Changing My Money Story

I grew up in a single-parent home. My mom raised my sister and me virtually alone, sometimes working two jobs to keep us clothed, fed, and sheltered (my dad lived in another country and we saw him during the summer). At one point we received government assistance, which was not uncommon for the families in our New York City neighborhood.

Despite this, my not going to college was never an option. It was understood in our house that we would go to college and more than that we would go to college outside NYC. I will be forever grateful to my mother for not allowing our economic status to decide what my future would look like.

My (old) Money Story

Still it was not easy. We always had enough but usually only just enough. I did not grow up with a “more than enough” understanding of money; it was either just enough or not enough, more than enough was never on my radar.

As a result, I became very comfortable living with just enough or not enough. No matter how much money I was making I never seemed able to stay in the more than enough state for very long.

All of that changed a few years ago when two things happened, I was introduced to the budgeting software You Need A Budget and the financial coaching program The Art of Money.

You Need A Budget

You Need A Budget, or YNAB, basically changed how I handled my money. I’d done Crown, Financial Peace and basically every other budgeting program out there and none of them clicked the way YNAB did.

The program is built on four rules, the first one being “give every job a dollar.” That simple rule right there changed everything for me. I suddenly got it, in a way I never did before.

One of the reasons I think it worked for me is because the other programs asked me to anticipate what might happen, YNAB asked me to work with what I had. This shifted something in me and things with my money started to turn around.

Art of Money

The real game changer, however, came when I took The Art of Money program. AOM is a yearlong financial therapy program aimed at helping you change your relationship with money. I never knew I had a relationship with money let alone what to do with that relationship.

The AOM program helped me learn how to engage with my money in a way that would ultimately shift me out of the just enough money story into one of being very comfortable having more than enough.

One of the things I learned from going through Art of Money was that because I grew up with just enough money as a child, I was very comfortable having just enough.

I had no frame of reference for having more than enough so when I did, it felt uncomfortable and I didn’t trust myself in that unfamiliar territory. As a result, no matter how much money I was making, I would spend into the familiar, not enough or just enough stories I was comfortable with.

Art of Money helped me recognize what I was doing and more than that, it showed me WHY I was doing it. Understanding the why helped me make a conscious decision to act differently because I was doing it without even knowing what I was doing. This is the magic of AOM.

The program doesn’t start by diving into the rules of money management though those are there in full measure. Instead, it starts with helping you understand the money story you’ve been living into, the one that has created an outcome you don’t want with your money.

It then equips you with tools to heal the wounds you have around your money story (and we ALL have them) before diving into the practical side of money management.

My New Money Story

This simple yet profound step is what really brought about the changes in my relationship with money. Now I’m not afraid of having more than enough, in fact, I gladly welcome it and because of what I learned in AOM I have the tools I need to feel very much at home in this new story.

The 2016 Art of Money program is now open for registration. If you know that what you’ve been doing with your money isn’t working and you’re ready to experience more then I invite you to check out the Art of Money program. At just $88/month for the year, it is one of the most affordable programs out there.

I speak from personal experience when I say, change your relationship with money and everything changes. Let this be the year you make that change too.

Here’s to you rising into your greatness!

From my heart to yours,

If you are interested in signing up for either YNAB or The Art of Money but you have questions, please feel free to email me at info(at)makedapennycooke(dot)com. I will be happy to answer your questions.

Disclosure: Some links on this post are affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission if you decide to sign-up. I would never recommend anything to you I didn’t firmly believe in so I know you’ll be in good hands.