What’s Your Money Story? A Conversation Circle

We’ve hosted Conversation Circles for about ten years now, and over time, some topics have naturally become our favorites. We recently gathered as group of twelve women to explore “What’s Your Money Story?”, a subject we like to re-visit regularly. Our goal was to reflect on our past experiences with money, consider how they shape our thoughts and beliefs about money, and share lessons learned.

Over the course of our lives, we are inundated with messages about money. Some are easy to spot, like the money behaviors we observed from the adults in our lives, while other money messages are so subtle, we absorb them unconsciously. Our financial beliefs and behaviors often take root in these messages, and they can wield a great deal of power over our habits today. What we’ve seen is that with a little more awareness, we can choose to change the behaviors that may be slowing our progress toward our financial goals. We can also feel empowered to embrace the behaviors that are helping us succeed.

We started our conversation by recounting and sharing our earliest money memories, which often resurface very quickly! Memories shared by others also prompted more memories of our own. Many of us remembered playing with actual coins and paper money. We washed it, played with it, collected it, and even swallowed it! Many of us were taught early on to save it – whether as a portion of an allowance or in the form of “Blue Chip” stamps pasted into a coupon book!

We then broadened the conversation to ask questions such as: What were the spending or saving patterns of your mother, father, or other guardian? What money messages or lessons from childhood have stuck with you? Looking back, what have been valuable lessons you learned about money? What’s working in my money story that I want to strengthen?

Two themes emerged from our robust and open conversation. First, many of us grew up observing conflicting messages and behaviors around money, which led us to develop contradictory money stories and created internal conflict and stress. Some examples:

• Bargain hunting despite enormous wealth and privilege.
• Having a father who was considered the money expert, but who suffered a string of business and financial failures.
• Ascending the professional ladder that resulted in more financial success, but less family time and connection.
• Experiencing the blessings of family wealth as well as “wealth shame” and discomfort over that very privilege.

The second common theme was the impact of an immigrant background. Many of us reflected back on parents and grandparents who were immigrants and how that family history influenced our money narratives. Many immigrant family members taught us to never spend more than we had and discouraged “wasting” money. But even within a family, the immigrant experience can be very different and can result in a variety of approaches to money.

It was also interesting to hear about our collective hard-won lessons, those that we carry with us and that guide our current thinking:

• Money is meant to provide experiences.
• Money can be viewed as bad, but in reality, money is also freedom, flexibility, health care.
• The “do what you love, and the money will follow” myth is just that, a myth.
• Money can come and money can go.
• Money is a tool given from ancestors. We can use to take care of family.
• Money is not a lake, it’s a river – and ebbs and flows by its very nature.

As we closed the conversation, we acknowledged the value of hearing other people’s money narratives, as well as their wisdom. It was inspiring to hear others’ stories, and we agreed with one participant’s sentiment that money is a tool and also an energy, and that having a good relationship with it is important. In truth, these conversations require courage and vulnerability. But the reward is a deeper understanding of ourselves and connection with others.