My Money story
Left to right: my sister, my brother, and hormonal, perpetually embarrassed, so-over-the-world, me 😂
Here we go!
I grew up in a rural village in Upstate New York (Onondaga Nation, Haudenosaunee Territory). Not cute “Upstate,” but post-industrial, post-farm country, economically depressed, culturally and spiritually depleted Upstate (Central) New York.
Like many rural places, rather than dreaming big, the culture encouraged folks to stay small. The respectable thing to do (if you were lucky enough) was to get funneled into a stable, conventional job like teaching or working for the local power company. The idea was that if you “put your head down and work,” then one day you’d be rewarded for it. And while where we grew up wasn’t all bad (I did make it out with a few amazing lifelong friends), the truth is—addiction, suicide, poverty, and racism were always one or two doors down.
My home was a haven for peace, culture, music, good food, and open-mindedness, and I was lucky to have that. Still, my parents embodied the conventional paradigm: my father always seemed to be working (and stressed), and my creative, home-making mother (who side-hustled as a school bus driver, a mail delivery person, a waitress, a glass engraver, a childcare provider, a massage therapist, a colon hydrotherapist, and so on…) was the definition of “waste not, want not.” My father, the breadwinner, was the first to graduate from college in his family, and at the time, managed chains of Burger Kings and convenience stores (before he followed his peak passion of concert production). While we were in school, he was making around $50k annually.
Because income is relative, what this meant for us was that we had nourishing, home cooked food on the table every night, but we never went out to eat. We had cars, but they were always breaking down. We went on a family vacation every year, but it was always a road trip. We had clothing, but it was always second hand or on the discount rack of a discount store. Life was good outside of money, but whenever money was the topic, it seemed to be the root cause of all the stress in the world.
And also, shame.
My best friend lived in a (fabulous) trailer two doors down. My next door neighbor had a water/hygiene issue so bad he got made fun of every. single. day. We brought brown bread and natural peanut butter sandwiches to lunch in brown paper bags (this was the 90’s before “organic” was cool), wore clothes our grandmother made, and I viscerally felt the difference between my dirtier-feeling reality, and the shiny, plastic-y, Bath & Body Works-scented, name-brand clothing experiences of many of my peers.
And while our life was pretty stable, the fault lines were all around us. From our neighbors to our best friends, it seemed like everyone’s fathers were always leaving and/or out of the picture, and the mothers were left hobbling together a living for their children. A few times our favorite aunts lived with us after their husbands crossed the line with abuse, alcoholism, or just checking out completely.
Even in our own stability, I saw vulnerabilities. For instance, our finances seemed to be precariously balanced squarely on my father’s shoulders. My father’s an amazing guy, but still, as a young girl, this didn’t sit right with me. My mother’s spirit was free as a bird, but my father controlled the purse strings. Even though my mom was super frugal, there was a subtext that she was somehow less responsible with money than my father. Even though my mother always worked (I’ve never seen the woman sit down), her most beautiful work—like raising children, nourishing us with home cooked meals, gardening, caring for her extended family, neighbors, and the land around us—was never truly valued. It was valued theoretically, sure, but not in dollars and cents. Not in power.
These experiences growing up taught me a few things about money:
Never be reliant upon a man for your livelihood
Don’t rely on your creative side for money
Women make irresponsible decisions when it comes to money
Men are inherently more responsible when it comes to money
The only way to “make it” is to put your head down and work
Hard work = success
Women’s work is not valued in our society
Me, lower right, during my spoken word poetry phase
After I left home for college, a few more money beliefs layered into my psyche.
In college, I learned to articulate systemic inequality, colonization, racism, and dissent throughout history. I found community and purpose in poetry and justice movements, and my worldview was fortified through incredible teachers and real life experiences working with kids and teens, as well as super marginalized folks, like people in prison. I was angry at “The Man,” and heartbroken from having such up close and personal views into the pain and struggle that so many people face.
Naturally, when it was time to graduate college and find a real job, I gravitated towards nonprofits. I lucked out and got my first “real” job creating an arts-based after school program for teenagers in Brooklyn where I stayed for the first half of my 20’s.
Concurrently, I was introduced to the world of NYC nannying by a college friend. The first time I arrived at a family’s apartment building and was greeted by a doorman, took an elevator up to their huge, beautiful apartment, was the first time I’d ever encountered real wealth. Before then, it was something so foreign and distant, something I’d only seen in movies. But all of a sudden, I was on the inside—breathing their air, holding their babies, eating their food.
