It's time to get real

I woke up this morning with a big ol’ ucky knot in my stomach. It is not surprising—last night, Rick and I had a spontaneous talk about the things in our life together that need healing. Naturally, what came out is all the stuff that you like to keep out of your consciousness because they are uncomfortable to look at. Now, I’m more intrepid than most at facing things, but even I have a hard time looking at the parts of me that are so deeply rooted in childhood messages of incompetency that I have diminished ability to deal with them rationally.

Case in point, finances. Now, it’s not that I haven’t spent time analyzing my money wounds—I have. I can tell you that I was reared by a loving, but controlling, father who was secretive about money, ostensibly, because he didn’t want us to be burdened with financial facts, but also, because, I believe, he liked the power of keeping it to himself (and who doesn’t like to feel more control in this world that is so uncontrollable?). The unspoken message I received? The programming that I internalized and still operate from? “It’s safer not to know the financial realities.” I can tell you that every time I came up with a financial crisis in my life, instead of empowering me to figure it out and handle it myself, my dad bailed me out. The unspoken message? “You are not competent to handle this yourself. You need someone wiser to handle it for you.” So I have spent most of my life to this point not wanting to know the reality of finances. I have been afraid of money stuff. The problem with that is that money is repelled by fear. And I, like everyone, could really use a free-flowing stream of money!

It would seem that it is time to finally come up with a way to heal this. More than anything else in this world, I want the message of Recreating Eden to get out to the world, and that means selling the book. Selling the book means making money. So in order for this to work, I need to stop repelling money, which means I need to transcend my fears around money and start living in reality about money. To do this, I need to shift some belief systems such as, “It’s better not to know about money.” “If I don’t know how much money there is or isn’t, I’ll feel better.” “I am not competent to handle money.”

I also should say that I’m not blaming this on my dad. It is not his fault that I have not dealt with this. It is my responsibility for changing any childhood programming that isn’t working for me. And let me tell you, it isn’t working for me! My unreality around money is affecting my relationship with Rick because he has been bearing the psychic burden of our financial ill health mostly alone (though it is not true that I haven’t been feeling it—I have just not been the one willing—till now—to stare the numbers in the face.) NOT that Rick is angry with me about this—it’s just clear that it’s time for us to get our financial ducks in a row, and for that to happen, I need to do some maturing and some “spiritual warrioring.”

So, to begin with, I was guided to dig up a book that we bought years ago and never used. It’s The Energy of Money by Maria Nemeth. I opened it today and it was bookmarked at the first page of the introduction and when I read that page, I knew the time was right. I also placed a hold on a copy of the book at the library so that we can both be using the book at the same time. I’m hoping that working with the book will help me deal with this at an energy level instead of purely at an emotional level. What it feels like to me is the linchpin in a whole bunch of self-worth, power-claiming issues. I know it is time to claim my power, and that I cannot do that at the same time that I am disowning my responsibility and power around money. This ought to be interesting!