017 Define Your Money Identity

Hey there, real quick before we jump into the episode, listen, if your earnings treadmill hasn't set you free yet, running faster won't either. Listen, hustle without principles just going to burn you out. So here's what I want for you. I want you to join me for my money machine experience live. It is three free trainings. Deep dive into how to escape the treadmill and build a money machine that actually works for you. All right, grab your spot here by going to moneymachinelive.com and I'll see you in the free training.

This is the affluent entrepreneur show for entrepreneurs that want to operate at a high level and achieve financial liberation. I'm your host, Mel Abraham and I'll be sharing with you what it takes to create success beyond wealth so you can have a richer, more fulfilling lifestyle. In this show, you'll learn how business and money intersect so you can scale your business, scale your money and scale your life while creating a deeper impact and living with complete freedom. Because that's what it really means to be an affluent entrepreneur.

Hey there, Mel Abraham here and welcome to this episode of the Affluent Entrepreneur show. And in this episode, we got a fun show planned. Well, actually all of them are fun. At least they are for me and I hope they are for you. But in this show, we're going to talk about something that when I talk about your money identity, okay, so often I see that what ends up driving people are impacting people is how they see money when it. It creates a threshold, it creates a ceiling, it creates a dynamic in their money game. Whether it's in the business or outside the business that they struggle with, that actually is the thing that's holding them back. It's not a lack of skills, it's not a lack of talent, it's not a lack of smarts, it's not a lack of. It's this stuff that we're gonna talk about today. This is gonna be game changing. But in order to do that, one of the things I'm gonna ask you to do on this episode especially is because I'm gonna ask you some questions that I want you to answer. So I wanna make sure that you have a pad of paper out. Cause listen, the whole idea of this show, this whole idea of the affluent entrepreneur show is to move you from a treadmill entrepreneur to an affluent entrepreneur, from a non entrepreneur to an affluent entrepreneur to help you build the business the right way so you can build your wealth the right way. It's the idea of in the intersection between business and Money. And how do we scale your business to scale your money? It's not just dealing with the money side, it's dealing with the business side. It's dealing with the integration of both of them because they both impact each other. And so what I want you to do, this is a doing show. It's not just a listening show. Because there's going to be some things during some of these episodes where I'm going to ask you to do things. This happens to be one of them. So I want you to get a pad of paper out, I want you to get a pen, I want you to get in a quiet place because I'm going to ask you to answer some questions. And if you need to pause the show while you're answering them, go right ahead. Let's do this thing. Let's make this rock and roll. Because we're going to talk about first your money, your blank money canvas, and then we're going to talk about the money identity cascade. It's a framework that I have that is built off of a framework that some people have probably seen before. But the first thing is this BL Money canvas. Because here's the thing. If we don't get clear, one of the first steps that we take people through in the affluence blueprint, when I work with people one on one at the high level or in my groups, is to get a real clear picture of what their affluent vision is. And we don't do it just with the money. It's not just about wealth, it's not just about money. It's about the domains of life to make sure that we're clear on that. But if we don't have a clear picture of. Of our future, if we don't have a clear picture of where, what and how we want to get there, well, forget the how for a moment, the where and what. At least then we don't know which way to go. We can't make the right decisions. We can't make the strategic work. We can't do any of that. So this exercise, I want to walk you through the blank money canvas exercise is going to help you start to define that, it'll help you start to refine it. It's not the whole affluence visioning exercise and process that takes a couple hours to do it. Right? I mean, because it's. You're really going through it. And everything is probably one of the most enlightening and, and empowering things that a lot of my clients go through once they get through it. So let's do this. So got a pad of paper in front of you? You got a pen? And let's rock and roll. Let's make this happen. So here's the first thing. I want you to start with an empty, clear future. Whatever judgments, whatever limitations, whatever boundaries society has set, you've set. Your family is set, your parents have set, your friends, your spouse. I almost said spouses. Hopefully it's not multiple spouses. Okay? But whatever you have set, I want you to clear that future. I just want to wipe the slate clean. We're going to start with an empty blank canvas and we're going to then define it from there. We're not worried about how we're going to get there right now. We're not worried about the process of getting there and how much to save and all the money and all that stuff. We'll get to that. Let's get this clear now. All right, so the first thing I'm going to ask you is that I want you also to look at it and say, I want you to begin with what's available today, what's available to you right now. It doesn't matter. You might be in debt, you might have a million in the bank, you might have somewhere in between or something more, it doesn't matter. But I want us to get real clear on our current reality. When we're clear on our current reality, then we have the place from which we need to operate. Now, it is simply to state the facts. I don't want you to attach emotion to it. I don't want you to feel bad about it. I want you to feel good about it. I just want the unbiased truth for you. Okay? So first things first. I want you to begin with what's available now. As you look at yourself financially, as you look at what you have monetarily, wealth wise and everything, understand what you have now. Now, first question I'd love for you to write down and just. This is a brain dump. You're just going to write with no filter. Write with no filter. Remember, it's a clear future. Write with no filter. What do you want to happen? What do you want to happen? Do you want the debt to be paid off? Do you want to make, you know, certain amount of money? I want you to be specific. I want you to be detailed. I don't want you to be generic. So get real with yourself and say, what specifically do I want to happen? What does that look like? What do I want to have happen? So answer that question. Then the next question I want you to answer is this question about.

