Episode #68: Talking Money with Dr. Bonnie Koo

Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify Podcasts | Google Podcasts 

Summary

In this episode, we discuss the discomfort many women feel when talking about money and the beliefs that hold them back. Join us as we explore the societal, cultural, and personal factors that contribute to this discomfort and offer strategies for overcoming it. Dr. Bonnie Koo shares her own journey of transitioning from a physician to a money coach and highlights the importance of prioritizing oneself and challenging ingrained beliefs about money.

If you want to learn how to leverage imperfect moments and overcome the obstacles unique to high-achievers, you can still get the replay of my free webinar: How to Lose Weight for the High-Achiever’s Brain. This webinar will show you your high-achiever tendencies, why they’re delaying your results, and give you the tools you need to correct them. Click here to get it!

What You’ll Learn from this Episode:

• Understanding the discomfort many women feel when discussing money
• Exploring societal, cultural, and personal beliefs that contribute to this discomfort
• Dr. Bonnie Koo's journey from physician to money coach
• The importance of prioritizing oneself and challenging ingrained beliefs about money
• Addressing fears around investing and making money mistakes
• Embracing the non-linear nature of money growth and taking action while learning
• Reframing the definition of mistakes and cultivating self-worth

Listen to the Full Episode:

Enjoy the Show?

• Follow: Get new episodes in your feed every single week on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google or search "The Unstoppable Mom Brain" on your favorite platform.

• Rate & Review: Take a few seconds and leave your review in the stars and comments of this show.

• Instagram: Come hang out with me on Instagram, you'll find me in your daily feed @theunstoppablemombrain

   

Featured on the Show:

• Learn more about The Unstoppable Group by clicking here.
• Click here to sign up for my email list!
• Dr. Bonnie Koo: Website | Podcast | Facebook | Instagram

Full Episode Transcript:

Click here to download the full transcript

• Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Hey, this is Dr. Priyanka Venugopal, and you're listening to the Unstoppable Mom Brain Podcast Talking Money with Dr. Bonnie Koo. I am thrilled to bring you today's conversation with my good friend and fellow peer coach, Dr. Bonnie Koo. Bonnie is a physician turned coach. She's the author of Wealth for Women and the host of the popular podcast, Wealthy Mom MD.

  She is an expert in all things money and really helps high achieving professional moms. Specifically physicians understand money and more importantly, grow their wealth. I think that today's conversation is going to help you really challenge some of the thoughts that maybe you've had about having money, earning money, and spending money.

  I know in my experience personally and in my work with high achieving professionals, women have a lot of thoughts about money, and I think that sometimes it feels very uncomfortable to talk about money. We feel uncomfortable in discussing money and talking about what we're spending on, particularly because of a lot of the beliefs we have grown up with, and we get to explore all of that today.

  This conversation is going to be so good for you. If you are interested in understanding how to create more money now and really start obliterating some of the old thoughts you've had. I cannot wait for you to enjoy today's conversation. Before we get into the podcast episode today, I want to make sure you know that you can still grab the replay of my most recent masterclass, How to Lose Weight with a High Achiever's Brain.

  In this masterclass, you learn the three most common obstacles that high achievers have in hitting their goal today. I find that high achievers love making plans and listening, plans are important, but unless you understand the three biggest obstacles that high achievers face, you're going to keep creating the same results.

  So do not wait to grab this masterclass. You can still get it at theunstoppablemombrain.com/training. Okay, let's get into today's episode with Dr. Bonnie Koo. Hello. Hello. Welcome to the podcast, Bonnie. I am so excited to have you and I have a list like it's a mile long of all of the questions that I wanna ask you.

  I'm gonna have you introduce yourself in just a minute, but I, we have been, me and Bonnie have been talking offline for quite a while and I have been so excited about this conversation because Bonnie Koo is a physician turned coach. She is a money coach for physicians and physician women specifically.

  I'm gonna have you introduce, Everything that you do, and then we're gonna talk about all things money today. So Bonnie, take it away. Welcome.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Hey, it's so fun to be on your podcast after, you know, it's just fun to have your friends on, right?

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So tell us, like, tell us a little bit about you.

  How, because I feel like somebody listening to this might be like, how do you go from being a physician to being a money coach? Because I feel like there's, there's quite a stretch. I know I felt like I didn't know much about money, even like going through medical school and residency and stuff. I feel like I had to learn after the fact. So tell us a little bit about your journey and then we're gonna get into it.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Okay. Yeah. I'll give you the short version. Yeah. But I was not planning to do this as I'm sure you were not planning to become a coach as well. I think that's everyone's path. They weren't planning on it and et cetera, so I just started educating myself about money and then noticed that it was a gap in people's knowledge, which makes sense.

  I think I like knew that people didn't really know money, but it's obviously a very needed skills and knowledge base. And you know, physicians make a great income compared to most of the country. But having more money does not mean you know what to do with it or how to deal with it at all. And so, and I think also a lot of physicians are maybe a little embarrassed that they don't know about money.

