The key is to recognize the pattern we have.  Often this is more related to your income and the dividing trick might not work for you.  Still you have to recognize the pattern that makes it happen and acknowledge that this is something in your past, not the present or future.  Your future is going to be different and you have to decide how different your future is going to be.

Remember that at one time in the past you had not crossed a street by yourself.  Then you did, and now that is in your past.  The street no longer limits you and you don’t even think about it.  The same goes for other limitations in your life.  You can earn more money and you have to allow yourself to do so.  That way you can start living a Life of Abundance.

Love and peace,

ElinAnna

Love and peace,

ElinAnna

It is like our brain goes on autopilot and before we know we are doing and saying the same things as we have been for so long.  The explanation is simple.  We have created a pathway in our brain.  It is just like when we start driving.  In the beginning we have to focus on everything we do and on our surroundings to know how to react.  After some time we master the skill and start to do the driving as a natural thing, like we are on autopilot.  The same thing happens with our automatic underearning behavior.

When we leave underearning behind we are charting into a new territory.  Our brain only has the old brain pathway, so now we are creating new pathways and it will take some time to do that.  In the beginning it can be very scary to head into this new territory.  But the payoff is much more than worth it.

What is your payoff going to be for leaving underearning behind and start earning what you need and deserve?  A Life of Abundance?

Love and peace,

ElinAnna

In a recent article in the New York Times “A Toolkit for Women Seeking a Raise” it is pointed out that stereotypes are still working against women.  For those of you that haven’t asked for a raise because of the fear of how it might go, the article gives good advice on how to ask for a raise.  I want to stress that although the article states that it is different and more difficult for women to ask for a raise, there is no reason to not asking for one.

Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government associate professor Hannah Riley Bowles describes a different technique for negotiating that will give you what you want.  Here is some of what she and her peers suggest women use in their negotiations.

Be Proactive: No one will notice that you deserve a raise.  It is your job to ask for it.  Point out the good things you do and find the best time to approach your boss.

Be Prepared: It literally pays to do research.  Information is power.  When you have the knowledge the power is yours.  There are websites like Payscale.com and Salary.com with information about what the average pay is for you position in your geographical area.  At Glassdoor.com and Vault.com the information can be more specific as they have information for salaries at specific companies and your company might be one of them.  Also talk with people and more than just your girlfriends, remember the men.  Women are more likely to be paid less than men.

Tailor Negotiations: A new study by Ms. Riley Bowles found that if women explain why their request is appropriate and that they care about their work relationships they are more successful.  There are examples in the article on how to do this.

Anticipate: Don’t forget to anticipate objections and what your response is going to be.  If you are not successful this time around ask your boss for recommendations for what you could do to move to the next level.

When women have good information, are proactive and tailor the negotiations they do just as well as men.  So there is no reason to sit and hope for the best.  Go and create what you want in your life.  A Life of Abundance.

Love and peace,

ElinAnna

Some go on to think about how they have never been able to make more money and take it as a sign that they will never be able to change this fate.  They will tell you about how it has always been this way and why it will not change.  They have thought a lot about this and know why it is like this.  They even have proof of why it is so.

Then you have other people that take it as a sign that there is time for a change.  So they will start to work out how things will change.  They might not even know how, but they know it will and set out to be proactive in making the change happen.  They do not sit and wait for life to happen to them and then explain why it did.  They live their lives.  It’s with the mindset of being proactive, to do, to take action and moving on.  Their mindset is to take responsibility of their lives and knowing that the past is behind them and the future is in front of them.  That’s where they are heading.

How can being proactive help you live a Life of Abundance?

Love and peace,

ElinAnna

This has been happening to millions of people in Europe, U. S. and actually all over the world for the last 5 days.  For example, the Boston Marathon was on Monday, April 19.  A lot of people had planned on being there to compete.  They had trained for months and planned on being in Boston early enough to be in their best form when the race started.  Many of them, especially those from Europe, couldn’t, all because of a volcanic eruption under a glacier in Iceland.  Because of this eruption nearly all air travel in Europe came to a stand still.  A cloud of ash moved slowly over Europe and didn’t go away fast enough for the stranded travelers.

What can people do?  Some that were only travelling within Europe tried to get a ticket on a train or rent a car.  Unfortunately those were quickly sold out.  Then of course there are those with plenty of money who could take taxi, like the actor John Cleese.  He took a taxi from Oslo, Norway, to Brussels, Belgium, where he could catch the train to London.

But how often is it that a natural catastrophe interferes with our plans?  Isn’t it usually something much smaller?  Or even just our own mind sabotages us?  What do we do then?

