It's ok for you to want things - including more money

I’ve been noticing something in my sessions with clients.  Many folks are moving up or moving around in their career, and getting the opportunity to earn more money.  But when the opportunity arises to ask for a raise or level up your salary when switching jobs, everyone tends to clams up.  Is it because folks aren’t sure what to say or how to say it? Absolutely, that’s part of it.  It’s awkward, vulnerable and scary.  But there’s another lurking doubt that I see surfacing again and again.  Am I allowed to want more money?

Money is extremely complicated for…basically everyone.  We all come with our money stories from childhood.  Money may be connected to love, safety, and freedom.  At the same time, money may be connected to resentment, inequity, and fear.  When it comes to our relationship with money, we are a fit of contradictions.  For that (any many other reasons), we tend not to talk about it.  It’s very uncomfortable. 

Which is why I talk about it.  You know my whole thing about the crucial importance of uncomfortable conversations?  Yeah, this one too. 

But I want to talk specifically about the brand of money discomfort that has to do with desire—with wanting something.  I see this often (but not exclusively) in my clients who identify as women.  The trope goes like this: Client A identifies that she wants something. She barely lets the desire emerge from her lips before she wonders if it’s even appropriate for her to want.  The question that Client A keeps coming back to is, am I allowed to want this? 

Here, I want to draw an important distinction between wanting something and feeling entitled to it.  Feeling entitled to something is feeling that you deserve it inherently.  This makes it unacceptable for you not to receive it, and you will react accordingly.  Wanting something, on the other hand, is being in touch with your desire.  It’s allowing yourself to imagine a future that you want.  It’s holding out that desire in the wild and uncareful world and saying, this is what I hope for.  It’s holding out this fragile and private thing, knowing that you might not get it.  If you don’t get it, it will be disappointing or even devastating, and you will be present with those feelings and breathe your way through them.  You will not die.  You will grieve and reimagine a life without that thing, and will eventually move forward to desiring other things.

We are only human, so we avoid vulnerability without even realizing it.  Wanting leaves us open to the possibility of not receiving, so we sometimes opt out of wanting all together. 

This brings us back to money—the kingpin of things people feel uncomfortable wanting.  We wonder what it means about us to want more money.  We feel greedy. We get overwhelmed by those uncomfortable feelings and push the idea out of our mind.  And we definitely don’t ask for a raise.

I invite you to connect with the things you want in your life.  I imagine many of those things have nothing to do with money, and some of them do.  Maybe you want to see the Northern Lights, maybe you want a bathroom sink that doesn’t leak, maybe you want to eat at that restaurant from Jiro Dreams of Sushi—ok, now I’m just naming things that I want.  Name the things you want for your life, and give yourself permission to desire them.  For some us, just giving permission to desire something is a radical act.  Hold that tender desire out into the world.  Say out loud that you want it, will full awareness that you may not get it.  You can’t get what you don’t ask for; find the bravery to ask for a life you want.

If you feel like a higher salary is a part of creating the life that you want, but the thought of negotiating for higher compensation gives you knots in your stomach, I invite you to my upcoming workshop Salary Negotiation: Courageously ask for what you want.  This workshop addresses the logistical, relational and emotional skills necessary for courageous salary negotiation.  Learn more here.