  We're so used to being the experts and kind of like a know-it-all. And to not really know about money plus all the, you know, drama around it, cultural, personal, et cetera. So I just was educating myself, helping other people in this Facebook group, and, and then someone was like, you should start a blog.

  And I was confused and I was like, why would I start a blog? But then I did, and then I just started getting asked to speak and it, it kind of was an accidental business in many ways, but then at some point I decided to make it real versus like a cute little hobby that made some money.

  Okay. So I was like, why not?

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: So like is this something that you were always interested in, in pursuing and understanding, or did you just feel like there's this need, there's a gap in my knowledge, I wanna go fill the gap. And then in your journey in doing that, you started being like, wow, there's so much here that people need to know about.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah, I mean basically I was educating myself cause I knew nothing. I was like a chronic over spender during residency. I got paid once a month, literally would go to zero before the next paycheck, very often. Okay. It just was like my whole life I would make, I was always good at making money. But not keeping it.

  It was like a sieve.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: That's so interesting because I feel like there's two ends of the spectrum with high achievers. Like some high achievers will make money, but they like do not wanna spend it. And I wanna definitely talk about that. And then the other end of the spectrum, which is like, you make money and then you just spend it kind of, without really thinking about how you're investing it, how you might wanna grow it, and create more wealth, which is I know what you teach your clients how to do.

  So what would you say about like, both ends of the spectrum? Do they have totally different mindsets coming into money or is it something you find overlap with?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: I definitely see exactly what you're talking about. I, you know, when people think of money or even how much they make, they're usually thinking about it in terms of how much they can spend.

  So as we're kind of, it's like we're very consumer driven. Right. And, which makes sense in terms of, you know, the, the message, you know, out there. We're not really giving messaging about. I think people kind of know you should save money. People don't really talk about investing when you're young. It's all about saving money.

  At least that's what I heard from my mom. But yeah, we're not really told that we can grow our money. So I think also just money is just a topic that people don't feel comfortable talking about and talking about growing your money. Like that's definitely not conversations people don't really have. Right.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah. Actually, that's actually what I wanna start out with is definitely we're gonna get to growing your money and creating more wealth and how you do that. But before we do that, can we just talk about why is it so uncomfortable to talk about money? Having money, earning money, like money?

  I feel like there's something uncomfortable about it and whenever we are uncomfortable about it, I think it kind of blocks us from educating ourselves really on it.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: For sure.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: So what do you think it is about, especially women. I don't see this happening as much with men, but especially with women.

  Why do you think that there's such discomfort and how can people start kind of overcoming that?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah, so I think of it as like, I was gonna say three things. I'm just like making this up in terms of how many things.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: But there's like the overall society, societal narrative. Now, we both live in the United States, but I'm sure it's similar in other countries about don't talk about money.

  If you have a religious upbringing, that's also part of it. Money is greedy. The pursuit of money is evil. Like all the things that we hear. Debt is bad. So there's like that societal narrative and then could be a cultural overtone as well. And then like as you said, it is totally different for women.

  I think there's some like historical, there's definitely historical stuff. And then just the way women are socialized to, we're just judged so much more harshly than men and we're given very different messaging. Like if you, I, I'm generalizing obviously, but you know, men are, boys are told like basically money is power and there's also pressure on men, right?

  Because in terms of, you know, if we're talking about just like regular heterosexual dating, the man and a woman, like there's a lot of pressure on the man to make money to be an attractive mate, right? So that's a, that's like something that I've thought about or like, you know, that there is like, there's like both sides of the coin, right?

  But women aren't, you know, I feel like women are kind of taught to save money and there's actually been some sort of study or literature showing that the articles, specifically for women have different topics. It's all about being frugal and you know, don't shop and spend so much money. Like I think in general, the overall theme with women is that like we need to be reigned in.

  Not just with money. It's like everything uhhuh, we need to be reigned in. We need to like be careful. And also this, there is like a harsh judgment. Like think about like this, like, and it's so insidious because also women, you know, we're talking about the patriarchy here, obviously.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: But women also perpetuate the patriarchy because it's like in the air, it's just how everyone talks about it. But like, think about if a man posts about his new car. Or Rolex watch. There's gonna be a set of opinions. Obviously there'll be some negative, but if a woman does the same thing, totally different comments will appear. Right? Like they're just gonna be judged so differently.

  Like, why are you flaunting that? Whereas for a man, it's almost like a status symbol.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah. I think the word that you said that like really struck me as completely true is the idea of money. And especially with men, there is a, there's a sense of power, whereas with women, I think that there's a sense of indulgence.

  Like, and, and there's something very shameful. I think that that's the word that's coming to my mind, like the idea of having money or spending money is indulgent, particularly if you're spending [00:09:00] on something that you deem as not morally valuable. Like if you're spending on a bag, if you're spending on clothes, if you're spending on something that you deem as quote unquote frivolous.

