Taking the baby steps necessary to transform inherited financial fears

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A well-dressed, articulate, confident lady called Leticia, South-East Asian by heritage, sat down in my office and began. 

“Growing up feeling plagued by financial woes, I learned to feel like I never had enough or never knew enough about money. On the exterior, I am in a fairly well-off position. I’m working a decent-paying job, contributing to a retirement fund, and renting out a property. And yet, I go about my daily life with dread that one day, something will happen that will cause my delicate balance of working and paying the bills to collapse like a fragile house of cards.” 

She paused before continuing, “for as long as I could remember, I have struggled with budgeting and financial planning. I have taken courses, talked to financial planners, and used countless budgeting apps. But I always found myself in the same position – never feeling like I had enough money and dreading the day that I could lose everything due to unforeseen circumstances. And yet, I couldn’t help but feel that my insecurities were all due to my own actions. Budgeting wasn’t so hard, so why couldn’t I maintain one? And so, after countless failed budgets and lack of savings, a core belief of helplessness around money was settling in.” 

Leticia was not the first client I’ve met who feels this way, many of my past and future clients have these beliefs. “Perhaps we could explore your feelings of not having enough and fear of loss before getting more financial education and using other budgeting apps?”, I said. Leticia looked relieved, suspicious and hesitant. She wanted to surrender to the process with me but didn’t believe that our work together would amount to much. I felt like I was the door at the end of the corridor.

After a few months of working together, Leticia understood that her financial struggles stemmed from a number of factors that influenced her beliefs and actions around money. Challenges around money weighed heavy on her and travelled deep to her emotional core wounds. One challenging aspect of our work together was her coming to understand the importance of taking responsibility for her finances and not her brothers or other family members. 

A lot of Leticia’s issues came from her Mum and Dad being forced to leave their home country, due to war. The struggle for survival was still very present for her and her family. Her family’s focus was on making as much money as possible. To stay safe at all costs. It was not focused on following their desire and purpose and having resources support this. 

They were behaving as if they were still on the run in their adopted land. And the belief was money is the thing that will save you. The pain came out in different ways in different family members, and Leticia took on the role of being the connector and mother of the family. Holding the space for everyone and protecting her younger siblings. They were still psychologically and emotionally fleeing. 

Her unprocessed pain turned into a constant fear and obsession with not having enough money. And the fear that it would be taken from her at any moment. The immune system was always in a state of fight and flight. The unprocessed pain got stuck in her body and turned into perceived and relentless fears projected onto money and not feeling she will be supported. 

All of these insecurities lay hidden in her life, shaping her thoughts and behaviours in the present day. She struggled with this for years, not acknowledging the pain she experienced and projected onto money, and subsequently avoided dealing with it. It was all so overwhelming. Her need to predict and control everything in her life was incompatible with the uncertainty around her finances. Life is full of curveballs that we can’t prepare for.

She slowly learned that financial difficulties can happen to anyone. It wasn’t a reflection of her. She learned to understand that her pain and fear have nothing to do with money. She was willing to start taking baby steps towards looking at her inherited fear and calling it what it really was.

Leticia stumbled and worked her way through addressing the core wounds of her family inheritance. And I held space for her when the struggles were overwhelming and jumped for joy when she made big strides in managing her fears around money.  

Today Leticia is a woman transformed, still stylish and well-spoken but now her confidence extends to her relationship with money. “Getting support to tackle these challenges projected onto money head-on was one of the best things I have ever done for myself. Light has been shed on my ability to help myself and has given me the confidence to finally address this long-standing core hurts. I continue to improve my money habits, but for the first time, I understand it is not about the money.”

I leave you with a thought. Money is a reflection. It is not a judgement. It is a friend that holds your wounds until you are ready to start healing. And that readiness is a beautiful gift that one receives with all the little baby steps taken and people who have helped you on the way. 

You are more than welcome to take a baby step with me by taking the complimentary money quiz and complimentary 30-minute consultation anytime. 

Journeying into the depths of money and spirituality with Mindful Money Coaching

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By Jenai Lieu

Growing up feeling plagued by financial woes, I learned to feel like I never had enough or never knew enough about money. On the exterior, I am in a fairly well-off position. I’m working a decent-paying job, contributing to a retirement fund, and renting out a property. And yet, I go about my daily life with dread that one day, something will happen that will cause my delicate balance of working and paying the bills to collapse like a fragile house of cards. Never did I think that one day I could get support from someone like Karen, from Mindful Money Coaching, who not only had the knowledge and skill to help me unravel these core beliefs, but the understanding and empathy to walk me through my fears.

For as long as I could remember, I have struggled with budgeting and financial planning. I have taken courses, talked to financial planners, and used countless budgeting apps. But I always found myself in the same position – never feeling like I had enough money and dreading the day that I could lose everything due to unforeseen circumstances. And yet, I couldn’t help but feel that my insecurities were all due to my own actions. Budgeting wasn’t so hard, so why couldn’t I maintain one? And so, after countless failed budgets and lack of savings, a core belief of helplessness around money was settling in. 

