The alarming rise of "money" dysmorphia

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. Do you ever feel financially anxious even when you know you're doing okay? Or maybe you feel like you're constantly worrying about money, even though when you look at your bank accounts, you kind of go, hey, it says otherwise. If that sounds familiar, you might be experiencing something called money dysmorphia. And here's the thing. You're not alone. They say that one third of Americans, nearly one third of Americans feel the same way. And 43% of Gen Z and 41% of millennials feel this way. And look, we got social media, we've got rising costs, we've got financial stress. We've got all these things that make it harder and harder for you to feel secure, even when you're sitting there saying, I'm in a good financial place. In today's episode, we're going to dive deep into the hidden struggle called money dysmorphia. I'm going to show you what it is, why it's impacting so many people, and most importantly, what you can do about it. How can you break free from the worry and start enjoying the life that you're building?

If you've ever caught yourself worrying about your finances, even when you know you're in good shape, listen, you're not alone. This anxiety is, is got a name. It's called money dysmorphia. Listen, I have been in this game for decades, not only on a financial journey for myself, trying to build financial independence, financial freedom as a single full time dad, trying to figure out, how do I get my time back? How do I separate my earnings from the efforts to earn it? Financial freedom as I define it. And what happened is that I was really focused on the money. When's enough? When's enough? Do I have enough? Do I keep going? And there was this angst, there was this anxiety that there was this nervousness and stress around, enough, enough, enough. And here's the thing. And while there is no real official diagnosis, it's a real condition. And it's affecting many of us, not just me. They say that Credit Karma said that there's 29% of Americans right now are gripped by an irrational fear that they don't have enough money. Now, the key there is irrational fear, and the key is that they do have enough money. I mean, these are people that have millions of dollars or that they have things set, but yet there's this fear around it. And the issue isn't just for older Americans, and it's even more prevalent in the younger Americans. 43% of Gen Z and 41% of millennials report that they're experiencing some sort of financial fear. This money dysmorphia, if you call it. And part of it is driven by social media, part of it's driven by comparison, part of it's driven by the media, part of it is just driven by stress and stories that are going on in our heads. So question I have for you is, do you have funny dysmorphia? As if it's like a disease and is there a cure? Well, in this video, we're gonna. We're gonna dive into what is it? How do you recognize it across all life stages? Because it shows up in our lives at different stages in different ways. But most importantly, how do you. How do you go about conquering it and reclaiming your financial peace of mind? So let's just start out with what is money dysmorphia? I mean, it sounds like this big freaking word, but it's similar to body dysmorphia. It's one of those things where you get a distorted view of the reality of what's going on. Money dysmorphia distorts your perception.

Of your finances. Now, let's be clear. It's about the perception and not the reality. But that perception feels so real. It did for me. Okay. And so people that have this. This money dysmorphia, you'll feel insecure, You'll. You'll be concerned. Even though you. When you look at it, you're in a solid financial position. Like, it. It's like looking in a mirror, and it's your financial mirror. And instead of seeing someone that's comfortable, someone that's doing things right, someone that has a plan and is in a financial position that's solid, you see someone who's broke, even though when you look at the bank accounts, you see lots of commas and you see lots of zeros and everything's good. See, this distorted view can lead to other behaviors, and that's actually the biggest concern is not the view itself, but it's what it drives us to do because it starts to undermine our financial well being. Remember, wealth creation is a behavior. Wealth creation is about habits, wealth is all about that. And if this starts to undermine our behaviors, it undermines our financial existence. And what happens is it shows up in our life as this extreme frugality to the point of maybe you skip going to necessary doctor's appointments or you avoid spending altogether, you hoard and you don't think about things that actually could improve your life because you're afraid that it'll jeopardize your finances. So let's just look at a couple of real life examples and I'm gonna break down what I want you to do if you feel like some of this is in your life. And I think we all look, let's be real, I think we actually all have some levels of it. It's just how much is it controlling us? How much is it affecting us? Because even me, I look at it and I still will look at numbers and say, is it enough is enough? What happens if inflation comes back? What happens if this happens? What happens if the market drops? Oh, I'm, you know, I'm 63 and, and I'm not going to be, you know, I might be retiring soon or whatever, all these things. So let's just look at how it shows up across ages, if you will. And these are real scenarios. Obviously names change to protect the innocent. But imagine a 70 year old retired woman who has over a million dollars sitting in a savings account. So we're talking about a million dollars in a high yield savings account, not including investments, pension, home and all that stuff. Yet she's refusing to, to replace her worn out furniture. But even worse.

