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Want to know the secret to running a permanently profitable business, paying yourself consistently, and eliminating your cashflow issues for good?

In this must-listen episode, I’m joined by Amber Dugger — a world renowned expert in cashflow and wealth-building strategies for entrepreneurs.

In this practical, reassuring and HUGELY valuable conversation, we discuss: why cashflow is the lifeblood of any business, practical tips on how to deal with fluctuating income streams, why most budgets fail, the key financial numbers every entrepreneur should know, strategies for mindful money management, the sneaky expenses that are tanking your profitability, how to develop a robust wealth mindset, the secret to overcoming emotional spending, and the money tools that every entrepreneur and wealth-conscious person needs in their life.

Whether you’re overwhelmed by money stuff, desperate to improve your business’s cashflow, or simply seeking a path to greater wealth and stability, then press play now… this one’s for you.

About Amber Dugger

Amber Dugger is on a mission to eradicate financial anxiety and overwhelm. She is the founder of Profit for Keeps®, a system combining the masculine and feminine aspects of money and providing a path to settle the nervous system to expand creativity and joy. She is the host of Profit for Joy TV, an international speaker, and has been featured in Forbes. She is paving the way for everyone to empower themselves with the information that the financial industry doesn’t want you to know.

In this episode we chat about:

• How she realized that the education around money and cash flow was broken (3:43)
• Understanding cashflow and why it’s the lifeblood of your business (8:55)
• The life-changing ‘Profit First’ system for building wealth and managing your business income (12:36)
• The budgeting app that will change your life (16:39)
• Her EPIC tips on managing variable cashflow (19:31)
• How to heal your relationship with money and rewire your nervous system for wealth (22:54)
• These hacks will help you overcome emotional spending for good (39:58)
• Tactics every online business owner should know for better money management (46:32)
• How to become consistent with your finances (and why this is crucial for long-term profitability) (56:28)
• The sneaky expenses that most business owners can immediately eliminate to save money (58:47)
• 3 powerful steps to permanently increase your profitability (61:48)

Episode resources:

• SheLaunch (join here)
• Mastering Your Mean Girl by Melissa Ambrosini (book)
• Open Wide by Melissa Ambrosini (book)
• Comparisonitis by Melissa Ambrosini (book)
• Time Magic by Melissa Ambrosini and Nick Broadhurst (book)
• You need a budget (app)
• Tapping Into Wealth: How Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) Can Help You Clear the Path to Making More Money by Margaret M. Lynch (book)
• Feeling is the Secret by Neville Goddard (book)
• You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay (book)
• Free revenue goal calculator (website)
• The Barefoot Investor: The Only Money Guide You’ll Ever Need by Scott Pape (book)
• Happier than God by Neale Donald Walsch (book)
• Conversations With God : An Uncommon Dialogue by Neale Donald Walsch (book)
• Profit for Keeps (website)
• Amber Dugger (website)

Prefer To Read?

The following transcript has been automatically generated and not checked for accuracy.

Melissa: [00:00:00] In episode 550 with Amber Duggar, we talk all about money mindset. What numbers you need to know as a business owner, how to make more money, how to manage your money better, plus so much more. This is essential listening for everyone. Welcome to the Melissa Ambrosini show. I’m your host, Melissa, bestselling author of Mastering Your Mean Girl, Open Wide, Comparisonitis.

And I’m here to remind you that love is sexy, healthy is liberating, and wealthy isn’t a dirty word. Each week I’ll be getting up close and personal with thought leaders from around the globe as well as your weekly dose of motivation so that you can create epic change in your own life and become the best version of yourself possible.

Are you ready beautiful? Hey beautiful and welcome back to the show. I’m so excited about this episode [00:01:00] because I absolutely love and adore Amber and her work. I think what she is doing is so important. Now she is on a mission to eradicate financial anxiety and overwhelm. So many people feel overwhelmed and stressed by money and so I am so excited.

For you guys to hear this episode because she believes, and actually I believe too, that money is a neutral energy. I talk about this in all of my books and our societal conditioning and experiences have created a collective disconnected relationship with what is just simply a resource and a conduit.

Of our intentions. Now, she is the founder of profit for keeps an amazing system combining the masculine and feminine aspects of money and providing a path to settle the nervous system to expand creativity and joy. Now, she actually has the doors open for profits for keeps right now, but they close next week on February 6.

So I want [00:02:00] you to head to melissaambrosini. com forward slash Amber to get inside profit for keeps. You’re going to hear about it in this episode and it is. It’s so good. It’s life changing. And so I would love for you guys to check it out, melissaambrosini. com forward slash Amber. Now, she is also the host of profit for joy TV and international speaker and has been featured in Forbes.

And she is paving the way for us collectively to empower ourselves with the information that the financial industry doesn’t want us to know. This is why I love her work. Now for everything that we mentioned in today’s episode, you can check out in the show notes and that’s over at melissarambrosini.

com forward slash five five zero. And don’t forget to go and check out melissarambrosini. com forward slash Amber. Do you have a look at her program at profit for keeps? It’s an amazing program. Like I said, that combines the masculine and feminine aspects of money. And it is open right now, but it closes next week.

The doors [00:03:00] close next week. So I do not want you to miss out on this. So head to MelissaRambrosini. com forward slash Amber. And now let’s bring on this incredible human Amber Duggar.

Amber, welcome to the show. I am so excited to have you here. But before we dive in, can you tell us what you had for breakfast 

Amber Dugger: this morning? Oh, well right now, Melissa, I am actually preparing for a procedure and so I’m doing a very high alkaline diet at the moment. So I’m intermittent fasting until noon.

So I actually didn’t have breakfast this morning. I had some mushroom coffee. And that was about it. Mmm. Yum. I 

Melissa: love mushroom coffee. So good. So tell us, how did you get to where you are today? What did you do before you do what you do now? Like, how did this all unfold for 

Amber Dugger: you? Wow. It’s quite a story and it definitely is something that I wouldn’t have been able to predict.

I started my [00:04:00] career in what I do now, much more in the finance arena. I started off in the nonprofit world. I was working for the third largest nonprofit in the United States. As their controller, and then I moved into corporate finance and other areas, government contracting, very boring stuff, and I became very just unhappy with my job, and I knew that I didn’t want to stay in a cubicle the rest of my life, and so I started to incorporate things into my day to day life outside of work that was really bringing me more joy, such as I found a garden plot because I had an apartment, so I found this garden plot in the community that I could go to every day after work.

And even though it was not efficient, I took three times as long to get to work by taking a bus to a really nice trail and rode my bike into work and got to experience the thrill of just having the cold air on my face every morning, but that just wasn’t doing it. And one day I was riding my bike home and [00:05:00] Everything happens for us, even the things that seem pretty dire at the time, and as I was riding home, my bike actually fell apart, and so the brakes fell from the bike frame onto the middle part of the wheel, clamped onto the wheel, and it shot me off of my bike as I was going about.

19 miles per hour on this bike, and I landed face first into the asphalt. And thankfully, the helmet that I was wearing saved me, and I watched the asphalt as I continued to slide on the ground. And in that moment, just everything changed. Everything changed. I had so much gratitude start to flow in that I still had all my teeth, that I was conscious I was still alive.

