Equal Pay Day is a symbolic day that represents the approximate number of days that women must work into the new year to earn the same amount of money as men did in the previous year. This day highlights the gender wage gap and serves as a reminder of the ongoing fight for gender equality in the workplace.

In the United States, Equal Pay Day typically falls in early April. The date varies each year and is based on the difference in earnings between men and women from the previous year. In 2021, Equal Pay Day was on March 24th, which means that women had to work an additional 70 days to earn the same amount as their male counterparts did in 2020.

The gender wage gap is a complex issue that has persisted for decades. Despite significant progress in gender equality in the workplace, women still earn less than men on average. According to the National Women's Law Center, women earn just 82 cents for every dollar earned by men. This gap is even wider for women of color, with Black women...

Everyone has limiting beliefs. That much you’ve probably heard before. You’ve probably also heard about the importance of overcoming those beliefs, and that the consequences of not doing so can be dire. Do you know what those consequences are, however?

Limiting beliefs can keep you from reaching or even setting goals. They can keep you mired in a cycle of “try and fail again” with seemingly no end or explanation. They can keep you from even trying to make your dreams come true.

Limiting beliefs around work can cause your career to bottom out. They can keep you from reaching your potential, from getting the job you want, and can even cause you to perform so poorly you get fired.

That’s only the start of what they can do to you. Many people, perhaps most in Western society, have limiting beliefs around money. This can lead to you being chronically broke and financially insecure no matter how much money you make. It can even cause you...

Mindset is an important indicator of your likelihood of success in an endeavor. It can make all the difference between success and failure. There are only two basic mindsets: a growth mindset and a fixed mindset.

A growth mindset is the preferred mindset for most purposes. You’ve probably heard about it and its characteristics many times. But what about its counterpart, the fixed mindset? Do you understand what it is and the ways it's different from a growth mindset?

One of the primary characteristics of a fixed mindset is the belief that intelligence and moral character are static. These things are fixed by genetics and can’t change or be developed with effort. A person is either smart or not; someone has a good moral character or not.

People with a fixed mindset tend to avoid challenges and give up on things easily if they don’t come naturally. After all, if you can’t learn to be better, why bother? Another characteristic of a fixed...

As an entrepreneur, your relationships with others can play a crucial role in your success. Whether it's building a strong network of professional contacts or maintaining positive personal relationships, it's important to recognize and overcome any limiting beliefs that may be hindering your connections.

Limiting beliefs can have a detrimental effect on business relationships as well as personal relationships. These beliefs, whether they stem from fear of rejection, inability to trust, or feelings of unworthiness, can prevent entrepreneurs from forming meaningful connections with clients, partners, and colleagues.

For example, fear of rejection can lead entrepreneurs to avoid pitches, networking opportunities, and other situations where they may be rejected. This can result in missed business opportunities and a lack of growth for the company.

The inability to trust can also harm business relationships by causing entrepreneurs to be overly controlling, leading to tension and...

Overcoming limiting beliefs is difficult and requires a lot of work and dedication. When your spirits lag and it seems like you’ll never get there, it can feel hopeless and make you want to give up. What you need to do instead is find a way to raise your spirits and give yourself a boost to keep going. Affirmations are great for this. Not only that, but used regularly, they can help you get rid of your limiting beliefs altogether.

What is an Affirmation?

An affirmation is a short, positive statement you use to talk to both your conscious and unconscious mind. They’re powerful sentences that can change your mood and help rewire your brain. They’ve been shown to help with everything from lifting self-esteem to reducing limiting beliefs. An affirmation can simply be thought, or it can be spoken, written, or typed.

How Do You Use Affirmations?

You can use affirmations to reduce your limiting beliefs in two ways. First, as a boost to your lagging...

A complete list of limiting beliefs would be endless because there are an infinite number of them. While some might be uncommon, others occur in many people across time and space and in any number of cultures. This is a list of five more of the most common limiting beliefs.

1.) I’m not good enough to pursue my dreams.

     As with many limiting beliefs, fear is the emotion underlying this one. Usually, the person holding this belief thinks that only people who have extraordinary abilities or talents can succeed in whatever the dream is and that ordinary people are shut out. Naturally, this isn’t normally true, with important exceptions such as the astronaut corps.

2.) It’s impossible to get what you want out of life.

     The consequence of this limiting belief is that the holders often get nothing from life and spend much of their lives miserable and dreaming about the “what if.” Major depression is...

Are you still struggling to understand the concept of limiting beliefs? Does the concept make sense, but you can’t understand how to put limiting beliefs into words? That’s a common experience. It’s often hard to come up with examples of a new idea. Luckily, because every person has limiting beliefs, some of them are common enough to be used as examples. This is a list of five of the most common limiting beliefs along with their negative consequences.

1.) Fear of Rejection

     This is one of the top three limiting beliefs. Everyone ever born is afraid of being rejected by someone or something, whether that’s a romantic partner, a college, a sports team, a job, or something else altogether. Most people are able to deal with their fear well enough to go for their desires anyway, but some people develop it into a limiting belief and stop trying for the things they want for fear of rejection.

2.) Fear of Failure

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Are you having trouble making progress on your goals? Do you feel “stuck” in your career or personal life? Does it seem like you don’t advance at all no matter what you do or how hard you try? If you’re having trouble figuring out what’s behind your lack of progress, it might be some limiting beliefs you didn’t know you had.

What’s a limiting belief? It’s an unconscious limit you place on yourself in childhood. You do it because your unconscious mind thinks something is dangerous (usually because you experienced some form of emotional harm) and your rational brain wasn’t developed enough to realize that wasn’t the case. Your brain puts the belief in place to keep the harm from happening again.

Your unconscious mind did its job to protect you when you couldn’t protect yourself. Except that now you’re an adult and you’re still dragging around that belief, and it’s keeping you stuck.

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You’ve recognized that you have limiting beliefs and decided to overcome them. You’ve identified your limiting beliefs. What now? The next step is to reframe your limiting beliefs into empowering beliefs. You don’t have to work on all of your limiting beliefs at once; if you have identified several, it’s better to start with only one or a handful of them. Select one or more before you move on.

The Framing of Limiting Beliefs

Limiting beliefs can be identified by their framing, that is, how the belief statement is constructed. The sentence structure tells you what type of belief it is. All limiting beliefs start with something like the following:

“I can’t…”

“I don’t…”

“I could never…”

“I’m not…”

“It’s always been this way.”

These statements are disempowering; they take away your agency and make it seem like things can’t be changed or...

Are you having trouble reaching your goals despite having the desire to do so? Are you having trouble maintaining healthy relationships? Do your fitness goals seem to fail the minute you start an exercise program? You might be dealing with some limiting beliefs.

What’s a limiting belief? It’s a belief you hold in your unconscious mind about yourself, other people, or the world. It’s not true, but you believe it’s true. Limiting beliefs develop in childhood when your rational brain has yet to develop enough to properly process your experiences. It’s a natural and normal part of growing up. Everyone develops a few limiting beliefs on the path to adulthood.

Your brain created your limiting beliefs to protect you. It thought they would keep you safe from danger or (usually emotional) harm. Now that you’re an adult, however, these beliefs are causing more harm than good. But you’re hanging onto them because your unconscious still...