  It seems indulgent rather than powerful. And I agree with you. I think that women have unfortunately bought into the narrative. And which is, which is why be perpetuated. So what would you say to someone that can see the difference, their start, like maybe even just in listening to this conversation, they're like true.

  Like how come it's powerful for men and indulgent for women? How do you think that they start to unpack that a little bit if they don't want to feel that way anymore about money?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah. I just wanted to give a quick example that came to my mind as we were having this conversation. Like, yeah, I'm sure you know everyone who's listening has had some experience where a girl's talking about, you know, oh, I'm shopaholic. I'm spending too much money on a bag. Like, you'll literally never hear a man say that.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Never.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Right?

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: No.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: So I think that is just something, cuz we all talk about that, right? And just like women will often talk about like they wanna lose weight. Like, I don't think men talk about that.

  So, okay.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: But the idea of spending on that, I mean, just, just to continue that example, the idea of spending on that, what I have found with women is like women will need to prove to themselves that they are worth spending on the bag or on coaching or on weight loss.

  Or like you feel in the blank with what it is that women want to spend on and they feel this need to prove to themselves that it's so worth it. Whereas, I mean, I'm just gonna use my husband as an example. He doesn't think 10 times before he makes a significant investment, whether it's in himself or whether he's doing something for the family or for our home

  He just like thinks about it once, maybe he mentions it to me. Not always, and he just moves forward. He doesn't think like 10 times about it. Whereas I know for me, at least prior to coaching, I used to not only think about it, I would research it, then I would like think about it for like a month. Should I do it?

  Let me weigh the pros and cons. Then I would take it to the next level. Let me run it by, let me run it by my husband, see what he thinks about it, and if he thinks it's a good idea, then you know, now all of a sudden it can borrow his belief that it's a good idea. So like, how, what, what are we doing about this?

  What, what are we doing about this? Because I feel like that is holding so many women back from investing in the things that they want to invest in to spend. I mean, I know this, this conversation is going all over the place, but I feel like this is such an important topic. So what are your thoughts on that?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Well, I think a large part of it is how women are not, we don't prioritize ourselves. We're really bad at that. And I, especially as even more so as a mom, like we're, you know, the caretakers, we take care of everyone else first. And maybe if there's something left over, we'll spend on ourselves. But if just think about like the parents listening, like most of us wouldn't hesitate to spend something on our children.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: No.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: But we will overthink and hesitate to spend something on ourselves.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah. Why?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: We feel like we need to do, think about that. Yeah.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Why we need like a justification. Yeah. It's like I've, I can see so many, so many high achievers, especially with the idea of spending for their child, for their home, for their family, even for their vacation, even for like a family vacation.

  I can see that we feel less like we don't have to overthink it so much, we feel more likely to be able to do that. But when it comes to, when it's just us and we're the only person, like a bag or a pair of shoes or coaching, it's like we think 10 times about it. So what is, what is happening there?

  How do we, yeah, how do we get over that?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: So part of it is, like I said, like just the practice of not prioritizing ourselves. Also, I think it's a worthiness issue. We feel like maybe we don't deserve it. Like it's funny because I don't really have those thoughts anymore, so I'm just trying to think what it was.

  But yeah, I think you, the word you said it, it seems like an indulgence.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah. Yeah. And it's like, is this worth it? Is like, is this morally a good thing to be spending on what? And you know how you were talking about judgment, like what will people say? The judgment, it's like actually we are judging it.

  Just as harshly as everyone else, like it's not that we're actually worried about what somebody else will think about, the fact that we're spending money on this quote unquote, indulgent thing. We have a lot of thoughts that are super laced in judgment, and I think that's what we're saying is coming from our upbringing, from the messaging that we've received from society, and then we buy into it rather than challenge it.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah. And in general, people have negative views on anyone with money. So if you're amongst your peers, you have this different comfort level of what you talk about. I'm sure you and I have been in the same Facebook group, cuz we're in all these position groups and they'll say like, well I can't post to my public feed, but I'm student loan free.

  Or I can't post to my public feed, but yes, here's this thing I bought, or here's this vacation that I'm taking. But they don't feel comfortable putting up because some people will have negative reactions who, you know, may not make as much money as you.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah. There's this sense that if you are making money and maybe you're speaking about it in a group of people that are not making as much as you are not making money at all, let me not speak about money.

  Let me not talk about what I just bought. Let me not talk about what I'm spending on because I don't want other people to feel bad.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah. Feel like, you'll make 'em feel bad. Like you said, a lot of it's just our own self-judgment, so it really comes down to being okay with people not being happy about you doing it.

  Everything comes down to the relationship with yourself, right? That's like what? That's like the core of actually. Just had lunch with a coach friend. It's like that really is what it comes down to when you have a great relationship with yourself, it doesn't mean that you don't care or feel bad when you have negative feedback, but you're just so much more gentle with yourself.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: When you think about like someone that wants to familiarize themselves with money and get maybe that they're starting to take steps to get comfortable, even talking about money, having it, earning it, what is it that you think high achievers are missing in terms of the information they need to start growing their money?

