Here’s the thing…so many human beings want it ALL RIGHT NOW. But that’s just not possible. Life doesn’t work that way.

I mean, when you decide to have baby, you don’t just pop the little one out right then and there. You plan and eat well and take care of yourself and wait…lots and lots of waiting. And then once the baby comes you’re either ecstatic or wish you could wait some more!

The same goes with your improving your personal financial situation. Whether you have it all figured out and are well on your way to ‘feeling’ secure (after all, there is no such thing as security…we’ve made that up to feel better about our days here on Earth) or you’re still learning about money and finances and getting on your feet, you still have to take things day by day and step by step.

So here’s a simple suggestion for this morning (or whatever you’re reading this), look at your finances as growing another being. Know that when you finally make the decision to get out of debt or build assets or create streams of passive income, it’s just going to take a while.

And then remember to smell the roses along the way!

Are you living the life you want for yourself? If not, do you find yourself saying things like…

• I wish I could live in (a certain type of house).
• I wish I could go on (tropical island of choice).
• I wish I could buy _______ for my family.
• I wish I could go ________ and do ________.

If you find yourself wishing you had things that you can’t seem to afford, it might be that you haven’t  identified the underlying reason for wanting these things. More specifically, you haven’t realized that, in order to begin manifesting or creating the life you really want, you have to know WHY you want the things you want.

There’s something magical that happens when you know (and state) your WHY. Let me give you an example and then a simple activity to start manifesting your dream life immediately (yes, immediately).

Let’s say you love to eat organic foods but you find them expensive so you only buy a limited amount of them on your monthly budget. The ‘why’ behind this want is…

• Because I value my health highly.

This now becomes one of your powerful WHYs. You use a WHYs as a motivator to keep you moving toward your goal, especially when you get tired, overwhelmed, feel lost or helpless. Staying focused on your goal (or goals) helps keep you on the path to that life you keep saying you want for yourself.

Here’s a simple, but profoundly effective, activity to do on a regular basis. Stop right now, get a piece of paper and your favorite pen or pencil. Write on top of the page…WHY I WANT MONEY! You don’t have to have a set amount, but you could do that as a next step. For now, just start getting your WHYs down on paper.

Once you have done this activity (and remember, if you don’t do it, it won’t work), put this piece of paper somewhere you can see it during the day. Also, make it easy to modify and add to. Do NOT type it. Put it in your own handwriting…there’s also something magical about writing by hand.

OK, that’s all for now. Get your Why List started and then watch what unfolds. You’ll be surprised at how things begin to happen. Have fun with this! And keep us posted!

Coaching women over the past several years in getting what they want in life has been interesting, satisfying and fun and there’s one thing that keeps women stuck more than most…or so it seems.

What is that one thing? The fact that women seem to struggle more than men when it comes knowing WHAT they want and then determining WHY they want it. Perhaps it goes back to caveman/cavewoman times when what we wanted wasn’t so tangible…strong man, healthy children, safety, enough to eat, berries that were sweet, a clan of girlfriends to help with the chores and the child rearing.

For whatever reason, though, when women DO figure out what they want and then uncover a powerful WHY behind what it is they want, whatever they want virtually can’t NOT happen.

Here’s a little video I did on Finding Your Why. Hope you enjoy it. Please leave a comment to tell me what you thought and what you want more information on.

With each passing day that I notch upon my proverbial age belt, the more I am sure that resistance is what actually ages us.

The resistance to what IS and the aching for what WAS. That, to me, seems the cause of our eternal angst.

Now I can only speak from my own personal existence and experience, so that’s what I’m going to do…

What am I resisting?

The fact that, as women, most of us have to take care of ourselves and our families now, financially that is. It hasn’t  always been this way. As a matter of fact, my OWN angst is from my seemingly hard-wired yearning to go back to the ‘way it was’ so that I could do on a daily basis what my soul seems to love doing.

And what IS it that my soul loves doing? Caring for others. Tending to the things that make a person happy, healthy, wealthy and wise. Raising children…mine and other people’s so they respect the world and themselves enough to grow into responsible adults who have children who…you get the idea.