There were all these things that started to come in. And that morning I had been so unhappy. And my husband had actually said that morning, you know, I think you need to start a gratitude practice. And I had trouble finding things that I was grateful for that [00:06:00] morning. And so that accident led me to start to listen to podcasts because I ended up having a mild traumatic brain injury.

So I wasn’t allowed to exercise, I wasn’t allowed to do much of anything, but I did listen to podcasts and I just started to learn about this whole new world. This was back in 2014. And so at that point, I knew that I wanted to do something different. I decided to make a no plan B and I enrolled in a health coaching institute and a year later I graduated.

I had about six clients at the time, I left corporate and about three weeks later, I moved to Bali, Indonesia, which in the U. S. is much less known. I know it’s much more known in Australia and New Zealand, but it’s not that close. It was really, truly flying all the way to the other side of the world to just experience a completely different life.

And while I was in Bali, that’s when I just noticed that a lot of entrepreneurs there were really stressing [00:07:00] about cashflow, paying themselves, having a system that allowed them to live this beautiful life that they had created for themselves. And so while I had never thought I would touch money again with a 10 foot pole, I recognized that while I was in Bali, that there was this major gap between.

What we thought accountants and bookkeepers were meant to do and what we actually need to do as entrepreneurs is as visionaries really be able to align our business model with the cash flow that we’re bringing in. And when we do that, we really have enough money for everything that we desire. And there were two pieces of information as I was becoming a health coach that if I had followed, I would have gone bankrupt in the first three years of business.

And the first thing was the revenue goal that I was encouraged to meet, which was a 5K month. I lived in Washington, D. C. at the time, and that just wasn’t going to cut it. I would have been 3, 000 in the hole every single month. The other piece of advice was the pricing. It was suggested by at the time to [00:08:00] charge 199 a month for a health coaching client.

Now if you do the math, that’s over 40 clients working all the time and going into debt every month. Now, those are very simple numbers that just by shifting it to 8K a month and doing, you know, 500 or a thousand dollars a client completely changes your life. It changes everything and it allows you to continue to grow your business.

So that’s how it really got started was just out of seeing so many people struggling. And I was being invited to speak at women’s retreats and do skill shares at the local coworking establishments. And it just was a very natural process to combine the masculine and feminine sides of money into a framework that I was using myself to keep myself sane as I was leaving corporate.

I love 

Melissa: this so much and it’s so needed and so helpful for so many people. So I want to talk about cashflow, like you just mentioned. Now I read a stat the other [00:09:00] day that blew my mind. More than 80 percent of businesses that fail, fail because of cashflow problems. So for starters, could you explain what is cashflow for people like, what are you talking about?

And why do people say cashflow is king? 

Amber Dugger: Oh, I love this question. And that stat does, it blows my mind to this day. And the reason it blows my mind is because I’m going to first explain what cashflow is, and then I’m going to come back to finish that sentence. So cashflow is truly, I’m first going to define what it’s not.

Cashflow is not accounting and cashflow is not bookkeeping and it’s not financial planning. And so bookkeeping is a really important thing in our business that allows us to. create a historical record of what we have brought in and paid out as a business. And this allows our accountant to then be able to do our taxes properly so that we don’t pay a penny more, a penny [00:10:00] less in taxes.

So those two things are very important, but they’re both looking backwards. And as a visionary, as an entrepreneur, someone who is looking to make an impact, we are trained to look forward. We’re trained in even in visualization to visualize and feel into what it is that we really want to be experiencing.

And bookkeeping and accounting is looking backwards to be able to decide what our budget is going to be for the next year. That’s not helpful as a visionary, and it’s definitely not helpful when you have a very clear idea of where you want to be. It may look very different than what you experienced the last 12 months.

So cashflow is truly just the understanding and the clarity of how much money you need to have come into your business. To be able to meet the needs of the business and also your personal needs as well. And so it’s really much more about how do I pay myself when I have variable income months? How do I ensure that I am not just hustling and hustling [00:11:00] and not know if I’m actually making enough money?

Preparing for being able to pay for your taxes when you don’t have a conventional job anymore and you’re needing to put aside money on your own. Those are all components of cash flow. And the reason that stat also blows my mind so much is because in corporate world, they have the same problem. Most corporate establishments are in massive amounts of debt.

And the reason for that is because there is no emphasis or focus on this component of business. Because it’s always been met in the past with financial banks meeting the need by providing leverage or loans for the business to continue with the assumption that, oh, we’re going to do so well that we’ll be able to pay that loan off and everything will be fine.

And in some cases that’s true, but without a clear plan in place, it can very easily continue to just be loaned more and more money with the bank expecting to be paid back with high interest rates. And so what blows my mind is that. [00:12:00] While we have a CFO, which you may think, well, shouldn’t a chief financial officer be in charge of cash flow as well?

I can tell you from my own personal experience and from conversations with others in the industry, CFOs are glorified accountants that are almost always fixing accounting software nightmares, transitions, giving explanations to people about what they’re seeing on a financial report, but they’re not focusing on the forward vision typically.

And if we had a cash flow officer in our C suite, I think that would completely change the game. Mm hmm. 

Melissa: Absolutely. So a cash flow strategy that you teach has two elements. The first is profit first. So can you explain what the profit first system is and how 

Amber Dugger: it works? Sure. So profit first is a system that was developed by Mike Michalowicz, he’s a very good friend of mine.

And our framework incorporates components of Profit First, so I’ll get to that in a moment. But basically, he is a [00:13:00] serial entrepreneur, so he has built and sold multiple businesses. But at one point, he had built a business and he had just spent too much of the cash. And so he was left at the end of the year with about 10, 000 in his bank account.

And his accountant called and said, Mike, I have such good news. I got your tax bill down to about 25, 000. And it just hit him, I don’t know how I’m going to even pay this bill. And it really crushed him. So he ended up having to, you know, close this business. And as he was just sitting in contemplation over the next couple of months, depressed, This is a very public story, so I’m not sharing anything personal.

He said to himself, you know, there just has to be a better way. How did I have so much money, and then I spent all of it on things that I don’t even know what I spent it on, and now I’m at a point where I literally don’t have a business, don’t have any cash in the bank. And he was watching some late night infomercial on [00:14:00] this concept of choosing a smaller plate to be able to reduce your.

weight. Basically, when you eat less food, then obviously you are not going to have as much calories to, that you need to burn. And so he just thought, well, what if I did that with my money? What if instead profit is being an afterthought? I actually just took it out kind of like paying yourself first. So that’s where the concept started.

And he did a creative live speech where he talked about this concept and he was blown away by how many people were just like, this is brilliant. This is such a great plan. And so he wrote a book and then he wrote a second edition and when I was in Bali, my business coach at the time said, you know, I think you’d really love this book because I was running these at the time it was called Budget Alchemy for Health Coaches.

And so I was just teaching my system, which is an envelope system, which is very similar to what profit first is. An envelope system is really, if you think back 50 or 60 years ago [00:15:00] when everything was cash and we then would put money in an envelope for different things, our grandmothers did this. And that was really a great way to keep our money organized.