She'S refusing to travel to see her grandkids because even though she's had conversations with her advisor, she's afraid of spending too much and outliving her money. I remember my mom when she was alive, we just lost her about this past September and she was 91 years old. She would constantly, at least once a month saying, how am I doing my money? How am I doing my money? How am I doing my money now? I controlled all of it for her, I took care of it for her. And I would joke around and said, oh, they're going to throw you out in the streets, they're going to throw you out on the streets. Which probably wasn't the nice thing of her son to do. But bottom line is that was this constant angst that, oh my God, what happens if I outlive it? What happens if I have something that I need? Or let's look at another one. This person was a 62 year old man and he actually needed a medical procedure and he kept postponing it. It was a minor medical procedure, but he kept postponing it because he thought it would deplete his retirement savings. And he thought, well, if I just postpone it, it'll grow more because it's invested. You know, here's the crazy thing. Medicare and his insurance covered most of the expense and it was the money dysmorphia, the irrational fear that prevented him from doing it. I had to force him to say, hey, you need to go do this and I promise you you're going to be okay. Let's look at the numbers. Now those are older people. You know, I'm not going to say older because I'm 63, 62 and 70. But what about, where does it show up in, in younger folks lives? I had a 38 year old professional, it was an attorney that came to me that it showed up in, in his life. And what he was doing is he was avoiding social gathering. He didn't go out because he wanted to save money. Even though he had steady income, he had investments, he had savings, he was fully funding his 401k, he was getting the full company match. Everything was, he was following the wealth priority ladder, he was doing the things. But then the other thing that he was doing, he was checking his accounts multiple times a day, y'. All. No, if you find yourself checking your account multiple times a day.

There'S an issue there. We shouldn't be having to check the pulse on the patient that often. And even though you check the account, the account hasn't changed much in a day. Okay.

You can now convince yourself that, oh, you're not doing enough. And it forces you to drive more, to work harder, to save more, to do that. And I think this is where the challenge is. One of the reasons that when we start to build the money machine master plans with our clients one on one, when we're starting to, we do those things, we build in joy points, we make sure that, we test it, we make sure that they understand it. You know, let me give you one last example and then let's get into some of the other things. This was an entrepreneur, a 35 year old young lady entrepreneur, financially stable, but she refused to invest in growing her business. She was very scared to do it because she was, she thought that it would put her risk because she would take on a little bit of debt and, and everything. And what she was really doing is hoarding cash and living so frugally, skipping vacations, quality time with friends. She wasn't doing it, she wasn't enjoying. And here's what was leading to, okay, because I, I've, I'm watching this happen and unfold in front of my eyes, but it started to create feelings of isolation and burnout. Now you might relate to some of these, you might relate to pieces of these. And I want you to understand that this isn't an existence that you have to live. This isn't a necessity in your financial journey when you start to, to realize how do you do that? So let's talk about how do you know if you have some elements of money dysmorphia? What does that look like? What do you do to conquer it? And how do you make sure that it no longer controls you and everything? Because I think money dysmorphia is really, really sneaky. Okay? It, like, it shows up in this, this like persistent little worry, this little nagging that might be in the background, this unease about finances that maybe.

You'Re not sure even when you look at the bank account, you sit back and say, yeah, it looks good, but what happens at this? And you start playing the what if games. Here's some signs that, that maybe that exist. One is if there's this constant worry about running out of money. Even when you have adequate savings and income in place. So you have a stable income streams, you have a history of income streams, all those things are in place. You have your peace of mind fund, as we call it in the wealth priority ladder. You have liquidity to take care of you, yet you're still worried about running out of money. Look.

I'm human and I've lived this game and I live this way too. Because I was running a lot to build my business. I was speaking all around the country. I was taking on projects, I was working late nights. I kept working with this nagging, nagging thing in the background of what if the next project doesn't come in?

