Ep 94: Manage Your Brain & Money Course

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In this game-changing episode of our ADHD Summer School series, I reveal why your ADHD brain struggles with money management and share proven strategies to transform financial chaos into control—without waiting for the "perfect budget" to get your finances together.

📌 Key Topics:

• Why 2 out of 3 impulse purchases happen in bed on your phone
• Understanding how emotions drive spending decisions (and what to do instead)
• Four major areas where ADHD brains struggle with money management
• Simple organization systems that prevent bills from getting lost
• How to notice spending urges and let them pass naturally
• Breaking limiting beliefs about money that keep you stuck

🗣️ Featured Quote: "It's cheaper not to buy the item at all. Although that item might be cheap, it's never cheaper than not buying it at all."

💡 Strategy Breakdown:

• Use the "I can have it later" technique to curb impulse spending
• Apply vertical filing systems that work with ADHD brains
• Practice urge surfing to build impulse control naturally
• Create one designated spot for all financial mail and bills
• Implement autopay systems while keeping backup reminders
• Reframe money beliefs from scarcity to abundance thinking

🎯 Four-Part Money Management System:

1. Curbing Impulsive Spending: Understanding triggers and building awareness
2. Getting Financially Organized: Simple systems for bills, accounts, and filing
3. Making Money Easy: Using your mind to create financial success
4. Money Relationships: Healing your relationship with money and others

🔑 Key Takeaway: Your spending isn't out of control—your ADHD brain just needs different systems. With the right tools to manage financial overwhelm, you can feel money stress less often and financial confidence more consistently. Start with one strategy, build momentum, and celebrate every small financial win.

Connect with Mande: 

Free Money Management Workbook: http://www.learntothrivewithadhd.com/workbook2025

Learn more about private coaching with Mande: https://learntothrivewithadhd.com/services/ 

Free Resources: https://learntothrivewithadhd.com/freeresources/ 

Website: https://www.learntothrivewithadhd.com/ 

LinkTree: https://linktr.ee/learntothrivewithadhd 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/learntothrivewithadhd/ 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/learntothrivewithadhd/

#adhdmoney #impulspending #financialorganization #moneymanagement #adhd #executivefunction #adhdsupport #adhdstrategies #adhdcommunity #moneyMindset #adhdworkbook #financialfreedom

Click here for full show notes.

CLICK HERE for more resources. We're on this journey together!

Transcript

Welcome. We are starting a new special series. This is the A DHD Summer School. This is the kind that helps you build real life skills to make life with A DHD easier and more productive. These courses that will be released over the next month or so, were originally in my Learn to Thrive with a DHD group coaching program, but now I'm making it available to everyone right here on YouTube and the podcast.

So why now? Because summer is a great time to slow down, reset, and work on habits and systems that actually make a difference. These tools have helped my clients create lasting change, and now they're here for you. But don't just watch or listen. I want you to take action. You can download the free companion workbook at www dot.

Learn to thrive with adhd.com. Slash Workbook 2025. It's totally free and designed to help you apply what you learn here. Ready? Let's dive in.

Welcome to manage your brain and money making finances clear, easy, and organized. Your agenda. Part one. Curbing impulsive spending. Part two, getting financially organized. Part three, making money easy.

And part four are your relationships around money. If you haven't met me yet, my name is Mandy John. I am an experienced A DHD coach for adults. I am an A DHD multiple business owner in true A DHD fashion. I'm a mom of three, a wife to my high school sweetheart and an animal lover. I do have a DHD.

I'm diagnosed hyperactive, and I'm a teacher at heart. So I hope these lessons serve you and I hope they just get better and better.

All right. So curbing, impulsive spending part one. Why does money matter to you and what are your goals for money? Why do you want money? What's the point of it? I want you to not think about the bills or the numbers on the bank statement. I want you to think about where it's gonna get you or how it's gonna help you make a mark in the world, or how it's gonna help other people if you have money.

Impulsive spending. What is it? It's anything that you purchase, unplanned, and it can get really outta control. So how does it happen? Two out of three impulse purchases happen in bed on a cell phone, and I actually found this study and then I had a client tell me as we were going, talking about, spending, she said if I just don't take my cell phone to bed.

I won't do any of the extra purchases. And I thought, how interesting, two outta three impulsive purchases happen in a bed on then this is not my information. This is information that's been studied. Are you taking your phone to bed with you?

What can you do instead? If that's a problem? Top impulsive purchases, food and groceries, household items, clothing, coffee, toys, and takeout. And isn't it interesting that it's not big screen TVs, it's not Hawaiian vacations, it's not that kind of stuff, but it's the little stuff that adds up because we dismiss it and think it's no big deal, right?

So why does it happen? Because of our emotions, our past experiences, maybe we feel like we've got a good deal that we can't pass up. And there's a lot of reasons. It feels good. Okay, so let's first talk about emotions. Many things we purchase because of how we think they will make us feel, or we're trying to shop, we're shopping to try to get rid of an emotion. And so maybe it's boredom or stress and you're shopping to not feel that emotion. And when I say how it makes us feel, think of buying a new outfit because you think it's gonna make you feel.

More confident or prettier, or maybe it's, a new toy for grownups golf clubs or, things like that. It's about how you think that will make you feel. It's not about the thing itself.

And what really happens is if we're spending beyond our means, those things that made you. Forget about an emotion or feel a different emotion at that time are gonna be things that create stress or resentment for you. So our past experience, did your family teach you how to handle money? Did you watch a parent that was a spender or a saver?

You are in charge of your experience now, that might be your past, and we wanna acknowledge it, but understand that, okay, that's just good information. I understand why I'm behaving that way, but now I'm in charge of my experience. So we mentioned a good deal.

According to a survey, 64% of shoppers impulse buy because of a sale. It's cheaper not to buy the item at all. So I love this course because of the impulsive spending on my part and my husband's part, we got into a lot of debt and we did some really crazy things to get out of that debt.

And. Things I would not ask you to do. We're teaching you to do it a much easier way here. But that's one thing I like to remind myself when we were going through that process of paying off that debt, is that although that item might be cheap, it's never cheaper than not buying it at all.

Coupons or whatever, but you're taking your time to clip those coupons in order to make an item free, right? So there is an expense one way or the other, but that's just a thought I'll offer you. It's cheaper not to buy the item at all, so it feels good. When we shop, we get a dopamine hit and that's what we're lacking as people with A DHD.

We're lacking dopamine, but it's. Only for a limited time, right? It's like an up and then a down. So what do you do about it? You can make a simple budget plan to spend, wait to spend, make a list, don't shop. When you're emotional, you can let purchases rest, meaning leave them. I had a client that would make a purchase, leave it next to the front door and not take it out of the bag.

And then if she still wanted that thing in a couple days, then it could come out of the bag. And mostly she didn't want it. But you'll have to get in a good practice of taking things back, make the time to do that, these are all tools that we're offering you for your toolbox, and you're gonna figure out the ones that work right for you.

Make it hard to spend, don't have all your. Credit cards or debit cards or whatever available to you at all times. Maybe cash is the thing you wanna do. There's lots of options to make it a little bit harder to spend. And don't put yourself in bad situations. Maybe you don't wanna go shopping with friends.

Maybe you wanna do other things with them telling yourself that you can have it later is more effective than telling yourself you can't have it at all. So that is something that, it was a study that was done as well, that if people told themselves they could just have it later, then they were able to not eat the chocolate or spend the money or do whatever it was.

Then if they said, no, I can't. And so when you're saying I can't, you're kinda resisting. You get exhausted from resisting after a while, but if it's, I can have it later, you're not resisting. You're open to the idea of it. And so it's just an easier, more sustainable way to go. So practice.

When you get the urge to purchase things you don't need, notice the urge and let it pass. The more you do this, the easier it gets. And this is true for anything impulsive that you're doing. If there's impulsive eating this is true.

anything you do impulsively, you'll get the urge to do it. And before you're aware of this urge. You just do the thing, right? And you just think you're doing it out of your control. But once you gain an awareness, which is what we're all about here is gaining an awareness of what we're thinking, what's going on in our minds.

Once you gain that awareness, you'll notice the urge, and then you just sit with it and you just notice that you want to shop online, for example, and you just notice it. And you don't resist it. You don't tell yourself you can't do it. You just say, I notice I'm wanting to shop online and just let it be there.

Okay? And then you can collect all these times that you had the urge to do it and you didn't do it. And pretty soon your brain is gonna leave you alone about that because what it's doing is saying, I need dopamine. Or I'm feeling this certain way that I don't wanna feel,

and it's just trying to get you to feel better. And if we just let that urge come, don't answer it enough times the urge doesn't come anymore, or it comes a lot less often, way easier to deal with. Make it fun. How long can you go without spending? How much did you save? Can you do it again? So what I'm talking about here is I used to play a game with myself when I was trying to pay off this debt and I would see how long I could go without spending money.

And, I'm raising a family and there's food to buy and things like that. But we are in a country where. Things are pretty abundant for the most part. And I would notice, I would feel the need to go shopping every week, but actually maybe I didn't have to. And I would go about a week and a half, sometimes two weeks, and then I would look and go, okay, how much money did I save by doing that?

And just make a game of it. So that's just an idea that might work for you. So take action, evaluate your spending. Create a simple budget, use a list when shopping, and then plan ahead for purchases. These are your action items for this time,

Getting financially organized. Part two, collect mail, collect all the mail in one place. So the reason I bring this up is as it says, so bills are never lost. Out of sight is out of mind. Paper bills can be helpful. I would automate your bills as much as possible, and I'm sure we'll talk about that.

But if you're getting mail that has financial obligations in it. Doesn't matter what is in that mail, let's collect it all in one place and let's make it a place, it is, it's never gonna get stuff stacked on top of it. It'd be nice if it's something vertical that's really helpful for A DHD brains.

Maybe you put it all in one folder. That is always where the mail goes, and that way bills are not lost. You're not paying a DHD tax for late fees and things like that. And then this was helpful for me to continue to do paper bills if it's not something I have automated. 'cause then I have that, maybe I have that email reminder and then I have that physical paper reminder.

Get rid of junk shred or dispose of junk mail. When it comes in, there's actually a number you can call. It's 1 8 8 8 5 opt out and it keeps junk mail from coming to you.

So that would maybe save you. Money because you're not purchasing things in this junk mail that you didn't ask for. It saves you time 'cause you're not having to open things that aren't actually anything important. And it saves you from having dispose of things and they never have to print the things to send you in the first place, right?

So simple files, keep it simple. The easier you make your file system, the more likely you are to use it. What I used to do was have a section, and this is when all bills were paper.

But I would have a section for oh, a good example is when we were in debt, a section for credit cards, and then I would have it for each individual credit card how can you simplify your filing system or maybe simplify your digital filing system?

Can you somehow make it searchable so things don't have to be super organized? So you don't have to take time to do that. How can you make your files simpler? Vertical over piles? Vertical is always best. Stacks of things on your desk are going to make it much harder to find things than having things vertical and upright.

A tax folder. Collect items you need for taxes in one folder throughout the year. It is a rule that the mail always goes in one place. I have one of my children will bring in the mail and they will just put the mail anywhere within the vicinity of the entryway even by the front door sometimes.

Different places in the kitchen, and I will remind that child where the mail goes, and I will always, when I find it, grab the mail and put it right back in that spot where it goes. So just making these rules for yourself makes things really helpful. Create a checklist of all the bills, noting due dates, so you'll always know when things are coming.