  Cuz that was the first thing that you were talking about having money. Then there's growing money. So what is growing money? How do we do that? Tell us how we do that.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Well, there's like the actual skill and strategy. Like you have to know things to have to do it. Right. You can't just be like, let's grow money. It'll start growing.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Look on trees. Yeah.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: But there's, yeah, there's a lot of drama around it though and fear. Especially with high achieving perfectionist women, cuz they're so afraid of making a mistake and losing money. It comes down to fear of losing money and the risk involved. And what I like to say is, how is it more risky to not be investing?

  What I have found is, there is a fear of losing money, which totally makes sense. I have those, you know, same thoughts too, but we wouldn't be so scared if, again, back to the treating yourself, you know better when, or well, when you do, you know, you don't get the outcome that you want. But also, I think a lot of the fear is if I lose money, then I'm gonna be even more behind as if it's gonna set them back.

  It might be a temporary setback, but it's because of most people think about the growth of money as being some linear thing. And so if you f up, you, you've like, you know, taken 10 steps back and it's gonna take double the effort to get ahead. That's just not true. Money is not a linear, and it, and the reason why we think that it makes sense is because most of us are employees on our regular paycheck, so it makes sense that you make the same amount of money.

  Right, the same increments. So it makes sense that your brain would think that, but that's actually not how money's created.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: I love one thing that you just said also is how you're going to be with yourself. So the piece that you just said was, people are afraid. It's not that they're necessarily afraid of investing or growing their money, they're afraid of making a mistake with their money.

  Like, what if I spend, or what if I invest and I don't get a good return, an ROI, then they've made a mistake. And I, I'm curious what your thoughts are on like, how people talk to themselves when they've made a money mistake. It's like they go down a shame spiral of like, I shouldn't have done that. It was terrible.

  And how that might hold them back from actually investing in the first place.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah, I mean, everything you just described is what happens. They go into a shame spiral or they'll just, they'll just like clam up and not take action for like another year or something like that, or, yeah. I've seen sort of all, all the things when it comes to money mistakes, but the thing is, it's less about that because.

  Also, it's like, how are you categorizing a mistake anyway? Right.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Right.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: So that's like one thing.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: But like I think the fear of that literally prevents them from even taking any action.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: This is the biggest thing. So I just did a webinar on this whole topic of why high achievers are not taking needle moving action for weight loss.

  But this applies to taking needle moving action to grow your money, needle moving action to get a promotion, to improve your relationship. And one of the big things is high achievers spend a lot of time in consumption, in learning, in passive growth. Like, like, let me just consume more content because I think we think if I learned more, then I would choose better.

  If I learned more information, then I might make that best investment decision. So how does somebody overcome that piece of understanding that they could keep learning? And I mean, I'm, I'm totally guilty of this. Like, let me just like read one more blog article. Let me just like google this one other thing before I make my decision.

  So how does somebody start knowing when they have consumed enough information to be knowledgeable enough to make a decision versus when they're holding back and they're like in fear? In fear?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah. Well I think, you know, it's obvious you're not actually doing needle, needle moving actions. But you know, I think there's also this like sort of all or none thinking is like, I need to be consuming before I can take action versus like, I need to learn and I can take action as I learn.

  Because the truth is like when you think about our medical training, like you had to see patience to put your knowledge and action and you get, could you imagine if like all of our training, even up till becoming attending was just learning and like not even seeing the patient like it would not work.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: So true. Oh, I never, that's such a good example. Yeah.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: So it's like you have to be doing things as you learn. And the truth is things will happen and I think people don't, people think there's a way to not have, basically have a perfectionistic path to making money, and that is just not true.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah, and actually if you, I mean, I like this medical, medical example.

  So like in medical school we did mostly learning by the textbook until we got to rotations third and fourth year, and that's when we got exposed to real humans for the first time. And we got to learn kind of by observing attendings or residents practicing medicine, but then in residency it was hands-on, right?

  So there was like textbook learning, but there was hands-on application. And I would probably say, I'm curious what you think about this, but some of my best learning happened while observing mistakes. Like if there's a complication in the OR, if there is something that like a patient is not responding well, actually those moments were the times that I probably learned and grew the most.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Totally, totally applies to money. Right. Because you know, so a lot of my clients will end up investing in real estate or start a business and Yeah. It's so interesting how high achieving I think this is, you know, I, I guess that's, you know, the people that we work with, so they, I think they just expect that, like, it'll just be a up upwards, like linear trajectory.

  Especially in business, right? Like you start making money as if it should always go up. Apparently that's not true. I learned that few years ago.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Apparently it's not, yeah.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: When I, when I made less money one year, I was like, I literally went into a shame spiral, Priyanka. Cause I was like, this shouldn't be happening.

