The 9 Steps to Financial Freedom (6 page)
Read The 9 Steps to Financial Freedom Online
Authors: Suze Orman
It’s not a money memory exactly, but what comes to mind is that I broke my grandmother’s lobster platter when I was seven, eight, nine—I can’t really remember how old I was. But I do remember what happened. Grandma was telling us—my cousins were there, everyone was there—about how in colonial times poor people would eat lobsters, they were so plentiful. But for us they were a special treat, and we had them only in the summers at her house in Maine. She always served them on this huge platter that was shaped like a lobster, and she loved that platter. Anyway, when the lobsters were done, she piled them onto the platter to be taken into the dining room, and I said, “Can I carry them in?” She said no, I was still too little. But I begged and begged until she said yes. There was a
swinging door into the dining room, and—you guessed it. One of my cousins came through the door; bang, the lobsters went everywhere and the platter, Grandma’s special platter, broke to pieces. Lobsters and platter everywhere, scattered all over the kitchen floor.
There the memory ended for Sheila, but it was very telling even so: She was afraid that she would lose it, that she couldn’t hold on to it. This was her fear. And how was it playing out in her life?
Sheila and her new husband had come to see me about switching some of his assets into her name; they were both in their sixties, and he wanted her to be safe should something happen to him. Here was a new first for me: Sheila didn’t want to take any of the money at all. She refused to let him give her anything. But what she was really saying was that she was afraid she would break another platter, so he shouldn’t even bother giving her anything to put on it.
“The thought of having a joint checking account with my wife—I just can’t do it” was Mark’s problem. “It’s as if I just don’t trust anyone when it comes to my money.” I asked Mark if he loved and felt safe with his wife. “Yes, of course.” Had she ever given him a reason not to trust her? “No. Never.”
The big joke in my family was that I saved everything, just hoarded it all away. I had all these different banks and would move money—we’re talking pennies and dimes here—from one to another, counting it and playing with it. I guess I was about nine, and I had twenty-seven dollars in my room saved up in my banks, and I felt so rich. I was thinking I wanted to buy
something, and what I wanted to buy was a trampoline. It cost forty dollars, so I kept saving. I added more and more money to the banks, then went to count it up again, to see how much closer I was. And there was only twenty-four dollars! I couldn’t believe it. I knew my sister had stolen the money, I just knew it. She denied it. And when I told my parents, they said I had probably counted wrong, how could I accuse my sister of stealing? And she was standing there in the room, smiling. I knew she stole it, and she knew I knew.
Having a joint checking account? When a sister you love steals your money, isn’t it possible, too, that she also stole your trust in those you love? I could see Mark’s face drop at the possibility.
I was the fourth financial planner Mark had been to see, after he no longer trusted the first, second, and third. Not only did he not trust his wife enough to pool their resources into a joint account, he didn’t trust anyone when it came to his money. Coincidence?
Liz’s biggest fear was being audited by the IRS. Had she ever cheated on her income taxes? “Absolutely never.” Had she ever been audited before? “No.” Had her parents? “No.” Had anyone she knew ever been audited? “Not that I know of.”
It was Halloween, and we all had bags, for candy, and also cans, to collect for UNICEF. But it was chaos—we were running everywhere, and sometimes the UNICEF money went into the bag instead of the cans. I tripped over a curb and dropped my bag. All the candy and UNICEF money went flying. I recovered what I could but knew a lot was missing. The next
morning I went back and found forty-five more cents right where I had fallen. I kept looking, and then I saw a drain. As I looked into it, I could see all these bright shiny pennies, but there wasn’t a thing I could do to get them back. I never told anyone to this day that had happened, but you know I still feel just like I did then: as if I had stolen money from UNICEF and if anyone knew, they would put me in jail.
Liz’s fear was an IRS audit. Most people fear an IRS audit when they’ve hidden something from the IRS, and are correct to fear an audit. This was not the case for Liz, who had never remotely tried to steal or hide anything from anyone. But she felt as if she had. Those coins for UNICEF had been collecting interest in the form of fear for long enough.
I asked Sheila to go out and buy a big new platter, the biggest she could find, and to begin using it. I asked Mark to write a letter to his sister, saying he forgave her. Liz wrote a nice-size check to UNICEF right then and there, which she mailed immediately. They had started to connect the dots from their pasts to their fears today. It’s a slow process sometimes, this kind of healing, but the relief each expressed to me after doing this step was extraordinary to witness. More important, they were ready to move on, toward financial freedom.
WHAT IS IT YOU’RE AFRAID OF?
Struggling to remember defines so much of our lives—to remember birthdays, dentist appointments, turning off the stove, where we put the keys, when the dry cleaning will be ready, what time the children need to be picked up … the rituals and obligations of everyday life.
Find yourself with a money problem, on the other hand, and just try to forget it. You can’t. It will be with you day in, day out, at the movies, when you’re trying to sleep, always there, never far from center stage of your consciousness. The fear is, very likely, powerful enough to keep you silent, too all-consuming to talk about, too big to take action against.
Most of us push away our fears without even knowing it. I am asking you now to step into them instead, pull them closer for a moment. What is it that you’re afraid of? If nothing profound comes to mind, just give it time; often we block what we don’t want to face. Here, to give you an idea, are some of the other fears that I have heard over the years:
I’m afraid I’m going to be a bag lady.
I’m afraid I won’t be able to support my family.
If something goes wrong at work, what other job could I possibly get?
I feel that I can’t keep up.
I’m afraid that if my friends find out how much money I have, they won’t like me.
I’m afraid that my wife is going to make more money than I am.
I’m afraid because I don’t even know the right questions about money to ask.
I’m afraid that my husband will leave me, and then how will I get by?
If my wife dies, who will take care of me?
What if my parents have to go into a nursing home?
I keep having to use my credit card just to cover the bills each month.
How will I ever pay for my children’s college expenses?
I’m afraid I’ll have to support my ex if we break up.
I am afraid I will lose everything I have.