The Reason I Still Close My Eyes at the Bank Statement
I do this thing where I look at my phone, see the banking notification, and immediately panic, get anxious and sigh. Then I open it.
Now I’m in crisis. The reality is that I’d rather not know. “It’ll be fine,” I eventually tell myself – and then I think about something else entirely, which is, when you think about it, a very sophisticated way of dealing with nothing at all.
I’ve done it for years. I genuinely thought it was just a personality quirk. A bit scatty with admin. Busy mum of three. Not a finance person. That was my story, and I’d told it so many times it had stopped feeling like a story at all.
Then I listened to Episode 179 of A Changed Mind. And David Bayer named the money blocks behind it – and said the quiet part out loud.
Table of Contents
Who Is David Bayer?
David Bayer is the host of A Changed Mind – one of those podcasts I keep coming back to because it sits right at the intersection of neuroscience, mindset, and what he calls the “Primitive vs Powerful” state. I first came across him through the Hustle Culture and Rewrite Your Purpose episodes, which hit differently when you are, as I was, quietly unravelling some very old ideas about work and worth.
He’s not a finance guru. He’s a mindset expert. And that distinction – applying a mindset framework specifically to money – is exactly what makes this episode land so hard.
What Are Money Blocks?
A money block is an unconscious belief about money that limits what you can earn, save, receive, or feel at peace with – without you even realising it’s there.
It’s not a budget problem. It’s not a maths problem. It’s a belief problem.
And the insidious thing is that most of these beliefs were installed when we were children, absorbing the atmosphere of a household, a classroom, a culture. They feel like facts because we’ve never questioned them. They feel like character because we’ve had them so long.
“Money is the root of all evil.” “Rich people are greedy.” “We’re not that kind of family.” “I’m just not good with numbers.” “You have to work hard and suffer to deserve money.”
Sound familiar? Yeah. Me too.
Where Mine Came From
I spent fifteen years teaching in Wales. Which is to say I spent fifteen years working harder than almost anyone I know, for a salary that never quite matched the qualifications, the hours, or the emotional labour involved. The message that absorbed into my bones – even though no one said it in so many words – was: good people work hard, serve others, and don’t expect much in return.
I moved to France in 2020 and my teaching qualifications weren’t recognised. Overnight I went from employed professional to vacataire – supply work, unpredictable, unguaranteed. The income disruption was real. The identity disruption was worse.
And somewhere underneath all of that, deeper than I’d like to admit, were older messages. The vague cultural hum of money being a bit grubby. The idea that wanting more was somehow greedy. The sense that people like us – and I grew up solidly working-class in a society that is very clear about what that means – weren’t really supposed to want financial ease. Financial ease was for other people.
That’s not a fact. That is a story. But I lived it as a fact for the better part of four decades. Those are money blocks. And they were running everything.
How Money Blocks Show Up (I Recognised Every Single One)
Bayer lists the patterns and I want to tell you I found one or two relatable. Far from it, trust me.
There’s the avoidance – the phone face down, the “I’ll deal with it later,” the vague anxiety every time a bill arrives that isn’t even necessarily bad. There’s the undercharging – the way I calculate what I’m worth and then immediately knock some off because I don’t want to seem presumptuous. There’s the guilt when money comes in – a reflex that says I should probably not want this, not enjoy this, not let myself feel good about it.
And there is the identity statement that I have said, out loud, to actual people: “I’m just not very good with money.”
Bayer’s point is devastating in its simplicity: you keep proving that statement true because you believe it. The belief creates the behaviour. The behaviour confirms the belief. Round and round.
It’s not a personality trait. It’s a thought pattern you’ve practised so many times it became automatic.
The Sentence Exercise
This is the most uncomfortable part of the episode – and therefore the most useful. Bayer suggests finishing these sentences without overthinking, just writing whatever comes first:
- “Money is…”
- “Rich people are…”
- “I would have more money if…”
- “Money makes people…”
- “I don’t have money because…”
I did this with a notebook and a cup of tea, feeling very smug about how open-minded I am. Then I read back what I’d written.
