I recently had the opportunity to interview the author of The Mindful Millionaire, Leisa Peterson. Leisa is on a mission to eradicate financial fear by elevating financial consciousness from a holistic perspective.
Can you please tell us a little bit about your background and what inspired you to write The Mindful Millionaire?
I wrote this book to help inspire people to heal their relationship with money—so they could create wealth mindfully rather than mindlessly. After working with people and their money for over 25 years, I saw how people either had a scarcity or prosperity-oriented mindset and depending upon which they had, it would affect their experiences with money in ways that were mostly unconscious. My goal with the book is to help people shift the patterns that prevent them from creating peace of mind and wealth in their lives.
What is a mindful millionaire?
The mindful millionaire is someone who is highly conscious of their relationship with money including how they earn it, spend it, save it and invest it.
What fundamental thought processes and beliefs create the basis for a healthy financial mindset?
Many times we are living reactively to money rather than proactively. This happens because we have a lot of disappointments and trauma stored inside that can come from many different places—our beliefs, our experiences, our culture. When we learn how to pay greater attention to our unconscious behaviors with money, we also become more attuned to ourselves. This self-reflective process allows us to change our behaviors, doing more of what brings us joy and freedom and less of what brings us anxiety and worry. This is what creates a basis for a healthy mindset with money.
What are the biggest obstacles most people have that get in the way of achieving a healthy financial mindset?
Coming from a home where my parents did not teach me how to save and spend wisely, instead teaching me how to get in debt and struggle financially, I set out early in life to make lots of money. The problem is that I did it from a wounded place rather than a sense of prosperity and possibility. A lot of people have this happen and even though we may become wealthy, we end up sacrificing our life in pursuit of money. We don’t understand that it is what is stored inside of us that causes us to do what we do, not the money itself—which is why the money merely amplifies who we were before and does not help us to create a healthy mindset. I’ve found when we change how we think about our experiences with money, we shift our mindset too.
How is self worth related to our financial reality and consciousness?
Many of us are taught from an early age that our self-worth is enhanced by our financial status and the resources money brings to us. This is tragic because it really has nothing to do with personal self-worth which is non-negotiable.
Instead we want to be able to honor ourselves and others as important regardless of financial status. When we can have these two things be seen as separate, it doesn’t mean we don’t want to build wealth for ourselves, instead it just means we can be confident in ourselves regardless of what’s happening financially. Funny enough it is this positive attitude that helps us to build wealth.
One of the important concepts in your book is the belief of scarcity. People tend to focus on their problems of scarcity rather than the solutions available to them. How do you shift that focus and activate someone’s ability to open up to creative solutions?
Figuring out the pattern underneath someone’s belief system that isn’t working and is causing suffering is what I think of scarcity representing in one’s life. My book, The Mindful Millionaire, helps people to dig into a 8 step process that helps them find the parts of themselves that are hidden in dark corners and cause them to think they are less than enough. Once you know what these stories and beliefs are, you can focus on what needs to be done, both immediately and longer term to let them go and ultimately change your finances forever. Once you master your money, there is no going back.
Can you tell us about your IPROSPER Process in the book? What feedback and benefits have you witnessed from clients working the process?
I created the IPROSPER 8 step process to help readers learn how to become more of their True Self when it comes to money. The method shows you the exact steps to help you drop away fear, uncertainty and scarcity so you can live with greater prosperity. It encourages the reader to put everything on the table and review their beliefs, thoughts, emotions and feelings so they can ask themselves the question, “Why am I agreeing to this way of being, thinking and doing?”
In the book I highlight more than 10 real life stories of the process that people went through to master their money. One of my past clients, Danielle operates a successful hair salon and was buried in debt and struggled to attract and develop healthy romantic relationships. Growing up, Danielle’s mother and father were abusive alcoholics. Her mother, in an effort to keep Danielle and her siblings safe, left her father in the middle of the night. Sadly, though, her mother developed a new relationship with someone equally toxic. As Danielle matured, she too married someone who was emotionally abusive and financially unstable. Reflecting on her past, Danielle recognized her problems with money and relationships stemmed from past experiences of abandonment and lack of security. As such, she didn’t believe she was capable of financial or romantic success.
Going through the IPROSPER process, Danielle sought to identify and release past issues around abandonment and not feeling safe. By releasing these negative thought patterns, Danielle learned to trust her ability to care for herself and ensured that her business and relationships support the life she wants to be living. Danielle’s story provides an example to those of us who struggle with our sense of security, demonstrating how to break free of those patterns so we can live with greater freedom and prosperity.
Many people are facing money-related catastrophes right now from the effects of Covid-19. What advice do you have for people facing stressful financial situations or catastrophe?
To remain calm and hyper vigilant in mindfully approaching your situation. When we are anxious and stressed, we tend to “tunnel” which is focusing on all that is wrong and bad rather than what can help us to solve the problems at hand. When we can breath, sit quietly, go on walks in nature, we can calm our nervous system down enough to see what our options are for recovery. The Mindful Millionaire is written to help you engage in that process of calming down and staying focused on what you really need and want at the moment. This has been proven to lead to better decisions.
With stress and anxiety levels at all time high, what wisdom do you have for those who might sublimate their emotions with shopping, over consuming and overspending? What can people do to make more conscious choices that support their financial well-being?
A lot of this is caused by the process of bypassing our feelings. When we learn how to tune into our feeling sense, rather than our reactive sense, we are better able to notice what we need to buy and what we don’t. We spend less naturally as a result of this shift, and over time we find ourselves spending far less and saving more which helps our financial well-being.
Your book feels especially appropriate right now with all the economic uncertainty. Why is it so important to you to get this book out into the world?
I think you are right. There is a lot of uncertainty, and I know that people have made great fortunes during times like these but only if they remain focused on the things they can do rather than all that seems impossible. The book presents you with a pathway to finding what is possible in your life right now.
A lot of people find themselves with more downtime than they are used to with Covid-19 restrictions and quarantines. What is one thing people can do every day to elevate their money consciousness and work towards being a mindful millionaire?
Meditate, breathe, take walks in nature and journal — all practices I highlight in the book.
You can learn more about Leisa Peterson and how to become a Mindful Millionaire at: