A January Reset Reflection on Permission, Weakness, and Trust
January is often framed as a month of goals, budgets, resolutions, and fresh starts. This year, my January reset is coming toward the end of the month, into February and its has been quieter and more honest. As I sit with the patterns I’m intentionally closing from the previous month, one truth keeps resurfacing, especially as I consider my finances: money is an area that activates my nervous system quickly and deeply. Not because I don’t care about it, and not because I don’t know how to manage it (although I’m not always great)—but because money has never just been about numbers for me. It has always been about safety, responsibility, provision, worth, and survival.
This reflection lives inside my Rethinking My Weaknesses series because for a long time, I labeled my anxiety around money as a flaw—something I needed to fix, override, or push through. But the truth is more layered than that. I know how to stretch. I know how to make a way. I know how to survive impossible seasons. Even when the numbers were negative, even when debt was present, even when I had to humble myself and ask for help, I have always found a way through. That isn’t failure. That is a survival skill. And yet, survival is not the same as safety. What once protected me may not be what carries me forward.
Here is the paradox I live in: money easily triggers my anxiety, and yet I have always been carried. Even when things looked impossible and I couldn’t see the path ahead, provision arrived. Not always early. Not always gently. But faithfully. Because of that, money doesn’t just stir fear for me—it stirs memory. My nervous system learned to stay alert, to brace, to prepare for impact, because relief often came after the stretch. Somewhere along the way, without realizing it, I learned a quiet pattern: if things get bad enough, God will show up. That belief strengthened my faith, but it also taught my body that anxiety was part of the process. I’m questioning that now.
This reflection also belongs in my Permission to Prosper work because my relationship with money has been shaped far more by pressure than by peace. Somewhere along the way, wanting stability began to feel risky. Receiving help began to feel undeserved. Ease began to feel suspicious. I keep returning to a truth I’ve saved and sat with often: Guilt about money doesn’t make you generous. It makes you energetically unavailable to receive. I don’t want to be unavailable anymore—not to help, not to ease, not to abundance.
As part of this reset, I made a decision that surprised even me: I asked my partner to take over our finances. Not because I’m incapable, but because of what carrying it alone does to me. That request required humility, honesty, and trust. It forced me to confront a belief I didn’t know I was holding—that responsibility has to feel heavy to be real. Letting someone share this load isn’t giving up agency; it’s choosing sustainability over survival.
So as January comes to a close and February rolls in, here’s what I’m naming. I’m closing the belief that anxiety is the price of provision. I’m closing the idea that strength means carrying everything alone. I’m closing the habit of bracing for disaster instead of allowing peace. And I’m opening something gentler: a relationship with money that includes trust and clarity, faith that doesn’t require panic to prove itself, and prosperity that doesn’t come at the cost of my nervous system. I’m not finished figuring this out, but I am choosing to begin differently.
A Gentle Practice for This Moment
Shared with gratitude to The Power of Manifestation
If money brings up anxiety for you, this practice isn’t about fixing your finances—it’s about creating safety in your body first. Find a quiet moment and sit comfortably. Place one hand on your chest or stomach, wherever you feel tension when money comes up. Take a slow breath in, and then a long breath out.
Gently say, aloud or silently: It’s safe for me to expand. It’s safe for me to receive. It’s safe for me to be supported. Allow yourself to visualize abundance—not just money, but relief, help, ease, and breathing room. Let it arrive without needing to justify it. Then recall one moment, big or small, when provision came through for you—not because you earned it perfectly, but because you were carried. Let gratitude rise, not as pressure, but as warmth.
To close, say: I am allowed to prosper without panic. I am allowed to receive without guilt.
You don’t need to do this daily. You don’t need to do it “right.” This is not a discipline. It’s a permission slip.
Maybe this year, permission to prosper doesn’t begin with more effort—but with learning how to feel safe while I look.
Well-Stirred & Wondering 