But as soon as we moved away from tangible cash, that’s when we started to get away from really having a connection with our money because everything is now digital. So it’s not like all of a sudden we just decided we are no longer going to care about our money or we’re not going to be good with our money.

I think one of the things that I hear more and more is just so many people really truly believe they’re not good with money. And I always just have so much compassion for that person because one, you’re not alone in thinking that. And two, it’s not true. It’s just simply not true. We just have gone away from a system that is natural for us.

And because of the fact that we now have money in all these different places, our brain gets quite disorganized with it. And so an envelope system can really bring us back to that tangible value of what our money [00:16:00] is actually intentioned and what it’s doing for us. And so Mike’s system, Profit First, if you think about it, you’re taking your money that you have come into your bank account and instead of it just being there to pay bills, we’re first putting a certain portion aside for intentional profit.

We’re taking a certain portion aside and having it be intentional owner’s pay so you can pay yourself and then another bucket for your personal taxes and then a final bucket for the amount of bills that you have for your business. And so that is the main concept of Profit First. Mm hmm. I 

Melissa: love that.

Thank you for sharing that. Now the second element of your cash flow strategy is a budgeting app called You Need a Budget. So what does a budgeting app allow people to do and do you think that everyone needs one? 

Amber Dugger: Oh, I do. As long as, as I do think everyone needs one with one caveat. If you’re really [00:17:00] happy with your relationship with money, you don’t feel any stress with your money, you feel really good, then I would say maybe not.

So that’s just one thing I’d like to put out there. But if you do feel any of those things, overwhelm or stress, then this can be an amazing gift to yourself. So YNAB is an envelope system, but instead of it being envelopes, it’s a digital product. So it’s a digital software. And so I found it so useful when I was in Bali, because Everything’s in cash.

So with Bali, I knew that I wasn’t going to use my credit card a lot. And YNAB really bridged the gap between what an envelope system does and then what our modern banking looks like. We have credit cards. We have multiple bank accounts. And so it allows you to think of all your money in one big pile so that you can then intention and allocate it to the things that you want.

And so our system that uses YNAB, the reason we do that is one, you don’t need multiple bank accounts [00:18:00] and two, it allows you to really think about your personal life as well as the core component, your dreams, the things that you wanted to do when you first started your business. I believe are the core of everything else.

So when you know that, okay, I know for me personally, I want to be able to, you know, go travel once every couple of months, I want to be able to see my family, I want to be able to have a massage every week, whatever it is for you, and it doesn’t matter what it is. It’s not a restriction. And I actually don’t even like to call it a budget.

I like to call it an expansive spending plan. Because what one thing that I don’t personally believe is profit first is not a penny pinching restriction. I think that what I like to think of what I call profit for joy is looking at the things that bring you joy reverse engineering that so that you have a revenue goal that supports the life that you know you want to live and then align your business model to [00:19:00] ensure that you’re making the money to make that happen.

And that’s really where profit first marries. this concept with YNAB and personal and business because it allows you to actually keep yourself accountable to what you’ve decided to accomplish once you’ve done that reverse engineering. Yeah, 

Melissa: so important. So many people don’t do this work and then pay everything in their business and at the end of the day, they’re like, okay, well, where’s my income?

Hello, where’s that? So I think this is really important and something that we need to look at. Now, for many business owners, they have variable income. Now, this was definitely me for many years. So what that means is they might launch one month and have a big influx of cash and then not launch for a few months or have little or maybe no money coming in for a couple of months.

So what is the best way to manage variable cash 

Amber Dugger: flow? Great. Okay. So I don’t know a. single online business owner or a coach that doesn’t have variable [00:20:00] income. It’s just a natural part of this business and that’s ultimately why I created this framework for myself. It was out of need. And so let’s say you do a launch and you have a group coaching program and you bring in certain amount of money one month, but then you don’t have any money the next two months.

Well, the first thing that I always encourage everyone to do is figure out what their revenue goal is based on what they really desire in their life. Like we were just talking about. Okay. So just for this example, let’s say that your revenue goal is 20, 000 a month, okay? And in that revenue goal, it’s allowing you to pay yourself 10, 000 a month and you’re putting, you know, let’s say 1, 000 a month into profit, et cetera.

Well, the thing is, with variable income, if you bring in 60, 000 in the first month, You can use an envelope system to hold aside 40, 000 so that you’re using the 20, 000 in that month to pay yourself, to pay your bills. To be able to hold us, hold aside money for taxes, [00:21:00] but then the next month you can take another 20 from that 40 that you held and then pay yourself.

And then another 20 that you held for the following month. And this is obviously a simple example and it never works out that perfectly, but you can start to see. That when you are looking at a forecast, which we definitely encourage everyone to do by listing out the cash payments, they expect to come in.

So if you have private clients and you know that they’re on a recurring payment schedule for six months for six month contract, let’s say you start three clients one month and then two clients the next month. If you keep track of it in a spreadsheet and you start to actually sum up how much money you are expecting to bring in that month, you can start to see what the gap is so you can decide, you know what, I actually just need to call in two more clients.

So let me just set up an intention to have a certain amount of sales calls and to talk about it every day, you know, do the things that you’re going to do to bring in the clients, [00:22:00] but instead of stressing about money. You now have a very clear goal in your mind because you can say, I desire two new clients.

So you can manifest them by putting, you know, two post it notes on your wall and every morning coming and saying, okay, I intend to fill one or two of those today. So that’s one thing you can do. Another thing is knowing that if you have variable income and you bring in more money one month, but then you know, the next month you’re going to be bringing in less money because let’s say you don’t want to have as many clients because it’s becoming summertime.

You can hold money as you’re making a higher number than your revenue goal and set that aside for the months that you plan to make less money. So it can start to even out even though you’re making different money each month. I love that. 

Melissa: A little bit of planning, a little bit of thinking, but So beneficial in the long run.

Amber Dugger: Absolutely. Let’s talk about 

Melissa: wealth mindset, money mindset. So a lot [00:23:00] of people have fear based beliefs around money. Maybe they were borrowed or inherited from their parents. They have that lack mindset. That fear around it. So how do you reprogram your mindset to have an abundant 

Amber Dugger: mindset around money?

It’s a great question and I think that has very many different answers. And so I can share my own experience and also seeing what’s worked really well for my clients. The very first thing is just having awareness. And so a lot of times I find that the framework that I developed was actually to satisfy a fear for myself at that time.

I was so scared of running out of money. I was scared that I was going to leave Bali, come back and everyone was going to see that I didn’t make it. There was a fear of failure. There was a fear of actually being destitute to be fully transparent. And it’s something I think that is very deeply ingrained [00:24:00] in my design.

I have an undefined root center, if you’re familiar with human design. So I just became more aware that with a system that allowed me to see that I had money for a certain amount of months. That it settled my nervous system. And so that was one thing that really helped was just having a system in place.

But as I’ve worked with hundreds and hundreds of people, I know that we all have a different paradigm around money depending on what our experience was as children, what we may have from an epigenetic standpoint. So just being really kind and gracious with yourself with whatever does come up and what you do find to be maybe blocking you from feeling more comfortable with money, comfortable or receiving money.

or comfortable having money. It’s just being very open to just forgiving yourself for whatever it may be. So forgiveness is a huge piece of it. And actually I did a practice for quite a while that you may be familiar with called Ho’opono Ono. It’s a, a [00:25:00] Hawaiian spiritual practice. It’s so simple too. And I started to just look in the mirror and I would do it every morning, 20 times.