What if I don't get paid on a project? What if that this is the last time that they hire me and I got no more income? All of that, this is, was the constant worrying. I mean, so I am, I was someone that was victimized by dysmorphia of my own doing. And so what that did then is, is I had this constant worry for, for a while, until I understood this Until I dug into the work that I do today to help people just like you, to. To grab hold of the finances and to make it. I didn't understand some of the elements of it, but it led to maybe the second characteristic of reluctance to spend unnecessary things. I literally heard about someone that would wear layers of jackets indoors instead of turning on the heater. They lived in the Northeast, which gets really freaking cold out there, okay. And would not turn on the heater, but would wear layered jackets indoors just to save money. This reluctance to spend. Maybe you're going to that perspective, but more importantly, it's reluctance to spend on things that are necessary. Medical care, home repairs.

And things that you need. But also things that you should like, experiences, vacations, when you know that they're affordable for you. This is. This is a challenge. And it's one of the reasons that when we create plans with our clients or in our programs, we in. We embed at least three joy points, sustainable joy points, into the plan because we need to train ourselves to, one, experience the joy. Two, to be able to spend without guilt and shame and to be in a way that is planned and that works within the plan. Okay? So. So the first two, constant worry, reluctance to spend. And the third one is an obsession around checking budgets and accounts. If you are constantly checking your accounts, logging in, checking your accounts, logging in, checking it, what's the, you know, what was my count out today? You know, why did it go down $20? This is what that's doing is. It's. It's leading to feelings of guilt, it's leading to feel to. To stress, it's leading to. To angst around small items, small expenses, like you're standing in line. And I know that, you know, my dear, dear friend talked about the latte factor, and I think it takes out. It's taken out of context. But if you're at a point where you're in line stressing about the croissant you're going to get because of the cost of it, we might have an obsession about something. Now, maybe we should be stressing about the croissant. And should we be eating that first? I don't know. But the bottom line is this. If there's this obsession of constantly checking budgets, checking accounts, there is. There's an unhealthy element to it. If we're doing it too often leads to the fourth thing that I think is a sign that might be there, and that is the inability to enjoy financial achievements. This one's huge, especially for entrepreneurs out there. When you pay off debt when you hit a savings goal, when you get a raise and you do and accomplish a milestone, do you celebrate it? One of the reasons, one of the things I'll do with clients when they get a windfall or they get a bonus, I don't want them to put it all away, I want them to put the majority of it away. But I want to make sure that they always take a slice of it off for celebration. We have to enjoy the journey to financial freedom, otherwise we'll never enjoy the destination of financial freedom because we don't know how to. We didn't train ourselves to. All we trained ourselves to was to hoard, save, accomplish, acquire, achieve. And I mean there's not the, there is joy in it, but there isn't sustainable joy in it because once you looked at the number, then what if the number doesn't go up every day? It's stressing you the hell out.

That's the thing. So if any of these sound familiar, there may be some elements of money dysmorphia at play here. And it impacts you no matter what age or stage of life. Think about this if you're an older adult, and I'm not going to try to define older adults because I don't want to put myself in that category, but.

The thing with older adults, especially when you start to transition into, into retirement where there is fixed incomes and we don't have a lot of income coming in or we're on, we're not earning income anymore, you feel financially constrained and this leads to a worry just like it happened with my mom around, health care costs and what if I live too long? And then they're reflecting on the memories of other financial hardships during their life which amplify those fears. And so in older adults you start to couple your life existence, the longevity of it compared to the cost of the existence and what you have. And it causes stress, which clearly at any age is not healthy. But at an older age it's even less healthy, if you will, and everything now but, but also younger adults, it shows up there. And this is a result less about the longevity of life because. And healthcare costs and all that stuff like in older adults, but more about comparison. It's more about the social media, the economic volatility, the, the things that they see, the experiencing of rising living costs and, and student loan debt that maybe you're carrying or there's in the job market. And so you've got this insecurity around your future and, and what it holds for you and so you've got this pressure of keeping up and, and all of this starts to lead to irrational financial fears that end up in a situation where you start to not go out with your friends, not spend any money. Not now. I'm not saying to go spend. I am saying to do it with a plan, follow a system, follow a process. If you don't have one, get my book building your money machine because it'll give whole recipe to move to financial freedom and do it the right way. But what I'm getting at is when we start to become irrational in the way that we define things and do things in doing that. And the impact of that is huge. First on a couple of places. One is our mental health for sure. Constant financial anxiety. 72% of the people say.