My soul loves to prepare cookies and muffins and soups for the people in my lives. Why? I don’t know. Perhaps I instinctually know that they need nourishment and I can provide it in a loving, healthy way. Maybe the smile on their faces as they lather butter on a hot banana muffin in anticipation of something yummy or watching them take a sip from a tall glass of ice-cold milk after the virgin bite of a rich, melting dark chocolate cookie freshly snatched from the hot oven.

All I do know is that the more women I talk to, especially women who around my age (51), the more I realize it’s not just me. It seems that women all over the world are craving the lifestyle they seem hard-wired to live; the lifestyle many of us witnessed our mothers living…until, and if, they got divorced that is. At that point, many of them lost their ‘do what you love for free’ cards and had to go to work. And many remarried quickly so as to reclaim that card as quickly as possible.

Ah, but the times they are a changin’ you might be humming to yourself. But don’t hum too loudly. You may ‘think’ they have changed, but if you talk to a few young women in your circle of influence, those about to leave high school and be off on their own for the first time (depending on what culture you belong to), they have their proverbial eye on the prince, the white horse in the distance, the picket fence, the apron and oh yah, the cookies.

Only problem is that that just ain’t happenin’ much anymore and I personally feel an elephant of sadness sitting on my heart about it. I see women struggling financially everyday who are trying to make it on their own, kids who rarely see their mothers (and fathers) because they’ll all ‘out there’ trying to make it in the world. And yes, I see men who are struggling also who pay, sometimes happily, sometimes court-ordered) child support and alimony to the ones they once called ‘family’.

There’s no obvious solution to this short expression of my emotion this morning. Just that I continually question why WHAT IS has replaced so deeply what USED TO BE and question if it’s really what’s best for our human beingness. At this point, I don’t think it is.

However, that being said, I also realize that the stress I feel is of my own doing. It begins in my head when I occasionally allow myself to think about my mom’s life…the one where she happily (or so it seemed) took care of all of us and appreciated the job.

I think I’d like that job. Though the financial pay was no where to be seen, the payment to our mother’s souls and spirits was often all they needed to be the women they really wanted to be.

Just something to think about…

If you are one way but you think you should be another way, maybe you should think again.

Many have told me that I needed to focus on one project and get it done first. Others tried to praise me into relaxing, focusing, finishing, doing other things.

Once in a while I would let other people influence what I knew to be true about me…what motivated me, what I enjoyed, what thrilled me, what drove me at my core.

Then I would decide that they didn’t have a clue who I really was…that they were only comparing me to how they thought a person should be.

Well, I have great news. I’m exactly the person I want to be and after reading Tamara Lowe’s new book, Get Motivated, I’m happy to report that I will never again question how I should be.

Tamara talks in the book about her Motivational DNA philosophy. D stands for Drives, N stands for Needs and A stands for awards. Each category has two options:

Drive: You’re either driven to develop Commonality (relationships) or Projects.

Needs: You either need Stability or Variety.

Awards: You either thrive on Internal or External rewards.

I am proud to announce that I am a card carrying PVI. I am motivated by projects, I thrive on variety and I am seriously internally rewarded.

Who knew? I did and I’ve known this (without the explanation and labels, of course) from as young as 13 years old. My mother always said I was happiest wearing a lot of hats and that I loved having projects to do. I was always sewing something or growing something or building something or working on something.

The variety thing? Oh my Gosh. I had one job at Hewlett-Packard one summer on an assembly line where they fill up the ink cartridges. The boss actually told me to stop asking everyone questions about how things were done. I think I lasted less than two weeks before I told her where to put her boring job.

And lastly, I have always been internally motivated. I don’t need others to tell me what a great job I’m doing…I need others to tell me HOW I’m doing, WHAT to tweak, HOW to make what I’m doing better…but I don’t need their praise to keep going. Do I like praise? Of course. I just don’t need it to keep going.

On that note, time to go work on something else.

Get the book. Get motivated, by Tamara Lowe. You’ll love it.

