This week, I wrote about four ways women handle money. You tighten up. You handle it alone. You avoid looking at it. You spend before you notice.

Maybe one of them made you say, “That’s me.”

Maybe two did. That’s common. Most women are on one pathway most of the time, with pieces of another when life gets busy.

Here’s what you should know about the one you recognized.

You didn’t choose it. You picked it up along the way. It happens because of the pressure in your life. It made sense at some point. I’ve had times when I avoided looking. I’ve had times when watching every penny was a comfort. I’ve had times when I spent way more than I realized I was spending. I’ve had way too many times where I just took care of paying for it myself.

It’s a pattern that you learned. You have to see it first. Then we can work on changing it.

Loosen Your Money Knot starts with meeting all four pathways. Then you find yours. We work until you can look at your money with no judging and no plan. Until a number is just a number. You open the account, and there’s no knot in your stomach.

We cover one pathway each week on our live calls. Every call is recorded. You can join any week.

So, which pathway made you say “That’s me?” Tell me in the comments. I’d love to know.

Find your happy. Love what you do. Make a difference.

Linda

Some of us handle money by not looking at it.

I see this one in so many women I know. I’ve done it here and there myself. This one is so common in the women I’ve worked with.

You don’t know what your numbers are. But you have a feeling of dread and anxiety about them. So you don’t look. You avoid opening a bill. You avoid checking the balance in your savings or checking account. You avoid meeting with your accountant. Even the thought of looking at a number tied to money brings on so much anxiety that you go out of your way to avoid it.

If a conversation with your partner starts to head toward money, you distract and change the direction of the conversation. You put off decisions about a purchase or an investment because you have no clue what your money situation is. You don’t want to look at it. It makes you feel awful.

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Nothing is defined. Avoiding it feels better than facing what you think your money looks like. So you never have clarity about where things stand. You keep putting it off. You find something else to do before you make the decision. But you’re not careless with money.

Sometimes money feels too complicated. Or too big. Or just too hard, because people have made you feel like you aren’t good at it. Like you can’t handle it or manage it.

When you avoid your money, a lot of the time you look away because of your conditioning, things you absorbed growing up. This is where looking at your money stories becomes powerful. Remember the one I told you: “Money doesn’t grow on trees?” If you grew up like I did, in a house where you weren’t supposed to talk about money at all, you’ll avoid those conversations. Even the thought of having one feels awful. Somehow, you weren’t supposed to need to talk about money.

And the longer you go without looking at your statements or your balances, the more it undermines your confidence in your ability to take care of things.

You might even tell yourself: “Today I’m going to look and get a sense of my numbers.” But before you do, something else becomes more important. And you don’t get to it.

We work on this a lot in Loosen Your Money Knot. It gets better.

Join us: Loosen Your Money Knot Program

Find your happy. Love what you do. Make a difference.

Linda

Some of us handle money by handling it alone.

Paying for it yourself, taking care of it, becomes your default position. You end up paying for things because it makes sense and someone HAS to. Not because you were asked. You just take it on.

It can start in a subtle way. When I was growing up, there was an expectation of how I should look. I was supposed to dress a certain way, and I was supposed to figure out how to do that. So I did.

I made most of my own clothes, and nobody ever knew they were homemade. It saved money. But the expense of looking a certain way was mine, and paying for it was my stuff to figure out. That’s a bit of where my habit of handling it alone got started.

Handling it alone can just…happen. Sometimes you thought you had an agreement with someone. Maybe your partner, maybe a friend. You were going to share the cost. Then, for whatever reason, they don’t take care of their part.

So you do, to keep everything running smoothly. Technically, someone else was responsible for it. You did it anyway.

You’re the dependable one. Something needs to be handled, so you handle it. You figure it out. Sometimes that means paying a bill at the eleventh hour, because you don’t have the cash flow after what you just had to spend on something else.

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You’ll figure it out. Because that’s what you do.

You take care of everything because you don’t want to let people down. It feels like it will all fall apart if you don’t. So you’re overly responsible for everything.

You overfunction. You overgive your time, your energy, and your money. That’s some of the Over-ing I talk about a lot, and it has a flip side. You under-receive.

Sometimes you’ve been in this place so long that you don’t know how to receive. It’s been missing from your life for so long that you’re not a good receiver. Without realizing it, you turn people down. They say, “Let me get it.” And you say, “No, no. I got it. I’ll take care of it.”