American Psychological association said 72% of the people are stressed about money and 22% are extremely stressed about money. Your mental health is affected by this. Financial anxiety will lead to chronic stress. It'll lead to lack of sleep, which leads to other things. And in severe cases it can push you into depression and anxiety disorders and other elements that affect our mental health. Guilt, shame, low self esteem, you name gets attached to the finances if we're not careful if and allow that financial anxieties to live in our life. So mental health is affected, financial behaviors are affected. Believe it or not, what it does is money dysmorphia will allow will get people to become impulsive with their financial decisions. So you'll either go to one extreme of overspending or the addict screen extreme of underspending and avoiding investing. And it can lead to debt and credit troubles. It can lead to bad emotional decisions around money because of the stress that's driving it. And then the fourth place that it impacts us is in our relationships. You start to separate yourself. You avoid social events, maybe you avoid family gatherings. There may be other reasons to avoid family gatherings, you know, or experiences that. And what this does is it starts to create this feeling of isolation and strain in personal relationships. Friends don't ask you to do things anymore. They say oh he's he or she's always going to say no. Family may, may feel pushed away and, and listen.

As much as we like stuff, we're human beings and we need human connection. And if the money is getting in the way or the stress around the money is get in the way of our ability to connect with people, to connect with experiences, It's a problem. It's a problem. I truly believe that financial wellness is the missing link between Mental wellness and physical wellness. Because until we get financially well, we can't get the other two, which is the fourth element. Your physical health starts to get impacted because you start to make fear based decisions. Postponing medical treatments, possibly neglecting health related expenses, maybe you don't join the gym and you don't work out now because of it that have lasting long term effects on your physical well being if we're not careful. And so I think it affects people at all income levels in all areas of life, no mattering what your economic struggle, struggles are, whatever, no matter what your past financial hardships are, especially when you start to look at comparison in the social media world, swiping up the perfect lives of people on social media and in the media. So how do we deal with this and not allow it to control our lives? I think that there's a couple things to do and if we're going to address it, I think the first thing to do is to acknowledge it. To simply say it is to acknowledge the fear. That's the first step is to recognize that there's some irrational nature to the fear. And the way I will have people do it sometimes is to write down their thoughts, write down their emotions, write down what they're feeling to start to track and see the patterns of fear based decisions or behaviors that might in play, be in play. Okay, because it's going to help you when you start to do that, it's going to help you differentiate between what's real financial challenges and we all have them and those that are anxiety driven concerns. More so like I hear people, if I invest in the stock market, I could lose everything. Okay, now if you invest in a single company, yes, you could lose everything because a company can go under. But if I invest, if you invest and follow the investing rules that I have in place and you're investing in a diversified portfolio the proper way, maybe you have, you're vested in an ETF that's got 500 or a thousand companies in it. Surely a couple of them are going to go, go to zeros. Surely a couple of them are going to go that aren't going to go so well, but the majority of them are going to do fine. And in fact the stock market goes up 8 out of 10 years. And so when you start to look at it and say, you know, am I allowing something that's completely irrational, like I invested in 500 companies, all of them go to zero, y'. All. If 500 companies on the, on the, on the stock market go to zero, at the same time, say the S&P 500, the biggest companies, if that happens, we're living in Armageddon. Something else is going on and we, we're, we're having to deal with that. So it's those kinds of things that I think that we need to separate from, from true real financial challenges to something that's anxiety driven but not founded in the reality of what's there. So the first is acknowledging the fear and the second will help with that. And that is to make sure that you educate yourself and get, and increase your financial literacy.

That means that you get books like mine, Building your money machine, you listen to shows and watch shows like mine. Building your money machine, doing that to be able to raise the level of knowledge and understanding. Understanding. Listen, this is what happened with me. I had an unhealthy.