  I should not be going backwards. And then my business coach was like, you know, business goes up and down, right?

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: And it was like, oh, I, I mean this is the same with weight loss. I think a lot of times women will think like, I'm just supposed to lose a pound a week, and it's like this linear line. And if you don't lose weight that way, I've done something wrong.

  I'm not going fast enough. I didn't figure something out. I'm going backwards rather than wait a second. This is a body, I'm not a robot. Of course, my body's not going to release weight linearly, but like we need somebody to tell us. So I guess you're here to tell us when it comes to money, it is not linear.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah. And also just you know, thinking about why money feels scarier, because if you think about it, money is needed for survival. Yeah. And the level of fear that people fear, and I felt it too, so I can relate it, it almost feels like you're gonna become homeless. Like that magnitude, even though like if you separate yourself...

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: You can see that's not necessarily true, but yeah, that's where your brain is going.

  There's a fear about losing money because I think kind of the sense I'm getting is that money is associated with security.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yes.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: And safety and the ability to have a roof over our heads and have a certain lifestyle that maybe we're used to, and the idea of that going away feels very threatening. So it's not surprising we have this primitive, very primitive response of like, fight flight.

  We have to really protect money to protect our security. So I think that that kind of lends itself really well to that question of how do we then define a mistake? How do we define if we are getting an ROI on what we wanted to get versus like really fearing, oh man, this is like was a huge mistake.

  Money's going out. I'm not getting an ROI and navigating that mistake moving forward.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: I think with all mistakes, no matter what the area, it just comes down to what you do with that. Yeah, either you learn from it or it just puts you in fear mode and you never look at it again. Yeah. And don't learn from it.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah. And I think actually not learning from your mistake is the most expensive thing you'll ever do.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yes.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: You know, a lot of times, because when I, whenever I talk about clients or potential clients that are interested in working with me about weight loss, I ask them the question, what would it be worth to you to solve this problem and hit your dream ideal weight and have it feel like it's lasting in forever?

  What was, what is that worth, worth for you? And 100% of the time, there's not even a dollar number that people can assign to that because it's priceless. It's priceless. The idea that I can live in my ideal weight body and feel calm and ease is priceless. So the ROI is priceless. And yet there's a fear around what if I mess up?

  What if I don't do it right? What if I don't get that ROI? And I think that what we're talking about is the only way you wouldn't get the ROI is if you stopped understanding and growing from mistakes. That is why it is so expensive and so many people do that. So like, I kind of wanna shed light.

  Listen, you will not get an ROI if you hide from mistakes. Like, I'm just gonna put it all out there. If you quit, if you hide, if you stop learning how to grow from your mistakes, it is absolutely going to be super, a super expensive investment.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: What if I make mistake? It's what are you gonna do when you do?

  How are you gonna treat yourself? Because that, like I said, it just comes back to the relationship with yourself and also maybe a fear that they're not gonna be able to figure it out and it's gonna be this like irrevocable mistake that they can't recover from. Right. Which we know is not true. So a lot of it's gently reminding people, you've literally always figured things out.

  A hundred, a hundred percent of the time.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Absolutely. I think that that comes from high achievers having a fixed mindset around the all or nothing, yesterday's best was my best, and so if that was my best, then it's not betterable because it was my best. I think that that's the whole, I mean, I know I've done this too with business, with medical school with training, with weight loss as well. So many times I'm like, I tried my best and I failed, and so I must not be able to figure this out. Rather than what we're talking about is your best is always bettable, but you have to decide you're never going to quit.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yes. I think that's really the important thing is that you're not gonna quit.

  Because it's like, what's the alternative is you're not gonna grow your money, you're never gonna have the life that you want. And if something, if you want something to change, you have to do something different. And it's, it sounds obviously so logical, but I'm sure you see this with potential clients or even current clients.

  Like, it would be great if I could wake up, if I could wake up tomorrow and be a billionaire. Actually, I, I probably should work with you Priyanka cuz I'm just, I wake up and I'm like, why am I not at my goal weight? Wait. It's like, well duh, cause I haven't done anything.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yes. And this is like, I love it. This is such a good example. It's true of money and it's true of hitting your, your dream ideal weight. It's if you want something to change, absolutely, you have to change something. I think that that's the other piece. It's like, oh, but like it's, there's a hopefulness. It's like we're hoping and wishing that maybe it'll happen on its own.

  And that's delusional. I'm saying that totally with so much love. I'm saying that with so much love to anyone listening when it comes to weight loss, when it comes to growing your money, if you want a new result this year, if you want a new result one month from now or six months from now, you have to take new action.

  Like there's no way around it. It doesn't mean it has to be too hard. It doesn't mean that it has to like flip your life upside down, but you do have to take new action. And I, I mean this is like kind of my like, I dunno, siren call to all of you that wants something new. You have to do something different.

