Have you ever noticed how your chest tightens when you check your bank account? Or how your gut twists when an unexpected bill hits?
Most people think money stress is just numbers on a screen. It’s not. It lives in your nervous system. It’s stored in your body like a memory you keep replaying: shoulders clenched, stomach in knots, jaw locked.
The truth is, your relationship with money is felt long before it’s calculated. And until you learn to feel it, really feel it, you’ll keep running the same patterns, no matter how much you make.
My Embodied Money Fear: The IRS Letter
I remember receiving the dreaded IRS letter in the mail. You know the one, that scary official font that says, “we mean business.”” Before I even opened it, I knew what it was going to say.
In simple terms: “It’s time to pay up.”
Most entrepreneurs know exactly what I’m talking about. We’re the only ones who really feel the sting of taxes. W2 employees get shielded by the pain since a portion of their paychecks is automatically set aside and sent off, they barely notice. But when you run your own business, a big year followed by a lean one can get ugly fast.
I remember tossing that letter on my passenger seat as I drove down the road. I didn’t want to open it. I knew what I owed and I knew I didn’t have the amount required to pay it.
Time to face the music. I ripped the letter open at a stoplight and read the number being demanded.
I threw it in the floorboard, gripped my steering wheel tight, and screamed at the top of my lungs while my eyes welled up with tears. With heavy breathing, I got ahold of myself.
I tried to spin it: “I should feel fortunate I made enough to owe this much.” But the mental gymnastics didn’t work.
This letter ruined my day. Actually, I let it ruin my week, stewing in that anger, feeling it burning in my chest and shoulders like a knot I couldn’t shake.
I talked to friends about it. Didn’t help. I knew I could set up payments and that I’d pay it off. But that didn’t help either.
So I did what any “reasonable” entrepreneur would do: I went out to make more money to cover up the feeling.
But the feeling didn’t go away. Even as the payments went through. Even after I put systems in place to stay ahead. Every time another notice showed up, that tension came roaring back in my chest, my shoulders, my breath. The heat. The tightness. The fatigue.
How much energy was I wasting holding that fear in my body? How much of my attention was falling into an abyss?
Your Emotional Money Map
You might be reading this thinking, “Yeah, Mike, I’ve got my own version of that IRS letter.”
And you do. Every one of us has a “money fear pattern” living somewhere in the body. It shows up when the credit card bill is due, when you raise your prices, when you’re about to invest in yourself, and your chest tightens, your throat closes, your stomach flips.
Most people try to outwork it. They hustle harder, make more, move the numbers around, but the feeling stays stuck.
That’s because your financial reality is being generated from the inside out. Until you get curious about where your fear lives in your body, you’re just putting new paint on the same walls.
Try This Right Now
Let’s map it together. Grab a quiet moment, close your eyes if you can, and bring to mind a money situation that makes your stomach drop. A bill you haven’t opened. A debt you’re afraid to look at. A goal you’re scared to claim.
Now… where do you feel it?
- Is it in your chest, your shoulders, your throat, your belly?
- What does it feel like: tight? heavy? hot?
- If that part of your body could speak, what would it say? (Maybe it’s fear of not being enough. Maybe it’s anger at being trapped. Maybe it’s a generational story you’ve been carrying for decades.)
Just notice. No need to fix it. Not yet. The first step is feeling it, because the feeling is the doorway to your sovereignty.
Why This Matters
This is sovereignty in action. You can’t chase freedom by ignoring what your body is trying to tell you. When you build the courage to feel, you create space to release.
The more you map where fear and scarcity live in you, the more power you have to shift it. When your body feels secure, your actions shift naturally. And when your actions align with embodied security — money can finally flow from a place of true peace, not panic.
How to Go Deeper
If you’re ready to explore your own Emotional Money Map more deeply, I’d love to hear from you. This work can’t be done through thinking alone, it happens through your body, your awareness, and courageous conversation.
📩 Email me directly at mike@bledsoe.life and share what came up for you. Tell me where you feel your money fear living and what you’re ready to shift. I read every reply.