Your Money, Your Rules | Financial Freedom, Money Management, Scarcity Mindset, Budgeting, Financial Planning

104 | Budgeting & Money Mindset Skills Women Entrepreneurs Wish They Knew Sooner

• Erin Gray | Financial Coach, Former Certified Financial Planner and CFO

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What if everything you’ve been taught about money — earning, saving, and investing — is only half the story?

In this episode, we explore the emotional side of money: the beliefs, patterns, and inner narratives that silently shape your financial reality. Because truthfully, most financial stress isn’t about the numbers — it’s about our relationship with money.

Even those who are “financially stable” often experience guilt, fear, and avoidance. Why? Because traditional education taught us how to handle money logically and practically, but never emotionally. 

In this episode I discuss:

  • The early childhood beliefs (before age 7) that secretly drive your financial behavior
  • Why having “enough” doesn’t stop money anxiety — and what does
  • How to create regular CEO-style money check-ins to feel empowered, not overwhelmed
  • Breaking cycles of scarcity, guilt, and fear through embodied financial practices
  • The problem with postponing joy until retirement — and how to start living now
  • Building wealth and spending in alignment with what matters to you
  • How to shift your financial legacy by changing the way you relate to money

Your relationship with money can shift not only your present experience — but also the trajectory for generations to come. And it starts with awareness, consistency, and new beliefs that support ease, trust, and abundance.

Want to learn more? Here are your next steps:

Step 1: Join my FREE Facebook Community.

Connect, share, and learn how to master your money with other women just like you.

➡️ Join here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/941450038160915

Step 2: Grab your FREE Human Design chart

Curious what your Human Design chart reveals about how you're uniquely designed to make aligned financial decisions?

➡️ Get your chart here: https://generatealifewelllived.com/receive-your-human-design-chart

Step 3: Ready to transform your relationship with money and build true financial confidence?

Let’s create a strategy that feels aligned, intentional, and empowering—just for you.

➡️ Schedule your 1-hour Money Mastery Call here: https://generatealifewelllived.com/11-support

Money doesn't have to feel overwhelming. Let's create a strategy that feels nurturing and custom to you.

From my soul to yours,

Erin

Erin Gray:

Today we're diving into something so many of us can probably relate to the financial skills that we should have been taught and weren't. If you've ever felt like you're just figuring out money as you go, I want you to know that you are not alone. Most of us were not taught how to manage money, grow our wealth and feel confident in our financial decisions. I want you to know it's never too late to learn, and in this episode we're going to break down the most important financial skills you wish you were taught and how to start mastering them now. Do you want to create a system to stop avoiding your money? Maybe you're feeling guilt and shame when it comes to finances. Welcome to your Money, your Rules.

Erin Gray:

I'm Erin, a former certified financial planner and CFO, and yet I used to avoid my money and had fear, no matter how much we had. I can't wait to teach you how I overcame my money avoidance and started consistently managing my finances in a really simple way. It's time to get comfortable with money. Are you in a place where you have enough money in the bank, yet it still never feels like enough? From the outside, everything may look fine, your net worth is solid and you're on track, and yet you still feel uncertain, anxious and out of control. I want you to know, I used to be in the same exact place as you are. We had plenty, yet I lived in constant fear of losing it all or not saving enough for the future, even though logic and my financial account said otherwise. The truth is, I was really terrified of my own money. I avoided looking at my balances or went into hypervigilance, restricting spending unnecessarily. The fear of making those wrong moves kept me paralyzed, and I was trapped in a mindset of not enough, even when I had more than enough. It wasn't until I realized that the issue wasn't the money itself. It was my mindset around it. That is when everything began to shift. I understood my money on a practical level, but I never had allowed myself to actually feel at peace with it. I had to stop seeing it as something that could slip away at any moment and instead began using it as a tool for empowerment and growth. So if you're ready to stop letting fear control your financial decisions and start using your wealth to create more freedom, opportunity and confidence, I would love to support you. Head over to my website, generatealifewelllivedcom and click the link. Work with me to schedulea call today.

Erin Gray:

I know I've said on previous podcasts that I think that, especially as women, you know us not knowing about money was done on purpose. You know from the school systems, from society at large, and this is something that I'm really passionate about because I think that this was done intentionally. So we didn't, you know, to maintain control. So we didn't know, so we didn't feel empowered. And I know how much financial knowledge I have taken, either through college or just learning, you know, on the job, training and just learning on my own. And and it wasn't probably until about, I don't know, a couple of years ago that how little I knew about actually like feeling wealthy and generating money on my own terms from a place of joy and abundance. You know, I knew, I always knew how to make money, not with ease, um, but I didn't know how to manage it or grow it or feel confident from a place of ease and trust, and I think that this is a skillset that isn't being taught. I think there's lots of strategy, tactics on how to grow your money, but we're not talking how to do it with ease and flow and joy and trust.