The first step is to acknowledging that it is only our mind that is standing in our way.  All the excuses that we are hearing are our own.  They are not an act of nature.  We are only giving our excuses the power of a natural disaster.  If we want to change things, we need to prepare, plan and then act, just like the runners did for the marathon.  The runner does not start out by running a complete marathon, but rather starts with shorter distances to get in shape.  Similarly it helps to take what you are trying to accomplish and break it down into very small tasks.  Each, of these very small tasks, need to be such that it is nearly impossible to make an excuse for not doing them.  Then slowly, but surely, do each of them one after the other.

I talked the other day to a woman that went on and on about how she wanted to keep on learning her trade.  She wanted to take courses to become better at what she was doing.  As we talked it became clear this was her dream.  And yet she hadn’t even taken any action to make a plan to make this dream come true!  There was no volcanic eruption that stood in her way.  The only thing was the excuses in her mind.

How are you making excuses that are stopping you from living a Life of Abundance?

Love and peace,

ElinAnna

Fear is something that keeps many underearners stuck in their underearning.  They tell themselves that this is the only way to be.  The fear of taking action is overwhelming.

In my cleaning up after the move I came across this book I read many years ago, “Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway” by Susan Jeffers, Ph.D.  As I started to read it again I remembered how great this book is and how it helped me to move forward with my life despite the fears.  I also noticed how the fears became less of an issue.  We grow through doing and by moving forward, as I talked about in my last blog.  And to get different results we have to do things differently.

But resting in our comfortable ways is not going to yield us different results.  We have to stop letting fear hinder us from doing something different, feel the fear and do it anyway.  This will allow us to live a Life of Abundance.

Love and peace,

ElinAnna

The question is how is it going to change?  What is needed for them to get paid more?  If you are one of these people then you need to do something different.  It is obvious that the same old – same old is not working.  Since it hasn’t happened in the past it is very unlikely to happen in the future.  There is a saying that if you want a different result you have to do things differently.  Doing the same as you have always done will only give you the same results, therefore different result require different actions.

The first thing you can do is to sit down and brainstorm about what you can do differently.  There are for sure simple things that you can start doing today and then there are other things that will require more time.  By looking for opportunities to do things differently, you have already started the process.  It is important to keep at it.  You are the catalyst in your life!  It is only by changing your actions and your mind that you can change your life and start living the life you want to live, a Life of Abundance.

Love and peace,

ElinAnna

In the news we hear about foreclosures.  When we drive around the neighborhoods we see empty lots with signs about what was planned, but is not going to happen.  It is easy to get scared of what has happened in the past and be gun-shy when thinking about taking actions, because of actions taken in the past.  It is easy to become paralyzed when you think about the past.  But the past is behind us, both the good and the bad.  Our life is actually about what is in front of us.  We should live our life as a forward action.  Life cannot be lived backwards.  Our life is going to be lived in the future.  What we do now will affect the future and our lives in the future.

What can you do today that will light up your future?  Today I am writing this blog.  I will prepare documents for my upcoming appointment with my accountant.  This will allow me to be better financially prepared for my future.  How can you live your live today to make your future even better?  What is going to be your action today to improve you future so that you can live a Life of Abundance?

Love and peace,

ElinAnna

You might think for yourself that this is not the case for you.  Maybe you are right.  But the money fog sneaks up on you and suddenly everything is dark.

One thing that comes with a new year is taxes.  We have to prepare our taxes, which means that we will have to look at our money.  Some people dread this time of the year.  They think it is too painful to look at their money situation.  To them, ignorance is bliss.  That reminds me of a woman I talked to last summer.  She hadn’t done her taxes, because she feared that she owed the IRS money.  When talking to her it was obvious that she was in a money fog.  She had no idea about her money, what she was earning and spending.  Her rationalization was that it was better not knowing, even after acknowledging all the fear and anxiety she was suffering from.  She was constantly saying that she couldn’t afford this and that, and there was anger in her voice as she was talking about her situation.

Finally she did her taxes, grudgingly.  When I talked to her afterwards, she told me she got money back from the IRS.  After all of these months of being afraid and suffering from anxiety, she got money back from the IRS.  She had been staying in the fog regarding her money, causing her to feel miserable for no reason at all.  When I asked her about that, she looked at me, as there was something wrong with me.  Her fog was so thick and dark that even after getting money back from the IRS, she still was staying in the fog.

When I thought about it afterwards it came to me that being in this fog and feeling afraid about her money situation was normal for her.  It didn’t even occur to her that things could be different.

How are you with money?  Are you lost in the fog and can’t find your way out of it?  What is it costing you to stay in the fog?  It is difficult to find your way to abundance when you are lost in the fog and don’t know where you are or where you are going.  Take this opportunity to get out of the fog and make this year the one when you know where you are and where you are going.  Put yourself on the path to a Life of Abundance.

Love and peace,

ElinAnna