Latest / Marci talks money (and life) / Breaking the Scarcity Mindset: Financial Trauma, Healing, and Growth with Paula McMillan-Perez
Transcript
- Marci: This is another episode of Marci Talks Money (and Life) with MoneyMarci and that's me and I have been privileged to meet wonderful people via my social media presence and guesting on podcasts, and I am thrilled to be able to introduce you to them. Today's guest, Paula McMillan Perez, is a licensed clinical social worker, psychotherapist, social systems and workflow strategists, and host of the Why Don't We Talk About This? podcast. Paula is a talented therapist and coach that works with people to improve their work life balance, create joy in their lives while working to get past a scarcity mindset and financial trauma. She is also a great conversationalist and I am excited to be able to share her with you. And here she is, Paula. Paula: Hey, Hey, and thanks for the intro. Like I may have to, you know, revise my own bio because while I definitely do work with folks on financial trauma and scarcity mindset, that's just been like the last couple of years, because I do a lot of work around anxiety and ADHD. But surprise, surprise, folks that have those two things struggle with their finances and may or may not have had some significant financial trauma. So I think, you know, highlighting all of those things, you know, in my new revised bio thanks to MoneyMarci would be hopeful. So thank you for the push in the right direction. Marci: Well, you know, I got to do my research before I have you. Truth be told, I have guested on Paula's podcast twice now, I think. Paula: Yes. Marci: With always plans to do more because I just love talking to her. And I love talking to social workers because social workers get people who have anxiety, who have issues and whatever else. And so often in life we have issues around money. And when you're having issues with your partner, it's not uncommon that there is a money component to the issues. And so I just love talking to people where we can integrate different areas. I don't just want to talk to financial people, though I do, because they have other information than I do, but people who who express themselves into the world differently and are aware that finance is a part of so many of the other things. So you know, let's see where we go. Paula. Paula: I'm with it. Well, one thing I do want to make sure that I kind of talk about, especially because I also used it earlier in this week in sessions, was during the last time that you came on my podcast, you shared the launch of your app. And I have to say that, even though like I previewed it like before our episode, I find that I use it more than some of my other resources now because the questions that you were able to put together, like they touch anybody. No matter like your race, your religion, your culture, your background. Money is something that impacts all of us, whether we have it, whether we don''t have it, where we want it, we dream about it. And the way that you kind of like frame your questions is really just like straight to the point, but there's like no shame involved. It's like, hey, let's like reflect on this, like is this something that you ever thought about before? And I always kind of test out new things with my husband, like he's my guinea pig, so it was like I don't do anything with my clients or like any activity that I haven't like tried out. So I don't want it to be like, oh, well, like you don't know what this is, Like yeah, I kind of do because I was my own guinea pig. And I will admit that like sometimes I was just like damn, like, this is what it feels like to be on the other side of it. And I don't know very many people in their professional practices that just come out with a resource just to increase conversation. Yes, the knowledge piece comes and you know, we may have to identify like other resources, or we may do additional research. We hopefully may get a financial planner, accountant, bookkeeper, or something. But it increases the conversation around financial literacy, even if that specific language isn't used. And I just kind of wanted to highlight that before I forgot. Marci: Thank you so much. And for those of you who aren't aware, I have an app available on Android. You can just go to the play store. It's called Let's Talk About Money, and you'll see my little icon there and it's conversation starters. So, it's questions for you to talk to your family about. It doesn't have the answers because so many of these questions aren't a black and white answer. They're not an answer for me to tell you what is right for you and your family. It's for the two of you to talk, or the four of you, or whatever your situation is, to talk so you can determine what's the right thing for you. So please feel free to check it out. As I said, it's in the Android Store. You can use it on chromebooks. If you are someone who is educated on your Apple stuff there is programs you can run so that you can run it on an Apple device, but it is not currently available in the Apple Store. So thank you for mentioning that, Paula. I'm so glad that you're liking it and using it and seeing what I intended. So that makes me feel good that I did it. I did it right. Yay, Paula: Yes, you did. And I tell people about it all the time, Like I have a few social work friends who have gotten like their financial social Work certification, even like a few like financial advisors that I'm like, hey, like here's this app that I'm using. Here are some resources that Marci has, Like, I think that the informational piece that kind of takes away a lot of the shame and stigma surrounding people's feelings about it can kind of, you know, reduce it just enough that you can open the mind. And I think that once you open the door, open the mind, open the door, it creates an opportunity to just be like, okay, like am I ready to have this conversation? Maybe not, but maybe if I answer one of these questions, it'll kind of like give me a little clue or maybe activate something in me to figure out, like why does this feel so hard? Like why why have I not talked about this? Or like is this something I talked about with my family? Is this something that I know? Am I completely scared and overwhelmed? And it has also helped me kind of uncover a few things with clients in a more conversational style, because even though you know I am clinically trained in you know a few different modalities, people just need to talk. Like we don't need to utilize you know, the psych and the social work terms, like we just need to like talk. So I just I just wanted to highlight that. And I know some of y'all listening are like I know they planned this, like it really didn't. Like