And I think I have a page in your workbook for you to do that. Keep bills simple. Have less accounts autopay whenever possible, and have your passwords somewhere secure, but somewhere easy for you to get them. If sometimes just that one step of I don't remember my password, keeps you from going ahead and paying that bill that day.

It makes you think I'll take care of it tomorrow when I have more time to retrieve the password. And then it gets really frustrating to have to retrieve passwords over and over again. Keep it simple. List all accounts. What are your banking accounts?

Do you have checking, savings, certificates of deposit money, market accounts, and if I'm leaving anything off the list to just note that down in your notes. Do you have debt? Are there credit cards, auto loans, mortgages, personal loans, student loans investments, brokerage, peer to peer lending.

Retirement, 401k, 4 0 3 BTSP IRAs. Bill paying location. Have one location where you always pay your bills and make sure you have everything you're there you need. So are you gonna need a checkbook from time to time? Do you need a password for this thing? Do you have a pen? Do you have envelopes?

Do you have stamps? Do you have everything you need to pay your bills? Take action, create a bills checklist, simplify your filing system or create one if you need to. I know I, I was once this person too but I have a lot of clients where their filing system is a bag.

And what happens when your filing system is a bag? You have a general idea of where that thing is, but you gotta dig through the whole bag in order to find it, right? Let's create a some sort of simple filing system for you, and then have a bill paying location.

All right, part three, Making money easy, set aside negative beliefs. Some people have beliefs about money that don't serve them For this conversation, let's assume that money's neutral and acquiring it is positive.

Some people think that? If they acquire money, they're not a good person. There's lots of beliefs around money or maybe they think they can't acquire money. Money's just neutral. It's just the thing we exchange for goods or services, and we're gonna keep it all very neutral and unemotional here.

So what does money mean? It means. You can have your basic needs met. It means freedom. It means security. It means helping others. It means opportunity. It means experiences. It might mean education or comfort. And I'm sure I left things off this list that you could add.

So what you can do is borrow other people's beliefs about money. And one of my beliefs about money that is super helpful to me is money's always coming and that makes me not get very. Uptight about money, it makes me very free to give money.

I'm very happy to tip or to help someone in need because I always believe more money's coming back to me. So that might be a little bit out there for you, but yeah, maybe you could believe that money is fun. Maybe it's fun to deal with money.

Maybe it's fun to get money. Maybe it's fun to give away money. Maybe there's lots of other beliefs that you could believe that would serve you here. So how do we make money?

There are more ways to make money than we can likely count, but there is one way that we all make money. And that is with our minds. It's true that even for work we do that requires little mental energy. So for example, moving a stone from one pile to another, you still have to use your brain to pick up the stone and move it from one pile to another.

you have a brain, you have so many ways to make money. So keep an open mind about that. So our thoughts affect everything we do, including making money.

How can we use our thoughts to make money easy? let's talk about the model. So a circumstance is something that everyone would agree on, everybody, there's no doubt about. It's neutral. And so a circumstance if we're talking about money might be my bank account says, X, Y, Z, amounts of money.

In my account, whatever that amount is. And you have a thought about that. You might think that's a lot. You might think it's too little. You might think that you're not gonna have enough money to get to the end of the month. You might think that you have enough money to give money to your friend that's in need.

You are gonna have thoughts about that circumstance, whatever it is, and then that's gonna make you feel a certain way. So that example of, I'm not gonna have money to get to the end of the month, that might make you feel stress, right? And then from that feeling, whatever that feeling is you're gonna take and not take certain actions you are gonna do and not do certain things.

if you're feeling stressed, that might make feel frozen. There's lots of things that you would do or not do from that, right? And then you would get your results and your thought is always tied to your results. And so that's why we wanna be careful what we're thinking.

'cause whatever we're thinking is gonna get us our results. A great example of this that I always told my kids since they were little is if you think you can't do it, you can't do it. Because what happens when people think they can't do something, they don't take action towards doing it because they can't.

