Natalie WagnerWillis

Certified Money Coach (CMC)®,  Finologist

Money Coaching, Thought Leadership

 

 

Does Money Corrupt or Connect?

 

Have you ever created something so connected to the essence of your heart that to exchange it for
money would feel like somehow cheapening it? But then you find yourself looking longingly at concert
tickets, a beautiful scarf or organic produce – and you don’t have the money?


This is what happened with my client, "Alice." Alice came from a family with a successful small business,
and she has been able to work there part time, earning just what was needed to financially support
herself and her daughter. However, her real work, the work she considers her true contribution to this
beautiful world, is energy body work.


Alice puts her whole Self into her energy work and recognizes the inestimable value her clients receive
when their bodies come into energetic balance. There is purity in her work, coming from deep within
Alice and impacting the wells of depth in her clients, that she is committed to upholding.


In contrast, Alice came to me with a deeply held money story saying that money is a necessary evil,
sole materialistic, corrupting all that it touches. This meant that the act of accepting money for her
body healing energy work was incompatible with her devotion to its purity. Yet when an opportunity to
take her daughter to Jamaica on a soul replenishing whale watching adventure came along, Alice didn’t
have the money.


Alice and I had already had a few sessions when the Jamaica trip showed up and she had recently
discovered her limiting money stories. We were able to unpack the root of these stories, and Alice
realized they applied to time in her childhood when dishonesty, drama and hurt surrounded the family
business and the money it made. Her separation between pureness and money was a way of protecting
her pure inner being from the pain and corruption she witnessed around money.


As an adult, Alice was able to take another look at money and see it more accurately. She recognized
that money is often used for great good, and she released her moral condemnation. Still, she had
trouble understanding a personal relationship with money in which she earned it and used it in ways
that create good. It was time to turn our attention away from what money isn’t (limiting beliefs/stories),
and explore what money is.


Alice and I turned to her Wheel of Money to understand what was going on and how she can move
forward to cultivate connection and balance in her money life. Starting with Alice’s relationship to her
two sources of earning potential, a job with the family biz, or her own body energy work. The first was
something most anyone could do, required her time and energy, produced something she considered
mundane, and paid enough for the basics but had few non-financial benefits.


The second taps into Alice’s unique gift for energy work, also takes her time and energy, has a profound
impact on her clients, and gives Alice a powerful experience through engaging and delivering her gift –
but she doesn’t charge enough to earn what she needs. This means she can’t afford Jamaica or her life,
unless she begins accepting money for her work.

 

Going to Jamaica on a whale watching trip called to Sierra – and her soul felt hungry for the experience.
She realized that her energy work had the potential to effectively create this invaluable trip to Jamaica,
if only she would exchange it for money – because she could then exchange the money for the trip.
Money was a way to turn her gift and her work into a soul satisfying trip to Jamaica.

 

She started to look at it differently. Going to Jamaica on a whale watching trip was about feeding her
soul, and her work is about giving her soul. She realized that if she simply exchanged her body-work
for money, she could turn the money into this soul food. Money was a way to convert her gift and her
work into soul-satisfaction.


Alice now earns money for her body energy work, and after returning from the Jamaican whale
watching adventure, she told me how her relationship with money has transformed. Now, rather than
feeling like it corrupts the authentic value of her work, she feels like money empowers her work to reach
its full value potential. By exchanging it for money, the work that is deeply connected to the essence of
her heart not only brings profound value to others, but it has become the financial energy supporting
her and her daughter as well as her means to priceless experiences like the Jamaica trip.


What could you buy that would bring soul satisfying value into your life? How cool would it be use
something created from the essence of your heart to bring this into your life? So the next time you feel
like money could lessen the authenticity of something you’ve created, try flipping it around. How could
money create more value, more good?


Natalie Wagner, CFRCSM, Finologist