It wasn’t until I talked to Karen did I realize that I was not acknowledging a fundamental issue regarding money. An initial exploration needed to happen before getting the financial education and before using budgeting apps. And that was asking myself, ‘What is my relationship with money?’ And so, my journey of money coaching with Karen began.

Money coaching ended up being more than what I had imagined. Karen helped me realize that my financial struggles stemmed from a number of factors that influenced my beliefs and actions around my finances. Challenges around money weighed heavy on me and traveled deep to my emotional core wounds. She pointed out how this shows up in my life. I couldn’t recall the last time I discussed my salary or amount of debt with a friend or a family member. And I felt deep shame around my feelings of insecurity and incompetency around money. It’s a wonder how I could ever find space to explore my financial issues and make any positive changes around money!

 

Something notable that Karen highlighted was the importance of taking responsibility for our finances even if we didn’t cause those issues to begin with. All of these insecurities lay hidden in my life, stemming from childhood circumstances, yet they still shaped my thoughts and behaviors in the present day. I struggled with this for years, not acknowledging the pain I experienced around money, and subsequently avoided dealing with it. It was all so overwhelming, and my need to predict and control everything in my life just couldn’t deal with the uncertainty around my finances. 

But life is full of curveballs that we can’t prepare for. I slowly learned that financial difficulties can happen to anyone, and I learned that it doesn’t represent my character. Karen validated my struggles, and was patient working with me as I stumbled and worked my way through addressing them. She held space for me when the struggles were overwhelming, and she was my cheerleader when big strides were made in managing my fears around money. 

Getting support to tackle these money challenges head on was one of the best things I have ever done for myself. Working with Karen has helped shed light on my ability to help myself and has given me the confidence to finally address these long-standing core hurts. Today, I continue to improve my money habits, but for the first time, I don’t feel alone in this. I know I have the support and expertise of someone who understands and is looking out for my needs. 

Why making financial decisions is so overwhelming when you’re newly widowed

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Widowed and clueless

I have worked with many widows over the years. I often hear them say nobody really tells you the kind of support you may need for your next chapter after your partner passes. I hope this story of one widow will help create more ease and cut down on unnecessary suffering after your spouse passes. 

After my husband passed, suddenly everything changed. It was a big change for me to be on my own after so many years spent building a life together. I felt very fortunate that he had very extensive healthcare benefits that covered all of his many treatments. That was such a blessing. We could have easily been in horrific debt.  He was probably a multimillion-dollar patient when it came to the costs of all of the medical care he had over the years. 

Once he was gone, the realization that I had to do everything alone hit me all of a sudden. Life sort of stopped making sense. A lot of the time, I feel hopeless and want to just hide. It’s as if there is a dark shadow hovering over me, and I often feel overwhelmed by all the demands of my life. I don’t know where to begin when it comes to living my life without him. I wasn’t sure I could do it alone without him and his support.

Why do the answers seem so simple to everyone else?

All that goes through my head these days is “I can’t.” How am I going to do all of this? Do I keep the house? So many people said to me, “Oh, well, you should just sell your house.” As if that would solve everything. A lot of people want to jump in and fix my life for me. They mean well but are quick to offer unsolicited advice. I feel very disrespected, even burdened by this, because they don’t really understand the complexity of my life or my choices. They seem to think selling my house would be such a simple thing in itself and would solve everything. They don’t see that it is nested in a whole other series of difficult decisions.  

I’m 53 and also amid the whole midlife thing, too. I’m re-evaluating everything now, especially since his death. What do I want my life now to be like? What can I let go of? I don’t feel I have to keep proving myself in my career. I feel like, okay, I’ve dealt with the questions of  am I good enough, am I smart enough. Now it’s really about how I create value in my life. How do I do something meaningful in my life? 

It’s scary to step out into the unknown. I have to be able to live and work. I need to pay the bills and everything and continue the life that really took two of us to support it. My husband didn’t have a huge life insurance, and after the funeral costs, there’s not a lot of extra money left to spend frivolously. So, I need to continue working not just to support myself, but also to stay involved in life socially. But there are so many questions going around in my head, and I feel a bit lost and not sure who to talk to. I know I need help but I also need that help to be gentle, supportive, and understanding.

Finding the right support to help you find your own answers

For any one widowed recently, you can feel overwhelmed by all the financial decisions you have to make. You may feel like you are all alone in a dark hole, and it’s hard to get out. You might even want to stay in that hole for a while, maybe only looking up and out every now and then. 

Perhaps you wonder how you can trust your own life? Your own process? How is life going to work to support you? How are you also going to support yourself? There was always your spouse to speak to about money. Any decisions you made were made together. 

You have looked around and have seen friends that became widowed and they made some bad financial choices quickly and regretted them. You understand why now. You feel clueless, very vulnerable and alone. It’s a big change financially to really grow up. It’s all on you. And that can make you feel very alone. 