It’s just four simple sit lines. And it’s, I’m sorry, please forgive me, I love you, thank you. And you can say this for any situation, whether it’s for someone else, it’s for yourself, if you don’t even know why you’re sorry or what you’re asking forgiveness for. It’s the energy behind this that is so powerful.

And so I actually did this with my money, my relationship with money, and I knew that there was a component inside of me that felt like I didn’t deserve. To receive the money I was receiving. And so by doing this practice, it allowed me to really start to feel I shifted my experience with myself, my love for myself, which truly is, you can only, I think, just say one day, you know what, I actually really do love myself and it’s an inner [00:26:00] energetic shift.

And it may just be something you don’t even realize happens, and then you realize, wow, this actually has shifted for me. So, it may be due to that, it may be due to, you know, an experience you had as a child where maybe one parent held money as power over another parent, so there can be components there.

But I think the biggest thing is, regardless of what it is, like I said, it’s the awareness piece, it’s the forgiveness piece for yourself, it’s loving yourself, and then truly just being open to different tools and modalities that can help you really settle your nervous system and settle or heal your relationship with money.

And it’s going to be different for everyone. So, there’s so many incredible modalities out there, but some things that have really helped me has been EFT, or Emotional Freedom Technique. And nothing helped me until I read the book Tapping into Wealth, and because I think it was addressing a key [00:27:00] issue for me of being scared of running out of money, that it really helped me at that point.

And another thing that has helped is EMDR, which is a therapy that, you know, it kind of taps into the subconscious. And for me, the biggest thing that helped was having an Akashic record reading. And I know that may not be for everyone, but for me, it was life changing. I did a holy reiki healing session paired with an Akashic records reading.

And I learned that I had a past life where I was a man in India, thousands of years ago I had leprosy. And I’ve actually never shared this story. And every day I was just making it. An ashram wouldn’t allow me to come until they had put out the food and had gone back inside. They were so scared of catching this, this disease.

And every day I would get food and live another day. And I lived to a very old age. And so the person doing the reading said, the thing that you really want to take away from this is you are [00:28:00] divinely supported and that you lived a very long life. End. It felt so incredibly true. I had full body chills when she was going through this.

I could see myself. And so that, for me, happened to be the thing that just completely changed the game for me. But I know others that have found tapping to be the thing for them, and others to just truly do some work around just awareness of learning, you know, from different books. I think one of my favorite authors is Neville Goddard.

And Feeling is the Secret has been one of the most profound books I’ve ever read because I believe that it’s not about visualizing, visualizing, visualizing. Well, that’s a component of it. I think we can sometimes, there’s some shame or guilt around, well, I must not be doing it right if it’s not working.

And I think it’s important to recognize what working is defined as, because we all are here to [00:29:00] choose to learn something, to grow, to experience something. So everything, and I believe everything happens for us. So if something is not manifesting in the way that you are expecting it to, maybe it’s because You’re actually trying to control something that isn’t meant to happen in that particular way.

Or perhaps you’re actually meant to experience this so that you can have more contrast to really feel into what it is that you really want. So I think the thing that has helped me more than anything that I just shared is this concept of everything is happening for me and curiosity is such a high vibration.

So when we’re curious about this, just why is this happening? It’ll be really fun to understand why this is happening for me. Then we start to see it. And I think that’s where we start to really settle our nervous system and open ourselves up to more abundance and recognizing that we’re not necessarily striving for wealth while that can be a component of a good life.

It’s really more about prosperity, which may [00:30:00] mean just having enough money for the things that bring you joy and having the time to spend to actually enjoy them. Yeah, absolutely. 

Melissa: And that little shift from why is this happening to me to what can I learn from this? Like these little shifts make such a difference and I want to share what’s really helped me with my money mindset.

So. In 2010, I ended up in hospital, hit rock bottom, my health completely taken away from me. And I remember laying in that hospital bed and a new friend at the time, they sent me a care package and in that care package was Louise Hayes, You Can Heal Your Life. And I remember reading this book and turning to my mom and saying, why haven’t you taught me this?

Why don’t you teach me that we create our own reality and all of these things that I was learning and reading and rediscovering in this book. And she, you know, said to me, Oh [00:31:00] darling, you know, I was doing my best and they absolutely were. My parents are so beautiful and I’m so grateful for them. But it was in that moment that I realized that most of my beliefs.

around money, around life, around anything were not actually mine. They were my parents. And in particular, my beliefs around money were my dad’s. And I had taken them on. I had inherited them. And in that moment, simply just having that awareness for me, I was able to see that they weren’t mine. And I got to ask myself this question, well, what do I believe?

So I whipped out a pen and paper and I wrote down the current beliefs that I was living by, which were my dad’s beliefs. I wrote them all down. I believe money, blah, blah, blah, blah. Then I wrote and I tuned in with myself and I wrote down, well, what do I actually [00:32:00] believe? And I wrote all of those down. And then I wrote an apology letter to money.

And it started with, dear money, I am so sorry for speaking so poorly about you for so many years. I’m so sorry for thinking that you were limited and finite. And I just went on and on, and I’m so sorry for being stressed over you. I’m, you know, all of these things. And then I wrote this beautiful letter and I apologized to money and I have that apology letter and my money beliefs saved in the notes section of my phone.

So whenever I feel something old come up that might not be mine, I will go and read that. And that has transformed my relationship with money. Now, that doesn’t mean that there haven’t been times where I’ve been challenged and things have come up. Absolutely. They have. And literally I talk about this with my husband [00:33:00] because he has no money blocks.

Like literally none. And I’m like trying to dig, I’m like, what about this? And he’s like, no, like we can create whatever we want. And I really was curious about that. I was really curious. And, you know, I interviewed his parents about it, not like formally interviewed them, but, you know, probed with questions because I was so fascinated with why he didn’t have any money blogs because so many people do, but.

You know, the beautiful thing about all of this is that when we have this awareness, we then get to choose how we want to respond and be with the energy of money. And it’s such a gift once you have that realization that it is just energy and that we are a vessel for it to flow through us. And thinking of it like that is just such a nicer 

Amber Dugger: way to live.[00:34:00] 

Oh, absolutely. And that’s such a beautiful story. And you’re absolutely right. It’s truly a neutral energy. And it’s something that I think so many of us put so much charge to because of these past experiences. It’s a physical response. And when we can transform that by what you just shared, I think it’s just absolutely amazing.

I’d love to know if you’ve found anything specifically that Really had your husband, you know, not have any blocks around money, like based on the interview with his parents? 

Melissa: Well, when I spoke to them, they were very neutral about it. They have always been very neutral about it. And I think he experienced both.

So they always had beautiful homes, but then just like an average car, but there was no charge. There was no. Feelings around either of them. It was just, we lived in this [00:35:00] home and this is the car we drive. You know, they lived in a beautiful home, but then they went to public schools. And what I gathered from that is that, yeah, there was no feeling around one being better than the other.

