The Real Reason Your Debt Feels So Heavy

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Ep. 214: The Real Reason Your Debt Feels So Heavy

In this episode, I dive into the hidden ways shame and guilt over debt and past spending can do more damage to your finances than the debt itself. I’ll help you shift your mindset, break the cycle of avoidance, and reveal the key step to finally finding peace and personal power with your money. Expect real talk about why traditional strategies alone aren’t enough, the importance of focusing on your net worth – not just debt payoff – and practical exercises to release guilt so you can confidently move forward. Join me to start building an empowering, unstoppable relationship with your money!

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Resources:

What’s The Best Debt Payoff Method: https://aimeecerka.com/147
Money Mindset Playbook – https://aimeecerka.com/mindset
Work With Aimee – https://workwithaimee.com
The Unstoppable Experience – https://aimeecerka.com/unstoppable
Instagram – https://instagram.com/aimeecerka

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Shifting Your Money Mindset: Releasing Shame Around Debt

What if I told you that shame around your debt and spending and past choices is causing more damage to your finances than the debt is itself? If you are carrying around shame about the debt, the spending choices that you’ve made, or regret around decisions that you’ve made in the past, this episode is going to be just for you.

It’s going to help you shift your relationship with debt and it’s going to uncover the one key aspect that so many of my clients finally unlock and they feel like they can move forward with peace, power.

We see so many things change when we make this one shift around our debt and our spending.

Ready?

Let’s get to it.

The Truth About Guilt and Debt

This is the youe Money, you, Life podcast, the show where I help female entrepreneurs go from stress and struggle to unstoppable. Here we blend step by step strategy, mindset, work, and emotional regulation so you can create and unstoppable finances, build an unstoppable business, and truly enjoy your unstoppable life.

It’s time to take my wisdom, my expertise to help you simplify money and go beyond the numbers. I’m your host, Aimee Cerka. Welcome. I’m so glad you’re here.

Welcome back to the Your Money Your Life podcast. I’m your host, Aimee Cerka. Today we are talking about debt and shame around our past spending choices. We’re in kind of a miniseries here talking about money mindset.

So we really laid the foundational work last week, talked a lot about what money mindset is, how it’s formed, give you a quick exercise that you had to do in a.

An intentional manner, not just, you know, checking things off of our to do list.

But today we are challenging probably one of the biggest beliefs that I hear and that I see when it comes to your finances and debt and spending.

Why Shame Hurts Your Finances More Than Debt

Essentially this: we feel, I’ll say we, yeah, but so many of us feel that we should feel guilty about our debt. That means that you made poor choices, that you failed. And a lot of that comes from societal programming, which we talked a little bit about last week.

Again, there’s so many influences that are out there saying that if you’re in debt, debt is bad, debt is evil, you need to do whatever it takes to get out of debt.

You made all these choices, like, what is wrong with you?

We hear all of those things shouted at us again and again and again and again. Okay, but there’s a couple things that we’re going to uncover shift here that shows you why that is not true.

Okay.

Avoidance and Its Impact on Financial Health

When you’re in debt, couple things that I see when we have this lens that we end up doing and that actually causes more harm for your finances.

The first thing is we just avoid looking at our numbers. Whether this is we’re just looking at the bank account and we’re not actually budgeting.

We don’t have a money management system in place personally, business both. Right. Like they’re both there.

Okay. We avoid looking at the debt numbers because even if we’re using a strategy like the debt roll down method and some of those things that I recommend and we’ll put a link in the show notes we’ve talked about like the best debt payoff method so you can check out that episode but make sure you stick through this one first because you need the foundational piece before we can talk about the strategy of how you pay off your debt.

Why Just Having Resources Won’t Fix Everything

Okay. So you can use those things. Smart strategy to have. Right. But when we just give that as a resource and I was actually reviewing some client feedback, you know, voice of client things in the last week or so there’s a client coming to mind and she came to me and she only wanted the budgeting for success worksheets which includes the debt roll down method, the debt payoff. Like it has that in there and it’s a great resource.

