empowerment - Purposely Empowered

Recently I read an article from Morgan Stanley stating that by 2030 women are going to control over $30 Trillion dollars. That is 2/3 of all the assets in our nation. WOW! Talk about a great wealth transfer. Unfortunately, over the last few months, as I have met with dozens of women, I have realized that women lack the knowledge, confidence, and time to really understand personal finance. So it raises the question, what is this wealth transfer going to be like? How are we going to control this money? My personal thoughts can be summed up in one word: YIKES. I foresee an overwhelming number of women feeling crazed and scared simply because we don’t get it.

Today, it is critical that women understand money. But if you don’t, I can’t place the blame on you. Personal finance is not taught in many public schools, which makes financial concepts elusive, complicated, and extremely frustrating. People simply don’t get it because we were never taught it, and this lack of knowledge creates problems in our families, from sleepless nights wondering how a bill will get paid to maxing out credit cards. Most Americans blame money and finance for so many of their issues.

The lack of understanding, available education, and the wealth transfer to women is why I entered the industry. For over 20 years I specialized in coaching, educating, empowering, and giving accountability to women. I also know that women are underserved in the financial services industry because when you lack understanding of something, like money, talking about it becomes taboo, and seeking help becomes hard. Because of this problem, many women believe that working with an advisor is only for the wealthy, a stereotype I need to break because that is not who I am. I am someone who listens to understand what is going on. I love to meet people where they are and develop a map to get them to where they want to be. I am someone who checks in and pays attention in order for you to follow through on making your goals a reality. I am someone who understands that sometimes it takes a little extra motivation to reach a goal and that progress towards that goal is always more important than giving up. I believe in people even when they have a hard time believing in themselves. Ultimately, I transform lives. And that job title is amazing.

The future of money is female, and it is critical that women begin to understand it so we don’t screw up what is our responsibility. It is time we jump into growth mode and begin to properly educate ourselves. It is time we grow in confidence as we inherit wealth from our parents and spouses. It is time that we feel empowered and in control of our spending. This isn’t a pitch to come talk to me, though I am here to provide a judgment-free space to listen to and understand your concerns and questions and to educate you on how money can work for you. But, this is a plea that you take your knowledge about money more seriously. In just 6 years the need for women to understand money is going to change drastically. Start learning now. Put it on your goals list. Take action by asking questions. Build that confidence. Spread the need to others in your life. Support one another, grow together, and take this transfer with control, power, and excitement. I want to change that thought about the wealth transfer from YIKES to YESSSS!

I have been writing a lot about risk and change lately. It is not bad. You can’t avoid change. The days change. You receive change. Your body changes. Relationships change. You name it. Change is out there. Many people spend so much time serving and avoiding change at all costs. But, eventually, it will find you. You cannot hide forever.

People avoid change because with change comes risk. And the risk is probably scarier than the idea of changing. What if I join a gym, do not go, don’t see results, and lose all my money? Sounds risky. Sounds scary. We often paint the worst-case scenario in our lives. We think about the failure and it fuels us to avoid the risk.

But as Kelly Clarkson so proudly declares in her song “Stronger,” “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger…” And here is where I have been focusing my efforts for years. Instead of focusing on the moment of failure, focus on the moment after. The re-evaluate, the lesson learned, the rebuild moment. If you don’t succeed what happens? If you do succeed what happens? Either way, you learn, you grow, and you flourish… even in failure.

I was a volleyball player. And literally, every point you allowed was a point of failure. The ball either hit the floor or your side or you hit it out of bounce on the other side. One thing most volleyball players have become trained to do is after the volley, everyone meets in the middle. We re-evaluate what happened and we celebrate the success or correct the failure. Lessons are immediately learned then applied with the next serve. There is no time to dwell on the mistake. There is no time to assess risk. And there is definitely no time to stop. You keep moving forward.

I watched Lily, my 4-year-old learn this lesson while playing with her magnetic tiles. She was in her room and every so often I would hear this grunt of frustration, then the whole tiled building collapsed. She would rebuild it. And again, another grunt of frustration and the building collapsed. Finally, in a moment of exhilaration, she yelled, “Mom, come here, look at this.” And she built this beauty. A pentagon of colors and fun. An atypical design. A change from the normal square and cubes. Something out of the box. She risked. She rebuilt. She learned. And you can too.

Despite the frustration, she rebuilt it until it was a success!

The tool to develop is to focus on the rebuild and the moment about what happens next. The tool is to go into everything with the mentality that lessons will be learned, not failure happened. Lessons learned sound a lot less scary than “I risked and failed.” No, you risked, you learned, and you moved forward. So let’s make this year the year we think about the rebuild and the lesson, not the year of the avoidance to change and failure.

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