It just was, and there was no charge. And I think it’s our stories and our charge that we have behind. Oh, I’ve got this nice car, or I’ve got this nice house, or I don’t have this, and therefore that makes me not good enough. And it’s the stories that we attach to the things. And what I witnessed was there was no stories.

It was just neutral. It just was. And 

Amber Dugger: that was really inspiring. That’s incredible. I’m so glad you shared that because I’ve honestly never heard of anyone not having them, but it makes so much sense. based on the fact that it truly is just neutral. And if they have that neutral experience and recognize that everything is always [00:36:00] temporary too, you know, so yes, we have this car.

Yes, we have this house. But also just appreciating whatever it is. And that feeling is what allows us to enjoy everything that we have around us too. That’s so amazing. Yeah. 

Melissa: You know, I remember when we first got together and we wanted to move to the beach and the rent for that place, this was going on 10 years ago, the rent for that place was so much more expensive than what we were currently paying.

And it triggered me so much. I was like, We can’t do that. We just can’t. It’s too lavish. Like the stories I was telling myself, who am I to spend that much on rent? It’s too extreme. It’s too lavish. And then he said, well, honey, I would really like to live closer to the beach and I want to invite you to go and sit with those things that are coming up.

And I was like, Oh, okay. And so I went and sat with them and I [00:37:00] was like, all of this old fear was coming up for me and it was an opportunity for me to look at it, to move through it and to grow. But there’s been so many times in our relationship over the past 10 years where he’s been like, we are doing this.

And I’m like, Oh, triggered, triggered. Oh gosh. And have to go and look at that. But, you know, he’s such an expander for me. 

Amber Dugger: Oh, that’s so incredible because as you’re talking, it’s just making me think about how you and I are quite similar in some ways, I think with our, like, I, I agree my, a lot of my money paradigm comes from my father.

He really actually has a lot of pride around not spending a lot of money and being quite frugal. And I described that as that is his joy. He does get genuine joy from it. And he’s a very happy person. And so because of that, there’s nothing wrong with his relationship with money. It just isn’t part of my design [00:38:00] to be that way.

I really do love to write with a 300 fountain pen because it is so amazing to have that beautiful glide across really nice paper, you know? And so what I always encourage people to just feel into is instead of thinking about the number, think about what it is that you would love to see in your life.

Whether it’s living near the beach, or it’s living in a sky rise in Korea, or it’s experiencing the rainforest every day, there are things that I think we’re naturally drawn to. And the best way to really learn that is to take action, have clarity with action by traveling and experiencing, or maybe even just being more aware of what does give us that feeling that we kind of forget time.

And for me, it’s definitely something that I think when we have the things in our life that bring us that joy, it no longer matters about the number. And so when I do sessions with [00:39:00] people and they’re listing all of their expenses and really feeling into these things. Sometimes they’re a little bit astonished at either the high number or the low number, whatever it is.

And I said, the number doesn’t matter. It’s similar to like firewood, you know, if we live in an area that’s colder, we’re going to need more firewood. Are we going to be shameful of the fact that we need more firewood? Of course not. If we’re hiking, are we going to be shameful because we need more water?

Obviously not. So it’s the same thing with money. And I just, I will always take this story now. To use as an example, because when you truly view money as a neutral thing, as you’ve just shared, you really truly do discharge any sort of feelings or emotions around it and recognize that it’s just a conduit of our intentions.

Melissa: Absolutely. And like I said, Nick is the biggest expander for me in this space. Like he truly is so neutral and he inspires me every day with it, every single day. So. I’m so grateful that I have him there, but I would love to talk to you [00:40:00] about practical tips and hacks for people who may struggle with emotional spending, which is very common for a lot of people, you know, that quote unquote retail therapy.

So talk to us about that and 

Amber Dugger: what we can do. I think it’s really knowing yourself and knowing Do I love to spend that, that retail shopping or that retail therapy because it’s filling a void? Or is it truly the actual pursuit of different items and the spontaneous joy you get from finding different things?

It’s important to first just decide what is my relationship with this emotional spending? Because if it truly is just because you actually enjoy the pursuit and you enjoy the gifting of these things or replacing them with things that you no longer want. If you don’t feel that there’s any sort of stress around clutter in your house or you don’t feel stress around the actual, you know, changing over of items when you’re [00:41:00] purchasing them, that’s important to first assess because if you truly do just love to have money every month to experience that and you find it very easy to also kind of give them away or not have a cluttered home, if you don’t like a cluttered home, that is.

Then I would say actually just plan for a certain amount of money to be able to do that with. Now, if you find that you actually don’t feel very comfortable with it, it makes you feel uneasy, then it’s looking a little bit deeper and sitting with it. I think similar to what your husband Nick suggested for you, you know, just sitting and without any judgment, without any, you know, shame, just ask yourself, why is it?

That I’m wanting to do this and maybe it may not be in the moment, but maybe the next time it hits you that you’re wanting to go and do retail therapy, just be observant and curious of what is the situation, what has triggered this particular thought or desire and start to document [00:42:00] it. And without even thinking much about it, you can still go and do the retail therapy, but I want you to just start listing out the occurrences and then start to see if there’s some sort of pattern there.

Because we can be very quick to forget the circumstance and instead just feel guilty about the experience. And so by listing it in the moment, it allows us to start giving ourselves a less emotional viewpoint of what may be happening. And if you see a pattern there, that’s like, Oh, you know what? Maybe this isn’t actually serving me because every single time I do this, I don’t actually care for the thing that I purchased.

And it just spent my money and it wasn’t any some anything that I really cared about. That’s where I find having an intentional expansive spending plan can be really helpful because it allows you to see how much money is actually going to those things and seeing how that could impact the things that you really do care about.

For example, I would absolutely love to [00:43:00] purchase. I don’t know exactly what the name is anymore, I can’t remember it, but it’s this amazing new modern camper and it allows you to see the stars at night and it’s just this incredible machine because it actually even has its own drivetrain so that you don’t have to use a big truck to haul it.

It will self dock itself onto your trailer hitch. And I just think, wow, this would be so amazing. So that’s just an example of something that if you have a line item and you’re looking to save up for that particular thing, every single time that you’re thinking about, oh, I want to go do that. But no, which matters more?

Do I want to have this incredible trailer? Or do I want to go and do this emotional spending? Then you can choose, you know what, no, I want the trailer more and you can actually move money from one of those lines down to that trailer and say, okay, now I’m just one step closer to the thing that truly brings me joy versus this emotional spending.

But I think it’s really mostly about awareness and allowing yourself to then dig deeper as to what may be, you know, there, there [00:44:00] may be a gap in terms of what may be unfulfilled and find something that can really bring you joy in the interim. Mm hmm. 

Melissa: Yeah, I truly believe that we vote with our dollar.

And every time we are handing over money. We are saying that we believe in that we believe in that company, their ethos. And so for me, just stopping for a minute and asking myself, well, firstly, do I truly want this thing and does it align with my core values and. My beliefs. And if the answer is yes and yes, then I purchase it.

But, you know, for me just having that moment, that breath, cause I think there’s a lot of impulse buying and this is maybe why a lot of budgets fail and people can’t stick to those sorts of things. But if we just took a breath and asked ourself, like, why do I want this thing? Like, what is it? What is it that I feel like it’s going to give me?