And so that's just a very simplified version of that. So using our mind to make money, motivating ourselves to work. We can use our mind to motivate ourselves to work. We can use our mind to learn skills.

We can use our skills to help other people. We can use our mind to visualize a reward. We can use our mind to feel good about our contribution. There's tons of things that we can use our mind for around money. That's helpful. So what are your money goals in that example of the model?

the model is just the way the world works. It's the way your brain works, it's the way everything happens. And you'll notice, like you have that person in your life that's always negative, right? They're always in the negative thought space. And what results are they getting? I.

They're not getting the good results, are they? And what about that person in your life that's always in the positive thought space, no matter what the circumstance, they're thinking the best and they're feeling good. And how is their life turning out? Pretty well, right? And it's because of the actions that they're taking and not taking because of how they feel, because of how they think.

Your many goals, you put your goal in the result line, and then you figure out if you're gonna get that goal. If you're gonna create that result, what would you need to do? What would you need to stop doing? How would you need to be feeling? What would you need to think in order to feel that way? And then. You can decide what your circumstance is. Okay, so how can A DHD get in the way of our money? So our executive function skills are time management, organization goal sustainability, task initiation focus, and attention planning and prioritization, working memory, flexible thinking, emotional regulation, and metacognition.

And metacognition is what? Become a brain boss is based on, it's our thinking about our thinking. So overcoming challenges, learn skills and practice, manage your mind, strategize, pivot, try again, and never quit. So if you're having challenges with money, maybe you're having negative beliefs about money, maybe there isn't enough money and you wanna do something about that, and that's a challenge.

Maybe you have plenty of money, but you're not spending it the way you wanna be spending it. So you wanna learn skills like you're doing here. You wanna practice or learn skills from other people as well. Read books, follow podcasts, wherever you wanna get your tools for your toolbox. And then you wanna manage your mind around this thing that you're wanting to do.

You're gonna strategize. If that doesn't work, you're gonna pivot. You're just gonna just try a different direction. That doesn't work. You're just gonna try again, and then you're just not gonna give up and you're gonna get through those challenges. So new thoughts about money.

These are ones I'm gonna offer you. Remember you said, we talked about borrowing beliefs about money. So beliefs are just thoughts. We think enough times that we've just decided they're true. Okay, so help some helpful thoughts about money. Money can be simple. There's always more coming. That's that one that I shared that I have.

There's plenty of money. I like money. Some people are afraid to like money. They're afraid that means something bad about them. If that doesn't resonate with you, that's okay, but that's just one that I would offer you. I can always make more and there's tons of positive beliefs that we could add to this.

I can achieve my financial goals.

That's a thought you could have. I'm learning to be responsible with money. This I'm learning to is, it's like it's a magic key. All right. You don't have to be responsible with money in order to be a person that's learning to be responsible with money, and it lets you off the hook for not being perfect.

It lets you off the hook for, stumbling and making a mistake because I'm just learning. And that's what people do when they learn. That's what babies do when they learn to walk. That's what kids do when they learn to ride a bike. It's never a perfect process. And I think as adults, we think.

We're grown up now and it must be a perfect process and it's not. But adding, I'm learning to for anything that you're trying to do is so helpful when you're not in the belief that you can do it yet. So there are plenty of good people with money. That's a great one. If you're one of those people that thinks that, people with money are evil or bad people, it's a catch 22, right? Because if you think people with money are bad, it makes it really hard to ever become a person with money because you don't wanna be bad, right? It always comes back. That's another one that I have. I really like that one. And it really does. It always comes back and that's where it's so fun to give somebody like a really nice tip or do something for someone.

'cause that money always comes back to you. And you don't even have to watch for it. It just does it. So I'm worthy to have money. That may be one that you need. So take action. Set your money goals, what do you want around money? Practice your thought models about money and just do the best you can with your thought models right now.