But the problem was is she only wanted the resource. So in her feedback I could see where she didn’t have the training and the things that she actually needed to be able to implement it. It was there, I offered it to her but she didn’t take it. And I saw where the transformation didn’t take place because we just stopped with the strategy.

So we end up, we avoid looking at our numbers. Whether that’s your business budget, personal budget, don’t really have a budget. Debt numbers, we don’t look at the debt numbers.

The Trap of Avoidance and Automation

Another way that’s becoming more and more common that I’ve seen is we’re automating things.

Okay. We’ve got all these rules set up and QuickBooks so that you don’t actually have to look at the numbers which you really do need to look at the numbers but we feel like we don’t need to because hey, we’ve got the automations working for us.

Only work.

Another habit or another thing that I see us do when we’re feeling the shame about our spending is again with that avoidance. But it’s like I’ll just, I’ll deal with it when I make more money. I can’t do it right now. We’ll take care of this later.

I’m just putting it off. I’m not looking at it. I’m not doing those things.

The problem is, is you’re still holding on to the guilt that you feel about that spending, that debt, those decisions that you’ve made and we’re trying to punish ourselves.

And this could also be, you know, like impulse spending. Maybe you’re an Amazon shopper or something else. You have that habit that you’ve impulse spent in the past and you’ve done those things and maybe there’s debt around that, or maybe it’s just the decisions, you know, you’ve spent more.

You don’t necessarily have to be in debt. But a large part of the thing that we see is around debt.

Okay, that’s what we’re talking about here.

Breaking the Cycle of Financial Guilt

We also use that guilt as a self punishment. Almost like we’re sacrificing ourselves isn’t the right word, but it’s a punishment that we put on ourselves because it’s like I have to figure out this first to order to earn that support.

I have to do this thing to be able to have the help with this. I have to clean up my numbers before I could have a bookkeeper.

I’ve heard that multiple times. I have to hit this revenue goal in my business before I could hire a business coach, before I could hire a financial coach like we have.

We feel like we have to do this on our own to fix the problem. This is like cleaning before the maid comes, right? We’re trying to fix all these things.

We have to do it ourselves, make it all pretty all neat before we can accept the help. That’s not really how things work, right?

Wanting Progress Without the Shame

So I know you don’t want to feel guilty about the debt, right? You don’t want to feel the shame.

You want to be able to trust yourself to make a decision with your finances, whether it’s investing in a program or something else.

And know that you’re not doing it out of FOMO and you’re doing it from an aligned place. It’s actually the right decision from you.

You’re not operating out of that fear and the scarcity. Because who wants to operate like that?

And then we do want to get rid of the debt, right? Like we want it to be gone, but we want that progress, that support the financial progress, those things.

We want it to actually last because so many times we end up that we. Yo yo finance. Have you heard of yo yo dieting?

Why Quick Fixes Don’t Work

This is why we don’t work. We don’t focus on our debt payoff.

Okay, before we get to that, before we get into the specifics on that, though, if you’re ready to stop letting guilt and shame run the show, make sure you grab my Money Mindset playbook. It’s absolutely free.

Today is only scratching the surface of what we cover inside the playbook. And it’s going to help you start shifting those beliefs and emotions around. Money, debt, so many different things beyond so that you can feel clear, be aligned, make these decisions from a place of clarity and strength, not fear and stress and overwhelm or things that aren’t even really actually your beliefs.

Simply head to aimeecerka.com/mindset. And of course, that link’s gonna be hanging out in the show notes for you as well.

Now let’s talk about why we don’t focus on our debt payoff. I started to say, you know, we. Yo, yo finance.

The Yo-Yo Effect in Finances

Okay, so, yo, yo, dieting. Have you gone on a diet before? And the whole time you’re on the diet, you’re doing good, you look good, you’re losing the weight, all the things, right?

So you’ve lost the weight, but then the diet ends and that chocolate chip cookie or the chocolate cake or whatever it might be, you don’t like chocolate. It’s the appealing chocolate chip cookie this whole time that you end up, you eat it, right?

And over time, what happens because we went on this hardcore focus, this sprint, we end up that we gain all the weight back and then some. Normally we gain more, right?