During this time, it is hard to know what you need or who to talk to. Here is some guidance on the kind of support that no one really tells for your next chapter. 


How to recognise a supportive financial coach

It’s important to receive support from a Financial coach who is kind, who doesn’t judge or shame you. Most times when we talk about money, it’s not kind. Discussions around money when someone dies, divorces or goes into debt can be very transactional. Look for someone who brings gentleness and kindness.

Find someone who brings a peacefulness and a sense of trust. Someone you could really trust and work with because these are sometimes really deep issues. Someone that brings great sensitivity and great heart.

Find someone you are able to say “I’m worried about….” to Someone who gives you a sense of patience, who doesn’t jump in with the “you should just” answers. We can take this slowly. Because very often when one’s widowed, one makes bad choices quickly. 

Someone who is open. Someone who opens up possibilities, has focus and shows you what’s possible, but doesn’t tell you what to do. Someone who lets you discover for yourself which possibilities are right for you when you’re ready.

Someone who doesn’t pressure you to go in there and rip open everything. 

Someone who has an ability to hold that place of being supportive and being open and still be a guide. Yet doesn’t allow you to hide behind the couch when you want to. And does it gently.

Someone who brings a very feminine sensibility to money.

Someone who helps ground you in yourself and helps you to stay instead of running away from this. 

Someone who says “you can handle this.” Someone you believe when she says it. 

Someone you can trust, who believes in you and with whom you can be honest. Who helps you to look at and unpack things that are sometimes difficult to unpack. Those things that are not talked about that can be very secretive. A supportive financial coach will help you not to be overwhelmed by them.

Someone who is very real too, who makes you feel they’re in it with them. 

Someone who doesn’t act as if they have everything figured out and it’s all fine, but it’s also clear that she’s done her work and has experience. She believes in the process and is very responsible. 

The person is marching ahead with a lantern and you feel you can follow her.

Valuing myself around money and work

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“I need to get better at valuing myself around money and work”. This is something I hear from many women in my work as a Money Coach. And when I ask them how they behave currently that doesn’t value themselves, I often get answers like: “I continue working for little pay; I take on too many jobs because I fear not having work; I don’t get down to my budget;  I don’t ask for enough money; I allow myself to take less money; I don’t spend enough time investing in my own business.” 

In other words, “I work too much and earn too little.” 

Fear around finances

One of the other fears I hear most frequently is the fear of being homeless. 

I get it. Women don’t have too much experience in being in the rooms of money and power. A lot of us have been conditioned into taking care of others first and not looking after ourselves financially. Many women leave the finances to their partners. They just don’t do the money thing.

Women often seek my help when they find themselves suddenly having to manage the money. This could be after they are widowed, or their partners have cheated on them and they decided to end their relationship. Others remain within emotionally or physically abusive relationships. They feel that they cannot leave because the children are too young. They fear that they don’t have enough money to support themselves and their children.

Ageism and returning to work

When women go into their 40s and 50s, and due to changed circumstances find themselves trying to rejoin the workforce to make ends meet, they meet another game changer: ageism. One of my clients wrote all her skills and abilities from raising children as part of a job application form and never got an answer back.

Yes, ageism is difficult to meet and accept today, when you are 50 and trying to restart your career after  devoting your life to your family and partner.

Two friends of mine were enjoying a 5 star hotel as a treat in mid life, after working hard to get to the resources they have today. They wondered what all these very young people were doing in the lobby with them. One of my friends had a conversation with a few of them as they queued to check-in. It turned out they were in the tech industry, just out of college, starting at $124k per year. 

Another client left the corporate world to start her own business in her 50s. She gave up on that and tried to return to the corporate world and was told she was too old and over-qualified. 

So, yes ageism sucks! Having been a mum and wife, giving all your time and energy there and to have that go  unrecognized in the work and money world hurts. It can be frustrating to see much younger, less experienced people catapulted to a much higher earning bracket.

And yet, we also bring our own suffering to it. We can point out ageism when it happens, but we can also shine a light on our own self-sabotaging commitments towards ourselves. 

Identity and self-sabotage

I worked with Saorise, a 50ish woman with 4 children from 12 to 24, in the midst of a divorce, who was working long hours for little. She didn’t ask for enough money and she allowed herself to take less money. She complained about ageism but I was more interested in helping her turn away from that to what she was bringing to the dialogue. Saorise was the scapegoat in her family of origin. Her brother said to her recently “You were a great kid, but you always got blamed and it was never your fault.”  She was raised to be the problem. She was built to get second-rate jobs, to scrap for work and to expect less. This was the default programme. What was really revealing for Saorise was when she realized that she had an unconscious assumption leading all her behaviors:  if she succeeded in her work and valued herself, then there would be nothing wrong with her. If she made enough money with work that she loves, then she would have to abandon that problem kid inside her. Then who would she be? 

Her whole way of being was to support the view that there was something wrong with her. 

