positive change would be a threat to your identity, you’ll do everything you can on a subconscious level to protect who you’ve been and resist the change. You are apt to engage in what is commonly called self-sabotage. I call it self-protection.

I’m going to address this issue in the next few tips. Actually, this is what my book Build Your Money Muscles is all about. If you have the book, go back to it and pay close attention to the discussion of the Identity Factor that appears throughout the book.

If you’d like to learn more about what is in the book, go to
http://ProsperityPlace.com/bymm

The audio Creating a New Financial Identity is also helpful.

I discuss the Identity Factor in episode #3 of The Prosperity Show

On yesterday’s teleclass, Working Through Your Money Issues, one of the participants admitted to being habitually disappointed in the outcomes of her life stories, expecially those that involve finances. Her habit was certainly not unique.

Many people have a disappointment habit, experiencing series of dramas that end in disappointment. Turning this around so that your like stories end with feelings of success and accomplishment requires that you first release your NEED for disappointment.

A disappointment habit is the result of holding in feelings of disappointment over an extended period of time. Those feelings keep looking for an avenue of expression and if you don’t express the feeling they will find that avenue through new life stories that magnify the feeling.

In order to avoid future disappointments, you need to release the pent of feelings from your system. You can do this by:

1. Doing a disappointment inventory, writing a list of all the times you were disappointed. Start your sentences with I feel disappointed when . . . or I felt so disappointed when . . .
2. Admiting, when something turns out in a way that is not to your liking, that you are disappointed. Say aloud, "I am so disappointed."
3. When approaching a new project, see if you can recognize an expectation of being disappointed. If you find that you harbor such an expectation, spend time imaging a positive outcome.

 Use your power word with the following series of statements:

• I release my need for disappointment. Power word.
• I am willing to release my disappointment and find new ways to express myself. Power word.
• I give myself permission to let go of disappointment. Power word.
• I want to let go of disappointment and replace it with success and fulfillment. Power word.
• I have the ability to create successful, fulfillng life stories. Power word.

Click here to listen to the teleclass on ProsperityPlace.com

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Do you suffer from a just-enough or less-than-enough financial habit? If you do, there’s a good chance that you feel trapped, frustrated, deprived, ashamed, and angry, all major feelings that act themselves out through money.

Frustration often mounts when people move up the economic ladder only to find themselves still in a just-enough or less-than-enough position. They may have a lot more "stuff," but the same sense of there not being enough to fill their wants still exists.

Often, a fantasy persists that if there were more money, there would be enough. Not true. If you have a just-enough habit, more money won’t change that. A large infusion of cash might alter your emotional state for a while, but chances are that when the high subsides, you’ll feel the same. The feeling is a habit.

How do you break the habit? First of all, realize that it takes time. You have to create new neural pathways in your brain while breaking down the walls of your own resistance to change. Start small. Here’s how:

1. Look around your house and environment. About what can you say "I have enough _________" Underwear? Dishes? Towels? Food to eat?

Find something and allow yourself to feel the feeling of enough. Sit quietly with yourself and repeat, "I have enough _______." Then say your power word. Observe your mind as it tries to convince you that you don’t really have enough.

2. What is your concept of more than enough? If you think that a particular amount of money would be more than enough, what is that amount? (If you answer is miles away from where you are now, then you can be sure you are setting yourself up for not having enough.)

Whatever the number, imagine that you have it and decide what you would do with it. Notice the point at which you change the number because it isn’t enough.

3. On a daily basis, say to yourself at least 10 times, "I am enough." If you resist this, ask yourself why you are so willing to diminish your value.

4. Use this series of statements with your power word:

• I release my need for not enough. Power word.
• I release my longing for more. Power word.
• I am willing to perceive myself as having enough. Power word.
• I am willing to perceive myself as being enough. Power word.
• I give myself permission to see my value. Power word.
• I give myself permission to see my value separate and apart from anything I do or own. Power word.
• I want to be enough. Power word.
• I want to value myself. Power word.
• I am enough. Power word.

