How Your Money Mindset Can Help You Build Wealth

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Tried different budget systems, but can't seem to get them to work? Jen Hemphill, Her Money Matters author, shares how changing your mindset can help you build wealth! 

Understanding Money Mindsets with Jen Hemphill

Really excited about today – my buddy and accredited financial coach Jen Hemphill is chatting with me on how money is both the numbers and mindset.

You can watch the interview here or read an edited version of our discussion below. Hope you enjoy!

Her Money Matters Interview with Jen Hemphill

Elle: Thank you so much Jen. I'm so excited to talk to you today!

For those of you who haven't met Jen Hemphill already, she is the incredible creator of Her Money Matters the awesome podcast that shares stories and money truths.

She is talking with me today because we have something special – Jen is releasing her new book Her Money Matters: The Missing Truths From Traditional Money Advice. Jen thank you so much for coming. I'm excited.

Jen: Oh my gosh. Thank you so much to you for having me. It's always a pleasure chatting with you we always have so much fun and such a big fan of yours so I'm excited.

Elle: We always have fun. And I think part of it is that you're someone who is a giver. I've seen how you take care of your community.

With the podcast and site along with your group, I'm curious, why write a book? Why do it now?

Jen: I wanted to write a book that was focused on what really is missing because I had that experience when it came to finances and traditional money advice.

We tend to focus mainly on budgeting and saving those traditional money skills, but what I've come to find out is it's just a small component of what I call the money headquarters.  In my opinion and in my experience it's really about 10 percent.

Yet we focus most of our time on that – on the savings, on paying off debt – which is nothing bad to do, they're great things to do.- but there are other components of the money headquarters.

These include the the mindset piece or includes money stories, your past, present, and future.

Your money stories are like the foundation of your home. So if you don't have a stable foundation, your house is in trouble. So you have to have a strong foundation and that's why the mind set the money stories those things are very critical.

You build on that with your money actions – creating a dream budget and those type of things. The money schools are like the bricks.

I wanted to write this book because I felt stuck. I was the one that was really good or I felt like I was really good with money.

I found myself 10 years into our marriage where I was stuck and I felt ashamed because people saw me as good with money, but yet inside I was feeling horrible.

That started that journey of figuring out what in the world that might be going wrong.

Elle: It's funny that you mention that because I know you, like years later and you got it together and everything.

Going back to that moment, when you realize ‘this isn't working for me'? What was the trigger that made you feel something was awry?

Jen: Well ten years later we were still under debt. And ten years later I was looking at our emergency funds and we were still continuing to deplete it.

We were putting away for retirement but not that much because we were trying to pay off debts. It felt like we were just running in a hamster wheel. That's how I felt and so I knew there was something else.

I was overwhelmed trying to manage our finances. I was like, something's not right. Why is this going on? That's when it just led to that journey of just me open up my mind and ask, OK how can I fix this?

That led me to some other books that weren't just budgeting and personal finance but it led me to T. Harv Eker and Secrets of the Millionaire Mind: Mastering the Inner Game of Wealth.

Eker's book opened up my mind to the mindset and how important that really is.

I grew up in a household where there was talk always of a lack of money so ‘we don't have the money' that was the key phrase that I heard growing up.

Even though when I became an adult I was determined to be in a better financial situation, but what I didn't realize that those thoughts still stuck in my mind and continued to repeat themselves.

Here we were always savings, but then somehow we were depleting it. I was very very frugal.

There's nothing wrong with frugal because you save money, but then I wasn't enjoying life as much because I felt guilty each time I wanted to treat myself. There was a lot of guilt surrounded with it.

It's important to acknowledge or understand it or be aware of it because then what happens is we repeat that.

Elle: I love that because as you pointed out, budgets are important, but they're not the who story.

Great illustration with the bricks because I then saw the mindset as the blueprint. No one builds a house without some sort of plan.

I can see someone checking out your book and they see those patterns. They realize they need to change, but their spouse is kind of reluctant and maybe they're shy.

Do you have any tips or conversation starters to get their spouse onboard?

Jen: Absolutely. So first, this money talk, this money conversation is not always about the numbers. You want to get to know each other.

You may already have hints from just from being married or in a relationship with that person.

It's getting to know each other on a deeper level. Maybe one has a challenge with impulse spending and the other one doesn't really and maybe that the other partner can help the the one that has the challenges with impulse spending.

It's definitely not about ‘oh you spent so much'. Don't want to ever do that. That will shut the conversation down.

It's more about getting to know each other and it's all positive again. Even though challenges doesn't sound positive but it's coming out and asking for help.

Because we as humans we want to be helpful. So if you're expressing this as a challenge then your partner in turn is going to be more than willing to help you through that challenge.

Your spouse will be more receptive.

Your Money Matters

I hope you enjoyed our chat. If you want to not only get your financial system in order but also figure out why you handle money a certain way, please check out Her Money Matters.

It's an incredible book that's designed to get you off the living paycheck to paycheck cycle and start building wealth.