So, yes ageism is an issue, certainly, but what are you bringing to the table too? This may be a bigger hurdle to your fulfillment than what the outside world is presenting to you.

When Saorise saw this clearly, she left the teaching jobs that didn’t pay well. She cut back her hours instead of working 7 days a week, and focused on building her own English school business. Ageism still exists. Saorise continues to confront this as it arises. But there is a difference now. She is not using ageism to make excuses for the inner work she needs to do. She has taken responsibility for the part she plays in her own happiness. And that has made all the difference to her sense of feeling powerful in making changes for the better in her life.

So, the question to ponder until we meet next. What unconscious self-defeating view is holding you in place and keeping you in a prison from a life well-lived?

There is an opportunity to do some work around your money issues coming up in 2022. Money and Spirituality starts February 19th at Noon EST for 4 Saturdays. Feel free to reach out and chat with me [email protected]. 

 

What’s your money mindset? How money, self-worth and value confuse us.

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“What am I doing wrong? I work so hard and I never seem to make enough money. I love what I do and my clients really grow from our work together. There is nothing more fulfilling that seeing my clients have breakthroughs. And yet, I feel like an imposter. Am I really successful? Because my bank account doesn’t really show it. I constantly feel in survival mode when it comes to the end of the month. I have to live on leftovers.”

“The amount of money you are making is a reflection to help you,” I replied.

“Are you crazy? I feel like it is a judgement of my worth. I feel it is a measurement of my worth. I dread pulling up my accounts and taking a look at what money has come in.”

Yuko’s whole body slumped over in a depression. 

It’s not unusual to have a distorted relationship with money and self-value. Yuko was not the first client that I worked with who struggled with this issue. I waited a moment and asked her,  “are you willing to take a look behind what’s driving this?”

“Yes, I think so, and I’m scared.” 

Yuko and I took a journey together to a place where she discovered that she found it hard to receive support and let things in. She had lots of clients who were paying at a lower rate than standard. She didn’t like to charge people the proper rate. She didn’t like to put a price on her time, she felt it cheapened her offerings. With every client she went way over the time allotted for their session. Her clients knew that she was available at the drop of a hat to them. 

And she felt she was always living on a shoestring by the end of the month, despite being very frugal with her finances in general.

We took some of these behaviors and I asked Yuko, “imagine doing the opposite, what comes up?” 

“Gosh, well if I keep the session within the hour, I feel like I am not giving them enough and they will leave me. If I charge the proper price, then I am being greedy and selfish and they will not work with me. Money somehow taints my work.” 

With Yuko’s next new client, she took a big breath and let the client know her prices. Normally she would jump in and fill the space with “but if you cannot afford this, I can do it for a discount.” She stopped herself, held back with A LOT of effort and waited. The new client agreed and when Yuko got off the phone she cried. This was her obstacle to receiving.

With this new client, she also trained herself to keep to the hour session. 

The client continued to work with her and completed the 3 months, without placing extra demands on Yuko’s time outside of the sessions. Yuko continued on this trajectory going forward with her other clients.

A year later Yuko returned. “I’m learning to truly value my time, my talents, and my energy. I am becoming open to receiving love at a deeper level than I have ever experienced. As a result, I have more energy, more joy and more revenue. You were right that my money is a reflection to help me. Not a measurement to judge me.”

Making more money was a good thing for Yuko.  It meant letting love in. Yuko was ready to allow herself to be loved. Through my money coaching work I see how our relationships with money can be distorted, sometimes in the way that Yuko’s was. Other clients who are wealthier may be afraid that choosing a less financially secure path may result in a loss of social value or status. Whether you are experiencing financial abundance or scarcity at present, you may be dealing with the emotions that come from linking your self-value with money. Money is a reflection that can help you, rather than a measurement to judge you. 

How might your money be helping you right now?

What does your current relationship with money reveal about your relationship to your value, your time and energy?

What is your money reflecting to help you? If you would like to book a discovery call to find out, click here. I am also leading a money circle, beginning Oct 7th, Oct 14th, 28th, November 4th, 11th and 18th from 1.30pm / 3.30pm EST. Each session is 2 hours. Cost: $USD550. If you are curious about this, book a call with me here. 

With so many worries right now, how can this moment be perfect?

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I just came out of a week-long retreat, practising breathing in and out. That’s it. It was that simple. I was noticing whether my breath was long or short. Each day my body calmed down, and my thoughts and emotions slowed down. This is the meditation system, called Anapanasati, taught by the Buddha, in which mindful breathing is used to develop both samadhi (a serene and concentrated mind) and vipassana (Insight).

As I practised everything got quieter, my storylines became clearer. Some were neutral – what’s for lunch, or thinking of foods I like. Others were very heated – the anxiety of climate change and our community’s safety, as wildfires burn in our province. Some days it was hard to breathe in the cabin. Worries about my business, clients, revenue, an argument with my partner, a disagreement with a colleague. 

My partner or colleague is not in my meditation cabin. I am having this imaginary conversation and going over the same dialogue repeatedly hoping to resolve it. It increases my heart rate, uses up my precious energy without resolving anything. 