Money keeps moving out toward everything everybody else needs. There’s less left for you. And you end up covering the costs of things you never really agreed to take care of.

If this sounds like you, join us in Loosen Your Money Knot. You can read about it here.

Find your happy. Love what you do. Make a difference.

Linda

Last time, I told you why I built the Loosen Your Money Knot program. This one is about one of the ways the knot shows up.

Some of us handle money by tightening up.

It’s all about feeling stable and in control. Underneath that stable feeling is a belief that if you aren’t in control, everything will go wrong.

So you closely watch the money. You track everything. You know where every penny is. You balance every account, and you check them often. Because seeing that it went exactly where you wanted it to go is a relief. You think hard about every decision. You prepare for the worst case, and then you prepare some more.

Spending tends to go one of two ways.

The first way: you don’t want to spend. Watching your savings go up and your debt go down feels so good that you build your life around it. You take advantage of every free offer and discount that you can find.

The second way: you have to spend, because it takes money to live. But deciding to spend can feel almost painful. It can take a lot out of you. It’s not really that you don’t want to spend your money. It’s that spending feels less controlled than not spending.

I know this one from the inside. When we consolidated our debt, I over-controlled and over-managed everything I could. Watching every penny became a comfort because I had answers and information about it. It was my way of proving I was in control. That I wasn’t a mess. That I wasn’t a failure with money.

If this is you, at some point you were the one who had to notice, to figure things out. You were the one who had to know where everything was.

It’s probably inconceivable to you that someone could spend money and not notice. You can’t even imagine it. That makes sense. Knowing where every penny goes feels good, because it means you’re in control.

Where that comes from is different for every woman. It depends on her money stories.

Loosen Your Money Knot starts October 20. The bonus session, Money Feels Different, closes at noon Central, October 19. You can see what’s inside and join here.

Find your happy. Love what you do. Make a difference.

Linda

I heard it thousands of times as a kid. “Money doesn’t grow on trees.” I also heard, “We don’t have the money for that.”

So I made a rule for myself. If I wanted something, I had to figure out how to get it. Period.

I was raised in a very religious home. Money went to God first, off the top. Wanting money was something good girls didn’t do. We weren’t supposed to talk about needing money.

The message was clear. I would receive exactly what I deserved. I would receive what I needed. I would be taken care of.

I wasn’t supposed to want more than that. What I received was supposed to be enough.

I believed all of it.

Then, early in our marriage, hubs got paid in cash for a job he’d done. He gleefully exclaimed, “I love money! I love money!”

My head exploded.

That was the opposite of everything I’d been taught. Good people didn’t love money. And here was my husband saying it out loud, happy as could be.

That moment became a turning point. I started to look at what I’d been taught. I thought it through. I questioned it.

It wasn’t the whole answer, though. I’ve taken every money program I could find. Budgets. Spending plans. A financial counselor told me to do everything in cash, and I did.

I still found money gone and didn’t know where it went. I didn’t decide to spend it. It just happened.

I know how that sounds. I’m a smart woman. It sounds ridiculous.

People said it to me over and over, my husband included. “You’re smart. You’re smarter than this. How can you not realize how much you’re spending?”

I asked myself the same thing. And I judged myself too. Harshly.

I also took care of things on my own. Something would come up that needed to be paid for, and I’d figure it out.

And everywhere I turned, the message was the same. Not having enough money was my fault. Irresponsible. The problem was me.

Then I started to see it. The way I handled money was a response to the pressure running through my life. And those money stories from childhood were part of it.

That’s why it matters to understand what’s going on. Knowing why you have this habit in the first place matters. Judging yourself doesn’t change it. Seeing it and understanding it does.

Now I can catch it. Not every time. I notice the pull before I act, and I get to choose.

Here’s what that looks like. I’m in Target. I walk through clothing and home goods. It feels good. I smell the candles. I look at the things I love.

And I stay present. I ask myself what I came here for. The tea that was on sale. The dog food Ginny likes. If I remember we’re out of toilet cleaner, that goes in the cart too.

I leave with what I came for. My old habit was spending without noticing, then being shocked when I saw the total later.

Working with other women, I’ve learned I’m far from the only one who this happens to. Many spend before they notice. Many handle everything on their own. And most of us are led to believe we’re the problem.

That’s why I built the Loosen Your Money Knot program. To help women understand that the way they handle money is a response to the pressure in their lives. Once you understand yours, you can catch it before it happens and choose something different.

We start October 20. The bonus, Money Feels Different, closes at noon Central on Monday, October 19. You can see what's inside and join here. So excited to share this with you. More soon.