No words. Just something to think about…

You get up. You get the kids ready. You get them off to school. You pack your healthy lunch (or not), get in your car and go to work. You work all day putting up with other people’s needs. You drive home. You fix dinner, do the laundry, manage the homework. You put the kids to bed. Your brush your teeth and take care of your beautiful face, asking yourself when the wrinkles happened and fall into bed, exhausted and perhaps wondering how your life got to be this way?

If this is you, you’re not alone. Read on…

When you do something over and over again, and if you’re paying attention, you often find commonalities and patterns. Coaching women through financial transitions has shown me a few such pattens. One pattern, however, is more pervasive than all of the rest and that’s the one that seems to drive us from deep in our core as women.

Financial education is important. I think we can all agree on that. Yet my experience of teaching this often taboo-ladened subject has suggested that financial education for women needs to quite different than financial education for men. And here’s why…

First, and foremost, money means different things to women than it does to men. In other words, when women think of money, it represents something completely different than it does to men. It’s like we (because I speak for myself as well) actually see a different thing when we look at a dollar bill.

Let’s explore what money represents to men first.

Men are what I call Providers and Protectors. As such, men see money as a way to provide and protect the ones they love and care about. Money is also a way for men to judge how they are doing as men; it’s a way of showing other men (and the ladies) that they have the bigger spear and can get the bigger deer and take care of the kids better than the next guy. It’s how they get the best gal to make the stronger family and in the end, survive. It’s a little about ego also as you might imagine.

Women are what I call Takercareofers and see money as a way to TAKE CARE OF the ones they love and care about. That’s slightly different than ‘providing for’ in this way. Men PROVIDE women with the money they need to TAKE CARE OF others. To buy the food, the clothes, pay for the education…stuff like that. When women have enough money to take care of themselves and others, they often do not have a drive to need any additional money.

More than anything else, to women, money is the ability to feel, and be, safe and secure.

The challenge for women happen when it comes to supporting themselves is that traditionally (from as far back as caveman and cavewoman times), men provided and protected and women took care of. Now, all of a sudden, things are different. Our hard-wired drive to take care of gets complicated and more difficult (stressful) because we now need to provide and protect as well. This is where the break down occurs.

Over the years, talking to the women I have coached, I have noticed that women don’t have the same internal drive to ‘make money’ like men do. They struggle, often asking themselves questions like, “Why do I have to get a job and work? I HAVE work to do at home that is fulfilling and satisfying.” Because they can’t see the question through the context of ‘where we came from’, the answer is allusive and ever present for many women.

But now that things HAVE changed and it does appear that we have to go to work for money, how do we adapt? How do we change our hard-wired takercareofer selves to see money as a means to take care of in a way that inspires us to make more than enough money than to just get by…to make more than enough money to support our immediate needs. How do we move beyond that to embracing the simple fact that things have changed and they’re not going to change back any time soon (even though many of us we wish they would)?

There are a couple of options.

First, you realize that you CAN have what you’re hard-wired for…you may just have to do it differently though. You have to be very specific when you choose a partner. You must agree, as a couple, that your ‘job’ is the home, the kids, the family. You must constantly work together as a couple to evaluate financial goals, spending, budgeting, wants vs. needs, and more. You must be willing to ‘sacrifice’ some things in order to have the grand thing…the ability to stay at home and do what your heart and soul is telling you they want to do.

Second, you can WORK for money from home! This is the best of both worlds. You get to make money to feel empowered in that way AND you get to stay home with your family.

There are many ways to work from home. You can…

• Find a regular job where your employer is OK with you working at home. The disadvantage to this option is that you’re not in control of your income potential and what you do.

• Create an internet business in a niche that you find interesting and have some expertise in. This is a great option if you are computer savvy (or not but have the ability to form a team), love to write, create products, want to learn to market other people’s products, etc.

• Create a business team by linking up with one of the many network marketing companies around today. But be careful…you must evaluate which company you choose to work with very thoroughly. There are tons of network companies popping up in today’s economy because network marketing DOES work, but these new little companies don’t have the research, don’t have the financial backing, the scientist, the funding, or the ability to go the distance.

