"Dear Money..."

Becoming an “accidental entrepreneur” at 57 brought freedom. It also heightened my anxiety around money.

Without a regular paycheck, I would need to rustle up clients and keep them. I would have to cut my overhead considerably. And develop a stomach of steel.

What could go wrong?

Together with a financial planner, I took inventory and made a plan. If I did everything “right”—in other words, lived frugally (a.k.a., in such a way that my Depression-era parents would approve) and earned a modest living for a certain number of years—then I could live “comfortably” into my 90s.

So far so good. I’ve supported myself for decades, and now have plenty of work. I can’t imagine stopping, because I love what I do.

Then what’s wrong with this picture?

What’s wrong, is that it’s based on an inherited “scarcity mindset” that perpetuates stress and fear.

At the Modern Elder Academy, we learned that money is “one of the central, linchpin issues in all of our lives…no matter how much or how little” we have. (Credit: Lynne Twist, author of The Soul of Money.)

We also learned that there are three negative “money scripts”—money avoidance, money status, and money worship—that most people unconsciously carry. (Read more here from the Klontz brothers.)

These scripts—like most of our relationship patterns—are inherited from our families. And if we don’t understand them, they can lead to bad decisions.

But the good news is this: Whether our habit now is to blow all our dough on Manolo Blaniks, or to stuff it under a mattress and deprive ourselves, we can realign our relationship with money to better serve our goals.

How? We first need to know how we feel.

At the Modern Elder Academy, we each wrote a letter to money, as though we were in a long-term relationship with it. (Hello, we are in a long-term relationship with it!)

Here’s mine:

Dear money,

I like knowing you’re there. Your presence makes me feel safe. When we go out together, I really enjoy your company. We have fun and eat good food and go places I love to explore. Hearing live music with you makes me happy! A little of you goes a long way. And some days I don’t need you at all.

So, there you have it. I’m appreciative but non-committal. Ambivalent. In it for the fun. (Sounds like a letter I could write to a mate!)

Why not take a moment to ponder our money genealogy?

Knowing how we feel about money can help us understand how we earn, share, spend, and give it away.

Knowing can help us realize our dreams, whatever they are. To open (or perhaps protect) our hearts. To find and trust (even enjoy) a financially compatible life partner.

To buy that casita at the beach!