And does it align with me? Because every time [00:45:00] we hand over money, we are voting 

Amber Dugger: with our dollar. 100%. And it just made me think of a time that I was walking into an art show and I just moved to New Mexico, back to New Mexico, and I saw this rug that’s actually behind me. And it’s dyed by native plants in Mexico.

I met the weavers. It was a really beautiful couple. And I just knew right away, this is coming home. It was not even a question. And I hadn’t planned on it. I hadn’t planned on purchasing an artisanal rug. But the thing is, I also know that when you just start to really become clear with your relationship with money, with your spending, there are going to be times when you just have these intuitive hits.

And that it will work out for you, especially when you have an envelope system, because I was able to just take money from another area that I was fine with moving and allows you that awareness piece of, you know, what. [00:46:00] I don’t really plan on good dining out this month, so I’m going to move some money from there.

I’m going to be able to move some money from my spontaneous shopping. You could even have a line for that to prepare for yourself. And that allows you to feel very empowered. I think one of the most important pieces of this is that budgets and being more aware and organized with your money doesn’t necessarily mean restriction.

It doesn’t mean that you’re now saying no all the time. It’s giving yourself permission to spend on things that you really actually care about. Absolutely. 

Melissa: Now, I want to talk about some specific strategies and tactics for online business owners because I am an online business owner and I know many people listening are.

So, I want everyone to be able to walk away with like tangible, actionable steps to take right now. So, to begin with, what numbers should every business owner know? 

Amber Dugger: Oh, it’s a great question. So, I always say there are five main things. And the first thing [00:47:00] is, you really don’t need to know your financial statements.

You don’t need to understand a profit and loss. You don’t need to understand a balance sheet. So, when you’re hearing people talk about this, just know. That is really not the most important thing to know. What the most important thing to know is what is it that is going to bring me joy month to month?

What are the resources I need to live my life? So for example, when I was living in Bali, I had double expenses. I had expenses in Washington, D. C. that I wasn’t going to get rid of, such as my mortgage. Things like that, but I also had rent in Bali and I had, you know, a scooter and I had massages that I was doing and travel and things like that.

So I just listed them all out to see what is it that I need to support the life that I’m living right now. And then look at my business expenses. I was an online business as well. So I was looking at, okay, I have a scheduler. I have a course platform. I have. These different things, I listed [00:48:00] all of those out.

And then by reverse engineering the revenue goal by saying, okay, I need so much money for taxes. I need money for profit. I need money for these two things. What is my overall revenue goal? So the number one thing you want to know is what is your revenue goal? We do have a free calculator for that. If you’re interested, I can share that with you.

And it’s very easy. You can just put in these four things and then you know what your revenue goal is. The second thing that you really want to understand. is really what goes into that revenue goal. Like I was mentioning, how much money is it going to be to cover your month to month life? And that includes what I call true expenses.

So we all know in our minds, typically what our fixed expenses are. We mostly know what our rent number is. What our utility cost is, but there are other things that we may not be thinking of that we definitely spend money on, such as perhaps holiday spending or home maintenance or travel or [00:49:00] school items or just random spontaneous generosity or that spontaneous shopping.

So those are things that you want to be thinking about as well. And it’s a really powerful process to just start listing out all the things that you would love to have money for so that can help you expand into perhaps a different revenue goal than what you first came up with when you use the calculator.

And then the third number is really just the same as a personal really understanding, does your business model align with making the revenue goal that you’ve calculated? And if not, what are the things that would really help me get there? Whether it be a coaching program to really understand how to scale your business, or perhaps it’s really learning how to actually manage the cash flow in your business, or perhaps it’s, you know, working with an EMDR therapist so you can really understand your relationship with money.

You want to just become aware of the things that you would really love to be able to invest in not only the business, but yourself to be able to create. The [00:50:00] identity of the person that you know is running the type of business that is making that revenue goal. And so far we’ve done three. The revenue goal, the personal expenses, the business expenses.

And then the next thing is really just understanding how much cash is flowing in your business. Every single month and how it compares to your average revenue goal so that you can start to make an action plan for yourself and your team if you have them to see what do we need to do to either increase our revenue over the next three months so that we can hit our overall revenue goal and then the final piece of it is really just.

Making sure that you’re checking in on this plan with yourself and that you do have a regular, perhaps a financial Friday, or you are maybe doing this on a daily basis just for 15 minutes in the morning, but checking those things I think are so key and it’s something that no matter how big my business has grown or my client’s businesses have grown, [00:51:00] it is a key concept that you will take with you no matter what business you run, um, Is you want to know these things and it’s not really what’s taught when we go to, you know, I didn’t learn this in health coaching school, for example, but I think that when you have those things, you can really start to let go of that guilt or shame of, am I really a CEO?

If I don’t really understand a balance sheet, no, you don’t need to know a balance sheet unless you’re planning to use your business to perhaps purchase a home with a mortgage. Then you may need to understand it a bit more, but that’s fairly easy at that point to understand it. But. Financial statements were not designed to run a business.

They were designed to calculate taxes. And I think that’s one of the biggest things to just take away is don’t feel called to understand how to do bookkeeping. Don’t feel called to understand how to do all the financial statements. Unless it really brings you joy, I definitely don’t feel called to learn all the nitty gritty.

I would rather be focusing on the things that [00:52:00] really move the needle in my business. And cash is really where it’s at, it’s where it gives us the empowerment to do the things we really want to do, travel when we want to, spend time with people when we want to, and actually make decisions and give ourselves that autonomy to do so.

Yeah, absolutely. 

Melissa: So once a month, Nick and I, because we have businesses together, and we’re also married, Um, and we have separate things that we do as well. We have a monthly money meeting and we talk about this in our book, Time Magic. And so once a month, it’s in the calendar as a reoccurring meeting.

It’s always in there. We never have to think about it. It just rocks up once a month in the middle of the month. And we go through our zero for the month before and we look at all of the revenue. We look at all of the expenses. We look at COGS. We look at everything. And we go through every line item and it’s so interesting because I’m like, Oh wow, Oh, [00:53:00] that affiliate revenue came in, didn’t even know about that.

Or, you know, there’s just so many things that you’re like, okay, cool. Or there’s things where you’re like, Oh, I need to cancel that subscription. You know, that’s still being charged and I didn’t know I was still being charged for it. So. I highly recommend, whether you do this by yourself or with your partner, that you sit down once a month and you go through your Xero or whatever system you use and you just look at every line item.

There have been So many times, too many times to count where we have picked up mistakes, where we have picked up. Yeah. Things like subscriptions that we were meant to cancel months before. You know, there’s so many things or double payments. We’ve been charged twice for something or just little things like that, that if you as the business owner are not looking at, they’re not going to get picked up.

Okay. Cause we have a bookkeeper and he didn’t pick them up. Right. Right. But he doesn’t know that we’re not using that subscription [00:54:00] anymore, you know, so it’s really important that you do 

Amber Dugger: this. And I just want to quickly say, based on what you just shared a moment ago, for anyone that’s thinking, gosh, I mean, don’t you get to a certain point where do you really need to be doing that?