What do you want to experience? You remember, one of the critical outcomes of an affluent entrepreneur is a richer lifestyle. The richer lifestyle comes from the experiences that we have, the feelings that we create. So now I want you to specifically detail out what do you want to experience and with whom? Who do you want to experience it with? Is it solitary? Is it with your spouse? Is it with someone else? Is it your yet to be found spouse? Is it with your children? Your grandchildren? What do you want to experience and with whom? And take the time to get as much detail as possible to make that happen, to really understand it. Okay, so what do you want to have happen? What do you want to experience in with whom? Now.

Next question.

How do you want to feel? Okay, remember, richness comes from feelings and experiences. How do you want to feel? Excited? Confident? Calm? Peaceful? Hey.

Inspired? What. What is the feelings that you want? What are the feelings specifically that you want? Next question.

How will your purpose and legacy be expressed in the future? Now that assumes you know what your purpose and legacy are. And if you don't take some time to define it for now, it may change and it will change, I promise. But if you know what you want to have happen, you know what you want to experience and with whom, and you know how you want to feel, then let's answer this question. How will your purpose and legacy be expressed in the future? Is it in products? Is it in a movement? Is it in a mission? Is it in what? Is it, how will it be expressed? Now, looking back at all these questions, this is an important one. How will you know when this happened? In other words, you're defining what the success looks like. What is it going to look like when we get this right? And that way you know you achieved it. That way, you know you got to the destination. That way you know you actually did it. But we need to define it, otherwise we don't know where we're going. Define the destination. How will you know when this happened? All right, so now this is where this really starts to, to drill down. If you've taken the time to do the questions that I asked, and I hope you have, because they are really powerful. The people that I've walked through this exercise have. This has been game changing for their money, that their, their money trajectory and their money journey. Okay, okay. You now know how. You'll know when it happens. So now I want you to write down, this is just a brain dump. Write down the all the ways of being okay I didn't say doing. Being who you must be. To have all of this, to have the legacy, to have the purpose expressed the way you want, to have the experiences and the feelings. And what are the ways of being? Is it confident? Is it inspired? Is it bold? Is it courageous? What are the ways of being.

That need to be in existence.

For this to happen? And like I said, if you need to stop watching, stop listening for a moment to do this, this is a game changer. Stop it, come back, but do the work. Because it's in the work that the beauty comes out. It's in the work that we start to. To see some huge shifts. It's in the work that I watch my clients completely transform. And that's what we're trying to get at here. So work with me here, because this is about your future. Okay, so I'm going to assume that you wrote down all the ways of being. Not two or three, but you did a brain dump. And you kept going and going and going until you couldn't go anymore. And now you look at all those words of the ways of being, and you're looking at that list of words. And now I want you to look at it and say, who, what, or what type of archetype embodies all those words?

It could be a superhero, it could be an alter ego, it could be a celebrity, it could be an athlete, it could be somebody, someone who's. Who's passed. It could be your granddad, your grandma. It could be someone. But who.