Click here for Power Word instructions.

Exercise 3 in Build Your Money Muscles is all about connecting financial patterns to emotional themes. Read more about Build Your Money Muscles.

 Working Through Your Money Issues: A Fr ee Teleclass
July 31 at 2 PM EST, 11 AM Pacific, 7 PM GMT
I’ll be coaching at least one person and answering questions from our audience. Sign up and then ask your questions by clicking here

When I first stepped onto the spiritual path in the early 1970s, a teacher said to me, "Worrying is a waste of time." He puctuated this idea with another statement, "Anything negative is a waste of time."

"What a concept!" I thought and spent many years learning how to replace worrying with a more producive mental activity. This one simple exercise led me in many different directions and allowed me to develop a way of perceiving life that has served me well.

If you are one of the many people worrying about finances at this time, I offer these thoughts:

• Worry requires making up a story about the future, which hasn’t happened yet. It’s just a fear-producing fantasy that exists only in your mind. Imagining a positive future requires the same amount of energy as imagining a negative one.
• When you replace worry with an expectation of a positve outcome, you can create a strategy to facilitate that outcome.
• Ask yourself, "How does worrying help me? Is it a good investment in my time? What can I do instead"
• When you find yourself worrying, take a few deep breaths and divert your attention to something you are grateful for.
• Worry and fear usually go together, so ask yourself, "What am I afraid of?" Examine that fear and dialog with yourself to discover if the fear is fact based or not. Are limiting beliefs about your possibilities perpetrating the fear?

What if you have put yourself in a vulerable position (debting, earning less than you need, making promises you can’t keep, etc). There’s a possiblity that you’ll lose somethng you value. If nothing can be done to change your immediate situation, you may have to face the loss and let it go.

As long as you are alive, you can always rebuild. Do what you can to limit your liability, then let go. People who succeed fail more than people who fail.

Life’s challenges can be the blessings that allow us to grow and thrive!

I had one of those AHAs the other day and want to share it with you.

By carrying the burden of debt, we do penance for our "sins" as we hope to assuage our feelings of guilt. Eliminating the need to debt as penance requires that you: 

•  Forgive yourself for anything you have done or think you have done that stimulates guilt.
• If necessary, make amends to those you have harmed and ask for their forgiveness
• Imagine that God, Source, The Universe, or whatever supernatural force you relate to loves and forgives you. For real.
• Start behaving as if you have a right to hold your head high and be proud of yourself. In this day and age, sometimes just getting through the day is deserving of praise.
• Praise yourself often.
• When the voice inside your head criticizes you, breathe and tell yourself something positive about you or your actions.

To help you work through your guilt and shame, try my CD Healing Your Financial Shame.

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When Warren Buffet was asked by a TV interviewer about how he measures wealth, he answered, "By how much love a person has in their life." He said that he knows a lot of high net worth people who have few successful relationships. For Buffett, these people are not wealthy.

I agree. . In Build Your Money Muscles I say that when you feel loved, accepted, acknowledge, and appreciated, you’ll be open to greater cash flow. And experiencing these feelings depends on your relationship with yourself and others.

Feeling loved, accepted, acknowledge, and appreciated by others begins with loving, accepting, acknowledging, and appreciating yourself. Many people I talk to admit that their internal dialog is more critical than loving. When this is your internal state, people will reflect criticism rather than love, and it is difficult to generate acknowledgement in the form of money.

To alter your internal dialog, start focusing on treating yourself like someone you love. Here are some suggestions:

1. Listen to how you talk to yourself. When the critical voice comes into your head, tell it, "Thanks for sharing, but we don’t talk like that any more." Take a deep breath and tell yourself that you are a good girl/boy, followed by your power word.
2. Stand close to a mirror and look directly into your eyes. Say outloud, "(Your Name), I unconditionally love and accept you exactly the way you are." This can bring up a lot of emotion, don’t try to hold it back.
3. Buy yourself some flowers.
4. Stroke your body gently.
5. Give your body what it needs to function well.