(Personal Note: A company that I honestly and openly recommend, and am involved in, is NuSkin. They are a publicly traded company who’s been around for 25 years, have more scientists than most other companies combined and have the financial resources to not only stay on the cutting edge of the anti-aging technology, they are leading the way! For more info, watch this short video at www.ns-spa.com and then email me for more information if you’re as impressed as I am.)

• Create any other type of product or service business which you can do at home. There are literally an unlimited number of businesses you can do from home. Use your imagination. Look to see what others around you are buying. Notice where the money IS flowing and then get into the middle of the flow with a better product, a better service.

And here’s the last bit of info to motivate you…

As I said earlier, you are NOT alone! Did you know that women are starting over 70% of all new small businesses? They are taking matters into their own hands and doing life differently. They know what they want and they’re going after it.

Just remember though, at any time,if  your hard-wired drive to go home and take care of others kicks in in a way that isn’t supportive, simply ask yourself, “How can I reframe (see differently) what I’m experiencing to see what I’m doing as taking care of others in some way?”

Once you do this, you’re off and running again!

Imagine that it was commonplace for children to be exposed to a myriad of career opportunities relating to each new discovery of something interesting? Imagine growing up in a culture where we naturally make money doing something we really love?

Imagine a teenager enrolling in Finding Your Genius 101 where an entire year is spent discovering their true talents? Then enrolling in Working Your Genius 202 (or Your Genius Working for You:-) where they are given options about how to use those talents to make money as an adult?

Imagine millions of adults loving what they do each day instead of dreading their j.o.b.s, where the thing they look forward to the most is Hump Day and TGIF?

In the past few decades, more and more people have considered the concept of actually enjoying what they do to make a living: to put a roof over their heads and food on the table. Today, this idea of fulfilling a mission or self-purpose is driving one of the biggest industries in the U.S. ~ personal development. We’ve all seen the ads for the following seminars:

“Make Money Doing What You Love”

“Passion and Profits”

“Loving What You Do”

“Do What You Love The Money Will Follow”

“The Money Follows Your Passion”

On and on it goes. People are drawn by the thousands to seminars, books, classes, speakers and online programs because they are sick of what they are doing, working day after miserable day knowing in their guts that there has to be a better way.

So, what if we started empowering our kids with this ‘better way’ and prevented them from falling into the TGIF habit of numbing their misery at the end of each work week? And, what if YOU were the one doing the empowering?

Hold on to that question as I take you back in time.

In the beginning, there was a cave. A place to get out of the weather, protect that which you claimed as yours: children, cooking implements, weapons, dried meats, herbs, and probably a whole lot more.

With each rising sun came a brand new day of hunting, cooking, eating, caring for the ‘gang’ which often meant keeping them from being eaten and just plain surviving.

At least this is the vision I conjure up when I think about my cave-dwelling ancestors. Each person had ‘a job’ to do. It was either gender based (hunting, killing, protecting for most men or cooking, cleaning, child-tending for most women) or based on one’s natural talents (healing, herb, weapon crafting, bowl weaving, carving).

There were no paychecks per se, simply the right to be part of the whole, which would then, in turn, provide and protect your well-being as a member of that whole.

As time went by, society became more mobile and people more independent. We created teepees, tents, lean-tos, cabins, castles with moats, mobile homes (in case you decide you like your house but not your neighbors) and finally, the ultimate mobile dwelling, the motor home where you just hitch up your portable house and live where ever you wish.

Things were good. Only one problem: as the ability to move about the planet became easier, the ability to keep doing our ‘jobs’ became a wee-bit more challenging.

Since we were no longer part of ‘the gang’ we often had to take on work simply because we needed the money. After all, basic survival (cave or no cave) generally dictates that food be somewhere in the picture.

As we became more and more mobile, we also became more and more specialized in what we did for a living. Somewhere in there, someone decided we should choose what we want to ‘be’ when we grow up. Once we got that figured out (if we ever did), we simply go to college to learn how to ‘be’ that thing, graduate, get a job, work until we can hopefully retire (also made up) and there we had it: A life well done.

