Why you're stuck.
Why you keep making the same amount of money, year after year.
We all have an inner thermostat for the amount of money we feel we “should” earn.
When we make less than that number, we scramble to earn more.
When we make more than that number, we self sabotage or take our foot off the gas.
Many people get “stuck” at a certain income level for years as a result.
I’ve seen it with my clients (and myself as well).
The fear of failure motivates us to maintain our current standards.
The fear of success stops us from exceeding those standards.
The pain of change feels more scary than the pain of staying the same.
So we stay stuck.
But it’s not just about money.
We have similar inner thermostats for nearly every aspect of our lives:
Love
Happiness
Health
Family
Success
Creativity
Self-worth
Productivity
and more.
Just like physical thermostats regulate temperature, our internal thermostats regulate our life experience.
The good news? These thermostats are adjustable.
The bad news? It only changes from the inside.
The thermostat is controlled from the inside.
“The tragedy of many people’s lives is that they look for self-esteem in every direction except within, and so they fail in their search.”
- The Six Pillars of Self Esteem
Most people believe they need something outside themselves to solve their problems.
But it’s just not how it works.
Your internal thermostat isn’t controlled externally.
Consider lottery winners (who often go broke within a few years) or celebrities/artists (who reach success, then self-destruct).
The problem isn’t a lack of money, love, or happiness.
The problem is your internal beliefs aren’t calibrated to bring those things into your life.
Success doesn’t erase insecurities.
It amplifies them.
When we gain success, recognition, or money beyond our conception of self, a great conflict emerges.
We all desire alignment between our external reality and our internal self-image.
If the outside and inside don’t match, we will (consciously or subconsciously) find a way to restore equilibrium.
That’s why many people implode after a big win.
They’re not prepared for what success unlocks:
Old wounds
Childhood scripts
Self-worth questions
A deep reckoning with your identity
So they return to the familiar pain they know.
The fear of success
People say they’re afraid of failure.
But the real fear that paralyzes people is success.
It’s not the money or the attention or the bigger audience that freaks them out.
It’s the internal consequences of success.
The identity shifts, the psychological weight, and the emotional exposure that trigger resistance.
We sabotage our success for a variety of reasons.
But they’re usually based on invisible scripts:
These unconscious beliefs about money, love, family, faith, and success silently govern our actions.
These stories are transmitted to us early on and we run them like a script, often without even realizing it.
Three scripts that hold us back from success:
1. “Success is evil.”
Our culture teaches us to associate success with corruption. Hollywood conditions us: success = greed, villainy, or moral failure. When your subconscious associates success with ego, greed, or disconnection, you will block it. Period.
2. “Change means pain.”
Success means change. If we internally associate change with pain, we will avoid it at all costs. This can manifest as procrastination, justification, or imposter syndrome.
3. “I’m not ready.”
If you’ve been hurt, neglected, or abandoned in the past, you may unconsciously reject the very thing you say you want. Most people aren’t afraid of achievement; they’re afraid of letting good things in.
Getting unstuck.
We’re all on a lifelong journey of raising our standards and becoming our most authentic selves.
If you want to raise your internal thermostat, here are a few places to start:
Step one is awareness. Ask yourself:
What level of success feels “right” to you?
What income level feels “normal” to you?
How do you feel when things fall below your standards?
How do you feel when things get “too good”?
What are the things you know you “should” be doing, but you’re avoiding?
More insights can be uncovered by doing deep personal work.
I endorse Morning Pages journaling and Internal Family Systems therapy.
Once you have awareness, you need to learn to raise your standards.
You can either “be” your self into a new way acting, or act your self into a new way of being.
Either way, your new identity requires new actions.
Finally, one of the fastest ways to raise your standards is to surround yourself with people who have what you want.
Observe: What do they do? How do they think? How do they show up?
Grow from the inside out.
“If you can’t be happy with a coffee, you won’t be happy with a yacht.”
- Naval Ravikant
Many people seek success through material possessions.
They secretly hope that fixing their outsides will magically fix their broken insides.
It doesn’t work.
The work must happen internally.
As you solve the internal blockages, you’ll experience the external shifts.
You’ll suddenly see yourself taking the actions that create the outcomes that you want in life.
That’s how you’ll know it’s working.
Thanks for reading. It would mean a lot to me if you shared this.
It would mean even more if you implemented it.
If you’re interested in working closely with me, watch this.
I've been trying to change careers for 20 yrs. I have either time or money but not both.
All of these Inner Entrepreneur writings have been amazing so far. I read every one and I really enjoyed them because I'm also on the journey of realising you can't win at business without doing the inner work. I've been in therapy and learning all this over the last year. Great to see the concepts being articulated so well. Thanks, Rich!