Anxiety around finances, especially as a single full time dad trying to take care of Jeremy when he was, you know, five and a half, six years old. I had this unhealthy obsession to try and do it, but I was, I was jeopardizing my relationship with him, which clearly he drew a picture which kind of woke me up. But also it was unfounded and unrealistic because I thought there was this extreme. I was either going to go to the moon and be showered with all these gifts, or I was going to the core of the earth and lose everything. No, it's not realistic. But once I understood the fine, the, the principles, the simple money principles that, that I now teach and I understand how the market works, how investing works, how to do it the proper way, the, the level of fear dissipated when the market drops. I'm good because I built it properly. So first is acknowledge the fear. Second is to increase your financial literacy, your understanding. Okay, get curious about. Third is to work with an advisor. Now I'm not saying to hire advisor. Let me just change it to work with a coach, someone that has been there, done that. One of the biggest things that I do with my clients, especially my, my one on one clients or my group clients, is me giving them a rational perspective of what's going on in their financial life. Because here's what we know. You're living your financial journey and it's only one financial journey. Now I have lived my personal financial journey. It's only one financial journey. But I have lived hundreds of other financial journeys through my clients. So I've got hundreds of financial journeys under my belt. You're on there and you're on your first. So I can bring hundreds of financial Journeys, perspective to you, to your life. And so when you get someone that is a financial mentor, a money mentor, a financial coach, an advisor, that is going to help you, one, understand how the numbers work, how the markets work, and do that, and then two, help you build a plan. It's one of the reasons that we do the money machine master plans with our clients is they get the plan, they get to stress this plan and they say, well, what if inflation comes back? Well, we tested it already, here's what happens. What happens if the market drops 20%? Well, we tested it already, here's what happens. So you check it and you test it and we test over and over again to give them the comfort that they have a plan in place that has a high likelihood of success. And it gives you the opportunity to know your finances. And so having someone in your space and place to do that, the, the next one, number four, is to automate it. Okay? Automation takes the emotions out of the decision making process. So automate your bill pays, automate your investing, automate your savings, take the decision out of it, allow it to just go on autopilot. It reduces the friction, it reduces temptation, it reduces comparison and allow the system to work. Okay? When we're working with clients, that's what we're trying to put in place is this automated system that's building their money machine in the background so their money machine can take care of them in their future.

And then the last is to get support. I mean, in extreme cases, it may be something that you need even more support, like, I mean, a therapy support, because the fears are irrational and the negative thoughts and everything around it. So I think that these are the things that you can do to really start driving it. But if you don't, that's where the problem is. Like I said at the beginning, I think all of us have elements and degrees of money dysmorphia where we have that fear. The question is, does it move to irrational? Is it based on irrational assumptions? And sometimes we can't see past that without the help. But addressing money dysmorphia isn't just about financial peace of mind, it's about the quality of your life. If you leave it unchecked and you allow that anxiety to come into your life, it's going to lead to chronic stress, it's going to lead to health issues, it's going to strain your relationships. They say that the second leading cause of divorce is money issues. And I don't think it's the money issues that cause it. It's the inability to deal with it and communicate it, that that is. And so, so if we leave this stuff unchecked, the impact on it is far, far more reaching than just the bank account. Financial freedom isn't about amassing wealth. It is about feeling literally secure enough in your life that, that you are building a life that is of your doing, of your choice, that you get a chance to live life based on your values. Okay? Money dysmorphia doesn't have to limit your happiness or your opportunities. And by tackling it head on, using some of the things that I, I gave you here and in my book, you not only start to secure your financial future, you free yourself to live fully and fully expressed with peace and confidence. I hope, I hope that this helps. I hope that you see that there's a path to take control of your finances. And that part of that path, I hope, is this show. So if you haven't subscribed to the show, I want you to subscribe to the show and share it out. Do this with a friend. Let me know what you're working on. Let me know your thoughts on this. But here's the thing. I am on a crusade in this season of my life to serve and support and get a million families on the path to financial freedom. And I want one of those to be you. And I hope that this episode, you found a value and that it shed some light on maybe some things you're feeling and the realization that you don't need to feel them and you certainly don't need to go through them alone. Okay. And that there is a pathway to get you in control, to master your money, to eliminate financial stress and to live a life of choice. And that's here with me. All right. I look forward to seeing another episode or on the road as I speak and on. On the road to financial freedom. Until the next time, always, always strive to live a life without losing.

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 affair 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 youg 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 Podcasts or wherever you're listening to this podcast and rate and review the show. It helps us 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.