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After reading Ali Wong’s book, I came to the sad realization that the poverty mindset is passed down within families, regardless of the size of one’s bank account. Ali Wong, who has become a multi-millionaire, still operates in survival mode and behaves as if she were poor. When I closed the book, I wondered, “How do you break free from a family survival mindset?” and a book seemed to fall into my lap: Get Rich, Lucky Bitch by Denise Duffield-Thomas (buy it on Amazon).
At first, I didn’t particularly want to read it because the provocative title “lucky bitch” put me off a bit. And in the introduction, the author mentions that she is a coach and that the book was written before she became a millionaire (she has since). Usually, I don’t read books by people who get rich by selling courses about getting rich, but I read one chapter out of curiosity and was very surprised to find that everything she said was accurate. She clearly has a strong understanding of the laws of the universe, especially the law of attraction.
Denise Duffield-Thomas is not an economist or a financial advisor, but she has an impressive track record of winning contests through the law of attraction, including a six-month trip around the world where she stayed in luxurious, honeymoon hotels. Her central thesis is simple and somewhat unsettling: it is not your skills, intelligence, or natural luck that prevent you from becoming rich. It is your psychological relationship with money. And that can be changed. That is exactly what I was trying to understand.
Money Is First and Foremost an Inner Story
The first major wake-up call from the book: money is not an external problem. It is not the fault of the economy, your boss, or your lack of qualifications. It is what you deeply believe about what you deserve to receive. Boom. On one hand, it is liberating: everyone can create abundance. On the other hand, it is uncomfortable: if you are stuck in survival mode, you are contributing to it without realizing it. Not easy to accept.
What is interesting is that this issue particularly affects women. Collectively, we have internalized the idea that money is scarce, that wanting a lot of it would make us mean or snobbish, or that our loved ones would love us less. Movies and TV shows reinforce this: wealthy women on screen are either manipulative, wives of rich men like Gabrielle Solis in Desperate Housewives, or people who have sold their soul like Miranda Priestly in The Devil Wears Prada. In these conditions, it is hard to envision wealth without feeling a sense of guilt.
The good news is that these beliefs are not universal truths. They are inherited stories. And that means they can be rewritten.
The Five-Step Formula: Simple on Paper, Challenging in Practice
Denise structures her entire approach around a five-step formula.
Step One: Declutter
Before attracting anything new, you need to make space. And this decluttering is both physical and emotional.
Physically, the idea is to get rid of anything that makes you feel poor or stuck. I have a friend who changes her mattress every time she changes boyfriend because she says she cannot sleep where her ex’s energy still lingers. As for me, stained clothes made me feel very poor. I used to turn them into pajamas, but even then I felt uncomfortable because I knew the stains were there. I eventually threw them away, and later discovered that my local dry cleaner could easily remove them. Since then, my clothes look as good as new. A small detail, not very expensive, but it really changes everything.
Emotionally, this is where things get more complex. You have to trace back all your memories related to money and identify those that still carry an emotional charge. I did this exercise thinking I had a fairly healthy relationship with money. Spoiler: not at all. Everyone has biases, resentments, and unpleasant stories tied to money, often buried for years.
I thought I had forgotten and forgiven a poorly handled annual review with a former manager. While doing the exercise, I realized I still held resentment toward that person. Other very old memories also resurfaced. I remember, as a child, feeling deep shame and bitterness every time I lacked money to buy something I really wanted.
To process all this, Denise relies on the Hawaiian practice of Ho’oponopono. The formula is simple: “I love you, I’m Sorry, Please Forgive Me, Thank You”. Repeat it for each memory, allowing the emotions to surface. Forgiveness does not mean forgetting or condoning. It means stopping spending your energy carrying that resentment and redirecting it toward your own growth. Forgiveness is a gift you give yourself.
Step Two: Decide Exactly What You Want
“I want more money.” That is a completely useless goal. Denise is very clear about this: money likes clarity. The Universe is like a well-trained dog waiting for precise instructions.
What I really like about this idea is that it forces you to put a number on what you want. Many people dream of certain experiences without knowing how much they cost. Sometimes, those experiences are already accessible, but because we do not look into them, we assume they are out of reach. Many people dream of traveling the world, but when we share our budget, they realize that our eleven-month trip costs less than their one-and-a-half-day wedding. They could have had a less extravagant wedding and enjoyed six months of honeymoon around the world.