  Stop wishing, stop wishing and just like start doing. So I'm like curious, what are your thoughts on that when it comes to money?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Oh, totally. They have to do something different and also, It's gonna take some effort, work and effort. And like, you know, our brains are lazy. They don't wanna do anything new.

  Many ways it's like, well, everything's fine. Would I want more money? Sure. And then you hear things like, well, especially with my clientele. Well I am this specialty, usually it's family medicine or pediatrician, so I can't make more than x or give me the pediatrician budget for this travel type trip.

  Right. They like literally box themselves into a certain amount of income. And a lot of people just have relegated themselves, like, this is the way it's gonna be for the rest of my life, and I chose this specialty to help people, so I really shouldn't want more money anyway. Some version of that.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: So I, I hear this too, it's like I only have 10 or 20 pounds to lose. It's not that bad.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yes.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Like it's not that bad. I'm okay and I love, listen if I love that you feel that. What I'm always more interested in is, of course you can keep that, but if you have a desire for something more, what's in the way of you going out and making that your new reality?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Well, failing.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: What do you, what do you think it is for you? Yeah. So what is it for you? Cause just saying like, yeah, failing and what else?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Well, it's not just failing, like you're gonna feel bad about yourself. It's like, but what will other people think? And also, if you think about money, I mean, I guess weight, it's the same thing, but like it's visible to some degree.

  So for example, if someone's living in a nice house and all of a sudden they're moving into a smaller house, I guess like, well who would really know? I guess they're friends and family, but like it's not like the world at large is gonna know that unless you're a public figure. Like you and me I guess.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah, right.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: But like there's also like, what are other people gonna think? But that's really based on what do I think? Like I used to feel embarrassed for people to see you know where I used to live, for example, because it was quote unquote small. I mean I was in New York City so everyone had small apartments, but I still feel that way to some degree, like this fear of what will they think when they see like where I live?

  Cuz we still live at it's a luxury high rise building and I love it. And actually very recently, Priyanka, I was like, but I like living here. And I think just even coming to terms with that or just telling the truth myself. No, those I love living here. Yeah. And yes, some people might be like, why doesn't she live in a huge house?

  Like sure. But it's like it doesn't matter what they think. It matters what I think.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: That kinda speaks to this piece of like, you know, owning, owning your desire.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yes.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Owning your desire. So I could say right now at, you know, my current weight, I'm, I'm, I'm okay right now. And then just own that. Nobody says you have to get to a certain size.

  Who cares about normal BMI? And I'm saying this as a physician. Okay. Like, I'm not, we're not in the business of telling you the number on the scale that is best for you. You know yourself best. You know yourself best with how much money you want to have, with what size body you feel the most comfortable living in.

  I think what we're talking about is own your desire. So if I feel perfectly content at this weight, then own it. And like let it go. You don't have to lose any money, any money, any, any weight. But if you know, you're like, you know what, I would love it. I had somebody say this to me on a consult call recently.

  I would just love, love to drop 15 pounds.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: I'm in that category.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Bonnie, listen. I mean she said, so she said, I would just love, I mean she's like, but, and then she said, but I'm okay right now. So do you see how she got, that's literally outta it. Yes. Okay, so why are you doing that? Listen, can we just talk about this for a second?

  I mean, I was gonna like, we're just gonna coach you on this right now, so Hold on. There's this desire. She said, I mean her, if you could see her eyes lit up, she's like, oh my gosh. The idea of losing 15 pounds, I just would feel so happy.

  But I'm just okay right now. Do you see what she did? So she got super excited at the idea of 15 pounds. Her eyes lit up her, her whole energy was like, buzzing with this desire. And then what does she do to herself? This is something women do all the time. She cooled herself off. She dampened her own desire.

  Why do you, you, you just said you do it. Why do you that?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Well, with money that I think it's with my too. I think, oh, and think is, Yeah, I think it's owning your desire. I just love that phrase that you just, I'm totally gonna steal it for my clients now let's do it.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: But yeah.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: But yeah, obviously my clients work with me because they have the desire for more money, but that's obvious.

  That's obviously what it is. But then they get quote unquote realistic. That's what, that's how it shows up for money. I don't know if that's what people think your clients think it's, well, it's...

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: I don't think it's a realistic thing. I think that there's two pieces happening. One is the idea of having that much desire or like a joy and excitement feels kind of scary.

  Like being at my dream ideal weight. I mean, lemme tell you, this was something that I thought about for decades when I was at my heaviest. I was like, the idea of being at my ideal weight felt like too good to be true. Cause I had spent so long living heavier than I wanted. And so there was a part of me that felt, it's so weird.

  You think you want your dream ideal weight, but there's something almost a little scary about like having it. So there's that piece like, wow, that's too good to be true. And I think women are not used to having that good feeling. It feels scary. The second piece is the fear of disappointment. So if I want it and I put it out there and I'm saying it out loud, like saying it out loud for the universe to hear, and if I don't get it, then the possibility of disappointment feels so great.