Then I remember the breathing practice and bring the focus back to my breath. Bringing the mind back, putting down the storyline and coming back to the breath and body. 

Training the mind to be present

The more I remember, bringing the focus back, the weaker my storyline’s power over me. This remembering gets quicker as I practise. It is mind training. Just like consistent strength training at the gym tones muscles, I meditate to train my mind to eventually stay in the present moment all the time. 

That doesn’t mean I won’t have thoughts, and feelings. They just won’t to have the power to take me away from being in the present moment. My mediation teacher constantly repeats “Karen, there is nothing wrong with this moment. This moment is perfect.”

“This moment is perfect? Are you crazy?  We have an unjust economy, wildfires burning all around the meditation center, and people are suffering from poverty, loneliness and fear. What do you mean this moment is perfect?”

“When you leave what is happening right now, and your mind is thinking about what happened yesterday, something it didn’t get, didn’t like, or worries about the future, then you are rejecting what you hear, see, touch and smell in this moment. You are in your head. You miss the birds’ song, the wind through the trees, that your ankles are swelling and need your attention. You are missing what is needed right now. You are missing life.”

I go for my daily walk. 

Breathing in and breathing out, noticing if my breath is long or short, shallow or deep. 

Hearing the birds sing. 

Breathing in and breathing out, noticing if my breath is long or short, shallow or deep. 

Experiencing joy. 

Breathing in and breathing out, noticing if my breath is long or short, shallow or deep. 

Noticing a grizzly about 200 meters away. 

Breathing in and breathing out, noticing if my breath is long or short, shallow or deep. 

Turning and walking away quickly. 

Breathing in and breathing out, noticing if my breath is long or short, shallow or deep.

Life is impermanent. It is certain that I will take my last breath, probably somewhere in the 2050s. I have eyes, ears, nose and body for another 30 years. When I use my senses to be engaged with this very moment, no matter how unpleasant, I give myself and others the gift of my life, my wisdom, my experience.

Transforming our world from “me or you” to “me and you”

We are having a hard time right now. The structures and systems of our human family are rooted in greed and fear, in a me or you worldview. It has assumptions like I can only win if you lose. We haven’t got enough, so we better look after me and mine. When I feel complete with that, I’ll look at others more unfortunate than me.  And that day never seems to come. 

We are so used to operating in a world of scarcity and lack. Our relationship with money reflects this. We are trained to repel the unpleasant and chase the pleasant. We are trained to be on the wheel of fear of missing out (FOMO), running on the belief that there is something wrong with us.  Social media and mainstream culture encourage distraction from being in the present. 

The futurist Buckminister Fuller, said in the 1980s that our structures and systems are rooted in a me OR you understanding of the world. He said it would take around 50 years for these institutions to crumble enough that they will need to be recreated, reborn, or redesigned in a new paradigm: a me AND you understanding of the world. A world where there is enough for everyone everywhere to have a productive and healthy life. Imagine. 

As we go from the me or you understanding, to the me and you, we need to get reacquainted with the practice of returning home to our body and senses. Only then can we look at the unconscious set of assumptions that are at the basis of how we organise ourselves, and of our storylines.

Breathing in and breathing out, noticing if my breath is long or short, shallow or deep.

Noticing scarcity in my heart. 

Breathing in and breathing out, noticing if my breath is long or short, shallow or deep.

Calming the states of not feeling enough and not feeling valued.

Breathing in and breathing out, noticing if my breath is long or short, shallow or deep.

Calming the states of not feeling enough and not feeling valued.

If you would like to build a sustainable meditation practice that permeates your body, career, relationships and all other areas of your life, join me for the Embodied Mindfulness: Tools for Holistic Living (Online) course, starting September 11th.   If you are interested in healing your relationship to money, there is a small group circle starting in September. There are 4 spots remaining. I take 8 maximum for the money circle. It is small and intimate to create a healing space for your relationship with money. For further information, send me an email at [email protected].

 

How To Improve Your Relationship With Power

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A talented landscape artist, Tamires specialized in Japanese garden design and construction. But she was teaching English. Nothing wrong with teaching English. But this was not where Tamires’s talent, abilities, her passion and interest lay. She would do pro bono design work and work when requested by a full-time landscape design professional. Bits and bobs, here and there.

Lots of talk, little action

We had many conversations exploring how she could create or be part of a design landscape company. She had similar discussions with trusted  friends  too. And nobody could understand why she was not moving in this direction. Instead, she put her energy into long hours creating class plans for her students of English as a second language. Then she spent even more time correcting their exams. It always felt like she over gave, overworked for what was needed in her teaching job. And she talked about feeling overwhelmed and stressed most of the time. She didn’t look or feel happy. So, what was going on?

Her response was that her job gave her a low but consistent regular income. It took care of her. And yet every so often, she would feel resentment and anger towards herself, her job, and wonder why she wasn’t doing what she loved. 

