“It isn't a matter of giving a lot or a little, of giving anything at all.  It is simply a matter of giving oneself.” Daniel Odier
 
Giving, or "tithing", is the practice of giving 10% of your income to places that inspire you and who do charitable work.  Historically this practice came from the Babylonians, who passed it to the Hebrews, who passed it the Christians, who passed it to the wider culture.  In modern society giving to spiritual teachers has gotten separated from charitable giving, when they used to be one and the same.  The temple would honor  the priests AND feed the poor.  So I recommend both.
 
When I first learned about tithing, in 2005, I started giving right away.  My income increased from $8,000 a year as a stay-at-home mom to $50,000 a year with a thriving business.  5 years later I was making $100,000.  Tithing works!
 
Tithing changes you immediately. Generosity makes us wealthy instantly because it affirms that we have something to give. When we give away something we formerly thought of as scarce, we reframe our experience of it to be something of which we have plenty.   When we give, we open up space to receive more of what has been given.  This works on a very practical level.  If you give chocolate, you get more chocolate.  If you give money, you get more money. 
 
"The act of giving restores a harmony and balance in both mind and body that results in happiness as well as prosperity.  When your life gets out of harmony, you need to give in order to restore balance and abundance."
 
                            ~Catherine Ponder
 
It is a powerful practice to give where you are inspired, to give back in gratitude.   Give to people and places that keep you in alignment with your highest self.  These are people and places which encourage you to be more generous, responsible, powerful, and loving.  These are people and places who lovingly call you on your shit and lovingly call themselves on their own shit, and keep going.
 
I see in myself and others the urge to call charitable giving enough, to just give to a need. "I'm giving to the food bank, and my local school, isn't that enough?" as we learn to be more generous, we are called upon to give more to others, and this is good.  And I see that this alone does not work to prosper me, not in the way giving to my source of inspiration does.  When we give only to a need, we are not feeding our soul.  When we give out of gratitude to where we are nourished, we are truly fed.
 
Who inspires you?
What work calls you on your shit?
Who aligns you with your source?
What work supports your life purpose?
Who stays with you and your intentions?
 
Giving is only ever your choice.  If someone tells you to give to them, run away!  The tithe is a freely given gift of gratitude for what has been received.  It is not a payment for a service or product.
 
Some places that people have historically given:
 
Ministers & Rabbis
Churches, Synagogues & Spiritual Centers

But they have also given to:

Musicians, Authors & Inspirational Speakers
Counselors, Coaches, & Healers
Spiritual Practitioners
Artists and those who Protect Nature, etc.

So, basically, anyone who is doing work that inspires you and helps you grow!
 
The way I recommend to start or upgrade a giving practice is to give to the locations of your choice for 1 month, and then keep a journal of all the blessings that come your way for that month.  See if the tithing practice is working for you to uplift you and help you prosper.  If it is a “downer” with few positive benefits, at the end of the month you can decide if you would like to shift and change the locations of your giving.
 
Some benefits people report from tithing:
 
Income expansion
Healing miracles
Freebies & discounts
Forgiven fines
Windfalls
Increased savings
Prayers answered
Unexpected blessings
Things working out well

Have fun starting or upgrading your very own giving practice!"

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"​“When your WHY is big enough you will find your how.”
                                                              ― Nelson Millard

What is your “Big Why”?  Your Big Why is the reason you want to build wealth.  The Why has to be big, and it has to be strong.  

Why?

Because if it is not, you will not be willing to do what it takes:  work more intensively, budget and save, let go of unnecessary spending.  Who wants to do that?  No one!  Unless….your temporary sacrifice will lead to a good result.

My Big Why when I started this journey was to buy a house for myself and my children.  I wanted security, and a place to gather and nest, that could not be taken away from me.  This was my burning desire.  It kept me going through days when I felt discouraged, months where there was no margin, and seasons of not much progress at all.  I just kept going, knowing that overall, I was getting closer to my goal.

It can help to ask yourself, “If I had a million dollars, what would I do with it?”  Your first answer is your Big Why.  Would you fund a foundation or give to charity?  Would you buy that family home for yourself and your children?  Would you travel the world on a sailboat?  Would you quit your dayjob and become an artist/healer/stand-up comic?  Would you support your aging parents?