  So what we do is we just kind of like slow our own roll down, don't let ourselves get disappointed to start, and we just basically live in a perpetual disappointment because you're not at your dream. Yeah. I mean these are just my thoughts. You tell me what you think.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Well, I think there's another layer to money is like we feel like we shouldn't desire more money. The desire to want more money is seen as like immoral, like morally wrong, and you should be grateful for what you have type of mentality.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: I mean, I see that with weight loss too, especially when it's 15 or 20 pounds. I see so many women that feel like it's indulgent.

  That's what, that's where that word came from. It's like, I mean, I'm fine right now. I technically don't have to lose the weight. I mean, there's a lot of that, like I'm okay right now, so I don't have to. It's, and there's something that seems either frivolous or indulgent about the idea of investing time, investing bandwidth, investing energy, and absolutely investing money in solving the problem.

  Because it's like, I mean, there are other people that are suffering with real problems, quote unquote, real problems. People in the world have way, way worse problems than me. And so who am I too like to spend money, time, energy, or bandwidth on solving 15 pounds. Like how, how ridiculous is that? And so do you hear the judgment how much it's dripping? And all we are doing is we are snatching our desires right out of our hands.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: This is, this is unrelated, but I was talking to someone who had like, I don't know, 50 to a hundred pounds to lose and I'm perpetually wanting to lose 10 or 15 pounds. And she kind of was like, saying, oh, it's so much easier to lose 10 or 15 pounds than what I have to lose.

  And I just was like, I actually think it's harder in many ways.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yeah.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Because of the, well, I'm fine and it's, it's fine.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: So I think the way that I describe it is it. It can be true both ways. The idea that somebody has a lot of weight to lose, they assume it's harder because they have so far to go. Yes, they have 50 or a hundred pounds to go.

  They feel like their quote unquote finish line is so far away. So in their mind, their thoughts are, I have so far to go, it's gonna take me so much longer. I have so much more work to do. The finish line is farther so in their mind, that's why they're saying it's going to be harder for me. The person that has 10 pounds to lose is closer to the finish line, like, you know, number of pounds wise. But they might have to make different tweaks to the way that they eat, to how much they eat, to how they eat. Like they might have to make more, it's almost like more fine tune tweaks and that might be more work. So you can see how like, either way.

  More people like either way, whichever camp you're in, you can make the argument that this is harder, the person has a lot of weight to lose. It's like, oh, the finish line's farther. The person that has less weight to lose is like, I have to tweak more. I have to get more specific. So they both are right?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah. They're basically, what I'm hearing is one isn't necessarily harder or easier than the other.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Absolutely not. I mean, this is why, like even with The Unstoppable Group, I coach clients that have, you could have five pounds to lose or more than 50, and the process applies to both and we tweak it and we customize it for your unique body.

  But the process, imagine, I mean, you know this, the process of really changing your brain and understanding how to treat yourself is the same for both, which is I think, the best news.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Just taking a little bit of a pivot. When you think about investing, when it's just investing on you wanting to grow your money or invest in just yourself, what are your thoughts?

  How would you share kind of your perspective on investing in something that does not have a tangible ROI like a money return. So like investing in coaching, for example. What are your thoughts on that?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yeah. To me it's investing in your mind is the key to making more money. Your mind is your biggest income producing asset.

  The limit of your ability to make money is the, is like your, the limitation of how you're thinking about it. Right. Yeah. Because if you're, if you have thoughts like, I can't make more money, then yeah, you're not gonna make more money.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: This idea of investing in coaching, which is effectively investing in your brain, is how you up the quality of your thinking, your problem solving, your solutions.

  You're so creating your solutions, and especially probably learning from the mistakes that you are absolutely going to make happens more when you improve the quality of our thinking.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: And it happens so much faster. Like I really think about coaching as like it accelerates whatever you're gonna do. Of course you could figure it out on your own.

  I just think it compresses a timeline significantly. So growing your money is the same thing as investing your money. And actually, I heard this from a friend of mine and I just love the way he described it beautifully. He said, investing is taking today's cashflow for tomorrow's to create tomorrow's cashflow.

  That's what investing is. The traditional mindset around investing is to invest in the stock market, in your 401k, max out all the things so that you can have money in 30 years. So tomorrow's money is just very delayed. It works. You just have to be okay with waiting decades. And I think if you think about that, just old mindset of retirement, you get a job, you work at the same job for decades, which is what people used to do when they worked for quote unquote corporation, and then they took take care of you with a pension. We all know that that's kind of all going away. The onus is now really on the person to prepare for retirement, but that is just one way to create tomorrow's cash flow. It's the slowest, it's also the easiest, right? There's always, there's this like, easiest and less effort takes longer for money.

