Embedded Beliefs About Money

    It’s five a.m., I’ve been awake for an hour and the demons have come to haunt me in the night. OK, they’re not demons - just bad thoughts. Call them demons and they take on a life and a power of their own. They’re just thoughts. But isn’t it interesting... you start with one little negative thought and it is like a magnet. It sucks in every other negative thought floating around and before you know it there’s a slew of them piling up on you, one after the other, each waiting their turn for a chance to dominate your mind.

    It started with my focus on the perfect renters, as I fell asleep. I woke slightly now and then throughout the night, just enough to focus again, thinking “Good, I’m still in alpha, this is another opportunity to bring those good renters to my door. “ Then after the third or fourth time I couldn’t get back to sleep. Am I trying too hard?
    I began to think about the people who had come to see my house. I must have shown it twenty times in the past three weeks. They all say they like it and take a rental application. That’s the last I hear from them. Thing is... I’ve known that the place was not right for any of them. The bedrooms are small. It is not the perfect house but it is really nice. I loved living there. I just need the perfect people for this particular place.
    There was one woman who seemed like she’d be a really good tenant - but she did not want the place for another month. I don’t want to lose a month’s rent. But if I get the $5000.00 that won’t matter as much and I just realized that I’ll get $5000.00 if my mother sells her house - but will she give it to me? (See that is how the negative thoughts progress from one subject to the next.)
    My mother has said since even before she had the house listed with the realtor, that she would give a commission of three percent to whoever brings a buyer. A friend of mine called the other day. He sells real estate. I told him how much my mother had lowered the price of her house, in case he knew of anyone interested. He immediately asked if she would pay a commission. I confirmed it with her. Yes, she would pay three percent. I had asked her the other day if I would get the same commission she’d declared to others.
    She laughed, “Oh, you want it, too!”
    “Well of course I do!” I said, a bit indignant, “And besides that, I’m your daughter and I need the money!”
    She agreed, yes, if I got her house sold she would pay me the same commission as anyone else. But there was reluctance in her voice.  Even though I have taken on this project, she might say that the particular buyers who looked at the house last evening, did not come due to my effort. She has already mentioned that they came because they saw the sign out front with the lowered price and that the price is the reason they are interested.
     It is pure coincidence, if there is such a thing, that the $5000.00  figure I chose for my goal is close to the same amount of the three percent commission. I decided on that amount when the house was still in the hands of the realtor. I was not expecting anything from its sale. And after my mother ended her contract with the realtor, she lowered the price. I had no way of knowing any of this when I set my intentions. I chose $5000.00 because you are supposed to pick an amount that you think is believable to achieve and I figured that much would keep me comfortable until I got the writing income going.
    I didn’t actually figure out what this commission would amount to until last night, after the potential buyers left. I didn’t want to think about it at all. I know what my mother is like about money. There are many things we think differently about. I do my best to accept her for who she is and forget about it. She wants to sell her house, I want to help. But wouldn’t it be great if it helped me out, too?
    Why do I feel like I am standing here waiting for a hand out? I doubt any random person who brought in a buyer would feel the same, when expecting their commission. Man, these deeply embedded beliefs about money that I carry are insidious! How do I get them out of my head?
    Here’s my story. Like many of you, my parents grew up during The Depression. My father was born and raised on a Pennsylvania farm. His dad left his mother with four kids to take care of. I remember the stories about the clothes washer they had, powered by a mule in a harness, that walked round and round in a circle. And how, in the winter they would wake up with skiffs of snow on the floor, blown through the cracks in the wall. My mom was from a small rural town in Canada. I don’t think they were poor, but back then everybody was suffering. They’ve both had their money issues.
    My father ran the show as I was growing up and he valued only two things - work and education. He was a serious example of the adverse effects of the Puritan work ethic. He never indulged in an activity that was not focused on an end result of making money. (My God! I’ve been like that for the past three months, trying to get this writing career going.) And my mother - I think she just never felt she deserved any luxury or even anything special. Those beliefs were handed down to me continuously, through the habits of daily life.
    I came out of it with the idea that I was bad at handling money. As a teenager, after school I worked at Dairy Queen and all summer at the local amusement park. Every week, my father doled out ten dollars of my paycheck for me to keep and put the rest aside. He didn’t trust me with it. And I must say, a few years later when I needed a thousand dollars, it came in handy.
     I managed to raise two kids on my own with only a pittance of child support. We never had much to spare until they got older and I had a good business going. I made a point of letting them manage their own money but today they are not much better than I was. I limited my debt, but I never saved money. I took my kids on vacations and spent money on “frivolous” things - like fun! I was intent on expressing different values than my parents’ and in this area I succeeded. My children appreciate the value of a good time.
    I know my rebellious nature worked against my best interests, in this case but I wonder if in touting values so different from my parents I was covering up my true beliefs about money.
    My father was a smart man who worked hard. Of his three siblings, he was considered the successful one. He was transferred many times in his job. In an effort to put myself and my brothers in the best schools, my parents always chose a neighborhood where we were at the bottom of the income bracket. My friends all skied, but we couldn’t afford it. They wore the nicest clothes, matching outfits with plaid skirts and little vests from The Villager Shoppe. My parents shopped at Sears and K mart. My escape from all this was to become a hippie and wear crazy clothes, like my great grandmother’s floor length dress with one hundred buttons down the front. Again, I rebelled, but inside, did I somehow get the message that I didn’t deserve what others around me took for granted?
    So many years later we are still plagued by things that happened to us in childhood. I say we because I know I’m not the only one. When does it all end and how do we just get over it and get on with our lives? I guess it is just part of the work in progress. Well, at least I’ve got it out in the open. I heard a line the other day, “You are only as sick as your secrets.”
    I feel better now. Writing is cathartic. Maybe now, those demons will let me sleep.

Today’s Progress:

Not much. I am waiting for the rental application from the couple I favor to rent my place. I will give them one more day. My second choice is a woman who will not be moving in ‘til November. She seems like a great renter but I will lose one month’s rent ($800.00) if I rent to her. Tomorrow is the last day of the month......     UPDATE! Since I posted this an hour ago I was contacted by the perfect renter! Yes! There is such a person. She is a single mom with two kids, just like me. That house was great for me and my kids. I'd been thinking about how I would love to have someone in a situation like mine living there. In fact, I happened to go to the coffee shop today and pick up a paper. The headline article was about all the homeless in Montana these days. I read, with compassion and sadness that most of the homeless are single mothers and their kids. I wished I could afford to reduce my rent and help someone out. I can' do that and live in Costa Rica, though. And I won't have to for this woman, she has a good job and can afford the house.  I would so glad to have someone there who needed and appreciated a house like mine. I'll meet her tomorrow afternoon. It feels like things are happening!!!!!

Running Total - I still need $4990.64 to make my goal of $5000.00 by the 20th of October.