Do you need to worry about these little charges that you are making, you know, X amount of money? And I just want to address that because I actually just had a fun text message the other day from Mike Michalowicz. Because many years ago, I was helping him with a book launch that he was doing. And he had gifted me at the time, a remarkable one, which I now have this one, the remarkable two.

It’s just an electronic notebook, but it never arrived. We ended up getting it refunded and that was the end of the story. So we thought, well, Mike is also definitely looking at all of his line items, looking every month at the things that are getting charged. And he started getting charged 2. 99 a month for their connect service, which they started to do many years later.

And so he’s like, did you happen to keep the remarkable? Because he couldn’t [00:55:00] even remember if I kept it or if it had been returned or whatever. I said, no, Mike, not only did I never get that. If I even had, we were completely legacied into never paying for that. So I have no idea why they’re charging you that amount.

Now it’s only 3 a month, but it’s not the amount, it’s being intentional about where your resources are being spent. Where are they going? Because an overspend is not the amount. The overspend is for something that you’re not using, you don’t care about. Or you don’t care, you don’t care to, to use and that’s when we start to really send signals that we’re not, we don’t really care about money because if we don’t care about money then it’s not going to necessarily flow to us as easily.

So I think one of the beautiful things about being intentional about where the money is going is it really just shows that we are wanting to be really good stewards of this resource, that we really do manage it with care. And [00:56:00] it’s not about the amount, but it’s really just about making sure it’s going to something useful.

So I just wanted to mention that really quickly because I thought that was such a great thing that you do. I was just going to 

Melissa: add Scott Pape. He wrote The Barefoot Investor. I’m not sure if you’re familiar with his work. 

Amber Dugger: I am. Yeah. 

Melissa: He’s amazing. He calls them leaky buckets. They’re these little things like leaky buckets.

If you’ve got all of these leaky money buckets, your money is just draining out. So visualize it like that if you’re a visual person. But I would love to hear. Any strategies or habits or practices you recommend for helping people, business owners, become consistent with their money management? 

Amber Dugger: Well, what we do in our signature program is we actually suggest that For the first 30 days, once they’ve established their personal spending plan, in YNAB is commit to a money magic practice every morning.

And it could be in the evening, it could be whatever really [00:57:00] makes sense for you. But the first thing that I always suggest is lighting a candle. Making it actually be an opening and closing ceremony, some breathing exercises if you feel that your nervous system is unsettled because it is definitely, it can be a very triggering thing to start looking at your money and coming more aware of it.

So just being really gentle with yourself, but actually setting aside all the things that really will make you feel more comfortable. Maybe it’s not being at your desk. Maybe it’s taking your iPad or your laptop. into your cozy corner with a wool blanket and some teak, you know, whatever it is that makes you happy, but make this a point to do it every day.

And so what we suggest is, you know, with our system, the way that they’re looking at their line items is every day, money that transactions are being imported in so they can see the things that happened the day before. And they also have an app where they’re actually entering in the spending before they spend to make sure that there’s money in the area that they [00:58:00] want to spend so there’s less surprises.

So I find that being consistent with this practice of looking at it every single morning for 30 days does create this habit and it also creates This experience where you kind of diffuse the emotions around it because you just continue to do it every day regardless of how you’re feeling about it. And you build this resiliency and understanding that, you know what, that actually isn’t so bad and I’m actually much more happy knowing where the money is and I, I now feel much more comfortable.

So I find that a lot of times our uncomfort or discomfort comes from our inability to actually understand it. And when we start to look at it, we start to understand it. Yeah. 

Melissa: I love that. Is there a common type or category of expenses that you see business owners spending money on that they could minimize or eliminate entirely to claw back some 

Amber Dugger: cash?

That’s a great question. From the business [00:59:00] side or the personal side? Business side. Okay. Definitely the subscriptions you mentioned. I think a lot of times we are paying for services that we don’t even realize we’re still paying for. I just had someone write in saying that she had saved 16, 000 after going through Profit for Keeps because she was just more aware of the money that she was spending.

So even just looking at those things, the subscriptions, but also I call this kind of like buying the bandaid. If you have a whole bunch of courses that you’ve purchased and you haven’t implemented them in any capacity, or maybe you’ve implemented 10 percent or 20%. That’s probably the biggest thing I see is that with every good intention, someone will purchase a course or a program, but then think that by purchasing it, that the problem that they’re wanting to solve goes away with that purchase.

And so I always just suggest that [01:00:00] before you purchase a program or a course, that one, you first see, what is it that I’m trying to solve here? Do I feel confident that this program is going to help me have ways to solve it? But also to take ownership of the fact that you are the one that is not only responsible for figuring this out, but also that it’s important that you have the time and space to take action on it.

And if you don’t, then maybe it’s just not the right timing. It might be the perfect program, but if you don’t have the time to actually intentionally spend on going through it, that can be a complete waste of money. And then you can feel even more, you know, shame or overwhelmed with money because you’re still in the same place.

So that’s the first thing. Another thing is purchasing something based on not having the need, but being caught up in. The kind of hype of something. So for example, if you happen to watch a masterclass on something that you didn’t even think that you were wanting to solve, [01:01:00] and then all of a sudden you get really excited because the person is really good at really hyping up what it is that they’re doing, you purchase it, but then you go, wait, why did I just purchase that?

For example, let’s say that there was a really amazing new website theme and then you already like your website, but you got so excited about the potential or possibility that you purchase it. But then it’s not a priority because you actually don’t have a need for a new website. The website you have is just fine.

I think a lot of times we try to fit a tool in with a need that we don’t necessarily have because the tool is so shiny. And so I like to always say, let’s first identify the actual gaps and the needs of the company and the team, and then we can start to look for tools. Don’t find a tool and try to figure out how it can work into the business.

Yes, I 

Melissa: love that. Now, what are three steps that you would suggest to every business owner to increase profitability? 

Amber Dugger: The very first thing would be to just go through and ensure that you’re not doing any [01:02:00] overspending in both personal and business. And I would say personal is probably the bigger emphasis here.

A lot of people that implement Profit First don’t address the personal side. And I think it’s actually the most important component of profitability. I think most businesses are actually quite profitable, but it’s the personal spending that can sabotage that profitability. So really becoming aligned with if you have a partner, understanding where you both want to be and understanding that it may look different and that your partner may have things that you really don’t find valuable or want to spend your money on and vice versa.

And that’s okay. But it’s important for you to really be on the same page and know that. Money is always going to be based on our priorities and our values. So we may not share exact same values, so it’s important to give freedom and expression to our partner. For example, one person likes golf and another person really enjoys going on knitting retreats.

You know, the person that is going on knitting treats that don’t really like the [01:03:00] golf, but the partner likes the golf. It’s important to give that expansion in both areas so that both, both people are happy with that. But being intentional with it and looking at do we, why are we even buying these streaming services when we watch TV maybe once a week, you know, that kind of thing is just looking at the things that are overspending.

So it would be definitely looking at the expenses. The second thing is making sure that your business model is aligned with the revenue goal that you have decided for yourself. Because I have actually seen people completely close businesses down after recognizing that the business model just simply doesn’t serve them.