Your Big Why could be related to security.  After the Coronovirus hit, many people are saying “NEVER AGAIN will I be without an emergency fund!”  The Big Why can motivated you to put a buffer between yourself and life.

The Big Why can clarify your purpose.  Sometimes we become aware of how we are in a dead-end job, that is soul-sucking.  We suddenly realize, we want to change careers, to move to something more meaningful.  If you already have work of heart, meaning and purpose and know your Big Why, then this book will help you get the money to fulfill that vision.  If your work is not satisfying to your purpose, then your Big Why can help clarify what your purpose is.

Simon Sinek says, in his book Start with Why, that the Why preceeds the How and the What.  I agree.  When you have your Why, suddenly the process of how to build wealth and what to do become clearer.  You become guided about how and what to do.  And the day-to-day difficulties that can arise with wealth-building take second place to your driving motivation, your touchstone, your why."

"If building wealth with a step-by-step plan is do-able by even a single mom, why isn’t everyone rich? 
 
Because there are obstacles to wealth, both internal and external.  Even if you start with the same resources as someone else, there are forces within you and outside you that will attempt to slow, or even stop you.  These obstacles may come up before you start your journey, or they may show up as you are working the wealth steps. 
 
Be aware…BEWARE….and know this is normal.
 
Your blocks will come up.  But hopefully you can recognize them, so that they will not define you.
 
 
Typical Money Blocks
 
“When you blame others, you give up your power to change.”
                                                              ― Robert Anthony
 
The Money Fog
Many people struggle to save, get rid of debt, and invest because of not having a tracking system for money.  They don’t know how much they make and how much they spend.  Even though they make good income, there never seems to be enough.  They live in the “money fog”, with a vague sense of fear and anxiety.  And if income is affected during the pandemic, the fog is even more distressing and painful.
 
The impact of the money fog is a high level of stress!  Relationships are strained, and they work non-stop chasing their own tail.  “I owe, I owe, so off to work I go!”  They make more money, only to have it disappear.  The debt always seems to grow back, savings is minimal, and you lose investment opportunities due to not having cash.
 
All because of the money fog.  
They say, “you don’t know what you don’t know”.  So ignorance itself can be a block.  The money fog keeps us from knowing how much of a financial mess we are actually in.  Clarity, and having a tracking system for your money, is actually the answer."
 
 
 
The Belief that Money is Evil
Many people believe that money is evil, tainted, or somehow beneath them.  This attitude leads them to call out executives and company owners who abuse their wealth as examples of how money corrupts.  
 
The oft-quoted phrase, “Money is the root of all evil” is actually a misquote.  The true biblical phrase is “The LOVE of money is the root of all evil”, meaning that if one prioritizes money over all else, they lose their goodness.  However, I would argue that refusing to deal with money at all can be irresponsible and evil.  Unless one is part of a religious order or disabled in some way, not dealing with money at all creates an unhealthy dependence on others.
 
It is impossible to build wealth if you hate the wealthy.  If you find yourself sabotaging your own results, perhaps this block is affecting you.  The answer is in shifting your mindset to one of giving, which has its very own chapter in this book!   Giving erases guilt, by helping us feel more deserving of more wealth, which enables us to give bigger.  And the more of us who incorporate giving into our habits, the more we create a culture of generosity which benefits everyone.
 
Making more money makes us more of who we already are.  If we are a stingy person, and we build wealth, we will continue to be stingy.   And if we are naturally generous, wealth enables us to give even bigger. 
 
The same goes for poverty.  There are ill-intentioned poor people, and there are generous, good poor people.  Given good character as a basis, would you rather have wealth or be poor?  Your choice.  Money itself is neutral.
 
Denial
Some of us are in denial about how broke they actually are.  We may own a home or have some assets, but have an equal amount of debt, which leaves us with a zero net worth!  Or we may lead our life like a party, never thinking about the future.  “I’ll get my act together someday” we say, until they turn 40, 50, 60 or 70 without any assets or plan for retirement.
 
