Taking on a taboo topic: Money
And why good-hearted women struggle with it.
“The more interest you take in your finances, the more they improve. As if by magic.”
Mark Butler (a.k.a The Budget Nerd)
Hello Courageous Thrivers,
My usual M.O. here on the Thriving for Equity Blog is to address the internal emotional stuff that gets in the way of your joy and your ability to do great work in the world—with a few practical strategies thrown in, mostly focused on practices of self-care and self-compassion.
In this post, I’m expanding my definition of self-care just a bit wider to include caring for your finances—and caring for yourself through your finances—because I’ve found that a crucial aspect of my personal ability to thrive has circled around how I approach money – earning it, spending it, saving it and (of course) addressing internal barriers and blind spots related it.
Because many of my clients and readers are either committed to social justice, deeply religious or spiritual, and/or moms, developing self-care practices related to money can be an especially difficult task.
Here are a few reasons why:
WE TEND NOT TO MAKE, OR HAVE, A LOT OF MONEY BECAUSE:
We have chosen meaningful work and impact as our goal for working rather than focusing on wealth building.
And, our society has deemed the meaningful work we do (thought of as “women’s work” in many cases) to be not worth paying much for, so salaries in our field are low.
(Anyone out there work in the field of early childhood education? Home health care? Elder care? Teaching? Stay-at-home parent? Do I hear an AMEN?)
Finally, we believe that good people who care about others (and/or God) cannot also care about being well paid. In other words, people who want to make money are shallow and probably also selfish and mean, so having the goal of making a good living financially means that we aren’t REALLY good people. And we want to be good.
Of course a big downside to these patterns and beliefs is that individually we end up using a lot of time and energy trying to get by. We can’t give or support the causes and people we care about in the ways we want to. And collectively we end up with a society in which the people who are most likely to do good things with money don’t have enough of it to make much of a difference.
WE TEND NOT TO SPEND A LOT OF MONEY ON OURSELVES BECAUSE:
We genuinely enjoy spending money on others AND ALSO
We think selfishness must be avoided at all times. (For some reason, this is the ultimate “sin” in our psyche/belief system.) AND
We often feel guilty about spending money on ourselves (because our students have so much less than we do, or because good moms always sacrifice for their kids, or because we think to be good is to always be frugal, for example) and since we feel guilt and doubt when we spend money on ourselves, it’s really not that enjoyable, so why do it?
The downside of these patterns is that we often miss the wisdom in our desires, because we call them selfish before we fully feel them. We end up undernourished in our own hearts when we don’t need to be. We live small and we lose opportunities for joy and delight that could energize our work and our lives.
DOES ANY OF THIS SOUND LIKE YOU?
If it does, I hope you’ll do two things:
1) Hit reply with the word MONEY. I’ll share a couple of resources and practices that have been really helpful to me - one of which will make you laugh because it seems so silly!
2) Set aside some time this week to journal about money. Do this stream of consciousness. Set a timer for 5, 10, 20, 30 mins (you decide what feels right) and don’t allow your pen to stop moving until the timer rings—even if you are writing the same word or phrase over and over for a while. (And yes, it's better if you use a pen and paper rather than a computer.)
This is a well-tested strategy for getting at some of the unconscious beliefs that might be driving your behavior even though you’re not aware of it.
If you want, you could use one or more of the following prompts:
a. People with money are…
b. I will never have a lot of money because…
c. I don’t want to focus on money/make a lot of money because…
Everyone’s journey with money is unique, of course. But the place to start isn’t with harsh judgement of yourself for your failures or with a rigid spending plan you’ll rebel against in five seconds flat.
The place to start is with awareness.
You can get to a radically new place in your relationship with money if you’re willing to start focusing on this taboo topic.
Creating financial health isn’t an easy or quick process for most of us. I’ve been consciously working on shifting my money beliefs and habits for over a decade now, with slow and (mostly) steady progress.
And I must say, the benefits of doing the work aren’t just financial. They’re relational. Because how we interact with money is how we interact with Life in so many other ways.
Here’s to Thriving and Equity, Financial Vitality and Impactful Service,
Deb
P.S. As I was writing this, I remembered that as part of my VITA Women’s Empowerment Certification, I learned a couple of Money Empowerment tools that were really helpful to me and others.
I don’t offer sessions with this focus regularly, but I’d help some of you get a kick start on shifting old money patterns. So, if you’re interested, hop on my calendar for a quick convo. We’ll talk and I’ll customize a package for you in the $125-$500 range; payment plan available.
This offer is only good until Sept. 30, so if you want one, now’s your chance!
This is not a false urgency tactic, it's just that October is FULL of things I can't wait to tell you about including a free webinar series with some awesome special guests, Risk-Worthy Intensives and my 31st wedding anniversary! So now is when I have the capacity to do these.