Erin Gray:

You know my dad he always instilled in me to work hard to save and invest, especially, you know, like in my 401k. I remember I was working at the hospital when I thought I wanted to go to medical school and I think it was. I was about to hit 21 and at 21, typically most plans 401k plans I know in the hospitals they're called 403Bs same kind of thing, just different in the tax code, let's just call it a 401k that I was able to start investing at 21. That's when I started investing in my 401k. So he taught me to start saving and investing and to keep debt minimal or no debt, and those are skill sets that served me really well. He allowed me to generate my wealth, to be able to, like I said, take time off with my family, but I don't know if he ever sat me down to teach me how to do all of that with ease and joy and trust.

Erin Gray:

And I know in my financial planning classes nobody taught me how to do that. And I have such compassion for him because how could he if he wasn't experiencing that for himself? Right, like we can't teach what we don't embody and know, and so if you're coming from a place of generating money from hustle, working hard, a lot of hours, you know, from lack. How can you teach that to anyone else? Which is why I think we have a duty as women this always makes me cry to master this stuff so that we can teach this to our kids, because the last time I checked, nobody's teaching this stuff in the school system, and I think we have an opportunity as parents moms to shift the entire trajectory of our children's lives by changing how we think and feel with our money.

Erin Gray:

You know nobody's actually talking about. How do we create create, you know, financial freedom beyond just saving for retirement. How do we manage our money without feeling overwhelmed and guilty? How do we make financial decisions that feel empowering instead of stressful? Like this is not stuff that most. Maybe it's coming around because you have more people who are connected and their consciousness has has risen. But I don't think a lot of the financial industry is really talking about how to do, how to do the tactical 3d part, how to build your wealth and marrying the 5d of with ease, with trust, with love and appreciation. And I think one of the biggest ones is how do we actually trust ourselves with our money and our financial decisions?

Erin Gray:

We're taught from a very early age right To outsource our decision-making, ask someone else, ask them what they think right, ask our parents, ask our teachers, ask our friends. But like, how often are we training ourselves? Like, what do we want? We're taught to ask our CPA, our financial planner, bank keeper, bookkeepers, you know, and what their opinion is, and they hold that. That advice is valuable, right, and it has merit. But what we tend to not do is we don't then run it through our filter before our final decision is made, right. There have been times where I've been working with the CPA and I have said they have suggested one way and I'm like well, the tax code said it's this and it's up to interpretation and so challenging, versus just taking verbatim of what they say as like fact.

Erin Gray:

And I want to encourage you that, even though that maybe we weren't taught these skills, that doesn't mean you can't learn them now. You know, I always say if we can figure out how to be a parent, we can definitely figure out how to be with our money. And if you aren't a parent, you know it still applies to you. There are things that you have figured out in your life that you didn't know beforehand, that you know now, and we can totally do this with money. So I'm gonna go through and name the. You know let's just call it top financial skills that I wish that we were taught. And then how do we get to learn them now? So one, how to confidently manage cashflow. You know, a lot of times when I talk to women they will look at their bank balance or not. Actually, they won't look at their bank balance, they just hope for the best, or they'll look at it and then they'll just see what they have in their account. And I think you know true financial confidence comes from knowing exactly what's coming in and going out right, knowing your numbers in your financial life excuse me, in your personal life and also your business. So you can create.

Erin Gray:

I always say I have CEO time on Mondays at 10 AM. I also have weekend check-ins with my personal money. You know, create a CEO money check-in. Create, like, what kind of check-in do you want to create for yourself, for your business and your personal finances, where you review your income and your expenses every month? I always recommend you know for clients that they start here, like I think you should start.

Erin Gray:

If you're not doing it on a consistent basis, I think you need to be doing it on a weekly basis, or maybe even daily, because there's a reason why you're not doing it. And so it gives you the opportunity, like, think about if you were to check it every day. That gives you seven times a week to check in with your body. And what are you feeling? What are those emotions and sensations that you're feeling with your body? That as you're checking your bank account, as you're looking at your numbers, and what we also want to do is get to a place of neutrality, so when you open up your bank account, you aren't feeling that jarring feeling in your body.

