and Jacob. Bernie for giving me the space and encouragement to follow my passions and Jacob for being my guinea pig, my heart and my inspiration.
I'm eternally grateful to all of amazing colleagues I have the pleasure of calling my friends over my career who have led, empowered and showed me that anything is possible. I learned so much about business, leadership and grace from each of you.
To my girls, my chosen family, whose unwavering support, compassion and honesty I cherish. To my Mom, brother Michael and sister Karen, who helped to guide and shape my experiences and my person as I grew, these memories and experiences led me here.
To everyone at Wiley for taking a chance on me and my book. Thank you for turning my scribbles into something more.
Finally, a huge THANK YOU! to all the others who encouraged me along this journey and have been a part of making this dream come true.
Introduction
In addition to being chefs, therapists, nurses, chauffeurs, and more, parents are inevitably teachers, despite most of us not having a degree in education (or for that matter, in any of these professions). For so many facets of parenthood, there is no guidebook or instruction manual. As parents, we tend to focus most of our energies on the emotional and physical wellbeing of our children. I propose we must also focus on their financial wellbeing.
Children are extraordinary learners from a very young age. They master concepts, language, walking, negotiating, and more in just their first few years. Yet we typically don't engage our children in learning about financial matters until much later in life, if ever. This is a mistake. In fact, perhaps because of this mistake, many parents never truly become knowledgeable about basic finances, let alone master their own.
According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, “financial wellbeing” is defined as “a state of being wherein you have control over day-to-day, month-to-month finances; have the capacity to absorb a financial shock; are on track to meet your financial goals; and have the financial freedom to make the choices that allow you to enjoy life.” My definition of financial wellbeing is much simpler. Financial wellbeing is a state of clarity, purpose, and direction; it is not separate from your personal wellbeing, in fact, financial wellbeing is inextricably intertwined with your overall health. We must begin to incorporate all aspects of wellbeing into our daily lives: emotional, physical, and financial, in order to optimize our personal health. And it must begin at a very young age.
As someone with a career in finance, I want to help you have important conversations and experiences about money with your children. Recognizing and making the most of “teachable moments” as they present themselves can help shape your children's future attitudes and behavior around their finances and give them a sense of financial wellbeing. After all, parenting is, if nothing else, teaching our children to make smart choices that allow them to enjoy life.
I have a son of my own, Jacob. My husband, Bernie, and I have worked hard to lay the groundwork to help him create smart and healthy financial habits. Starting when he played with a toy cash register as a toddler, I tried to teach him how credit cards work. He was too young to fully grasp the lesson then, but our conversations about money evolve as he grows up. I wish I had the same open communication with my own parents when I was a kid. Instead, I grew up like many children of my generation where money was a taboo topic in our house. When I asked my parents about their salaries, I was told I was being crass and inappropriate. It made me feel that money was bad, something never to discuss. It took me years to correct this negative association. Never forgetting how that made me feel, I want to make sure that Jacob knows only open and honest communication about money that helps him build the foundation of a successful and healthy relationship with his own finances and in his life.
This is not to judge my parents' parenting. As parents, we are all often just treading water, doing the very best we can. But I do think we need to pay attention, listen closely, and be present when it comes to talking about money and finances. Our kids so desperately need guidance. I encourage you not to underestimate the people and lessons in your children's lives and the permanent impact they can have on their financial behaviors, attitudes, and overall wellbeing. I was fortunate to have close friends throughout high school and college who were taught basic financial concepts and did offer guidance that intrigued me—so much so that I wanted to learn and understand more about how best to earn, invest, and spend money. Maybe this is what led me to my current profession as a financial advisor.
As parents, we must prioritize teaching our children smart financial habits while attributing positive connections with money. Today's technological landscape has made teaching kids about money increasingly difficult. Consider that the way most of us were introduced to money was with actual dollars in hand. We walked into a store, picked out what we wanted, and had to figure out how many of those dollars to hand over. Today, children have gift cards, online shopping, and apps for purchases and as a result they can go years without ever really handling money other than play money from that toy cash register.
We so often hear the word “entitled” to describe kids today. I personally think the word is overused and incorrectly applied, except when it comes to the expectations children have about getting things—then it's right on point. The question is: Why do our kids feel so entitled? Why do they feel as though they have the right to simply “get” everything they want simply because they want it?
The answer is that the culture we live in, and many of us, have fed into this environment of instant gratification for our children, and unless we figure out how to break the cycle of expectation, we will set our kids up for failure as adults, particularly when it comes to their becoming financially independent and successful. So, let's stop blaming our kids for their sense of entitlement and do something about it. Melinda Gates, who has more money than most of us can ever dream of, recently said about raising her children that she could never say “No, you can't have that item because we can't afford it”; what she did instead was help her children understand that just because you can afford something doesn't mean that you should buy it.
When I was in college, only a lucky few had parents who paid for all their college costs and expenses. Today, for many, parents paying for college is an expectation. In fact, not only are we paying, but we start planning for these costs when our kids are right out of the womb. Many people save more for their children's college than their own retirement. I'm not suggesting we shouldn't plan for our children's future. Bernie and I are in fact saving aggressively for my son's college education. As a mom, like most, I want the best possible future for my son, and I know a college degree will push him toward his future earning potential. However, we want him to understand the value of that degree, our expectations of him, as well as the cost of each class and each missed class. We try hard to reinforce that we will help him because, through his hard work in school and sports, and as a good friend and community contributor, he has earned our support; there is no free lunch. Earned is the operative word.
When I think of the struggles of raising children to be financially competent adults, I think of the Chinese proverb: “Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.”
Feeding all of your child's financial wants day in and day out can create a cycle of dependency and a lack of resourcefulness on the part of your child. I hope after reading this book you can teach your children how to feed their own financial needs and wants and ultimately set them on a successful path toward their own financial wellbeing. I also hope this book will help adults who may not have a healthy relationship with money to reflect on the reasons behind their own financial habits and begin to live a life of financial wellness.
I'd like this book to be used as a tool to help you guide your children, and to be shared with your children. The goal is to help raise strong, educated people who have the know-how and desire to set and achieve financial