YUK!

Antidote: the idea that work can be an expression of our passion or this thing we’ve labeled ‘our purpose for living.’ Now that we’ve convinced ourselves, or had the outside world convince us, that we can actually be happy each day, living our dreams, fulfilling our purpose, using our passion and natural talents, filling a void of some sort, making the world, and people’s experience of it, a better place, where do we go to figure it all out?

Where do we turn to:

“Make Money Doing What We Love?”

“Turn our Passion into Profits?”

“Love What We Do?”

“Do What We Love and Have the Money Follow?”

“Have Money Follow Our Passion?”

Well, that is the proverbial $64,000,000 question.

The answer? A few more questions!

What is my natural genius?

Howard Garner, who wrote Multiple Intelligences, understood long time ago that everyone had a genius. He labeled them spatial-visual, linguistic, interpersonal, musical, naturalist, bodily-kinesthetic, intrapersonal, and logical-mathematical. Problem is, we’re not routinely tested for all of these geniuses in school so we grow up thinking we are dumb, not talented, or worse.

What are the things I love to do?

Think about the activities you do where you lose track of time, forget to drink water or go to the bathroom; activities where you are so absorbed you lose yourself in them. These are the things you’ll first want to explore in terms of creating a life where work won’t seem like ‘work’ at all!

What are my talents?

In other words, what are you really good at? What could you become an expert at? What would you love to be paid to learn?

What would give me a sense of purpose?

What would cause you to jump out of bed each morning, excited to see what the day had in store for you? What are ways you would like to help others or help your community, or the planet?

When we’ve answered these questions, we can begin to explore our natural genius, the things we love to do, our talents and our purpose (and, by the way, there isn’t just one) and turn these into making not just a living, but a LIFE.

Now, let’s go back to empowering children to find that ‘better’ way.

That class they need, along with Finding Your Genius 101 and Working Your Genius 202 is Financial Literacy for Life, an ongoing course of study ideally beginning somewhere around the 5^th grade (but available for everyone at any time.)

In addition to encouraging children to grow into their natural genius, to do more of what they love to do (aside from texting all day!), helping them to develop their emerging talents and identify passion and purpose, financial intelligence gives them the tools to live in the world successfully.

Imagine the difference this would make in each child’s life, in their future, in their choices, in their results, in their families, and in their relationships.

Imagine that YOU were responsible for making this happen for every child you possibly could?

Imagine using YOUR natural genius, those things YOU love to do, YOUR talents and expertise, YOUR purpose(s) in order to make a difference in someone’s life, young or not so young? It would be “personal development” at its finest.

Financial literacy for kids and adults. It’s our genius, our reason for getting up in the morning ~ quite simply, what we love to do here at Creative Wealth!

If it’s yours, come join us in living a life with passion, and beyond. If it’s something else, we completely support you on your quest to never work another day in your life as well.

…or so it seems.

I have been working with women in a coaching and teaching capacity for years. One of the major differences I find when working with women is that their goals are more…how do I say this…intangible than men’s. 

Men can usually tell me what they want, when they want it, what it looks like, what color it is, ‘how big it is’ , etc.

Women, on the other hand, describe their goals in nebulous terms; saying things like this:

I want to grow and learn and set an example for my kids. I want to make a difference in the world and live my passion. and on and on.

When I ask women I coach, “So, can you tell me what you really want?”, they often can’t. I used to think this was simply because they didn’t know what they wanted. I don’t necessarily believe that now.

I’m beginning to think that it’s not that we, as a gender, don’t know what we want; it’s that what we want can’t be spoken in terms of what, when, color, how big, etc. What we want is more an experience or a sensation or an emotional response or feeling. And it’s sometimes hard to put these types of a goals down on paper or illustrate them on a dream board or vision board.

If you’re a girl and this is you, please know you’re not alone. You’re perfect just the way you are. Just because we need to know WHAT we want before we can HAVE what we want, doesn’t mean WHAT we want has to be tangible. Let’s explore the idea that we can create exactly what we want…tangible or not!