It is January. If you’re working with any coach anywhere, you have recently set money goals. My dining room table is mounded with last years receipts and statements, waiting for me to prepare taxes. I’m still under audit for my 2015 taxes, which won’t be settled very soon, I suppose, with the shutdown in process. (Talk about a tug-of-war between money and power!) And I resolve – once again – to being using an online money manager and bill payer… money is just in the air. The air is thick with it.

Money is in the air

Quick story – my father tells a story of a time when my mother – an 50-something absent-minded professor type – got out of NYC taxicab on a blustery day, and simply picked a $20 bill out of the air, as it flew past her face. She stood up from the cab door, looked at the money in her hand and put it in her raincoat pocket, taking it completely in stride.

Money and Power, what do they mean to you? I watched two movies this week, Vice and If Beale Street Could Talk. Both were ultimately about what money and power mean to the characters. In Vice, Dick Cheney had to prove himself worthy to his wife Lynne, so he sought positions of power. He ultimately became wealthy as CEO of Haliburton, and getting a $23MM nest egg on leaving for the vice presidency, bec as Lynne Cheney said: “They’re not stupid.” Haliburton was, of course, protected in their extreme billing practices by Cheney, once in office.

In Beale Street, the main character is being framed for rape, and the family needs money to counter the incredibly, powerful machine that is the racist DA’s office in the mid-1960’s. As one father says to another, speaking words straight out of James Baldwin’s philosophy: “It ain’t about the money. White people always want you to focus on the money. We ain’t never had money, and we raised up our children, fed them. It’s not money we need, we can get money. We need power.” (That is paraphrased as closely as I can recall.)

What does money afford for you? Where does your power lie? This idea was swirling in my head from my recent double feature… when…

Money Mindset

I had a money mindset session with creative business coach Minette Riordan. It was fascinating and I can’t wait to share a central tenet of the training. As Minette laid it out, there are four major money core needs. All four factor in our lives, but one, above the others, drives your money mindset.

SIGNIFICANCE – APPROVAL – LOVE – SECURITY

The Four Core Drivers in a Money Mindset

To figure out your core money need, ask yourself some questions with these four possibilities in your mind…

  • What are you afraid of?
  • What do you need to feel whole?
  • Which one is your core money need? If there are two, sit with it a minute to determine, which one really has emotional hold on you?
  • What belief or story (from your childhood, possibly) drives this need?
  • Who did you make a contract with to deny yourself this need?
  • Are you willing to break that contract now?
  • Can you forgive the person with whom you entered into the contract (even if it is yourself)?
  • Can you forgive yourself for upholding the contract well past its usefulness?

If you spend time with this concept of understanding your driving need, money-wise, you may be able to liberate your spirit and do the specific work you desire. You may see a tiny path to freedom – the freedom to charge appropriately for your goods and services, and feel whole as you permit yourself to let go of a fear, embrace a need and fulfill your promise.

Is wealth enough?

Wealth was enough for Dick Cheney, because in wealth, he attained what he needed at his core – Lynne’s APPROVAL. The Beale Street characters were likely motivated by LOVE. There is no wrong answer. Yo want to see and acknowledge your need – and fill that need.

This week, my minuscule mind was blown, yet again. I was at the California Science Center, viewing the sarcophagus and artifacts of the tomb of King Tutankhamen. Talk about wealth. King Tut certainly never worried about his SIGNIFICANCE in his lifetime. He lived a life of extraordinary luxury, drove chariots, and was buried with more inventory than most people ever saw in a lifetime. For me, gazing on intricate jewelry and statuary made by human artists some 3,300 years earlier blew my mind.

His tomb belies a deep need for SIGNIFICANCE in the afterlife. The ancient Egyptians believed that a man dies twice – once when his soul leaves his body, and once the last time a person on Earth declares his name. This 19 year-old king died in obscurity, but is living his dream now, remembered, his soul kept alive over 3,300 years. Who else in human history enjoys that kind of spiritual longevity? Jesus Christ? Buddha? The prophet Muhammad comes to mind. (Oh, wait, Cleopatra! Nah, I just googled it. She’s from about 80 years BC.) Only Buddha is older than King Tut.

But more urgently, I think he worried about APPROVAL – namely from the gods. He needed the deities to know and accept him as one of their own, upon death. He sought their approval throughout his devoted life and in preparation for death.

Power over Money

We writers seek often significance. We live to see our work read and admired. We dream of our words living beyond our lifetimes. Like Shakespeare. Like Jane Austen. What is holding you back? A need for APPROVAL, LOVE, or SECURITY perhaps?

We cannot all hope for the wealth of a 19 year-old pharaoh, but in our lifetimes, may we all see wealth and success, as we each define it.

How will we handle it?

  • Will we pick it out of thin air and take it in stride?
  • Will we wheel and deal with people who understand money-making
  • Will we do what we have to, in a situation out of our control, to feed our families and keep them safe?
  • Will we be awed and awesome?

That is your money mindset. Understanding that is your power over money. The universe has been telling me this all week – and I just had to share.