Denial is common.  Most Americans do not like to talk about their money problems. Nor are we taught about how to manage money and build wealth in school.  In addition, for small business owners, denial is often true ignorance.  How many of us got the manual on “How to Run a Profitable Business”?  We don’t know what we don’t know.  Admitting our real money problems also makes us look bad, which leads us to the next money block:  Keeping Up with the Joneses."

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Excerpted from my new book on wealth-building coming out FALL 2020~

"You’d think I would have been happy.  I made $100,000 that year.  The year I got divorced.  I had moved my kids from a very lovely, but very quiet, rural community to an artsy tourist town with great opportunities for my work.  My business had done well, and I had also received a settlement from my ex-husband.
 
I was trying to look good.  I had built a successful business in the healing arts & money coaching, using mindset prosperity tools such as giving & tithing, positive thought, and integrity practices.  I knew how to make money, just not how to manage it.  And I was afraid to look bad.  How could I let the world know that I, a money coach, didn’t have my money act together?
 
So I rented a home in my new town, not understanding that to keep the lifestyle I had as a former wife in a 3 bedroom home I would have to pay an arm and a leg
Due to the inflated real estate market.  I kept going into debt in my business, and did emotional spending to assuage the pain of my divorce.  I was bleeding money all over the place.
 
In my rental house I had all the externals of prosperity:  sheepskin rugs, the most expensive organic food, a thriving business…I kept my business going and never thought twice about how much my business expenses were eating up my
Profit.
 
But underneath it all I felt frightened and powerless.  Like a deer in the headlights.   I fed my kids and arranged playdates with a quiet desperation.  My shame about being a broke money coach stopped me in my tracks.  Behind the scenes my debt was out of control, and I had no plan for my spending. 
 
My dream was to purchase a home for myself and my children.  But that was not to be.  Even though I was current on all my bills, the debt load was too high.  I brought in $100,000 that year but had very little profit after business expenses.  The lenders denied all my requests. 
 
Then my income did a freefall, and I ended up having $1500 net monthly income, with $300 of that being food stamps!   The prosperous couples who had wanted to work with me when I was married slowly fell away.  I began to attract a new crowd of single parents, who unfortunately had little money to pay for coaching.  I kept coaching and teaching them, but I had to hustle and work side jobs to actually bring in money.
 
Little did I know that this low point was one of the best things to ever happen to me. 
 
I went on a journey to understand my feelings, and to understand how to manage money.  I saw a counselor, and began to take on new mentors and
Guides.  It felt like I was drinking water after being in a desert feeling thirsty for so long.  At last!  The help and information that had been missing in my life!  Instead of having just 1 money mentor, now I had a whole team!  I felt empowered and grateful.
 
I learned that wealth is not just about making money.  That is half of the equation.  Wealth is also about what you do with the money once you have it.  Are you managing it generously and wisely?  I learned that if you do not give, you are stingy.  And if you do not save, you are stupid!  New patterns and habits emerged in my life that brought balance.
 
But I had a lot of work to do.  There was a mountain of debt to pay off, a shattered
Income to rebuild, kids to raise, and empty bank account to fill.  I started where I was, as a working single mom, and began plugging away.  The goal to buy a home for myself and my children was my motivation.  It kept me going, through 5 years of intense work on myself and my money situation.
 
Fast forward 5 years to the present:  My life has completely changed.  Yes, I am off of food stamps.  I am debt free, have a large emergency fund, own a home, give 10% of my income away and save 30-50% of my income each month.  My kids earn their own money, and give, save and spend out of what they earn.
 
My new husband and I invest according to our values and watch our nest egg continually grow.  We run profitable businesses that actually cash flow, instead of drag us down in debt.  We are able to give to spiritual organizations & charities a regular percentage of our time & money~even through the Coronovirus!

So how did this turn-around come about?   The short answer:  through a balance of giving and saving.   The long answer:  through 7 powerful steps to wealth building I will unpack throughout this book.  If you stay with me, you will see step by step how to overcome your own obstacles and build wealth while doing good and changing the world!"