(How Losing Millions Gave Me the Richest Life Imaginable)

Today I want to talk about MONEY. 

About how we rob ourselves from the life we were intended to live – because of our flawed relationship to money.

We let MONEY run our lives.

I remember, as if it was yesterday, where I was in my life…. 

I had just lost both of my parents to suicide together, over their confusion over money.

In my own form of rebellion and state of grief, I started filling the void they had left, with WORK and MAKING MONEY. 

And MORE work and MORE money.

And MORE work. So I could make MORE money!

I believed that somehow, making more money would appease my sadness. That it would make my pain go away.

I started spending all of my time in my office, watching ticker symbols.

My life was all about productivity and making the next deal.

Before long, I started feeling a lot of anxiety and fear.

I was completely STRESSED about money. 

This worry took up the majority of my day.

The anxiety became so intense that I remember a few times literally banging my head against the wall and pulling my hair out.

The most ironic part of all this, is that I had inherited my parents’ estate and came into millions of dollars after their death.

That should have been enough….

Yet I chose to trade in the stock market (as my father had done) – and became caught up in mindless & heartless investments.

There was an energetic umbilical cord still attached to my father and his choices, and I’m sure a huge unconscious part of me that still wanted to make my dad proud.

My stress over money soon turned into an OBSESSION with making money, which turned into more stress and the need to make MORE money. 

Which created more of an obsession to make more money.   

I stopped spending time with my friends and lost touch with the people I loved.

I became isolated and spent most of my time in my office alone.

And then I began to REALIZE, that even with all of this money, I STILL wasn’t happy and was anything but secure. 

WHY????

Because, I was basing my happiness and security on a LIE!!!!! 

The lie that I could achieve FINANCIAL FREEDOM. 

I had bought into the cultural hallucination that having money would somehow give me a sense of freedom, security and fulfillment. 

What’s even more insane, is that I had grown up in an environment where my dad had lectured about Financial Freedom, for as long as I can remember.  He was in pursuit of the elusive “it” his entire life, and even after accumulated millions, was NEVER truly FREE and eventually took his life because of his relationship with MONEY. And yet, I was heading down the same path of self destruction.

I became afflicted with the “If/Then – When/Then” Syndrome…. 

IF I could just make X amount of dollars, THEN I would be secure.  WHEN I met my next goal, THEN I would be free to do more of what I wanted.  IF the stock market produced the ROI that I wanted, THEN I would be happy.

I was so focused on making a buck, yet I was killing myself.

I was on the fast track to being the RICHEST WOMAN IN THE CEMETARY.

Ben Franklin said  – “Most people die when they’re 25, but aren’t buried until they’re 75.”  I was definitely dead inside, going through the motions, waiting to be buried.

And then, the UNTHINKABLE happened!!!

The tech collapse happened, and I started losing money VERY QUICKLY!

I remember losing sometimes $75-100K in an hour! I felt completely out of control.

As the market collapsed, so did I.

Eventually I LOST IT ALL.

I didn’t know what to do. 

I felt completely and utterly HOPELESS!

In the blink of a few ticker symbols, I had lost EVERYTHING.

I was penniless and pointless, lying in a bed all day.

I was barely eating.

I was living in gorgeous home in Colorado, yet I didn’t even go outside because I was so depressed.

I was surrounded by so much beauty, yet none of it mattered because I was living in a prison of my own angst.

Soon, my home was in foreclosure and I found myself in an abusive relationship. 

Everything in my world was crumbling around me.

I decided I just couldn’t go on….

I had lost my will to live and decided I was going to kill myself.

But instead…

I reached out to a close friend, and decided to be vulnerable by telling her what I was feeling.

I was so humiliated and embarrassed but I managed to gather some courage and open up to her.

I let it all out.

This choice initiated one of the MOST LIFE CHANGING MOMENTS OF MY LIFE!

My friend looked at me with compassion and understanding. 

She looked beyond my words, beyond my fear and despair, to the truth of who I was. 

It’s very difficult for me to put into words the affect that this exchange had on me, so I’ll just say this….

I felt seen for the first time in my life and with that, felt a pin prick of hope in my heart. 

For the first time in my life, I caught a glimpse of a bigger picture. I began to sense that I was more than just a human being, and there was a point to all of the pain….

I had NO IDEA what the point was, it was just a sense.

But I had HOPE for the first time in a very long time.

For the next 3 years, I was devoted to the path of “surrender” and to “letting go”…(which included letting go to letting go).

… I let go of the illusions I had been holding around my worth and value.

…I let go of all of the false beliefs that had kept me trapped in limitation and hypnotized by the notion that my power, security and happiness existed outside of me in someone or someTHING.

…I started focusing on what was meaningful to me.  Because I choose to live, I was going to make it matter.

I managed to find a way home again, back to myself.

…More than anything else, I REMEMBERED that there is nothing more valuable to me than how I FEEL.

I started to value myself more and more and chose to govern my choices on how I FELT, which was a foreign language to me at the time.

I began to renegotiate my own terms, and discovered the Natural Laws that were governing my personal reality. 

One of the most profound Laws – The Law of Response, reminded me that MY thoughts are creating MY reality! In this empowering discovery, I began going into my mental fitness gym and did “reps” everyday of deliberately choosing thoughts of gratitude and appreciation.  I soon began to see evidence in the form of opportunities coming into my experience and with this, remembered that with all things being energy, I too am energy and govern and shape my reality through the focus of my attention.

I learned to be in harmony with this Law as well as other vital Natural Principles, which changed EVERYTHING!!

Living in harmony, instead of reaction and opposition, allowed me to have an experience of true freedom, fulfillment and EASE (which is something I had NEVER experienced before!)

And now, I experience life in a RADICALLY different way…

…My anxiety has been replaced by a true feeling of flow and trust that things are happening FOR me, not TO me.

…Instead of feeling afraid that things are falling apart, I have an unwavering sense of security because of my connection to my own power. I know that things are actually falling “together” and are unfolding on my behalf – provided I choose to view it in this way.

…I don’t have to struggle to make money anymore — things now feel easy and natural (and I am more successful than ever!).

…Instead of dreading getting out of bed in the morning (or not getting out of bed at all), I wake up inspired, on purpose and excited about the day ahead and what will unfold.

…I have amazing authentic friendships that are truly meaningful to me.  I recognize that my community if one of my greatest resources.

…I make MONEY doing what I love and invest my time in experiences that are life affirming and positive to my soul. I make my own schedule.

…I get to go in nature often, to go on hikes regularly and to travel to beautiful locations all over the world.

…I’m not MONEY DRIVEN, but rather PASSION and PURPOSE DRIVEN… and the outcome is that even though I am still a work-in-progress, 95% of my experience is comprised of joy, love and freedom.

…Everything I do I do out of CHOICE. The word obligation doesn’t exist in my life anymore. I don’t “should” on myself.

I am now living a life that is truly priceless and I have a deep irrevocable sense of inner peace. I have a life that is both emotionally rich and materially abundant.

I realize now that the point of me losing everything in the Tech Collapse, was NOT a “loss” at all, but rather a profound GIFT containing the greatest riches I could have imagined.

No amount of money could replace my discovery of the infinite treasure that exists within me, that I could only have realized through those trials and tribulations.

My former life was no life at all.  I was a prisoner to money and the mental shackles of my material preoccupation. Fill-fullment should never be confused with Fulfillment.

Every experience of pain, struggle and “loss” was really a “gift in disguise” to help me to realize my Self worth beyond my net worth. Each of those experiences afforded me the character, strengths and unique gifts I have today and have enriched me with a life of authentic abundance.