Your Relationship With Money Is Holding You Back
Recently, I was thinking about how much my core identity as an adult was shaped by my upbringing.
And no, I’m not talking about eating Lucky Charms in front of the TV while watching cartoon re-runs (don’t judge).
I’m talking how I feel about cold, hard cash.
The kind that doesn’t jiggle jiggle, but folds.
Money impacts our relationships, our career, and especially our thoughts, fears, and insecurities.
Not to mention if you grew up in a surrounding where money was tight or taboo to discuss…
So, as creators, somehow we’ve found ourselves in this situation where we’re negotiating paid partnerships with brands, often saddled with tremendous personal baggage and little-to-no experience with how to value our creative work.
WTF?
Well, the good news is that our relationship with money is malleable.
But it takes conscious effort to retrain your mind.
Today I wanna talk about how to do it.
First, I do not mean to trivialize your childhood if it was challenging or tell you the way you think about money is wrong.
But according to Morgan Housel’s, ‘The Psychology of Money,’ it’s nearly impossible to ignore the impact of past experiences on your current outlook.
So whether you’re a YouTuber, an Instagram influencer, or a TikTok superstar, the amount of money you begin to ‘unlock’ is going to seem ludicrous by any conventional measure.
I mean, imagine being paid thousands of dollars for making a couple of posts where all you’ve gotta do is mention a brand’s name a few times!
For those of us who grew up modestly, this makes negotiating sponsorships an absolute minefield.
It’s sooo easy to immediately compare a sponsorship offer to a “normal” job and think, “I should just take this deal. I would’ve had to work 2 entire weeks in the past to make the same money.”
But you have to remember…being a creator is NOT a normal job.
It requires a very unique skillset and tenacity that (honestly?) most people will never have.
The preconceptions you have about how much you ‘ought’ to be paid for something aren’t relevant.
It’s not like a corporate 9-5 where promotions and raises happen once every year.
You can literally give yourself a raise with every new sponsorship if you get better at this stuff!
Sadly, some brands will jump at the chance to exploit creators who don’t realize their own worth.
Especially creators who find it hard to push back even if they think they’re not getting a fair deal.
After all, it’s easy to feel like:
You’re lucky they even contacted you when they could’ve picked someone else
You might upset the brand and scare them off
You’re being greedy asking for too much
But here’s the deal…
Reversing these insecurities comes down to a mindset shift about money itself.
On-demand, self-study course, Gifted To Paid - If you wanna convert free product offers into PAID partnerships
Earning money is NOT evil.
It’s not a bad thing.
It just depends what you choose to do with it.
As a creator, money allows you to continually make better content. To expand your business. To feed your family.
It also allows you to do good for others, like when my wife April and I literally gave away thousands of dollars to our followers when the pandemic started because we wanted to help families who were struggling.
Scale that up and you get creators like MrBeast who gives away MILLIONS of dollars, delivers free food to areas in need, and builds homes in underdeveloped countries.
All with the money he earns from YouTube!
If you’re looking for an awesome resource to further explore this topic, April absolutely loves this book.
So, I humbly implore you to reset your relationship with money.
You have to tell yourself:
I have worth.
What I’m doing is valuable to these brands.
If I wasn’t bridging the gap between a brand and my audience, how difficult would it be for them to reach new customers?
Resetting your relationship with money also means realizing that sometimes money will go OUT, not in.
It means seeing the money you spend on growing your creator business as an investment, not a cost.
It means giving back to the community that helped you get to where you are today.
The moment you stop seeing money as a resource that you don’t deserve, you’ll start to gain the confidence to ask brands to pay you your worth.
Then, the good you can do with that money is only as finite as your imagination. ♂️
So, by now I know you’re thoroughly pumped up, right? Good.
If you want to feel even more pumped, check out this conversation I had with Think Media about how to start making money with brand deals (strategies for new & small creators)!
Be well!
Justin
Thanks to George Blackman for contributing to this piece.