A moment of insight

One day at our normal regular session, Tamires’s resentment was up again. And something new appeared that day. “I am happy to be taken care of, even by a job I don’t like ”. 

Oh, this was something different showing up here, I said to myself. “Tamires, tell me more.” There was a long pause. I could feel something new bubbling under the surface. I waited…..maintaining my presence and equanimity. 

“Yet, why do I feel so much resentment towards myself, my job and others when I am taken care of? You know Karen, I think I am afraid of stepping into my power. Power is visibility and being visible means criticism. Power is acting and that means making mistakes. Mistakes mean rejection.”

Wow. I have worked with Tamires for many years now. You never know when the fruit will fall. It is such a moment of grace when it does. And I felt very honoured to witness this moment. 

She continued “I abdicated to my older sister growing up, to more competent friends at university and my wife with our finances. Following is easy in the short run, it feels so good at first. But then it turns into a gooey, dark mess.” 

You could feel the atmosphere change. Relief and releasing of some very deep held patterning of protection gave way to showing up and engaging with the world. 

The catalyst for change

One of the reasons this was all coming up now, was that one of her confident design partners challenged her to step into her power and take over his business. She has been working on and off for him. He was retiring, and like everyone else, knew her ability and talent in this area. 

Fast forward two years and Tamires is no longer teaching English. She has now taken over the Landscape Design business and is responsible for all aspects of the business, from marketing to outreach to design and project management. She works as hard on her business as she did preparing her lesson plans and grading. But rather than feeling overwhelmed she is energised. She said “I’ve acted more these past two years than ever before. And it feels much easier to bring in revenue.”

20 years of work of intention and determination by Tamires is summarised into a few paragraphs here. I hope it will inspire you if you have a strong pattern of abdication, and of outsourcing your power to others. 

How to improve your relationship with power

Here are a few ideas that you can try to stop giving away your power to others and slowly learn to find safety in the knowledge of your own capabilities. These ideas, if you put them into practice, have the wonderful benefit of dissipating your fear of rejection and abandonment.

  1. Meditate on “How can I allow myself to experience my own independence?”
  2. Ask yourself “How can I show up and step into my power?: Brainstorm with your friends, your therapist, those you trust and, who have your back. 
  3. Do some drama therapy and perhaps take on a skit role of being a “Policewoman in a lawless town” or something similar. 
  4. Tamires’s meditation teacher suggested that she try  “wearing the cloak of authority.” He advised she did this three times, to really understand how that felt to show up in that way.

This is a beautiful story of the path towards integrating and reclaiming power and attracting revenue to match your skills, talents and abilities. Every person’s story is different but there are common traits. Tamires didn’t make money because she didn’t value herself. She didn’t believe in herself. It is a story of coming back home to a house of the heart that was abandoned so long ago. If this story resonates with you and you would like to chat with me, reach out for a complimentary 30 minutes session to [email protected] or take the money quiz. 

How Wealth Complicates Our Relationships With People We Want To Help

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People are far more open about their sex lives than their money lives. This is according to my meditation teachers Acariya Doug Duncan and Cata Sensei. And money can be as much a source of relationship dysfunction as sex can.

Feeling Uncared For By The People I Wanted To Help:

“ I try saying something, and people get upset with me.“

Ciara, a woman in her 50s with beautiful white hair, and black-rimmed glasses, leaned into the webcam. She told me, “My family has money. And I have been successful in my life around resources too. I feel deeply grateful by the amount of privilege I have been born into. And I have always had a calling to use that privilege to provide funds where they are needed.”

Her face changed. It took on a sad look, hurt and confused.

“And I have felt uncared for, even ostracised by the very people and organizations that I wanted to help. I have come away from conversations feeling like I have done something wrong for having money. My experience is that people feel awkward around me. Either putting me on a pedestal or staying far away. Either way, it is a distance. As the relationships continue, I end up feeling taken advantage of or rejected. I have tried bringing it up, and I feel like I have said the wrong thing. It feels like I am inside of a framework of thinking which is unhealthy and unconscious and I don’t know what it is. And I try saying something, and people get upset with me, or dismiss me.”

 

Well, Where Do I Start?

For Ciara, other people’s discomfort is a reflection of their relationship with money. Her hurt feelings and attempts to discuss the issue have put her into a repeated pattern where money has become a divisive wedge in her relationships.

Lynne Twist, a mentor of mine speaks of a way of seeing that we don’t even realize we have around money. An unconscious, unexamined set of assumptions that are at the base of the way we  organize ourselves. These beliefs become the tone of the conversations we have with ourselves. Lynne calls it the mindset of scarcity. There is not enough time, money, hours in the day, volunteers, donors, participants for a workshop to run, not enough this, not enough that. The consumer culture produces this environment of thinking, its continued existence depends on it.

Everyone is going to have a different reactive pattern to the consumer culture and to how money is used.