Embodies what, embodies all those ways of being. This becomes your embodied archetype. This becomes the thing that says if you step into this, this role, this archetype that your ability to. To fulfill on your money canvas goes way up because you are being all the things that need to be before you can do. It's the be, do have model. Okay. Looked at a little differently. Okay, so this is the blank money canvas, but this isn't all of it. So it's this next step that starts to really bring this home. But I need to know, so I'm going to trust you, that you've done the work. Now I'd love to hear from you in our Facebook group, the private Facebook group, the affluent entrepreneur Facebook group. We'll put that in the show notes for you, how you're doing on this exercise and who, what your archetype is and how you defined it, whether it's a superhero. You know, for me, you know, I'm partial to Captain America just because of the Way he came up as a scrawny kind of dude trying to do the right thing and do good and kept being pushed away. Listen, I. This is. This was given a little away, a bit away about my past. Look, I grew up as a kid by the name of Melvin. When I went into high school, I was like a sum total of 130 pounds soaking wet, okay? And I was trying to play varsity football and this and that. You know, I got. I got laughed at. You know, I got laughed at. And yet over time, not only did I play varsity football, I started on the team. You know, I was trying to be a pole vaulter. And again, I got laughed at. I was horrible. But I believed in myself and I had some people that believed in me. By the end of my senior year in high school, I broke the school record. I jumped over 14 and a half feet at that time. Now, we're talking a long time ago in the 70s. All right? So it was a long time ago. They're jumping way higher today. But here's the thing. My point is that what is it? That is your archetype, because that's what's going to feed this next piece. Okay? This next piece is built off of a framework that isn't mine. Okay, I know I don't own all the frameworks, but this is a framework called the logical levels. This was something that was created by Robert Diltz, and Robert Diltz is. Did a lot of teaching and persuasion and NLP and everything. But these logical levels are really interesting. I'm gonna walk you through the logical levels, and then we're gonna convert them into your money cascade, and we're gonna see how this archetype comes into play here. In doing this, your archetype could be an affluent entrepreneur. Your archetype could be, you know, a mission driven entrepreneur. It could be whatever it is. So let's just look at the logical levels first in making this happen so you understand that. So those of you that are watching, you'll be able to see this. Those of you that are only listening, do me a favor. I'll make sure that these graphics are in the show notes. So we'll make sure that we give you a link to all the graphics so you have the access to all of this in the show notes as we move forward. But what Robert Diltz did is he understood that the way to shift and change people, the way to make a difference in people's lives, to have an impact, went through a certain set of levels. And as we went up these levels the level of impact in change, changing people would go up. The first level is environment. And when he says, look, we're impacted by the environment, and the environment is our surroundings, it's the people we hang out with. And if we hang out, you know, growing up, they say what? They say that you're the sum total of the five people that you hang out with. It's true. It truly is true that the environment we choose to place ourselves in will. Will push us up or bring us down or hold us back. And so the environment is the first level of change. And we need to think about the environment in which we operate in our corporate culture, our business culture, the culture we make with our customers and our clients, and all of that to make that happen. This is everything we do. What are our habits? What are our behaviors? What do we do? Look, you've heard me say this over and over again. No one really has money issues. They have behavior issues. Your financial results today, today are a result of the decisions you made in the past, good, bad, or indifferent. And this is not with any judgment, but we are all here where we're at because of decisions that we made in the past, the behaviors that we had in the past. Now, some things were out of our control, but the response to them was. Was within our control. Okay? So the second level of logical levels is behaviors. Everything we do. The third level. The third level is your skills and capabilities. This is your abilities, the knowledge, the wisdom, the education, the training, the things that you. You understand. So we go through school and we get trained and we get a profession or we. We start to understand. We're reading books, we're going on YouTube, we're doing, going through pros. You're going. You're watching or listening to my show. All those things are affecting your skills and capabilities and hopefully your behaviors and hopefully your environment. And then that leads to the next level, which is about your beliefs and your values. See, the beliefs and values is really about how you see things. We deal with what we perceive in the world as a truth, but it's really our model in the world. There are facts that are absolutely blanket, but we need to understand that our beliefs are an interpretation of the facts. So our beliefs, if we believe that money is evil, guess what, you're probably not going to attract a whole lot of money. If we believe that wealthy people are greedy, guess what, we're probably not going to be wealthy. If we believe that money is a tool and is. Is agnostic. And it's how. It's how it's wielded, how it's used, that makes the impact. That might be a whole different story. What are your beliefs in doing that? So what. What Diltz understood is that at the environmental level we have a bit of impact, but it's distant. Then we look at our behaviors. If we can shift behaviors, we get more of an impact. If we can shift develop skills and capabilities, we have more of an impact. If we can shift beliefs and values, we actually have a