  The higher risk, the higher likelihood of, it's not even like failure, but the tomorrow's cashflow can be a lot sooner. So for real estate, tomorrow's cashflow can be within a year. And also one thing is when you do the, the whatever type of investing you do, you'll likely die at your peak net worth, which means you spent your whole life not enjoying the money that you have.

  Of course, I, I'm sure most of our listeners, we do enjoy the money, we travel more, et cetera. But you could be enjoying so much more money sooner. Like, I don't know, do you wanna die at your peak net worth and not be able to use it?

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: I mean, this is like one of the things that I always like. Yeah, I always, I always think about this like when I'm 90, I will not wish that I had more money in my bank account at the age of 90.

  I will wish that I spent more time in the body that I wanted to spend my life in.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yes.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Like, I think I really think about it like that. Like when I'm 90 will, what will I want? Will I want more money in the bank account? No. I will wish that 50 years ago I had solved this problem and that at 90 I can like lift my own groceries and feel comfortable in the body that I'm in.

  So I, I'm curious if that's kind of like what, that's my weight loss example, but I'm curious if...

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: No, I love it. Right. Cuz you're never gonna be as young and healthy as you are now. And also if you're gonna, you know, wait 30 or 40 years to retire. Well first of all, that 30 or 40 years, not only is it not guaranteed, but your health isn't guaranteed.

  And you know, we all know people who get sick, but no one thinks that it's gonna be them until it happens to them. So I think it's like this balance of enjoying your money and growing it. So it's not either or.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: It's kind of taking us back out of the all or nothing. So it's not, we're not ignoring the long arc. We're not ignoring our long-term future, but we're trying to bring it back to balancing. What about today?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yes.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Like what about our desires today? And like, start taking action to create that now, instead of waiting and wishing and hoping that it happens on its own, it's not going to happen on [00:38:00] its own. Like bring back the balance.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: I think the important thing is to do something and then to do something after that. One thing at a time, like, cause my clients are often overwhelmed with all the money things they have to do. It's like they decide, okay, I'm gonna work on it. And then they're like, holy crap. There's so much stuff out there. I'm like, just one thing at a time.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Okay. So like if you just think about, just to wrap up, like there is, there are so many resources out there. Somebody wants to take one step so that they're not overwhelmed. What would be the first step that someone takes to educate themselves and then start taking actual needle moving action? Yeah. What's their first, first step?

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Well, they could obviously work with me.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Yep, absolutely.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Or I think it's just do some education. So obviously, you know, I wrote a book. There's some practical stuff, but it's more about like getting your mind straight and like, you know, allowing yourself to have the desire to have more money.

  I don't think it really matters what they do, Priyanka, I think it just matters that they do something. In fact, when I was really struggling with what type of real estate to like, to start with, do I do passive? Do I do active and inactive? Do I do short term, long term? And I remember because Peter Kim, he was like, I think I was like, oh, should I do this type?

  I think it was like a turnkey type of investing. And I was like, oh, he's gonna give me an opinion. I'm pretty sure he is gonna say don't do it. But he was like, you know what, I like it cuz it means you're doing something. That was the answer.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: You're doing something. That's the answer. So like I think the takeaway is start doing something that is fulfilling your desire today. Stop waiting.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Yes.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Stop consuming. Stop waiting. Start taking action today. Bonnie, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Guys, Bonnie is the author of Wealth for Women, which is her book. Make sure you go get it. And the host of the very popular podcast, Wealthy Mom MD, go and listen. She has all kinds of amazing strategies and tips for you that will blow your mind.

  Bonnie, tell us where else we can find you and how people can reach out to you.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: So everything is wealthmommd that's my Instagram handle, that's my website, and as you said, it's my podcast as well. So, Pretty easy.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: I love it. Bonnie, thank you so much for coming on.

  Dr. Bonnie Koo: Thank you for having me.

  Dr. Priyanka Venugopal: Bye, Bonnie, and I had so much fun filming this conversation because I think this is such an important topic for high achieving professional women.

  I don't know about all of you, but for me especially, I know that growing up and particularly into my early adulthood talking about money just was not really a thing that I did. So I hope today's conversation sparked something in you, maybe created a shift in how you want to think about money and how you want to talk about money.

  Having it, making it, earning it, and spending it. I know that high achieving professional women are working so hard, and our first and foremost thought is often really thinking about our families and taking care of ourselves in the far future. My goal for all of you is yes, that matters. Your far future matters, your family, safety and security matters.

  But what would it be like for you to start owning, creating more of what you want today? As Bonnie and I talked about, that means taking new action today. I encourage you to stop waiting for tomorrow to create what you want and start now. The biggest thing that is in the way for high achievers to take needle moving action, whether it comes to hitting your dream ideal weight or growing your money is because high achievers have specific obstacles. I discuss all of this in my most recent masterclass. Make sure you grab it while it's available, theunstoppablemombrain.com/training, and you will learn exactly why you might hold yourself back from taking needle moving action and exactly how to solve it.

  I cannot wait to meet you in your email inbox, and I will see you next week. Bye.