No one is more surprised than this money hoarder that spending would lead to my latest cycle of growth. My last post, Like a Virgin, was all about buying my first home and how that led to big time personal gains. Before we get into those big time gains, let’s go back to where it began.
If I had to describe my financial self in two words, born saver does the trick. It’s extraordinarily on brand. I come from a long line of savers. It’s in my blood. Hell it’s in my name. Alexandra, my middle name is after my paternal grandfather Alexander who was the king of saving.
In My Blood
Papou Al not only taught me the value of money but the value of saving money. He spent his career as the treasurer of a corporation. His life’s work was saving and investing. So when I got my first paycheck at 15 from a summer job, I was so excited to share the news with papou. His advice was to save half and spend half: aggressive goals for a girl who wanted to blow it at B.P. Nordstrom. But you should know that Al was a first generation Spartan Greek: minimalism and discipline ran deep in him as did the experience of living through the Great Depression.
Papou Al passed this discipline on to my dad George. Looking back I see the biggest financial lesson my dad taught by example is just because you can afford more doesn’t mean you need to spend more. Case in point: the house I grew up in was a four bedroom McDougall for a family of seven. My parents and brother had their own rooms and my sisters and I were two to each remaining bedroom. By no means a hardship, but I mention because I now see we could have had our own rooms. My dad chose our future security over our comfort at that time.
My family anecdotes shed a little light on the fiscal environment I was raised in and that environment greatly impacted my relationship to money, which is deeply rooted and about so much more than dollars and cents.
A History of Scarcity
I have a long-standing dysfunctional relationship with money. I finally did something about it. Once again I have Mark Groves (@createthelove) to thank for being the agent of change (see I Knew You Were Waiting For Me). I took his Relationship to Money course last June. As a self-described Human Connection Specialist Mark handled the emotional aspects and Selina Gray (@selinagmoney), the CPA CA handled the finances. It was a match made in personal growth heaven.
The immediate return was awareness and insight into the roots of my hoarder mentality and seeing how much this mindset impacted all my relationships, most importantly the one with myself. My hoarder mentality was born from my background and then reinforced by perceived necessity. I didn’t make much when I started working and this planted seeds of scarcity.
I started my career in radio. My first paycheck was so small I cried when I opened it (in the privacy of my car mind you). I could make more at the mall, but I stayed because I loved it. Coincidentally it wasn’t long before I was working at the mall - doing makeup at Sephora and the Bobbi Brown counter - to supplement my radio earnings. I grew tired of working six days a week after a few years, so I left my rock n’ roll dreams behind for an office job.
I focused on saving what I could because I believed the only way I would ever have money was by saving/hoarding. Eventually I found myself a project manager in advertising. A job I never knew existed that I was naturally suited for. As I advanced my career for the first time, I increased my savings percentage along the way.
Saving and spending are symbiotic behaviors so if you over extend in one area, it’s natural to fall short in the other. I’m hard wired to save first, and spend much later after much deliberation. My typical process is over analysis and eventual purchase, or, over analysis and no purchase or worse yet over analysis, purchase, and return. It’s the guilt that gets me. It’s not about the money because I don’t buy what I can’t afford, another Papou Al trademark and SNL classic.
Emotions: Deeper Than I Ever Dreamed Of
It’s about emotion and that’s why Mark and Selina’s work was such a game changer: it tackled both sides of the coin, behavior and emotion. My relationship to money (RTM) is complicated. I struggle to spend because ultimately I don’t believe I am worthy of the purchase. It’s never really about what I am purchasing, but the belief that I am not worthy of what I want. The internal question I hear is “Do you really need that?” But what I’m really asking and can’t hear is “Do you really deserve it?”
While working through my RTM it helped me to untangle the difference between self love and self worth. How is it that someone who loves herself so much can hold herself in such low regard? It’s a hard mirror to face. Even more difficult to see that my regard was so low I was practically punishing myself by doing my damndest to deny myself the things I wanted, no matter how trivial they might be.
Spending doesn’t come easy so I prepared myself for some serious spending anxiety when I began the home buying process (see Like a Virgin). I braced myself for impact that never came. Like when you hit the brakes and unconsciously raise your arm across the passenger seat even if there’s no one there (or maybe that’s just me).
It took a beat to realize it never came because I was ready. I had done the work. The dividends were paying out on the self improvement investment I made with Mark and Selina.
Major Gains
The first gain was a perspective shift. I referred to my condo as “the biggest purchase I’ll ever make.” Accurate (to this point in my life) but dramatic. My dad helped me reframe it from a loss to a transfer. I was simply moving money from one place to another. This semantic shift helped my mindset move from scarcity to abundance. I wouldn’t have been capable of that shift without the work.
Seemingly overnight my money mentality went from scarcity to abundance. The fear of spending was gone. I had to let go of the security saving gave me to experience this new found freedom to spend. I spend because I know I am worth what I want. It’s a new feeling and I like it! And it couldn’t come at a better time as I renovate my condo. I bought it for it’s bones and I am in the process of a cosmetic overhaul.
The condo purchase revolutionized my relationship to money. It made me see that you can do both: save and spend. Simple as it sounds, this is something I needed to experience on a large scale to truly comprehend. Previously my scarcity mentality gave me tunnel vision to save, save, save - and then spend - with guilt, anxiety, or both. My field of vision expanded with the work. I now see the feeling of scarcity was directly linked to my self worth.
New me who dis?
The feelings of scarcity diminished as my self worth increased. As I shed years of scarcity and leave it behind like a reptile, I find insecurity has been replaced by a confidence that has seeped into all areas of my life. I am assertive. I am decisive. And I like it!
I climbed the endless decision tree that is renovating as quickly and naturally as a squirrel because I know what I want. I’m not vacillating between the endless options (i.e. the great abyss that is cabinet pulls alone) but narrowing the field to find my just right.
I feel this shift in decisiveness and so does every sales person I’ve encountered along the way. A perfunctory “How can I help you?” is met with a crystal clear objective. If the salesperson offers suggestions or substitutes there is an immediate yay or nay with rationale. Shopping for my kitchen faucet Joe at Consumers Supply told me I was a breath of fresh air after spending the whole morning with a couple who had no idea what they wanted. That’s right Joe, there’s no guesswork with me.
And there are no more concessions. Old Themi would have couched such assertiveness with some sort of modifier like “Forgive my directness” or “I don’t mean to be a diva” but the truth is I do mean to be a diva. If being a diva means knowing what you want and asking for it then I wear the crown proudly. I wouldn’t be wearing said crown without the work.
This concession-less confidence comes with a positive side effect. Like many women I am a chronic apologizer. My knee jerk reaction to many situations is “I’m sorry” even if what I really mean to say is “Excuse me” or "Excuse you." I find myself apologizing less and questioning that instinct more. Progress. One less sorry at a time.
Expansion
After the year that was 2020, the time felt right to make my first vision board. It was time to take my life back. No more sitting around paralyzed by the state of the world. Time to focus on the things I could do and time to start taking action. No matter what the year ahead had in store I had my own visions for 2021.
The only word on the board: expansion. More than halfway through the year and my life has unfurled. I feel the most expansion has come from within. If I can purchase my first home by myself, I truly feel that nothing is outside my reach. And that’s just it, I started reaching for more, asking for more, taking more. Now that I’ve started there is no stopping.
Although he left my life years ago there is not a day that goes by when I don’t think of my Papou Al. He shaped a large part of who I am and so much of how I handle money. I am thankful for the lessons he left me. I am grateful to have built upon the foundation he laid. I know he would be proud of me. I’m proud of me too papou.
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