Afraid of Being Rich? Why More Money Can Feel Like Losing Love

You want more money. You've said it out loud, written it in your journal, maybe even put a number on your vision board. And yet, every time things start to open up, something pulls you back. A client cancels. An unexpected bill shows up. You get a strange heaviness right when you should be celebrating.

If that sounds familiar, I want to gently offer something my mentor Scott Haug teaches that shifted how I see my own money story. Sometimes the block isn't that you don't want money. It's that a younger part of you is afraid of what money might cost you.

The fear underneath the fear

Scott describes a quiet fear so many of us carry: if I become that abundant person, the people I love most won't love me anymore. In his words, "if those people don't like rich people, and if I become rich, I'm not going to be loved."

Think about the phrases you heard growing up. Money doesn't grow on trees. Rich people are filthy. Those people shouldn't have so much. Maybe nobody said it directly to you, but you absorbed it from your parents, your grandparents, school, TV, even cartoons.

Scott teaches that everything we believe about money came from somewhere outside of us, and it built a survival mechanism. If money didn't feel safe to the people who raised you, your nervous system learned to push it away.

It isn't the grown-up you who's scared

Here's the part that softened me. You're not consciously thinking, "I'll lose my family if I get rich." Scott says this is a young version of you, somewhere between three and eight years old.

That little girl learned something simple: to survive, I need to be loved, and if I'm not loved, I'll be left. So when expansion shows up, she gets scared. And she pulls you back the only way she knows how.

Scott says this even applies if you weren't close to your family, or if you were adopted. A younger version of us always wants to survive, and it believes survival depends on belonging.

That's why affirmations alone can feel so hollow. You say, "I'm abundant," and somewhere inside a small voice is saying, "but then they won't love me."

Money isn't good or bad

One line from Scott's teaching I come back to often: "money is incredibly spiritual. Because money is just an energy form." It has no morals. It doesn't care whether you're a good person.

When I started to see money that way, I stopped needing to prove I was "not one of those people." I could let my income grow, and over time it did triple, without feeling like I was abandoning anyone.

A gentle practice for this week

The goal isn't to argue with the fear. It's to meet the part of you who carries it.

1. Notice the moment. The next time money comes in or a big opportunity appears, pause and notice what you feel in your body. Tight chest? A wave of guilt? Write it down.
2. Ask who's scared. Close your eyes and ask, "How old is the part of me that feels this?" Trust the first age that comes.
3. Find the old rule. What did that little girl learn about money and love? Maybe "Rich people are selfish," or "If I have more than them, they'll be hurt."
4. Speak to her kindly. Let her know, in your own words, that love and abundance can live in the same body. You don't have to choose between belonging and expanding.
5. Repeat when it comes back. It will come back. That's not failure. It's just another chance to meet her.

You don't shame her. You see her. That alone starts to loosen the grip.

Why this matters for your family, too

As moms, we pass down our money stories whether we mean to or not. When you heal the belief that wealth means being unloved, you're not just changing your bank account. You're showing your children that they can be generous, kind, and abundant all at once.

You don't have to untangle this alone

If you can feel that younger part of you holding the brakes on your money, let's look at it together. Book a free Discovery Call with me and we'll find where this fear started and one gentle place to begin.

Book your free Discovery Call with Lindsay

Lindsay and David Hawkins are Scott Haug Affiliates. The teaching on money survival mechanisms in this post comes from Scott Haug.