And in the spiritual, transformational world, the world Ciara wants to be of service to, money represents a path down to the underworld of greed, the world of the tyrant, the world of the narcissist. A path to dishonoring your authentic self. There is a subtle rejection of anything to do with money. A belief that if we allow the money in, that it will change things for the worst. Well, there are millions of examples where this has happened.

Internal Money And False Beliefs:

Joni Mitchell sings so beautifully about it:

“They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique
And a swinging hot spot

They took all the trees
Put ’em in a tree museum
And they charged the people
A dollar and a half just to see ’em”

So, my friend Ciara perhaps meets the financially dissociated part of the spiritual community, the non-profit, the artist, the transformational change agent by simply showing up with wealth. She meets the internal money conflicts and false beliefs which keeps the wheel of staying poor and struggling with getting money, donors, funding, participants, clients and so on. With the additional pressures that COVID has put on that sector, it is more important than ever that we address our unhealthy mindset with regard to money.

Build Bridges To Overcome Gaps With People:

“Doing the internal money work will help to bring clarity and confidence to how you approach money for yourself, your business, or nonprofit.“

My meditation teachers would always say to me, where there is resistance, lean into it. So, if you find living in the material world difficult and challenging, or if you over-identify with your interior world and may even despise those who live in the material world, lean in and imagine what it is like for them, as a person of wealth. What are their worries, their challenges having the responsibility to steward that money well? If the organizations and people that Ciara supports saw things from her perspective it could go a long way to improving relationships.

With COVID, many people are earning less while some already rich are even wealthier than before. Many small business owners, nonprofits, and service industries have been hit hard. The normal available government funding may not be available as much as before. It has already been declining before COVID. If you have internal assumptions around scarcity, or a belief that money is evil, the behaviors from these mindsets will only get stronger in this environment.

Doing the internal money work will help to bring clarity and confidence to how you approach money for yourself, your business, or nonprofit. It will help you to have those conversations with people with money to build bridges to overcome the gaps that stand in the way of wealth being directed between those that have it and those who need it.

 

Interested?

Finally, if you are interested in doing some work around healing the split between money and spirituality and learning to direct and attract financial resources in full awareness, I invite you to join me online for Money & Spirituality course, starting April 3rd at 10am MT / noon EST for 6 weeks.

Whether you feel that you have more money than you need or not enough, you may benefit from exploring your relationship with money. I invite you also to learn about the 8 money archetypes  – as a way for you to understand where the root of your suffering may lie.

From Fearful To Flourishing: Sinead’s Money Journey

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“I am fearful all the time: of not earning enough, of being sick and not being able to pay my rent. My health hasn’t been great lately. I am scared that I won’t have enough money to cover health costs.”

“I am spending more than I am earning just on food, rent and utilities. And, I am on my own again and turning 48. I never thought I’d be here at this age”, says Sinéad, coming in and out of focus from her virtual background on Zoom. “I am too ashamed and embarrassed for you to see my room”……

“I don’t trust myself to be able to support myself”

Sinéad is a bright, talented, happy-go-lucky woman who would do anything for you. I feel a lot of joy just being with her. And despite her abilities, she works a 40 hour week earning minimum wage.  She recently broke up with her long-term partner and wasn’t covering her monthly expenses.

She continues “I don’t trust myself to be able to support myself. I don’t trust that I can actually bring in the money necessary to meet my basic needs.”

A Common Thread:

I hear similar stories from many women in their 40s and 50s. The details might be a bit different. And some women are in a relationship with a partner and still have the same insecurities in their own abilities to support themselves as Sinéad has. Many struggle with their own confidence, especially when the partner is earning a lot more money. COVID19 has brought these feelings to the surface for many.

So what led to Sinéad feeling very alone and unsupported?

What We Are Taught:

“never taught to take responsibility for herself financially”

As we worked together on looking at her relationship to money and resources, it became very clear to her how she was never taught to claim her power to manage money. She was never taught to take responsibility for herself financially. Sinéad was trained to be a lesser person in service to others’ needs. She learned not to value herself. And, not to expect good behaviour and fair treatment from others.

There seemed to be a total abandonment of her own life energy. The people she cared for and invested so much of her time and energy came and went. Now she’s experiencing health problems with no money in her savings account.

We worked together to get to the point where Sinéad started to get glimpses that there was nothing wrong with her. She realised that this was a script. A script she was following, written by her family and society. And, written by their family and their society, and so on, back through countless generations. You can think of the script as running software. Although it keeps things going it needs to be updated and improved.

Trapped In Our Family’s Script:

“The script was invented”

This kind of repetition of scripts fits in with biogenealogy which explains how we inherit illness from our ancestors via cellular memory.

Biogenealogist Patrick Obissier observes that, “Because our ancestors live within us, we can find the roots of our illness in our family history, in our family tree.” In my experience of working with over 400 clients, emotional toxicity around money is also passed down.

Once Sinéad realized the script she was following in her relationship to money, she realized their contents were arbitrary. The script was invented, crafted, and adjusted over countless generations. It was designed for her to get along and be able to live and work together reasonably well.