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Find your happy. Love what you do. Make a difference.

Linda

I’ve overed my whole life. It was just how I operated. I didn’t have a word for it yet, and I certainly couldn’t see it, but I overed. Therapists told me I was trying to fill my bucket. And my bucket had a hole in it.

Overdoing. Overgiving. Overthinking. Overspending. Overcommitting. Overworking. Overindulging. Overing.

The list keeps going. For a long time, I lived inside almost every overing without realizing there was a name for what was happening. They were all running in my life. And depending on the moment, it felt like they were ruining my life.

I didn’t recognize it, but overing was running my life. I was the Overing Queen, and I lived in Overing Land.

About 12 years ago, I started on what I now think of as my Learning Journey. I went searching, trying to understand myself, and I found tools I believed in because when I used them, it helped me. I felt better.

I invested in the tools. I trained and got certified in tapping (EFT), breathwork, life, and business coaching. I used the tools, and my overing eased up somewhat. Life was better. I slept better. I felt better. People noticed. I started sharing my tools because they helped me so much. I worked with my students, and I took on clients. I guided them to a place where they felt better, too.

The thing is, the overing was better, but I still didn’t understand it. I thought, and was often told, that something was wrong with me. Maybe the Trauma had broken me? So, I continued to use my tools, trying to “fix” myself.

It sucks to walk around, functioning well, looking very successful, when inside doesn’t feel that way. But I was better, and that ain’t nothing! My overing eased up some. But I still didn’t understand where it came from.

And then, about five years ago, a friend told me about human design. I got curious. I had a reading. It was okay. Interesting. Not life-changing. I started to learn more. I had another reading. The glimmer of recognition was starting to shine. I learned more and integrated it, and wowsa! It was as if someone handed me the map to myself.

For the first time, I could see where my overing tendencies came from. Guess what? It WASN’T my Trauma! That map didn’t just describe me, it explained me. Once I GOT it, and really saw it, I couldn’t unsee it. I continued to study and started to work with people, sharing what I was learning. The more I understood myself, the more I recognized in the women I worked with.

Most of the women were high-capacity, capable women: the ones who hold everything together, who everyone counts on because they can. Maybe this is you? A lot of these women were releasing their pressure through money. Spending, avoiding, controlling, carrying, releasing, in ways that had nothing to do with the number in their bank account and everything to do with the pressure they were holding. And because money behavior is so easy to misread, these same women were misunderstood. Sometimes shamed. Sometimes even misdiagnosed.

That’s the work I do now. I help capable, successful women see and understand their own overing habits, and how those habits run their lives behind the scenes. They usually aren’t at a breaking point or burnt out; they just feel…like I did. Like, everything looks great on the outside. People even comment on what a great life you have. But inside is your dirty little secret, because your inside feels…off. Like it doesn’t match your outside. So we work together. I help them move forward on their Road to Better.

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So, what exactly IS overing?

Overing is my term for the high-functioning habit of doing, giving, fixing, proving, indulging, and perfecting. It costs you your peace, your energy, your joy. It’s fucking sneaky because from the outside, it looks, smells, sounds, and tastes like success. But it doesn’t FEEL like success because on the inside, you’re losing yourself one overing at a time.

Here’s the part I want you to get, to REALLY get: overing isn’t who you are. Let’s say it again: overing isn’t who you are. It’s a habit you picked up along the way. It probably worked for a while. It kept you safe. Needed. Respected. In control. It made sense. You identified with it. Overing may even have defined you. It just isn’t serving you anymore.

Eight Overing Habits I See Most Frequently

Overthinking: “I can’t stop spinning in my head.”

Overgiving: “I say yes when I mean no.”

Overworking: “If I slow down, it won’t get done or I’ll fall behind.”

Overcommitting: “There’s just not enough of me to go around. I need to clone myself.”

Over-perfecting: “It has to be flawless before I can share it or submit it.”

Over-adapting: “I shrink or shift to keep the peace.”

Override mode: “I push past what I feel, and I don’t stop until I crash.”

Overindulging: “I do this/need this to cope, even when I end up feeling worse.”

Slowly read through that list again. I’d bet at least one of them stopped you.

If it did, here’s what I want you to know: this isn’t a character flaw (although some will say it is). It’s not proof that you’re too much or not enough (although some will say you are). It’s a habit you learned, and on some level, it worked for you. What’s learned can be unlearned. You get to leave Overing Land and live at “Better.” Like, on the Road to Better.

