Loaded

Appendix B: Interventions and Exercises

Most of these exercises are described in the text. This space is for you to jot down notes and responses to ideas that strike you. You will likely want a dedicated notebook for longer written responses.

Change the Narrative

The narrative you wrote (Appendix A) is just one of the millions of stories you might have written about your financial life up to this point.

Finding a different way to interpret the events you have experienced can lead to new, more helpful core beliefs. To do this, we have to try to shift our perspective on events that we have seen in one way for a long time. Try the following, and see if you can get a different view:

1. Are there any other patterns you can see in your story? How would someone with very different views turn your story into a money message?
2. How have your core beliefs helped you so far? How have they hindered you?
3. Does the person you dream of becoming have the same core beliefs, or different ones?
4. Ask a trusted friend to read your narrative. How do they interpret the meaning of money in your life? What’s the moral of the story from their point of view?

Challenging Core Beliefs: Find a Counterexample

Your core beliefs are the result of many years and lots of experience.

Changing them is not an easy task, but with some effort, it can be done.

The thing to keep in mind is that if you want to challenge a belief, you need to find a way to prove it wrong so that you won’t believe it anymore. ...