Money is: hard to hold onto.
Rich people are: lucky, or ruthless – usually both.
I would have more money if: I’d chosen a different career.
Money makes people: change.
I don’t have money because: I chose the kind of work that doesn’t pay.
Well, then! There were my money blocks, in my own handwriting.
The scarcity. The suspicion. The fatalism. The passive resignation dressed up as acceptance. Not a single one of those statements is objectively true. Every single one was a story I’d inherited, absorbed, or built to explain away something that felt too painful to look at directly.
I’ve done EFT tapping on money fears before – I wrote about it in my Tapping Solution post – and the same principle applies here. You cannot think your way out of a belief that lives in your body. You have to feel it, name it, and consciously choose something different. The sentences exercise is the naming part. It’s not comfortable. It is, however, necessary.
From Financial Fear to Financial Calm
Here’s where I want to be clear about something, because I think it matters.
I am not chasing ridiculous wealth. I have never wanted a yacht or a Rolex or whatever the aspirational lifestyle machine is currently selling. What I want – what I have wanted quietly for years without quite being able to articulate it – is financial calm, financial security and freedom.
The ability to look at my bank account without my stomach dropping. Enough breathing room that money isn’t a constant background hum of anxiety. The freedom to make good decisions without fear making them for me.
Bayer’s framework calls it moving from the Primitive state – scarcity, threat, narrowed thinking – to the Powerful state. And the neuroscience is clear: when your brain is in threat mode, it genuinely cannot make good financial decisions. It avoids, it panics, it self-sabotages. The fear creates the very outcome you’re afraid of.
The reframe isn’t “I am rich and abundant” said to the mirror until you believe it. It’s quieter than that. It’s: I am someone who is learning to manage money with care and intention. That I can believe. That gives me something to actually build on.
Practical Takeaways
- Do the sentence exercise. Write fast, don’t edit, read it back. Your blocks are in those answers.
- Name the belief, then trace it. Where did it come from? Who said it? Does it hold up under examination? Most blocks don’t survive honest scrutiny.
- Replace the identity statement. Not “I’m bad with money.” Instead: “I am learning to have a healthy relationship with money.” Small shift. Different trajectory.
- Notice the avoidance. The phone face down, the unopened statements, the “it’ll be fine” – that is where a block lives. You don’t have to force it. Just notice.
- Consider tapping. If a belief feels lodged in your body rather than just your head – which money beliefs usually are – EFT tapping on the specific feeling can help shift what logic alone cannot reach.
Why This Belongs in Roots
Money anxiety doesn’t stay in the finances folder. It seeps into relationships, health decisions, creative confidence, how present you can be as a parent. Financial fear is foundational – it affects everything built on top of it.
Clearing money blocks is root work in the truest sense. Not the exciting, visible work. The underneath work. The kind that makes everything else possible.
Still Working On It
I want to be honest with you: I have not solved this, far from it!
The stomach drop still happens sometimes. I still catch myself calculating my worth and editing it down. I am still building this blog, this online business, this slow and imperfect path toward financial independence – from a place of real uncertainty, not from the other side of it.
But I know what the avoidance is now. I know where it came from. And I know it is not a personality trait or a character flaw or just the way I am.
That is not nothing. That is, actually, everything – it’s where the work starts. Learning, not perfection. Still figuring it out. Full stop.
Notes from Soph | Learning, not perfection.
Et toi? Do you have a money block you’ve never said out loud? Drop it in the comments, or come and share it in the Notes from Soph community on Skool – I’d genuinely love to know I’m not the only one who closes their eyes at the notification.
Source Details:
A Changed Mind – Episode 179: Breaking Free from Money Blocks
David Bayer | 2025
🎙 Listen on achangedmind.com or search “A Changed Mind” on Apple Podcasts / Spotify