Ask yourself which one of these habits is costing you the most energy right now? And what would life feel like if you unlearned that habit?

If This Sounds Like Your Life

You don’t have to figure this out on your own, and you definitely don’t have to keep toughing your way through it.

I host a free call called “When You’re Capable…and Something Feels Off,” for women whose lives look completely fine to everyone else but don’t feel that way on the inside. We’ll talk through what’s running in the background of your life and what your next step could look like. No pitch. No pressure. Just a real conversation with someone who sees you and understands you.

Book Your "When You're Capable" Call

Warmly,

Linda

The way you relate to it?
That’s where things get complicated.

There’s a reason money feels harder than it should.

Not because you’re bad with money.
Not because you need another budget, strategy, or system.

It feels challenging… because the way you handle money…
is the same way you handle everything else.

You just do it. Automatically. In the background. Without questioning it.

And it works—until it doesn’t.

It looks fine on the outside

I see this all the time with capable women.

You’re the one who:

• steps in before anyone asks

• figures it out

• makes sure everything gets handled

So of course you can manage money.

And from the outside?
It probably looks like you are.

But inside… it feels different.

There’s pressure.
There’s second-guessing.
There’s that low, constant sense of:

“Why does this feel so hard for me?”

It’s not about money

It’s about what you’ve gotten used to doing with

· responsibility

· support

· change

Three patterns I want you to notice:

1. What you carry

You don’t just handle your own responsibilities.

You carry things that were never fully yours:

• other people’s needs

• unspoken expectations

• the invisible work no one tracks but you

So, when money comes in…

It doesn’t feel like it’s yours to hold.

It already has a job.
A purpose.
A place to go.

Before you’ve even had a moment to breathe with it.

2. What you allow in

Let me ask you something simple.

When something good comes your way: money, support, an opportunity.

Do you let it land?

Or do you immediately:

• justify it

• earn it

• match it

• prove you deserve it

Most of the women I work with don’t struggle with giving.

They struggle with receiving without turning it into another responsibility.

A quick example

You run into Target for “just a few things.”

You grab what you came for.
And then a few other things you just remembered you need.
And then a few more.

It’s not reckless.
It’s not out of control.

It’s almost… automatic.

You don’t fully feel it while you’re doing it.

But later, when you see the total, there’s that moment of:

“Wait… how did it get that high?”

That’s not a budgeting issue.

That’s a pattern of delayed awareness.

The same pattern that shows up when:

• you say yes before thinking

• you take something on before checking if it’s yours

• you realize after the fact that it was too much

Money just happens to be one of the places the pattern shows up.

3. What you won’t let go of

This one’s sneakier, and it’s the one that keeps everything in the same place:

• old roles

• outdated expectations

• ways of doing things that used to work… but don’t anymore

You can feel it when something has run its course, but instead of letting it go, you:

• hold on a little longer

• adjust around it

• keep trying to make it work

And money follows that pattern, too.

Because if nothing changes…
nothing really changes.

This is the pattern

This is what I call a capacity pattern.

Not a money problem.

A pattern in how much you:

• carry

• allow in

• release

And here’s the part most people miss:

Trying harder doesn’t change this.

You shift it by seeing it clearly.

And then you start to notice things like…

· “Oh… I don’t let anything land and stick around.”

· “Oh… I take on more before I even think about it.”

· “Oh… I’m still holding things that are already over.”

You can start to choose differently.

Not all at once.
Not perfectly.

But intentionally.

Where this starts to change

Money gets easier when your life stops running on autopilot.

When you:

• pause before stepping in

• let something support you without balancing it out

• allow something to end without replacing it immediately

That’s where things start to change.

Not because you learned a new strategy.

But because you stopped running the same pattern in a different area.

You don’t have a money problem.

You have a pattern that’s been working overtime for years.

It has become the internal operating system that runs your life.

Money is just where it finally became visible.

I’ve been noticing something about myself lately.

I’ve been holding back.

Not in an obvious way. Not in a “doing nothing” way.
But in a quieter, more subtle way…

Waiting.

Waiting to have the audience.
Waiting to have “my people.”
Waiting for some external signal that it’s time to fully step in.

And I see now—that thinking is completely backward.

I don’t become the leader after the audience shows up.
I become the leader first.

The audience comes because I lead.

So, I’m shifting.

I’m stepping into Leader Linda now.
Not later. Not when it feels more comfortable. Not when it feels guaranteed.

