Money Mindset Insights

Real stories from people who've shifted how they think about money. No fluff, no magic formulas—just honest conversations about what actually works when you're trying to build a healthier relationship with your finances.

Person reviewing financial documents with notebook and coffee

Why We Keep Sabotaging Our Own Savings

It's weird how we can know exactly what we should do with money and still not do it. Lachlan Greenfield spent three years trying to build an emergency fund. He'd save for two months, then something would happen—usually something that wasn't actually an emergency.

The breakthrough came when he stopped treating it like a willpower problem. Turns out, his brain had learned some pretty specific lessons about money during his childhood in regional Queensland, and those patterns were running the show without him realizing it.

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Financial planning session with charts and calculations

When Earning More Doesn't Actually Help

Priya Venkataraman got a substantial raise last year. Six months later, she had less in savings than before. This isn't uncommon—most people experience lifestyle inflation without noticing it happening. The coffee upgrades, the nicer apartment, the extra subscriptions.

What made her situation different was recognizing that the spending wasn't about the money itself. She was using purchases to validate the stress she felt at work. Once she saw that pattern, she could actually do something about it.

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Couple discussing finances together at kitchen table

The Conversations Couples Avoid

Money ruins more relationships than people admit. Not because there isn't enough of it, but because no one wants to be the person who brings it up. Felix and Juna Kowalski almost didn't make it past their first year of marriage because they had completely different money scripts running in the background.

She saw saving as security. He saw it as mistrust. Neither was wrong, but they were definitely not on the same page. The shift happened when they got curious about where those beliefs came from instead of just defending them.

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Financial mindset specialist Freya Thornley

Freya Thornley

Money Mindset Specialist

March 3, 2025

What Actually Changes When You Work on Money Mindset

People often ask me what's different after someone works through their money patterns. The answer isn't what they expect. You don't suddenly become a different person who loves budgeting or never makes impulse purchases.

What changes is the awareness. You start noticing when your brain is running old programs. You catch yourself mid-justification and realize what's actually happening. And that moment of recognition? That's where choice lives.

The clients who see the most progress aren't the ones who have perfect spending habits. They're the ones who get genuinely curious about why they do what they do with money—and they're willing to sit with uncomfortable answers.

I've been working with people around money psychology for eight years now, and the patterns are remarkably consistent across different income levels and backgrounds. The specifics change, but the underlying dynamics? Those show up again and again.

The interesting part is watching someone realize their money stress isn't actually about the numbers in their bank account. It's about what those numbers mean to them, what stories they're telling themselves, and what they learned about worthiness and security way before they ever earned a paycheck.

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