deeper impact on the person until we get to these next two levels. And the next two levels is really at the identity level. And this is huge. Who are you? When we talked about you coming up with that archetype, when we talked about who embodies all those ways of being, that's the identity that we need to have. Because when we have that identity, those ways of being come in. Guess what? That shifts your beliefs, it shifts your values, it changes your skills and capabilities because you will do the things that people need to do to develop them, which will shift your behaviors and shift your environment. All of a sudden it's this parade, this cascade effect of things which is driven by the last piece of the logical levels. And that is your purpose. Why do you do what you do? Why do you do what you do? I did a session in my 10 days of money momentum where the first session was really talking about the why around the money. I tell people, always, don't tell me how much you want until you tell me why you want it. I don't care that you want a million dollar business. Let's talk about why. Because without the why, we can't get through the what and the how. Okay, what's the purpose? So you sit back and so these are the logical levels that Diltz said. Let's apply these to business. Let's apply these to business and money. Let's look at it and then I'm going to show you how to then use this as the tool to create the money identity cascade with your archetype, with your way of being for you. Okay, so if I look at it in a sense for me, and, and I go from here, I'm going to go from the identity, the identity level down where I look at this, I mean from the environmental level up. So at the environmental level, I need to be around money, mindful people, I want to make sure that they're using money for good. I'm going to be. The environment's going to have advisors and certain focal points in money and the way we do money. And it's going to be focused on the results. So I want to be in an environment where that supports those. At the behavior level, though, there's going to be some things like I'm going to need to behave where I have an oversight on my financial stuff. The people that are wealthy, the people that live an affluent life, the people that have that richness in life, they get educated, they communicate about money, they talk about money, they don't make it the taboo topic. They track the money in and out. They do these things, they have these behaviors. And you know what? They forget about the Joneses. They don't worry about keeping up the Joneses. They don't care what their neighbors have, what other people have. They don't care what social media says. They don't care what the Kardashians are doing. They simply say, this is my life, this is what I want. I define it, I'm going after it. And as long as it's legal, moral, ethical and not and not hurting someone, go for it. I don't care if it's a tent in Montana or a yacht in Monaco. That's the way we want to have it. So we need to look at it from a business and money standpoint. And now we look at and say, all right, this allows me then to look at the skills. At the skills level, I'm going to understand, I'm going to learn the financial principles, the investing principles, the universal truths, the fundamental truths that make a difference with money. Those that are good with money and have done well with money, they develop the skills and the capabilities to make it happen. They understand how to negotiate better. They realize that there's a vision for what they have, but they have a little bit of pessimism to keep them safe to do those things to make it happen. They have investment knowledge, they understand what it is to try and sell something, or they have leadership skills and management skills and that kind of thing. They start to develop those capabilities. They understand that they have to up level their skill set. And then the beliefs at the belief level, those that are truly affluent, the belief level, they realize that money, money is just a tool. It gives me time, money buys my time back. It gives me that and that I start off with believing that I have value. You have value, you have value, you're deserving of it. Because if we don't feel that we have value, if we don't feel we're deserving of it, we're not going to get paid our worth. And that your success, your success is a byproduct of your solutions that you bring to the marketplace. Now, these are not the soul beliefs. These are the beliefs that I just put on here to talk about. There's other beliefs and you, you have your own beliefs and then your identity, whatever that identity is, is truly this idea that I'm an affluent entrepreneur. I'm no longer a treadmill entrepreneur, I'm no longer a wannabe entrepreneur. I'm no longer anything else. I am an affluent entrepreneur. I do the things that affluent entrepreneurs do because. And what's the purpose? Because I want to create a life that outlives me. Now, when we take the logical levels and start to build it into our money and business, this shifts everything because it drives our environment, our behaviors, our beliefs, our skills, our capabilities, our identity and our purpose. This is why this is so powerful. So how do we integrate it? How do we bring it down to a level where you can do this? So I built this up from the bottom up. We're going to walk you through from the top down. This is how I'm going to give you some questions to answer to make this happen. But this is the, the money identity cascade. And the money identity cascade looks like this. We're going to start off and you got to answer the question. You're going to answer the question of I am. Now, this is your identity. This is your archetype. This is the person, the superhero, the identity of that that had all the states of being that you listed. And you're going to list, literally go back through and say, man, I am an affluent entrepreneur. I am a wealthy, I am a, A mission driven millionaire, whatever it is. Okay, So I am will give you your identity then. Beliefs. Beliefs, which means. Which means what? Which means something. And I'll give you an example of this. So which means I can do this. I believe in this. I have this value. So what we're creating is a cascade all the way