Now.

That means I’m doing the things that build my business and my life before there’s evidence they’re working.
It means I’m choosing “being and doing” instead of waiting for permission.

This whole realization reminds me of a story from my family.

My cousin Craig, around 15 years old, was not exactly known for his personal hygiene. My aunt asked him one day when he was going to start brushing his teeth every day.

His answer?

“When I get a girlfriend.”

You can see the problem.

He was waiting for the result…before doing the thing that would help create the result.

And if I’m honest? I’ve been doing my own version of that.

Waiting for the business to grow…before fully showing up as the leader who grows it.

But here’s what’s also true about me.

I do step up.

I’ve done it my whole life.

I became a college professor because someone needed me—and I said yes.
I stepped in, figured it out, and only later did I start to feel like a professor.

I became a mother in what felt like a blink.
After being told pregnancy might not even be possible, I learned I was pregnant in September—and by February, I was holding a baby in my arms.

I remember thinking, “You have to pick him up. People expect you to pick him up.”

And I did.

I figured it out, like I always do.

That’s been the pattern.

Something happens → I’m needed → I step in → I grow into it.

And while that’s made me incredibly capable…

It’s also trained me to wait.

To wait for the moment.
To wait for the need.
To wait for something outside of me to move me forward.

And I don’t want to live that way anymore.

Because here’s the cost of that pattern:

When I step in at the last minute to help…
When I respond instead of initiate…

I don’t advocate for myself.

The opportunity is already shaped.
The compensation is already decided.
And I hear things like, “We know you should earn more, but this is all we can offer.”

And I accept it.

Not because I’m not capable of more—but because I entered the role after the terms were set.

That ends here.

I’m not waiting to be needed anymore.

I’m choosing to lead.

I’m choosing to initiate.

I’m choosing to build something on purpose—with my experience, my training, my education, and my voice at the center of it.

Not as a response.

As a decision.

So, the question I’m sitting with now is this:

What are Leader Linda’s actions today?

Not the perfect ones.
Not the guaranteed ones.

The real ones.

The visible ones.
The ones that build strength, stamina, capacity, and skill over time.

Because I’m not waiting to become her.

I’m practicing being her.

Starting now.

I didn’t realize I was waiting—but I’m not anymore.

For most of my life, I’ve been the good student.

The one who:

• Does the homework.

• Integrates deeply.

• Brings nuance.

• Goes beyond the assignment.

• Quietly hopes the teacher will notice.

That part of me built my degrees.
It built my career.
It built my credibility.

And it followed me everywhere.

Into classrooms.

Into boardrooms.

Into leadership roles.

Into entrepreneurship.

And into my relationships.

Into being the steady presence.

The capable one.

The one who holds it together.

The one who keeps things from falling apart.

Every framework? I learn it.

Every new expectation? I meet it.
Every new layer? I integrate it.

Every new challenge? I figure it out.

And then I catch myself.

Because somewhere in all that competence is a sneaky question:

Will someone see how well I’m doing this?

Not in a needy way.
In a human way.

But here’s what I’ve realized: At some point, you have to graduate.

You have to move from “Did I do it well enough?”

to “This is what I stand for.”

That shift is uncomfortable.

Because being the good student is safe.

There’s a rubric.
There’s approval.
There’s belonging.

Leadership is different.

There’s no gold star.
No final grade.
No guaranteed recognition.

It’s just you deciding what matters and standing behind it.

And if we’re honest, the scariest part isn’t stepping forward.

It’s this:

What if I claim my authority…and no one responds?

That’s the fear underneath so much over-learning and over-integrating.

Not lack of knowledge.

Not lack of ability.

Exposure.

If things don’t move immediately, it won’t be because I’m not enough.

It will be because growth in business, in leadership, in influence, and in life requires:

• Clarity.
• Consistency.
• Repetition.
• Patience.

That’s strategy — not identity.

So, I’m making a decision.

I can still learn.
I can still grow.
I can still attend workshops and read and study.

But I’m no longer rebuilding my foundation every time I discover a new layer.

My core work won’t change.

I guide capable women who look fine on the outside but feel the constant pressure hum underneath their lives, especially around money and responsibility, to see the patterns running them and build lives that support them.

That’s the spine.

Everything else is seasoning.

If you’ve been the good student your whole life, this might be your season, too.

The season where you stop trying to be noticed in someone else’s room…

And start building your own authority, wherever you stand.

Where are you still trying to earn authority you already hold?