So we’re starting off in a worse spot again because we did not build a sustainable habit. It was a binge fix. We tried to fix it. It didn’t work.

We are building a lifestyle of financial literacy, of unstoppable finances, of an unstoppable life, unstoppable business. All those things that we do inside the unstoppable experience, right?

That’s the goal here. It’s not a quick fix. And that’s really what my client, who grabbed the budgeting for success worksheets, which are fantastic, they work.

But the strategy there, the tool alone, what was not fixing the problem because we didn’t address where we were at the habit, the lifestyle.

Focusing on Net Worth, Not Just Debt

Okay, the solution is really rather quite simple. There’s a couple things here we’re going to cover, but the first thing, instead of focusing on paying off your debt, we’re going to focus on your net worth, because your net worth is your true financial picture of where you’re at.

As you pay off debt, your net worth is going to grow as you grow assets in your business, in your personal life, all of those things, net worth is going to grow.

So it’s reflected on both sides. It’s the true financial picture of where you’re at.

So, yes, we have the tactical strategy to pay off the debt, but that’s not the focus. The focus is your net worth.

All right, second thing. Now we’ve got the shift in the focus. Let’s talk about, like, that’s the action step moving forward.

And then we’ve got a couple things here that we got to talk about. Because debt is a loaded word, right?

Stop Wasting Energy on the Past

The feeling guilty and the shame and everything that you’re carrying around from this decision that you’ve made in the past, whether it was a right or wrong decision, it doesn’t matter.

The point is, this decision is in the past.

There is absolutely nothing you can do in this moment to change that.

Okay?

Nothing you can do to change it. So why are you wasting energy, mind space, happiness?

You’re letting it steal your happiness in life because of a decision that you’ve made in the past that you absolutely cannot change.

There’s no point in that.

What we can do now moving forward is we work on our mindset, we work on our the Energetics piece integration so you can stand firm in your personal power and make decisions moving forward from a place of confidence instead of the scarcity and the lack and the fear and all those things show up.

Okay? That’s the first thing you can do, right?

Turning Regret Into Growth

The second thing, and this is a very powerful exercise, especially if you have, like, a bigger purchase. Maybe it was a program you invested in and it wasn’t really quite the right fit.

Now, I absolutely believe you should honor obligations. So if you purchase something and you’re still paying on it, and you know it wasn’t the right thing, and you’ve realized that.

Absolutely. Go through this exercise, but from an energetic perspective with doing this from a place of integrity and honoring the commitments that we’ve made.

Right?

Okay, but if you’ve made a purchase that you regret, right. Or you feel like it wasn’t the aligned fit, whatever that might be, I want you to go through and write down five things where it was a benefit.

How could this be a pivotal moment in your story, in the movie of your life? You know, that moment where things change and that comeback starts?

What was that moment for you? What did this purchase allow for you to do? What were the benefits of it? What did you learn?

Did you learn the difference between being forced into a decision at a FOMO and standing in your personal power, did you learn that you don’t want to operate that way?

This is. It was very clear to you, that’s not how I operate my business. That’s not how I want to operate.

What was it? And this might take a little bit of time, a little bit of contemplation.

If you’ve got a lot of energy and guilt and shame stored around this, this might take a little bit.

If you know EFT tapping, I would highly recommend that you sit here and you tap.

And when you’re tapping, you just talk through this. Like, I feel so guilty about this purchase.

I feel like I shouldn’t have done this. I shouldn’t have done this. This is what’s going on.

And just speak those emotions that you’re feeling and you can go to that dark space, those inner thoughts, the inner critic. Give that voice when you’re tapping because it’s clearing that trapped emotion there.

Okay, so focusing on our net worth instead of the debt payoff, we have the debt payoff strategy, not the focus we’re clearing.

Claiming Your Power Over Money

Shame, guilt. We’re not going to feel guilty over our purchases in the past.

And the third part here, I really want to speak and show you the difference.

Like, do you know how powerful it is? How incredible is it?

Like, how incredible are you as a person that you were able to spend money that you don’t have?

Like, what kind of magic power do you have that you were able to do that you’re able to spend $20,000, whatever the amount might be, Maybe it’s more, maybe it’s $100,000, maybe it’s less.