You can also use the following statements with your power word to help overcome your resistance to loving yourself:

• I give myself permission to treat myself like someone I love. Power word.
• I release my resistance to loving myself. Power word.
• I am willing to treat myself in a loving way. Power word.
• I am willing to speak kindly to myself.Power word.
• I want to love myself. Power word.
• I am lovable. Power word.

Instructions for the power word

You can find many more ideas for altering your inner dialog in Build Your Money Muscles 

Do you remember, quite a few years ago, when Donald Trump was going through his divorce from Ivana, there were lots of headlines about his financial troubles. What he was going through was not unusual.

After a divorce or loss of a loved one, financial loss often follows. People unconsciously use money as the convenient pathway of expression for their emotions, and this is especially true for deep feelings of grief and loss. Feeling the pain of financial loss is more bearable than the pain of the real loss of a person or pet we love or has played an important role in our lives.
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Regularly checking in with your money feelings can prevent financial stagnation–that feeling that you just can’t seem to move through your current financial position into a new one.

No matter how much emotional clearing you have done, there’s always another layer of emotions lying in wait, ready to hold you back. That’s because emotions are the bridge between our internal and external worlds. As you move towards a new financial position, the habitual emotions that have defined your current position have to be replaced by new emotional reponses that are in tune with where you want to be.

So, when you check in with yourself today, what are you feeling about your money? Are you feeling frustrated, limited, trapped, deprived, or angry? Or perhaps you feel satisfied with what you have, comfortable with what you are earning, or hopeful about your financial future.
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Because of cultural influences, people rarely reach adulthood with a clear understanding of their authentic selves. More often than not, identities are formed more out of the need to please caregivers than from authentic self-expression.

As a result, people experience a holding back, not just of who they are, but how they express themselves financially. Thus the common thought, "I should be earning more than I am" or a longing to reach a perceived true potential.

The prevalent feeling of being trapped in a particular financial position is the result of feeling trapped in an inauthentic persona. This also often stimulates feelings of abandonment (of self), deprivation, anger, and shame, all of which people tend to blame on external circumstances.

Self-help literature is filled with prescriptions for finding your authentic self. In this limited space, I can only give a few suggestions to move you forward:

• Remember the slogan: If one of us has to be uncomfortable, it doesn’t have to be me. Express your needs and give yourself permission to fill them.
• Learn how to express your feelings. I can’t stress how important this is to being in integrity with yourself.
• Do something today that you have always wanted to do but were afraid that others might judge you harshly for.

These three suggestions will point you in a new direction and help you create a new financial identity.

My book Build Your Money Muscles and the CDs Let Go of the Aloneness Blocking Your Prosperity and Healing Your Financial Shame have specific instructions for learning to express feelings without having to rekindle a lot of old hurts.

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Any time anything unexpected happens financially, it’s a good idea to be hyperaware of your feelings. This can give you great insight into the dynmaics behind your finances.

For those of you in the US, when your tax rebate arrives, take a moment to tune into the kinesthetic experience in your body. A number of possibilities come to mind. You may:

1. Feel eelated. Like a kid who just  got a birthday gift and your immediate reaction will be to want to spend it.
2. Feel initially elated, then sad because it isn’t enough to get all of the things you want or because you know you have to use it to pay for bare necessities.
3. Have a feeling that someone cares about you.
4. Be aware of a sense of resolve that you will use the rebate, or part of it at the very least, to pay off some of your obligations. You decide that this is the moment that you are going to change your habitual financial behaviors.

Whatever you are feeling is most likely to be something you have felt in the past and your habitual behaviors will follow suit. This is the perfect time to be aware of the feelings, sit with them for a while, do some deep breathing, then do something that you wouldn’t normally do. Like doing nothing with the money for a week, then making a decision as to what to do with it.

One of the keys to moving to a new financial position is to change your behaviorss. This is a great time to do this.

If you are outside of the US, imagine that you are getting a check for the equivalent of $600. How would you respond?