Erin Gray:

Okay, so we're building up our capacity with our nervous system to just be with our money, and this is a skillset of being the person who looks and pays attention to her money. Right, who is the woman that pays attention to her money? We always say we want more money, but are we taking care of the money that we have now? Sometimes the answer is no. It's not a place where we need to shame and guilt ourselves if that's the answer, and also we can do differently right? Who's the person that, whatever number you're wanting to have, how is she interacting with her money? She has to start doing that right now. You know we're taught to work for money right, trading our time for dollars versus creating income streams and assets that will fund our lifestyle. You know, I think business is one of our biggest assets because it's our mind right, our mindset, our systems in place, our assets that we're building, that that is a big asset for us.

Erin Gray:

You know there are other types of investments, like the stock market or real estate or whatever else you might be investing in, but I just want to encourage you to get curious, like what types of investments do you actually want to become interested in? I used to invest in the stock market and that is one of the ways that we generated our wealth, and that is one of the ways that we generated our wealth. And then, once I started to kind of diving in more to the stock market, who's actually controlling some of those bigger stocks, how it really works, all the behind the scenes I don't know right now if that's a strategy that I want to continue to use. Moving forward, may I will. I maybe possibly make a different decision in six months or a year, yes, but at the time currently, as I record this, april 2025, we've decided to use our money, I should say, or invest our money a little bit differently, just because of the way that the stock market has been. So start with basic stuff, right?

Erin Gray:

Ask your financial planner questions that you may not understand. Make them explain why they have you in these specific funds. How often are they reallocating for you? What is their plan and your plan for these investments? How are they tax favorable, like? There's so many questions that you get to ask because they are working with you. And if you're like, oh, I don't wanna do that, I don't enjoy that, then I have to ask you, why are you investing that way then? If that doesn't light you up, if you're not excited about it, then what do you wanna invest in that feels really good? Are you investing in the market because someone said that's what you should do, or are you investing in the market because you love it and you're genuinely curious about it and you want to learn more?

Erin Gray:

The third one is just how to break free from scarcity mindset. I know I feel like sometimes I'm like talking like a broken record, but I think that this is so important because if you grew up hearing things like it's so expensive or we can't afford that, then those beliefs you know, basically, between the time that we're born until about age seven or eight, we are just absorbing. So everything from everyone around us, obviously our parents, cause we're with them the most. So those beliefs that just went into our subconscious up until age seven, if we aren't aware of them, that's the program that we're running and that is what will create our financial reality. So, starting now, rewiring your mindset right, questioning those old beliefs, finding evidence of the opposite that is true, replacing them with more sufficient and abundant ways of thinking. Become the watcher of your thoughts, right? We have, we're the only species that has the ability to actually think about what we're thinking about, right? So become that person who thinks about what you're thinking about and what your body is actually feeling when you interact with your money.

Erin Gray:

Start practicing daily new thoughts that are conducive to a woman that not only has the money in her bank account and investments, but truly feels wealthy. What does wealth actually feel like in your body? Not how much you have in your bank account and then I'm wealthy. What does that actually feel like in your body with ease? Number four is you know how do we get to start spending guilt-free, right, and still build our wealth. I think so often we're taught to either save everything or it's like this pendulum swing right Either there are some of us that like spend recklessly or just without awareness I don't want to say recklessly, but we spend without awareness or there's those of us that really save and invest a lot or over save and there's a balance right.

Erin Gray:

Spending with intention is key, creating a values-based spending plan where your money flows towards what matters to you. And I really like to look at it as my money flows. My money flows on things that I care about. Right, and think about that trickle effect of when I use my money. Let's just say, if you go out to eat and you spend time with your family, my money is. Let's just say, if you go out to eat and you spend like time with your family, like my money is getting to circulate because I got to spend time with my family, the server had helped us and that money gets to go to them and then they get to use it in a way that feels fun for them.

Erin Gray:

So really starting to spend your money in ways that you find value and they're going to look different, you know, than someone else's, or even your, even your spouses, and that's okay, I think, allowing yourself, each of you, to have your own spending plan on things that you value. So maybe it's starting small If you're someone who never spends money on themselves. I was talking to a girlfriend and she's like I don't know if she said she'd never gotten a pedicure or she just hasn't gotten one in years. But if that's something that's important to you and you're not doing, starting to do that on a consistent basis, allocating funds so that you can spend that money guilt-free. So obviously, be kind to your nervous system. If you're not spending any money and then you want to start spending $1,000 a month, that may be too big of a jump, right? But maybe $100 a month for each of you to see how that feels Just start doing it. Start using and allocating some amount of money for you that you get to have just for you, same thing with your spouse, and what this will do is you'll see really quickly what stories you have around spending on yourself and not your kids, right? I think a lot of times we have mom guilt, which is a social construct completely made up, but we have mom guilt around spending on ourselves and not our kids, and that's going to bring up those feelings, those lower vibration emotions of feeling shame or guilt, and that is coming up to be healed, to be transcended and worked through right. It's an invitation for you to go deeper and to see what stories and beliefs here that are creating this feeling of shame and guilt.