through this. So you have the I am statement, which means is your beliefs so that or because is your skills so that. And this will make sense. In fact, I'll give you a friend of mine, he said his archetype was young Merlin. And he said, I am young Merlin, which means I can conjure up magic, I am powerful, I have gifts of intuition and foresight. And now he goes to the skills, he says, because I can help, I can coach people, I can share wisdom from my experience. And I show up every day to coach and to serve and to lead. And so then he goes to the behaviors and that is showing up every Day. So what are the behaviors that you have? What are the behaviors that you have? So that I can. I can help people become wealthy, become affluent, to become financially liberated. So my behaviors are. I show up daily with a mindset of service. I show up daily to give the principles of financial liberation to people that need them. I show up, I coach, I mentor, I create programs, I create content. All of that. I are the behaviors. And then at the environmental level, we answer the question and how this affects the big picture. And my life will be this. So. And how it affects this is that all of a sudden, we shift and we give a pathway to financial independence to everyone. Because I believe that financial independence is a birthright, and we just need to claim it. Now. There's one thing I left off this, and that is the purpose, because I wanted to get you through. I am. Which means so that. And. And how it affects you. And then go back and say, well, why do you do this? I do all this because I want to live a life that outlives me. How would I create this for me? And that's what you see, what I walked through before. So I am an affluent entrepreneur. That when you look at it in this context, I just want. I just. I want you to take a moment and really start to. To look at it in this context that I am an affluent entrepreneur, which means that I get a chance to help people, which means that I value money as a tool to make a difference in people's lives and as a tool to further my message, as a tool to give me the financial liberation and give me the financial freedom and peace of mind that I want. Okay, so that. So that. Or because I work to develop my skills in the financial investing and money realm each and every day, and I take those skills and I transfer the knowledge to those that I serve in my Facebook groups, in my programs, on my show, in my blogs, and all my presentations to allow people to see the possibility and in front of them, from a financial independence standpoint, to give them the behaviors by showing them the behaviors. I show up every day to do it. I track my numbers on a regular basis and use scorecards to make it happen. This is the behaviors. And when I do that on a regular basis, it gives me the financial liberation. It gives me the financial peace of mind. It also gives my. My beautiful bride the financial peace of mind and the generations of Abrahams to come, which. I'm going to be a granddad, all right? And I do this all because I want to create a life that outlives me. When you create a money identity cascade for you, things shift dramatically. Things shift dramatically because now all of a sudden, you step into that archetype with this definition of purpose, of identity, of beliefs and values, skills and capabilities, behaviors and environment. Now I get it. You might look at me and go, mel, I don't have the skills and capabilities. Oh, you don't yet, but you will. Because when you step up into that identity of being, then you'll do the things that those people do because that's who you are. Take it on. That money identity, this money identity cascade will make a huge difference for you. So understand that you're going to be driven by environment, behaviors, skills and capabilities, beliefs and values, identity and purpose. Go through this. I know I threw a ton at you in this episode, and this is one of those episodes. You can't take while you're running. You can't take while you're driving. This is one of those episodes. You need to sit down, slow it down and do the work. Answer the questions, move through the work. It will be mind bending, mind boggling, and game changing. Okay, if you have questions, if anything comes up, do me a favor. Reach out in the affluent entrepreneur Facebook group. I'll put the link in the show notes. We'll make sure that we support you in this. The idea here is to move you forward, and sometimes we have to do some work, and sometimes that work can hit a little resistance because we're butting up against our financial comfort zone. But that's okay because you're not alone. We're all in this together, and I'm here with you. So let's make it. Let's make it happen. Let's change your financial destiny. Let's do it together. Let's give you the tools to make that happen. So if you're listening, I'll make sure that you have all the graphics and everything that you need in the show notes. So make sure that you go there and I'll see you in the next episode. This is cool. I hope that you had you enjoyed this and that you found value in this, but like I said, you probably have to go through this one a few times. All right, so until we get a chance to chat or see each other or talk again soon, I look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Cheers. Bye.

Thank you for listening to the affluent entrepreneur show with me, your host, Mel Abraham. If you want to achieve financial liberation to create an affluent lifestyle, join me in the affluent entrepreneur Facebook group. Now by going to melabraham.com group and I'll see you there.

And that's it for this episode of Building YOUR Money Machine, where we help you learn how to master your money, eliminate financial stress, and live a life of choice. If you found this valuable or helpful to you, here's what I'd love for you to do. If you do me a favor, go to Apple, Apple Podcast, or wherever you're listening to this podcast and rate and review the show. It helps us tremendous, tremendously to keep us at the top of the list so we can continue to get this information and this message out to people. Because I truly believe that financial freedom is your birthright, and I want to help each and every one of you claim it. Thanks so much.