A Month for Making Peace With Money

Much of Sunday was spent playing with my grandchildren. Their parents had a long overdue weekend away and I wanted to help out the lovely young babysitting couple who were beginning to look a bit bedraggled.

Four-year-old Zachy and I spent the better part of an hour playing with Legos. When he lost interest in building a Space Age helicopter, I began picking up the hundreds of tiny pieces that were hiding in the shag rug.

Zachy left the room, When he returned a few minutes later, he declared, “I own you.”

I laughed and said, “What do you mean?” Zachy, who is frequently the most earnest kid I’ve ever met, explained that since I was doing all the work, he needed to pay me.

“Oh,” I said, “you mean you owe me, not own me.”

I asked what he planned to pay me. He had already figured that out.

He left the room and returned with the ziplock bag that serves as his piggy bank. “I’m giving you some of my Chuck E. Cheese tickets,” he proudly announced.

“Hmmm, I’m not really a big fan,” I said. He wondered why. “Well, I don’t like their pizza,” I explained (but avoided adding that I wasn’t crazy about the noisy atmosphere either).

That did not deter him. “You don’t have to get pizza,” he said. “You can use these tickets for the games.” His eyes lit up at the thought of all the fun he was offering me.

I thanked him and took the tickets which I returned to the ziplock bag later.

As so often happens, Zachy got me thinking. I had already decided to spend this month writing about money on this blog, but after this little encounter I realized that so many people are owned by money.

The good news is (as I’ve been pointing out for years) that self-employment is where we come to develop a healthy relationship with money. For most of us, that’s a lifelong project that involves challenging years of negative money messages.

While I’m not about to challenge Suze Orman to a debate, I am going to spend this month sharing ways that you can create abundance, prosperity and ease in the financial area of your life.

And I promise that you’ll never hear me use the popular expression, “in this tough economy.” Prosperity thinking is much bigger than that fear-filled slogan.

As Coco Chanel reminds us, “There are people who have money and people who are rich.” I’m thinking we can be both.

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Here’s a money smart idea. Join Terri Belford and me for the upcoming Obstacle- Busters Mastermind on September 14-16 in enchanting Albuquerque. Register before July 15 and you’ll save $100 on your enrollment.

 


Small Change, Big Payoff

Janice von Rabe is a woman on a mission to share her passion for football with other women who are perplexed by the game. When she attended the Obstacle-Busting Mastermind in January, she got enthusiastic from the group for her idea to teach seminars demystifying the sport.

Like most new entrepreneurs, Janice is facing some challenges. For starters, she’s a bit of a technophobe. Mention Web sites, Facebook or blogging and her body language changes.

She sometimes shudders when urged to participate in cyberspace. A passerby might think she was being forced to drink castor oil or eat worms.

Every couple of months, Janice drives from her home in Long Beach to have lunch with me. When she arrived last Saturday, she was carrying a colorful striped case which she had adorned with a bright pink fabric flower.

The moment we sat down, she opened the case and whipped out her brand new MacBook Air. Janice was giddy over her new tool, exclaiming, “It thinks like I do!”

She went on to rave over the helpful folks at the Apple store and told me about all the fun she was having with her computer. Obviously, I was listening to a convert.

Two days later, Janice was on the monthly conference call with other participants from the Mastermind. Like the others on the call, she was excited to share her progress.

Mary Anne, one of our Canadian participants, talked about the changes she was making on the road to launching her new enterprise. She began by telling us about the things she was eliminating from her jam-packed schedule.

Both Janice and Mary Anne reminded me that often we have to let go of something before we can move forward. Sometimes it’s an intangible, a limiting belief that keeps us stuck.

Other times it may be a time-consuming obligation that no longer satisfies. Or a computer that doesn’t think the way we do.

Sometimes we just forget that we have to eliminate what we don’t want in order to make room for something more satisfying, more appropriate.

Not making progress the way you’d like? Maybe it’s time to eliminate something.

Take a look at this eye-opening list of The Six Enemies of Greatness (and Happiness) and see if there’s a clue to what needs changing.