The exercise is called “Be, Do, Have”. Every day, you write what you want to be, do, and have, with specific numbers for financial goals. She says the difference between a billionaire and a millionaire is that the billionaire writes their goals twice a day 😀
This method works because it activates the Reticular Activating System, the part of the brain that filters relevant information. It is like when you want to buy a red car: suddenly, you see them everywhere. By writing “I want to earn xxxx€/month,” you become more attentive to job offers that match that salary.
Step Three: Surround Your Life with Positivity
Be careful, this does not mean ignoring reality. It means actively monitoring the messages you send yourself and surrounding yourself with people who have a healthy relationship with money. When you set ambitious goals, you may focus too much on the “how” and start telling yourself negative things like “I don’t know how I’m going to get there”, “I won’t make it”. If you surround yourself with people who believe money is hard to earn and that the system is unfair, you risk falling into a vicious cycle.
When my career was at a standstill, I had no idea how to move forward, but I had very clear goals: I would not leave that company without having worked directly with the two most competent people I had identified. I did not know how it would happen. I applied the law of attraction and believed in it fully. My only obstacle was a former manager who said “no” every time. The Universe responded by sending that manager abroad, and those two highly competent people successively became my direct managers. A complete plot twist. That is what happens when you let go of the “how” and focus on the “what.” You have to believe.
Step Four: Take Action
Manifestation does not work in a vacuum. Thousands of women read books about abundance, meditate, visualize… and take no concrete action. Action is the strongest signal you can send to the Universe. And it can be very small: reading a book about investing, opening an investment account, applying for a job, asking for a raise.
But Denise goes further than that. She says that one of the most powerful actions is to talk about it around you, without conditionals, without “maybe,” without “if I make it.” Just as something obvious. When you tell your colleague, “I won’t be there that week, I’m in New York,” she does not question it. She believes you. And that outside belief does something unexpected: it strengthens your own. The more you state it, the more others believe it, the more you believe it yourself, the more energy you find to make it happen for real. It becomes a virtuous circle. The people around you become, without knowing it, co-manifesters of your project.
Action, even imperfect action, even just verbal action, says: I am serious.
Step Five: Receive and Adjust
This one is often overlooked. Receiving is a skill. Many women know how to give but struggle to receive, whether it is a compliment, a gift, or an unexpected opportunity. You need to learn to say “thank you” without minimizing or feeling guilty. I have a friend who cannot accept a gift without immediately sending me money in return, and who refuses to let anyone treat her at a restaurant. She spends a tremendous amount of energy pushing away what is offered to her, including opportunities.
But receiving also means not sabotaging what comes your way. Things are going well, money is coming in, projects are moving forward, and then suddenly an unexpected bill arrives, the car breaks down, or a fine shows up. Denise explains that it is not the Universe taking back what it gave you, it is us sabotaging ourselves. When things go too well, something in us panics. Abundance feels unfamiliar, undeserved, and not safe. So we unconsciously create the conditions to return to what we know: lack. Celebrating every win, even a small one, is a way of telling your brain: it is okay, I deserve it.
Emotional Decluttering: Where It Really Hurts (and Truly Frees You)
Denise asks you to go through your entire life chronologically, from your earliest money-related memory to today, to identify anything that still carries emotional weight: humiliation, shame, anger, guilt, or a sense of injustice. A boss who refused a deserved raise. A stingy ex-boyfriend. A childhood marked by financial struggle. A parent hiding expenses from the other. Nothing is too small or too old.
What is particularly powerful is the part about family inheritance. Our beliefs about money largely come from what we observed, heard, and absorbed growing up. And our parents themselves inherited these beliefs from their parents. We can break the cycle, but first we need to see it.
Beyond forgiveness (the famous Ho’oponopono), the author recommends several tools to go even deeper in emotional work. EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique), also known as tapping, is highlighted in particular. It involves tapping specific points on the face and body while repeating affirmations such as “Even though I have this fear of not being enough, I deeply love and accept myself.” Kinesiology, meditation, acupuncture, and other therapeutic approaches are also mentioned, as Denise’s advice is simple: “throw everything at it”.
Sabotage Patterns: The Loops We Replay Without Realizing
This chapter was a bit painful to read. Denise calls these behaviors RSIs, “Repetitive Sabotage Injuries.” Patterns we repeat over and over, often unconsciously.
Over-giving: it is a beautiful quality, but when it comes from an inability to receive or from guilt, it becomes self-sabotage.
Perfectionism: probably the most sophisticated form of sabotage because it disguises itself as a virtue. “I’ll ask for a raise when I have more experience.” “I’ll launch my project when it’s perfect.” While waiting for ideal conditions, nothing happens.