Only $5,000, whatever it might be.

And it. And I said only.

But the amount doesn’t matter what you feel inside this big thing, this air quote mistake that you’ve made.

Think about the power in that, that you are able to create, receive in this amount without paying for it first.

And if you’re a match to receive that, wouldn’t you be a match for the income if you’ve received the $20,000, why wouldn’t you.

Like you’re a match for $20,000 in debt. Why wouldn’t you be a match for $20,000 in revenue?

You are. And we have to see that power that we have and those things that we are receiving, giving. And we’re going to talk more about that next week, the different channels and the way that works.

But think about the amazing power that you have that you can do that.

And we’re spending all this time beating ourselves up Beating ourselves up over this decision, that’s not going to do you any good.

Look at it in the lens of your power, your success, all that you’re capable of.

Okay.

Removing Meaning and Creating Possibility

And the final thing that I’ll leave you with, it’s almost like a caveat.

Again, we’re going to link to that. What budgeting or what debt payoff method should you use Episode so that you can check that out and see the differences, because I have some recommendations.

But again, it’s personalized to you, your situation.

But the thing that trips up so many people as we go through this plan and we look at it and it’s like, oh, it’s going to take me 36 months to pay off all this debt. It’s going to take me two years to pay off this.

Picking numbers like it feels like it’s going to take forever to get out of this debt. That’s looking at it from the practical solution.

If we go back to the magic and the power of you were able to spend this money that you didn’t have yet, what if you could receive an entire amount too?

What if $5,000 showed up for you tomorrow? What would that be? Then the debt’s going to go that much faster.

So looking at it from this is the tactical strategy that we’re working on, but it’s another layer of removing the meaning.

Because if we look at the. This is what the numbers looks like, it’s going to feel impossible, but we have to look at the strategy, do the strategy without getting attached to like, we’re going to be stuck here.

We. We have to find that. That magic portion of it.

What if. What if this showed up tomorrow?

And you know what? It might not. And the other part of that is not letting yourself get taken out and beating yourself up if it doesn’t show up, but knowing that the magic can exist.

It could happen. It doesn’t have to take that long.

And really the other caveat is if it does, like, you’re going to be okay.

Support for Your Financial Journey

All right, this got much more deep than I thought it would be. But this is such a passion topic for me. It’s probably one of the key things that clients come to me for and we shift for them and we see the biggest breakthroughs.

So if this conversation hit home, if you are done carrying guilt for your past money decisions and you’re ready to shift how you think, feel, and act around money, the next step for you to is to grab the money mindset playbook.

It’s completely free and it’s designed to help you uncover some of these patterns and beliefs that keep you stuck and begin building that unstoppable relationship with money that actually feels safe and empowering.

Totally focused on the money mindset work.

But if you’re like, Aimee, that was so good. If you’re ready to go deeper for ongoing support to fully rewire your financial identity, the way that we operate with the tactical strategy, the mindset work, the beliefs that we have, and then the energetics who you are while you’re doing those things, that is exactly the work that we do inside the Unstoppable Experience.

You do not have to do this alone. You’re not meant to do this alone.

And I’d love to walk alongside with you.

So grab the money mindset playbook at aimeecerka.com/mindset or join me inside the Unstoppable Experience.

Let’s work together for the next 12 months. That’s going to be aimeecerka.com/unstoppable. Both those links are going to be in the show notes below.

We’ll see you next time when we’re going to talk about the difference between receiving and giving and the way that we mess those up all the time as entrepreneurs.

So we’ll see you then.

Ready for More Financial Freedom?

You’re struggling with shame and guilt around your finances. Whether it’s debt impulse, spending, mistakes from the past, or the fact that you still haven’t hit your income goal, then it’s time for you to work with me.

There are different levels of support and price points that you can use on the path to removing that guilt and shame so you can step into your unstoppable life.

After all, your finances are unique to you and your support should be too.

Go to workwithaimee.com to get started with one of my most popular programs.

Or you can book a Q and A call with me. Figure out what your next step should be.

And of course, all those links are hanging out in the show notes as well.