Some background; I grew up financially poor. As a teenager, I remember looking at my single-mother's tax returns for one year when I was a kid and being surprised that she had only made about $13,000. She'd make pupusas (typical Salvadoran food) and sell them for $1.50 in our local grocery's parking lot from the trunk of her car. I also remember walking along the train tracks behind our house looking for discarded aluminum beer cans so we could redeem for a couple cents. Although I always had food, clothes and a roof over my head, I now realize money was always tight. For a while, none of us had a bed so my siblings, my mom and I would simply roll out blankets on our bedroom floor and sleep in makeshift sleeping pads. Each morning we'd roll them up against the wall so we could move around the bedroom without having to step on where we slept. We could never afford vacations or a nice car or even a nice meal. In fact, going out to McDonald's as a family was a treat.
I'm now 30 working at a stable job that doesn't pay much, but benefits are good and I've been conscious of keeping my expenses down as much as I can. Except for emergencies, I haven't used a credit card in years and hope to finally be credit card debt free by the end of the year. I squirrel away 5% of my paycheck into my 401(K) while I try to save up as much as I can into a--at minimum--$3,000 emergency savings fund.
Every month I have the blessing of having at least $100 of play money that I can use for whatever I want, yet I still feel hesitant to part with it and find myself nickle-and-diming everything I buy for myself or others trying to keep costs at a minimum. The financial blue print that I inherited from how I was raised prevents me from truly enjoying what I receive as well as giving without any remorse. How can I change that?
Without having to get too woo-woo, I sincerely believe that money is energy and the more I give credence to this financial blue print from childhood, the less I'm open to the abundance that I'd like to receive.
Are there any books or YouTube videos that anyone can recommend to help me shift my perception of money from one laden with want and fear to one full of abundance and possibility?
September 14, 2018 at 11:33AM
