What’s Your Story, Morning Glory

The starting point to creating an amazing relationship with money and with another is discovering your own money story.

Your money story is the collection of memories and beliefs you have around money. It is shaped by your upbringing, experiences, and emotions.

Each of us have multiple money stories woven into how we relate and deal with it in different contexts and situations. 

Our money stories are made up from experiences we had when we were tiny, from the things that we saw our parents doing, from interactions with our siblings, society's views on money and wealth and scarcity and work and abundance and greed, and the language and the words used when discussing and describing all things money. 

Before you enter into a relationship and want to change somebody else and how they're managing their money stuff, get curious about our own stuff. 

In Money & Love Part 2 we delved into the link between money and our self worth and the areas where we are not yet OK. This is one of the foundational pieces of our money story. 

Now come with me on a further journey of discovery into knowing…

Your Stories

What is your story about 

• making money, 
• managing money, 
• saving money, 
• investing money, and 
• spending money?

We can often have seemingly different stories in these five areas of our money flow.  

Our belief about what it takes to make money could be very different from our beliefs about spending money. 

“Not so easy come, but very easy go?”

 Some of these beliefs may be in conflict with each other. 

For example… 

“Investing is good but keeping some of the money you make is bad.”
Maybe your money story is that you have to work really hard for money. If you don't work hard, if it hasn't come with some sacrifice and cost to you, your health, your time, it means you've cheated. 

What are some of your earliest memories about making money? 

• When you grew up, did you need to do chores in order to earn money? 
• Did you get an allowance that was just given to you? 
• Was money given out fairly and in an equal way between you and your siblings?
• Did money come to you in a consistent and predictable way? 
• Were the ‘rules’ about how to earn or receive money consistent? 
• Was money used as a substitute for love?
• Was money withheld as a punishment?
• Was money given as a reward?

What were some of the conversations you heard around making money? 

"Money doesn't grow on trees." 

I certainly grew up with that one. 

“For you to have what you want means someone else goes without.” 

Growing up I always felt like there was a big burden on my folks to provide for us. I had (and at a deep level still have) a belief that having my needs and wants met comes at a great cost to somebody else. 

As a child that cost was to my father, whose health was not great, who always seemed stressed, who was an alcoholic who drank to deal with the pressure and stress of earning and being responsible financially for everyone. 

The cost was to my older siblings that had to “do without” because my twin and I had the audacity to be born.

I’ll go so far as to say that I felt guilty being alive and taking up resources. 

There was this conflict about wanting things but feeling that my wanting came at a huge cost to somebody else. 

That was magnified in other ways including growing up in South Africa at the height of the Apartheid era. Seeing the brutality and injustice of a system that stated some were worthy and others were not significantly impacted my own money and wealth stories. I saw how some people's wants were being met by others who in turn didn’t get their needs and wants me. From this I developed a belief that money is limited and having what I wanted held lots of guilt.
Perhaps you recognise beliefs like… 

"I'm great at making money but bad at investing and keeping it." 

Perhaps you compare your relationship with money to other types of relationships. 

"I'm great at money stuff, but useless at relationships." 

I used to have that belief too. 

Managing money, earning it, keeping it, investing it - that all felt much safer for me than dealing with humans. 

I trusted my money a lot more than I trusted humans.

I understood money more than I understood humans. I still think money is easier to understand than humans LOL!

Think about some of your earliest money memories and write them down.

Write Down Your Money Story

What are some of your earliest money memories around specific situations and specific interactions? 

For example, let's look at gifting.

Did you celebrate Christmas, Eid or another gift exchanging occasion growing up? If so, 

• What is your story around gift giving? 
• How did you give gifts in your family?  
• What did gift giving mean? Was it lavish? 
• Were your parents frugal? 
• At what age were the kids expected to give gifts too?
• Were you expected to buy gifts with your own money?
• If so, from what age? 
• What happened with birthdays?  
• Were gift giving occasions for practical things like replacement socks or for treats?
• Was money given as a gift?

How did these experiences shape your current stories around gift giving?

What about money and spending decisions?

• What did you see demonstrated for you around spending money? 
• How were money decisions made in your family?
• Did your parent/s speak about money in front of you?
• Were spend choices and budgets discussed with you?
• Were you allowed to make your own spend choices and if so on what sort of things? 
• Were you judged or shamed around some of your spend choices? 
• Was spending an anxious or fun activity? 
• Was there flamboyance from one parent and not the other? 
• Was spending something done when a parent needed an emotional pick up? 
• Did your parents or other authority figures even speak about others spending in a negative shaming way?

Who had a big impact on your money story? 

Parents, siblings, Grandparents? A poor or rich Aunt? A greedy merchant down the road that others bitched about? 

What was the language of money growing up?

Was money spoken about or was it considered a really dirty thing?

Money was something that we didn't really speak about, it was hush hush. Good people didn't talk about that stuff - greedy people did. 

Money is a taboo subject, even more so than sex.

For many people talking about money feels charged, hard and complex because that is what they experienced growing up. A topic infused by stress and guilt and shame and desire and regret and conflict. 

In business and work, how easy is it for you to discuss how things are doing financially, to have conversations about budgets or salary increases or bonuses or to ask for what you want. 

What is your story about negotiating or asking for a discount? 