And while it may seem like a drastic move, it’s really important to know ahead of time that your pricing aligns with the goals, the amount of time you want to be spending working in your business, that’s a really important part of profitability. Because you could be hitting your revenue goal, but be working 60 hours a week and be [01:04:00] exhausted and that’s not a sustainable business.

So it’s looking at the time as well and the space that you want to have in your life and ensure that it’s aligned with your pricing and that will increase profitability for sure, just by looking and making sure that’s aligned. And I would say the third one is knowing what it is that you want to do with your profitability.

Because with Profit First, there’s actually intentional profit above and beyond the amount of money you’re spending to your, in your personal life to sustain the life that you desire. So this is where I believe this component that we call profit for joy is so important. What is it that you want to do with the extra money in your business?

After your bills are paid, assume you have no debt, assume that you have six months savings in the bank. What is it that you really desire to see that money being funneled into? Is it a cause you care about? Is it a particular person you want to be able to help? [01:05:00] Is it something much bigger that you just know, if I put more money into this, I’m going to see change and impact here?

It’s important to just see what it is that you want, list those things out so that there’s actually intention set for that extra money to come in. Because again, like, you know, your husband Nick experienced as a child. If we’re neutral about money and we are truly satisfied with our life, there’s really no need for extra money to come in.

And so you may find over time that your list becomes less complicated and it really becomes more about just spending quality time with someone and Enjoying just those moments that we all I think sometimes can overlook, but I think looking at that and ensuring that you’re really clear on where that profit is going to go will definitely increase your profitability.

Melissa: Mm hmm. I love that. Thank you for sharing. Now, let’s pretend you have a magic wand and you could put one book in the school curriculum of every high school around the world. What [01:06:00] book would you choose? It doesn’t have to be on money, it could be on anything, but what’s the first book that 

Amber Dugger: comes to mind?

Magic First one, definitely, because I almost always have it on my desk, is this, Happier Than God by Neal Donald Walsh. I would put that in every single school. Yeah, that’s such 

Melissa: a beautiful book. I have had him on the podcast and his book, Conversations with God, the first one, changed my life. If you have not read Conversations with God, do it, run, do 

Amber Dugger: it right now.

It’s so good. And this is really just, I think, an even more practical conversation around it. So it takes everything you talked about in Conversations with God and I think applies it very practically. I just absolutely love, I love him. That’s beautiful that he’s been on your podcast. Yes. 

Melissa: Go and listen to it after this, babe.

You will love it. 

Amber Dugger: I have an intention of meeting him in person. I’ve already set that intention. I know it will happen when it’s meant to. 

Melissa: Yeah. He’s a beautiful man. So [01:07:00] yes, put that on your vision board and it will manifest. 

Amber Dugger: Thank you. 

Melissa: All right, my love. I have three rapid fire questions for you now. Are you ready?

Ready. What is one thing that we can do today for our health? 

Amber Dugger: I would say meditate. Yes. Yes, yes, 

Melissa: yes. What is one thing that we can do for our wealth? 

Amber Dugger: Redefine what wealth is to us and know that it’s not just about money, but much more. I like to replace it with the word prosperity, where we have our health, wealth, relationships, really giving us joy and redefining that word.

Absolutely. 

Melissa: And what is one thing that we can do for more love in our 

Amber Dugger: life? Being open to how it comes in. It may not look the way that you define it, and it may be right in front of you. Yeah, 

Melissa: beautiful. Now you are helping so many people around the world with your programs, with everything you do. I want to know what I and the listeners can do to give back and serve [01:08:00] you today.

Amber Dugger: Oh, wow. Well, you know, I really do believe that we’re always in the intention of touching as many hearts as possible. So just this opportunity to truly touch as many parts as possible today has been a true blessing and I’m very grateful for that. I’m grateful for everyone listening, for taking the time to listen to this work and listen to these concepts and I think one of the biggest things is taking these things that we talked about today and putting them into action and sharing and talking about it.

I think we are at a point in society where we have this beautiful opportunity to break down this taboo. about talking about money. And so if you feel a little uncomfortable talking about it, I just ask that you feel into that and wonder, you know, is this something that could really help change someone else’s life that I talk to today because this conversation is changing my life and just share that with others.

And that would be honestly the best thing. Because when we truly share [01:09:00] this, it becomes normal. This is no longer going to be something that we need to be talking about because we are all truly healing our relationship with money together. And when we do that, I think we’re really stepping into a new level of consciousness.

Absolutely. 

Melissa: Imagine if we all just went around sharing our numbers and what’s working and what’s not working. And I would love to get to that place of true vulnerability and 

Amber Dugger: transparency. Absolutely. I think it’s just such a beautiful thing to be able to have that space where we don’t feel unsafe. And I think the more safe spaces we can create for these conversations.

It’s going to allow us to open ourselves up to like you were asking before more love because ultimately that’s truly the only energy that we Truly resonate with and the more that we can just see that if someone is acting or acting out or maybe saying something unkind You know removing ourselves from that and allowing us to see that this person is hurting This person is [01:10:00] maybe not at the state of awareness of being able to see how to handle this Feeling that they have inside but removing ourselves Ourselves from this and really just having more compassion overall, whether it be with money or anything else that we’re experiencing.

I think the more compassion and forgiveness and just true grace, I think we’re just going to really enjoy living together much more in the future. Absolutely. I 

Melissa: so agree. This has been so jam packed with goodness. I’ve absolutely loved this conversation, and I’ll link to everything that you have mentioned in the show notes and that I’ve mentioned as well for people to dive deeper.

But thank you so much for coming on, for sharing. I’m so grateful to have had this opportunity with you. It’s been such 

Amber Dugger: a delight. Same here. Likewise, Melissa. Thank you so much for having me.

Melissa: I absolutely loved this conversation and got so much out of it and I feel so inspired. To just clean up my [01:11:00] money even more and to be even more intentional with everything. And I hope you got a lot out of this. And if you did, please subscribe to the show and leave me a review on Apple podcasts because that means that we can inspire and educate even more people together.

And it also means that all of my episodes will just pop up in your feed so that you never have to go searching for a new episode. Now come and tell me on Instagram at Melissa Ambrosini, what you got from this episode. I absolutely love hearing from you and connecting with you. So come on over there. Now, before I go, I just wanted to say thank you so much for being here.

We are at episode 550, 550. This is just amazing and I’m so grateful and I do not take it lightly that you are here. Every single time you come back, it means the absolute world to me. So thank you for being here, for wanting to be the best, the healthiest and the happiest version of yourself. And for showing up today for you and your finances and your family’s [01:12:00] finances.

You absolutely rock. Now, if there’s someone in your life that you can think of that would really benefit from this episode, please share it with them right now. You can take a screenshot, share it on your social media, email it to them, text it to them, do whatever you’ve got to do to get this in their ears.

And until next time, don’t forget that love is sexy. Healthy is liberating and wealthy isn’t a dirty word.

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Thank you so much for listening. I’m so honored that you’re here and would be SO grateful if you could leave me a review on Apple podcasts, that way we can inspire and educate even more people together.

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P.P.S. Please seek advice from a qualified holistic practitioner before starting any new health practice.