At first, it seemed impossible to reconcile these two realities: kids in poverty in BK, and multi-millionaires in Manhattan. But it also became impossible to hold onto my negative beliefs about rich people. I was enmeshed in their families. I loved their kiddos. I saw the way they loved each other the same way everyone else does. They had good taste in food and wine. And they were kind and reasonable to me, seemed to really appreciate me, and paid me more than I ever thought I’d be making (hourly).
So as you can imagine, portaling on the train between these two realities eventually dissolved some of the stark contrasts and judgements I had about them, about where I belonged, and about where I wanted to be. I still couldn’t make sense of it, but there were two very different seeds growing in the same pot.
I spent the next 5 years waffling between nonprofits, DJing, and nannying on the side. I’d live the gritty Brooklyn lifestyle during the second half of the week, and then take the train out to the Hamptons for the other half.
28 year old me working my $12/hour farmers market shift
Finally, I moved upstate to make my money go farther while digging further into earth-to-table cheffing work. At a time when it should have been a step forward (I was 28), financially, it was a huge step back. I was making $12/hour in food work. I qualified for food stamps, and I said yes to them. My card got declined often, and it was stressful and embarrassing. I would perpetually rack up $5-$6k in credit card debt, even though I told myself I had more discipline than that. I bought a car from a friend for $1200 (which felt like a lot at the time). It broke down immediately, and I was so stressed it made me sick. I also felt deeply ashamed, and believed that I was just “bad” with money.
Eventually I got a job with another nonprofit—one that was even more aligned with my passion for racial justice and food dignity. Even though it paid a “living wage” ($18/hour), I was still broke. But, I was supposed to be happy about it.
See, there’s a story that a lot of people carry when they end up in nonprofit-y work. It’s usually powered by altruism. It ends up being a bit savior complex-y, and it caps the amount of money you can, and should, be making. Who are you to ask for more when you’re serving populations who have far less?
But here’s the problem I grew to have with the nonprofit industrial complex: it’s a shitty business model. (I know it’s not a “business” model, but money flows in and out of it, right?) Large amounts of it, too.
But where does that money go? Usually not directly into the hands of the folks who need it the most. Too often, it gets filtered through the hands of well-intentioned white ladies like myself, who create and manage elaborate projects intended to serve historically under-resourced populations, but can also end up keeping people small and barely hanging on.
Now listen, some of the most amazing people I know have started or work in incredible nonprofits that do truly vital work. And even the questionable ones are still usually powered by genuinely good human beings. All I’m suggesting is that on the quest to make the world a better place, there are other models out there.
So at some point, I said “fuck it,” and bowed out of the nonprofit model completely. Simultaneously, I started experimenting with helping farmers, herbalists, healers, and other folks I believed in build their businesses, websites, marketing campaigns, and sales systems to see if we could get to the promised land faster in a for-profit model.
The answer, my friends (with a little creativity and sustainability innovation), from what I’ve witnessed, is yes, we can.
Fast forward to today, dozens of self-help books, podcasts, and one life coach husband later––this is the primary plant I water: the belief that we can make good, abundant money serving our community and doing what we love. This belief has been reinforced time and time again, not only through my own success, but through witnessing the success of the people I’ve worked with.
36 year old, easeful, home-owning, comfortable-six-figures earning mama me
In short, I went from making $12/hour to $120k annually in a few years flat—doing work I love. I also went from working 7am-7pm Monday through Friday and some weekends too, to making abundant money working 25-30 hours a week.
I’ve seen single mamas go from food stamps to sustainable six figures doing what they love, serving our most marginalized populations.
I’ve seen revolutionaries go from working nonstop and swimming in stress to freeing up their schedules and making twice as much (more than they ever thought possible).
And I’ve witnessed countless values-driven people divorce themselves from institutions and bet on themselves and double, triple their salaries, on their own terms, in a few years flat.
My money story is still evolving, and always will be. This work is a matter of re-patterning.
Here are some of my current beliefs around money:
Money flows to and from me easily
There’s always more where that came from
The only difference between millionaires and billionaires and me are matters of time and relationships
As I make more, I give more
I believe creating a new, equitable, mutually-flourishing economy is the quickest way to the change I want to see in the world
I love giving generously to people and causes I believe in
When I value my work, I help raise the bar for other women who have historically undervalued themselves. Together, we re-value healing, creative, regenerative work in our society.
