CHAPTER 1
The Money Type Promise
People always ask me where the money is. The other day, after signing off
from my phone-in radio show, I opened an e-mail from a young Tennessee woman
with just such a request. Her story struck me as both poignant and typical of
what so many people are going through in their efforts to better handle their
money. It went like this.
(Continued below ...)
"It's been one of those rough years," Holly wrote. "I've had a shopping
problem that my husband and I attacked head-on and have, for the time being,
been able to control. I leave my credit and debit cards with him so I only buy
what we absolutely need on a day-to-day basis. Unfortunately, he didn't get hold
of my cards before I ran us into serious debt. Now we are trying to dig out of
the $10,000 I owe plus pay off some costly repairs on our roof. I feel like I've
laid my head on a chopping block and now the ax is swinging. How can we deal
with debt? Who can help us catch up? Frankly, I'd just like to run away. I'm
terrified."
I was particularly struck by this e-mail for one reason. Holly's "rough year"
sounded all too familiar. I felt as if I'd heard about it, or variations on the
theme, many, many times before from people all over America who also seem unable
to manage their resources. Naturally, the details are different, but the
urgency, and the sense of feeling lost about money issues, were the same.
Consider:
- Peter from Florida, running a small, successful real estate firm who is
consumed with worry about how to save for his children's college education.
- Frank and Ellen from New Jersey, who are living so close to the vest they
can hardly make it from payday to payday while sitting on a pile of savings they
are too afraid to touch.
- Maria, a devoted government employee from Alabama, living well within her
means but feeling frustrated by her unrealized dreams.
- Sam, a California freelance graphic artist who is in demand but can't
figure out where all the money he takes in is going.
One thing is true: People everywhere work hard and want to live better.
Often, they can overextend themselves in their desire "to live the dream" and
then get caught with bills they can't pay. Or they are doing well but live with
the fear that they may lose it all-and may not have any idea how to manage what
they have to improve their lives.
In more than two decades as a financial commentator on radio and TV, a
lecturer, author, and Wall Street correspondent for Money magazine, I've spoken
to and advised thousands of people-some successful, some struggling-on how to
solve money questions. But no matter where these people fell on the continuum
between haves and have-nots, I realized that I was speaking to many of the same
individuals over and over again, people who were asking me for the same advice
for the exact same financial problems.
Obviously, they were not following my advice, yet they kept contacting me!
What was going on? I had to be missing something. At first, I thought it was
simply a matter of answering greater attention to detail.
Determined to help, I would enthusiastically explore the details of their
situation and offer carefully considered financial advice tailor-made for that
person's income, holdings, responsibilities, and needs. Truly, it seemed to me,
all these people needed was sound advice from an attentive financial expert for
them to make some significant changes with their finances. But I know now that
expertise alone isn't the answer. I finally realized that the "What do I do
now?" to which I'd been responding with such optimistic fervor was actually only
the first half of the question. The second half is, ". . . given how I feel
about money."
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Copyright © 2006 by Amherst Enterprises, Ltd., and Lynn Sonberg Book
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