How do you feel about following up on monies owed to you? Do you avoid it? Does it feel uncomfortable or greedy or just awkward?

What is your story around earning money? 

What is your story about saving or investing money? 

If you keep some of the money you make and then invest it and grow it - does that mean you are greedy and selfish or wise and clever? 

I have a twin brother. Every Easter we would have an egg hunt and collect a bunch of chocolate easter eggs. I was the kid that shared hers whilst eating a good deal of them and very quickly they would all be gone. I had a story that sharing was good and I wanted to be accepted and liked by my older siblings. Andrew was a hoarder. He would keep his Easter Eggs until the chocolate went white. It frustrated me. I resented him and judged him as selfish and greedy for not sharing his with me. 

It’s All Made Up.

We are all living our lives according to made up stories. 

If the stories we are running our lives by are producing a crappy lived experience we need to write new stories.

I've definitely had a story that keeping money is selfish or greedy. This is why it's been so important to set up automated systems to save and invest to counteract the story.

What Are Your Money Triggers

Get curious about your money triggers.

Do you tend to spend money to soothe your emotions? 

Do you spend money to reward yourself? 

Maybe when you’re feeling afraid you stop spending and you contract?

What are your money behaviours when you feel anxious, stressed, happy, bored, irritated, excited or fearful. 

Do you avoid seeing what is happening in your money world or do you go towards your money stuff when you are feeling anxious? 

My Balance Sheet Is My Pacifier. What is Yours?
I tend to go towards my money for safety. I bring out my spreadsheets when I'm feeling anxious and I update my balance sheet. There is nothing more calming for me than to update my balance sheet and feel like I have a semblance of control over myself and life. A wonderful illusion but pacifying nevertheless.

It wasn’t always this way. 

30 plus years ago before I started my financial freedom journey and had a Wealth Plan that I could see was working and could trust, my default was to contract and get all penny-pinching when I became anxious. This didn't appease the anxiety, it actually fueled the feeling of not enough, but it is what I did. 

What is Your Money Muscle and Your Kryptonite

Instead of referring to them as your strengths and weaknesses I like to ask… “what are your strengths and what are the areas you could do better?”

Better still, what are the areas where somebody else could do it better for you?" 

Knowing what you are great at and where you need to bring in support is a vital aspect of creating a life you love. This does not mean abdicating your responsibility for these things, it means getting support!

Do you love spreadsheets? 

Do you like tracking where your money is coming from and where it is going? Are you great at the savings stuff but nervous about the investing stuff? 

Do you love earning money, but hate managing it? 

When you enter into a relationship knowing who you are, you can overlap your muscle and kryptonite map with that of your partner and see what the natural strengths are you have together and where you need to fill in with support.

What Are Your Blind Spots?

Where are your money blind spots? I know - since they are blind to us we don’t know they are there… but if you have a great friend or coach you can get them to help you find them.

What don't you want to see in relation to your financial world? 

Do you not want to see where your money is going? 

Do you not want somebody else to see where you are spending your money? 

What do you tend to neglect?

What aspects of your money management do you avoid? 

What Do You want?

Part of taking your personal money story inventory and understanding your relationship with money is getting clear on what is important to you.  

What do you want? This is one of the hardest questions to answer, but answer it we must.

Dive into the “Life By Design Workshop” if you are struggling to get clean on what you want.

I know I go on and on and on about how important this is. 

No partner, no money, no job, no business, no adventure, no relationship can thrive without a vision of what we want from it? 

In relation to your financial wellbeing, what's important to you? 

• Security? 
• Peace of mind?
• Feeling you have enough? 
• How do you want your money to be in service of your life? 
• Do you want to travel? 
• Do you want a beautiful home? 
• Do you want lots of cars? 
• Do you want to be able to contribute financially to things that mean something to you?
• Clothes? 
• Stuff? 
• Kids? 
• Animals to care for?
• What's important to you? 

You Don’t Need To Heal It All

We don't have to heal all our wounds and stories and correct the behaviour we have generated around them. We first just need to be aware of them.

 "Ah, this is how this thing is showing up now in my adult life”.

Often just the awareness is enough to dissolve the impact but where it isn’t enough we can put frameworks and processes in place to protect the important aspects of our lives from the damaging impact of our wounds. 

Things Are Always Shifting

We are never so arrogant as to assume that our money story and relationship with wealth is static. 

As life reveals new things, new parts of your money story will reveal itself. As your wealth grows, new money triggers will pop up. You will be uncovering layers of story and baloney triggers and blocks the rest of your life. At least I hope you will be.

But for now you know you’ve done your inner enquiry work and you commit to a fresh enquiry on a regular basis, and with that knowledge you forge forth! 

This is what I want from my life. This is where I want to be using my life force, my energy, my time. This is what's important to me. These are my values. These are my current priorities and goals and these are the ways I want money to support and serve me.
I want to be financially free. I want to be debt free. I want a portfolio of assets that serve me and enable me to live my life my way. I want to feel safe around my money stuff. I want to have choices. I want peace of mind. 

Our vision, our goals, our beliefs and our values create a framework to help us make money choices and decisions that serve us and create the life we want. 

Having discovered all this about yourself, we are now ready to dive into how to bring money and love together in Money & Love Part 4.

“Take the Money and Love masterclass to expand your intimacy and your wealth”