If you don't know how to use the model completely, that's okay. Just ask yourself those questions. What would I need to be thinking to feel this way? And if I felt this way, what would I do if I felt capable around money?

What would I need to be thinking to feel capable around money? I can learn to be capable around money. If I feel hopeful, what am I gonna be doing? I might be trying out some of these tools.

I might be taking a look at my finances instead of like burying my head about it. I, might dabbling with some things that might help me. So what are new thoughts that you can create about money? All right, so that is your take action.

Part four, your relationships around money. And this is an interesting one, so we are gonna talk about money and relationships and our relationship with money. Two separate things. Okay? Money and relationships. So it might be family relationships, romantic relationships, friendships and acquaintances.

Family relationships. How were we taught? How were we taught to handle money? What are family's expectations of how we handle our money? Do you depend on your family financially? Does your family depend on you financially?

Romantic relationships. Are you on the same page? Financially Are, is one of you a spender and one of you a savor? Like where do you need to come together with that? Do you have similar financial goals? Do you argue about money? Does one person take over the finances? Do you discuss finances together? How are your financial problems handled together?

Friendships? Are you spending to try to keep up with friends? Do they maybe have jobs that pay more than yours? The restaurants you're going to are out of your budgets, but to be with your friends you're doing that, that's just one example. Are you loaning money to friends?

Do you, when you can't afford to do that, do you spend money on people to be more integrated with them to fit in? Are you afraid to discuss money with friends? So what's going on with money around your friendships? Acquaintances, what are your thoughts about those you know that have or don't have money?

Do you judge the way those around you spend money? Are you afraid you'll be judged for having or not having money? Our relationship with money, how do we treat it? What do we believe about it? How do we talk about it? Do we spend time with it and do we work on our relationship? If you were to think of your money or your finances like a person, then are you ignoring them? Do you talk about them at all?

Think of the questions then. What do you believe about them? How do you treat them? Do you just throw them away? Do not think about them much at all? If money were a person and you wanted to have a good relationship with them, what would it be Different.

So how we treat money, do we ignore it? Do we hide it? Do we get rid of it? Do we disrespect it? Do we hoard it? I know when I was a kid, I would be the kid that would shove all my money under the monopoly board, so I didn't look at it, so I didn't spend it.

That's hoarding. Or are we paying attention to it? Giving it our time, not trying to get rid of it, being thoughtful with it, valuing it in a healthy way? Are we willing to really look at it? Beliefs about money. Money, okay, these are ones that can be unhelpful, right? Money is the root of all evil.

Money doesn't grow on trees. There isn't enough money to go around wanting more money is greedy. Money can't buy happiness. I don't deserve a lot of money. These are all very unhelpful beliefs about money. Are there more useful beliefs about money? We kinda went with the opposite here. Not the opposite of those exact ones, but money comes to me easily.

There's always more money coming. There's plenty of money for everyone. Making money is fun, and making money is easy. And you might say to me, oh, but my job is so hard. That's your thinking around your job. We can work on that, right? Or can just get you a different result, right? And get you in a different job.

Whatever you need to do to be happier about the situation. What do you want your future to be with money? Maybe you want to handle money more easily. Have your finances organized. I. You want money to come to you easily. You wanna have plenty of money and your, you wanna feel like your options for money are endless.

And remember, through all this, money is neutral. Money is just a means to an end. If you are happy in a tiny house and you don't need much to fulfill your needs and contribute in the world, then that's fine. This is different for everyone. All right. Your goals are unique to you, and you can want what you want just because you want it.

All right? Take action. What beliefs do you have about money that doesn't serve you? What new beliefs can replace these? Can you replace these old beliefs with, and what is your future with money? Okay? I want you to answer those questions and answer them in the workbook or on your sheet. So you did it.

Congratulations, you completed. Manage your. A DHD brain and money. making finances clear, easy, and organized.

All right. Congratulations.