Erin Gray:

And the last one is how to build financial freedom on your own terms. I have mentioned in previous episodes I don't believe financial freedom is a number. It's not just about saving for retirement. It's about creating options and flexibility and choice, and I think the financial industry has been conditioned to have us believing that we're going to make a lot of money, invest it and then retire. And I don't necessarily know if I agree with this. I think this might be some of the most limiting advice.

Erin Gray:

When we act from this space, right, we assume that we will never work again. I mean, wasn't Betty White the one that, like, worked and she passed away? Like, when you're doing work you love, why are we retiring? You know, when we act from this space, we assume we're never going to work again, that this money that we're creating now has to last us until we die, and that just feels very limiting, nevermind what we're telling our bodies about when we retire, right, if we're thinking about, okay, well, when we retire, then the next stage is death. What are we prepping our bodies for?

Erin Gray:

So, if we're working to invest and accumulate to finally get to do what we really want to do, if this resonates with you, then the question is why aren't we doing that right now? Why aren't we enjoying what we have right now and working and doing work we love right now? Like one of the questions I used to ask my clients when I was getting clear on, you know, their financial plan was what do you want to do in retirement? And they would share with me and I would always be curious of like, well, why aren't we doing some of that right now? Right, if your answer is I'm going to start doing X, y, z kind of work, then the question then becomes why aren't we doing that right now? Which that's going to bring up limiting beliefs. If the question, if the answer is you know, I want to travel more, well, why aren't we traveling more right now?

Erin Gray:

I think one of the biggest ahas I mean, I always say one of the biggest ahas but I think one thing that I really have thought about, as my parents have started to I don't like to say the word age, as they've been around the sun more than I have is that there are different seasons of our life, like what might you be able to do right now that you may not be able to do when you're 80 or even want to do Right? So I think, really starting to get some clarity around. Am I prolonging something I mean? So many times I hear people be like well, when I retire, I'm going to go travel Europe. Well, are you going to be in the best health, which I believe I will be. But if you're holding off because you think sometime in the future is better, I just want to encourage you and challenge that line of thinking and really asking yourself what can I do right now that maybe I may or may not be able to do at 10 or 15, 20 years from now?

Erin Gray:

You know I talk about how we took off with our daughter and, yes, do I think that there will be more opportunities for us to do that? Absolutely. Do I also think she's getting into a place where she's going to get into high school? I mean, she's already started. She's like mom, I don't want to travel like as much as you want to like. I want to stay and I want to be in school the entire time. I'm in school. So there was a window of opportunity that we got to have because she didn't really care too much about school and friends, but now she really does.

Erin Gray:

So what are some things that you may might be prolonging or, you know, pushing off to some later date, that maybe it might not be as easy or you might not be in that state of mind to do it at some point later down the road? So define what financial freedom actually looks like for you. It's not a number, right. It's about how you want to feel about money. Okay, so to recap one, how to confidently manage our cashflow with ease, how do we make money work for us, how do we break free from scarcity mindset, how to spend guilt-free and still build our wealth, and then how to build financial freedom on our own terms.

Erin Gray:

Start looking and playing with these in a way that feels good for you, and I want you to know if this episode resonated with you, if it spoke to you, that you are not behind, no matter where you are. Right now you can learn these skills and we can shift the trajectory of our financial future and if this is something that you want one-on-one support with, I would love and be honored to walk beside you along this journey. You can schedule a link in my show notes or you can go to my website generatealifewelllivedcom. Click on the link, work with me and schedule a call. We will dive in for that first hour.

Erin Gray:

You know, looking at your goals, what you want to create, gain financial clarity around where you are and then work towards that together. Okay, I'll see you in the next episode. Did you learn something today? Do you know another female entrepreneur who might be avoiding her money? Will you send this episode over to her for me and, if you have it in you, please leave me a review for this podcast. It helps the show grow and I love hearing from you. See you next week.