The Power For Change Is Ours:

Sinead’s breakthrough began when she saw it was within her power to choose to make changes. She didn’t have to follow the script of believing that she wasn’t allowed to take up space and have her own life. She saw that she didn’t have to build a life that was based on safety at all costs to avoid being abandoned. It’s interesting that the over attachment to safety created a life of loneliness and fear.  Exactly what Sinéad didn’t want – rather than a life committed to compassion, loving kindness, exploration and joy.

Preparing for your 80 year old self with kindness and love

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Maybe you are not receiving any government assistance right now and your income has decreased. Perhaps you feel COVID has done a number on your resources. Or you are not covering basic expenses, your credit cards are maxed out and your debt plan has gone out the window.

Whatever situation you are in, it’s uncomfortable. You might feel like the ground is being pulled from beneath your life as you knew it. And in some ways, the old life, as we knew it, has gone. And there is grief to be acknowledged and allowed. 

As women get older, we tend to get more fearful, because we may realize we are 

not prepared for retirement. Maybe some of us feel we don’t have enough. Many women 

report talking about the bag lady syndrome feelings of, “Oh, my god. What’s going to 

happen to me?” The pandemic might be serving to feed this view of not enoughness for you right now. 

Hre are a few tips to help with your bag lady fears around not having enough as our money lives and livelihoods are struggling with this new normal:



  1. Women who are aging and coming into greater maturity and wisdom have the capacity to unpack what’s really going on inside of us. Ask yourself what are the stories you tell yourself about you and your relationship with money?What are the assumptions behind the fear of being a bag lady? I don’t deserve money in my life? I can’t bring in enough? I am not good at the money thing? Nobody will hire the older woman? 

What is your narrative? Sit down with your friend and have this conversation. Get it all out on the table, ladies.

I had the honour of working with a mature female client recently. For our time together she wanted me to provide the space where she could download what was not permitted to say inside or outside the family system about the money culture she was brought up in. There was a huge yearning to be seen and heard. She came from a wealthy background where money was used to buy love and control others. And women were not allowed into the rooms of power and money. She learned to be a kept woman and a caretaker. It was never talked about at home and there were so many unspoken rules about it. This upbringing would certainly create some bag lady fears if you are taught that your financial independence is dependent on others, that another will rescue you. There is always more coming was her family’s mantra. 

The narrative prevented her from owning her true entrepreneurial spirit, and she felt herself withdrawing from the family, but not understanding why . Through our work together she came to name that she was withdrawing from her family  to honour her authenticity. She realised that she couldn’t have love and acceptance from her family and be authentic to herself. The family’s money system unconsciously didn’t allow it, and didn’t look like the system was going to change any time soon. The change was going to have to come from her own transformational work. It was through seeing this, naming it that she was liberated to fully embrace her dream of setting up her own business. Her insight gave her the confidence not to follow the script from her family’s money culture. It no longer had as much power over her. She didn’t have to pay the price of belonging at the expense of her own potential. She could love them as they are and start building her own business, standing in the knowledge of her own power. She had disentangled alot of the tangle in her 50s. 

What’s your narrative that you inherited that is causing you to self-sabotage your potential and growth around money and right livelihood? What is the learned inherited thinking that is not serving you?

  1. When you get to see these partial views or assumptions, feel them in the body. Give the emotive states and body sensations their air time. The body doesn’t lie. The truth is there. Allow them their voice. 
  2. We managed to get this far. There must be parts of us that are highly capable, and that all we need to do is configure a way of living our lives that really serves us in the long run. Maybe it’s time to do your vision board again.
  3. We naturally become less attached to things, and having-less, and be much more interested in what we can create in terms of purpose, and right livelihood. What can you start to sell and let go off? 
  4. Create an advisory board for your 85 year old self. This might be a financial planner, your bank manager, a money coach, your therapist and a lawyer. You don’t have to do this alone. We are all going to get old and die. Have fun imagining the right advisory board for you and how that would manifest for you.
  5. Create an advanced care plan for your 85 year old self.  I live at a meditation center called Clear Sky center in British Columbia. I am one of the founding members here. All the staff onsite were invited to do a self-advanced care plan under the guidance of a death and dying counsellor, who also helps to get your affairs in order. It took us a year to do it with so many extended timelines, because it brought up so many uncomfortable questions about wealth, money and death. The fruit of the process was greater trust and intimacy among the team. Perhaps find a death and dying counsellor who is a right fit for you, who could help you with preparing for that. It is one of the quickest ways of clearing up what is not serving you anymore and getting clear about what is important. 

Women as we tend to get older have that deep commitment to the exploration of the inner 

world. As we seek through faith, trust, balance and spiritual practice, we understand and transform whatever doesn’t serve us any longer, we step into greater alignment, and greater balance. I invite you to integrate money and power in this exploration.

If you resonated with this article and would like to chat with me, just drop me a line. You are also more than welcome to take the money quiz and we can have a conversation about money together over zoom.