Compulsive spending and paralyzing saving are two extremes with the same root: fear. Some women spend everything because having too much money makes them uncomfortable. Others accumulate savings they never dare to use. In both cases, fear is in control, not conscious choice.
And then there are chronic “forgettings”: accumulating fines, late tax filings, unopened bank statements. Denise highlights something interesting: these are not harmless oversights. They are signals, something to examine, not ignore.
Incremental Upgrades: My Favorite Chapter
Since I upgraded my pajamas and started wearing 100% silk at home, I feel so much better and in a better mood. It is a small upgrade that cost me very little but has a huge impact on my daily mindset. And that is exactly what Denise explains in this chapter.
The idea is simple but somewhat counterintuitive: you cannot wait to be rich to feel rich. It is the opposite. You must start by feeling rich to attract wealth. Not by spending money you do not have, and not for social status, but by gradually improving, one element at a time, the quality of your daily life: switch from basic soap to a slightly more luxurious one, buy better bread, go to a slightly nicer restaurant, read a beautiful hardcover book instead of a paperback.
To guide yourself, Denise suggests a simple question: “What would my millionaire self do?” My millionaire self would have a cleaner, perfectly ironed clothes, a private chef, and would travel first class… And I realize I can already afford some of these upgrades. After all, even a Coke in the most luxurious hotel in the world cannot cost more than €20. Even billionaires probably have the same iPhone as you.
What Denise does not mention, but I will add, is that this principle aligns with the law of correspondence described in the I Ching, an ancient Chinese text. The I Ching suggests that what is aligned naturally draws in what matches it. By feeling wealth at a cellular level through these small upgrades, you raise your energetic vibration to match abundance. And like a magnet, you attract what operates at the same frequency: opportunities, meaningful connections, and money.
Tracking Your Money: The Simplest and Most Transformative Exercise
This one, I love. The idea is to write down every day all the money that comes into your life. Absolutely everything: your salary, of course, but also a coin found on the street, a birthday gift, a discount, a meal offered by a friend, a reimbursement from health insurance.
But before you start tracking, first take stock of everything that is already there: the coins lying around in corners, old forgotten accounts, unused gift cards, expense claims never submitted, and loyalty points sitting idle. You would be surprised.
The intention is twofold. First, it forces you to become aware of all the abundance already present that you tend to overlook. Second, it sends a signal of gratitude to the Universe: “I see what you send me. I appreciate it. I want more.” Imagine the Universe sending you abundance and you do not even notice it or say thank you. At some point, it might stop. Noticing even the smallest signs of abundance encourages more. It also raises your vibration to align with prosperity.
I did this exercise right after finishing the book and guess what? Money literally fell from the sky that same day. I referred someone on iGraal and my security deposit for my apartment in Lille was refunded.
My Review: Pros
What makes Get Rich, Lucky Bitch (buy it on Amazon) different from most books on the law of attraction is its pragmatism. Denise does not claim that thinking positively is enough to make money rain down. She clearly states that inner work and external action are inseparable and provides practical tools for both. Many other books focus only on action and ignore inner money blocks, which I believe are far more significant (at least for me).
She also does not promise quick or easy results. On the contrary, she explains that each new income level brings new ceilings to break through and new fears to overcome. Viewed this way, wealth is not a destination but a continuous learning process. And honestly, that makes it far less intimidating.
What this book fundamentally changes is how you see yourself in relation to money: not as a victim of external circumstances, but as the primary author of your financial reality. This shift in perspective can feel uncomfortable at first, but it is also the most empowering. Because if you contributed to creating your current situation, you also have the power to create a different one.
My Review: Cons
This book is often criticized for being less relevant to salaried workers, whose income is generally fixed. As a result, some exercises, such as tracking money or increasing your rates, may seem irrelevant to them. However, with a bit of creativity, these ideas can absolutely be adapted. For example, “raising your rates” can mean asking for a raise. “Earning more” can also involve taking on better-paid side tasks: in my previous job, it was possible to work a Sunday in exchange for a day off or a 50% pay increase. You can also sell unused items on platforms like Vinted. You can also invest your hard-earned money. Or you may even realize that reaching your goals requires becoming an entrepreneur, who knows.
Another criticism concerns the length of the book. The exercises, ideas, and tips could have been condensed into about 100 pages. However, Denise uses many examples and frequently repeats certain ideas, which brings the book to nearly 300 pages. This is a common flaw in self-help books, and unfortunately this one falls into it as well.
I read the book (Amazon link) and also listened to the Audible version (link, narrated with the author’s charming Australian accent). I liked both, but I have a slight preference for the physical book because it allows you to take notes and do the exercises at the same time.
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