330 | Rewind: When You’ve Tried Everything

Do you feel like you’ve tried everything to get your money under control, and nothing has worked?

Many lawyers tell me some version of this statement. It’s a very common sentiment, but it’s also one of the most unhelpful things you can tell yourself when you’re working to achieve your money goals.

In this episode, let’s talk about the actual belief underlying this statement, why it’s holding you back from achieving your goals, and what to do instead.

• • the true belief underlying the statement “I’ve tried everything”

  • how you approach your goal believing you’ve tried everything

  • why believing you’ve tried everything is so unhelpful

  • what to do if you find yourself in this place of believing you’ve tried everything

Episode 70: Your Money Is Not Happening to You

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You’re listening to Personal Finance for Lawyers. I’m Rho Thomas, and as a busy wife, mom, and former Biglaw associate, I know all too well the tension between the culture of the legal profession and pretty much everything else you want to do in life. That’s why each week, I’m bringing you the information and tools you need to improve your money mindset and manage your money to create true wealth. Because ultimately, it’s not about the money. It’s about the freedom and flexibility the money affords.

Hey friend. Welcome back.

Today I’m bringing you a rewind episode. I wanted to revisit this episode because oftentimes we tell ourselves that we have tried everything, we’re doing everything we can, and it’s still not working.

This episode will help you to reframe your thinking around that, if you’ve ever told yourself something like that with respect to your finances or anything else in life. So please enjoy this rewind episode, “When You’ve Tried Everything.”

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So many lawyers tell me some version of “I feel like I’ve tried everything and nothing’s working.” And I want to address it here because it’s one of the most unhelpful things you can tell yourself when you’re learning to manage your money.

When you tell yourself that you’ve tried everything and still haven’t figured out your finances or gotten a handle on your money, what you’re really telling yourself is that it’s impossible for you to achieve your money goal. If you don’t believe it’s even possible for you to do something, how are you going to approach that thing?

You’re probably not going to even take steps to try to do it. Or you may try something, but you don’t give it your full effort because you’re going in expecting to fail, looking for when it’s gonna stop working. That is not how you achieve a goal, my friend. That is exactly how you ensure you don’t achieve your goal.

And when you’re telling yourself you’ve tried everything and nothing is working, one thing I know for sure you haven’t tried is changing your mindset. The way you’re thinking about managing your money and your ability to do it is the biggest reason you haven’t been able to make the progress you want. Again, because you’re telling yourself it’s basically impossible.

It’s important to be really honest with yourself about that statement, “I’ve tried everything.” Because if that were true, then that would mean that there’s nothing you can do. Where do you go from there?

You would be completely powerless to do anything to change your situation. And we both know that’s not true, right? If you had tried literally everything, then you’d have the financial situation you want or be well on your way to creating it.

And if you don’t have that, it means you have not tried everything. It’s kind of like what we talked about with putting your finances outside of your control as if it’s just happening to you. As if you don’t have to actually do the things that you need to do to achieve what you want. To be able to stop overspending or save the money or pay off the debt or whatever your goal is.

Let’s be real. All the things work. Every kind of budget out there, every kind of money management system, every debt strategy, they all work for somebody. And when you’re talking about the things that you’ve tried that have not worked, you have to remember that the common denominator in all of it is you.

What is it that you’re doing or not doing to make it not work for yourself? What is it that you are not seeing that the people it works for are seeing? How are you looking at the things you’ve tried versus the way people those things have worked for are looking at them?

One example I know I’ve talked about before, is with budgeting. When people make a budget and then they get off track one month, and they just throw the whole budget away. It typically takes time to get on top of your budget, especially if you haven’t been budgeting before. It takes time to really get a handle on your spending.

You might create a budget and blow it the first month, maybe even the second month. But if you keep going and don’t tell yourself, oh well, it’s just not working. I might as well give up. Then eventually you’re going to get it and you’ll be able to manage your money the way you want and have money to achieve your goals.

If you’ve truly tried everything, there’s nothing more for you to try. Vs. “Okay. I’ve tried these things. Let me evaluate why they haven’t worked. What is it that I’m missing here?”

Instead of looking at all the things you’ve done, that haven’t worked, try looking at what else you could be doing, looking at something else you can try, looking at how you could approach something you’ve already done differently. It’s never helpful to tell yourself you’ve tried everything because you literally haven’t. There are plenty of things that you haven’t tried.

Are you willing to keep going and try 10 more things? 20 more things? How much more are you willing to try to achieve the goal that you have? If you’re not willing to try anything else, that’s fine. But don’t tell yourself that you’ve tried everything, and there’s nothing else to try. Be honest with yourself that it’s a choice you’re making not to try new things.

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All right, I hope you enjoyed that rewind episode, and I hope it helps you to reframe your thinking and just think about things a little bit differently. If you would like help with your finances, apply for a coaching session at rhothomas.com/apply.

All right, that is it for this week’s episode. Please take a second and share this episode with a friend or two who you think could use this information. That is how we spread it to all the lawyers so that we can all get our finances in order and achieve more freedom. And as always, I appreciate your support.

As we close out, friend, I pray that you take the information you learn here, apply it in your life, and open up to the realization that wealth is available to you. As you do that consistently, week after week, you’ll continue to take steps to take back control of your time, build wealth, and live the life of freedom and choice you deserve. Talk to you later.