I wanted, I wanted to be able to highlight this because I've been telling people in real life and now I'm telling people in the podcast-land. Marci: Oh and I did not plan on this first bit being a commercial for me. I do appreciate it but let's talk about what you do in your work and how you feel money relates in various ways, or how you came to be working so much in money from a social work standpoint. Paula: Well, that's gonna be the whole episode. But I'll do my best so. Marci: I can always invite you back. I know the boss. Paula: I'm down all right, you have an in, so I'm with that. So I I'm trying to think of where to begin. So I started, well, I graduated in twenty eleven with my master's in social work, but I was working in social services prior, so even when I came out of undergrad, I was in the field. And I purposefully went to a generalist practice program, which basically means it's just general, it gives you like a broad education on all things social work, as opposed to some social work program where you have to choose a concentration. And they can look different, but usually the main ones are like clinical policy or end or administration advocacy. Sometimes there's like a little school social work. Sometimes there's substance abuse, so but certain programs are structured differently. But I felt, even though social work is such a beautiful field, because it is so broad and you can touch on different areas. I wasn't sure at the time like the direction I wanted to go, So I didn't feel like I would have been, I don't want to say successful, but I didn't feel like it would have been me, like it would have been an accurate representation of my educational experience to choose a concentration. So I purposefully chose a generalist practice school. And one of the things that I learned kind of in that journey is that I have more than one interest. And the beauty of the field because it is so broad, is that you don't necessarily have to specialize in one thing. But you know, there is benefit in niching down, which is, you know, one of the buzzwords of like the last decade. But for the most part, I was trauma trained. And part of the reason for that is because I work with historically marginalized communities. I worked with populations that were mandated to attend certain services. So if let's say, for the sake of argument, maybe they were incarcerated, or they were in an alternative to incarceration program, or you know, they got caught up in some things outside and it was like, well, you either do this, or you're going back in, or maybe they were in a residential program because you know, they were in transition, or in recovery, or you know, any number of things. And part of one of the things that I noticed in the scope of that work was that usually some of these clients helped didn't have a lot of access, whether that was due to growing up in poverty, whether that was due to a lack of just accessibility to supports and services, whether that was appropriate education, appropriate literacy. And we know that financial literacy, unfortunately isn't something that is a main focus in school. But even some of these populations I worked with, they didn't get very far in school for a variety of different reasons, so that also limited access. But as a result of it, like we talked about money, but from the lens of I need to get it. Like I need it. Like this is how to take care of my family. Or this is how I stopped myself from homelessness, or you know, so many other themes. And I think that even though I knew it was like an area I kind of wanted to tackle, I wasn't necessarily sure how to go about it. And for me, I was one of those young kids that learned the hard way when, kind of segueing real quick. When I was in college, I was one of those students that fell into you know, those predatory traps for freshmen where like you know, you just got on campus and you're getting like, you know, your posters for your room, and it's like, hey, get a free tote bag or a T-shirt or a radio if you sign up for this credit card. I knew information about credit, like overall, like, based on information. My mom has excellent credit. Like all my friends are like, we want your mama's credit score. Like that was always something that you know, we all aspire to. So I was like, bae, I got this, and I did for a little while, and then I did it because as a broke college student, it's like yeah, because you know, I'm going to work in the summer or I'm going to use my work study money. And it went left. And I was very fortunate, not just fortunate, privileged even that you know, my mom bailed me out of that situation and she was like, listen, this is it. Like if you make you know, these decisions moving forward, like I'm not going to get you out of this. Whereas many people do not have that level of support to do that. And I utilize that example because it's a predatory is because a lot of people don't know how credit works. And they get caught up in a situation that they can't get themselves out of because they don't understand how interest works, the difference between daily interest, the difference between the annual percentage rate, how finance charges work. And it's a lot of jargon. Plus there's the tiny teeny itty bitty legalese at the bottom that no eighteen year old is trying to read. So for a lot of you know of, the work that I have done over the last several years comes from the place that sometimes we just weren't taught. I was fortunate that I was, but I also had, you know, the stubborn streak, and you know, I got this and you know I could figure it out, that put me in a situation I didn't want to be in. Which is a story that I do share with clients because that's just one lens or one lane. But the thing about it is that we're not, like I mentioned before, we're not really taught. So there's a lot of shame and stigma surrounding money management. Surrounding poverty. There has been discussion around oh, like you know, people just need to get organized or get on a budget and they can get themselves out of anything. You can't wish your way out of poverty. You can't. Like it would be great because if that were the case, we wouldn't have so many impoverished communities over and it's not even nationally, internationally, and it's not just communities of color. I know people who identify as white. People who identify as Asian who either grew up in or for one reason or another, live in poverty. And some of us we are one paycheck away from being in poverty. Because I don't even know the statistics, so I don't want to butcher it, but many Americans are living paycheck to paycheck. And if unemployment becomes a significant concern, there's going to be a whole host of additional significant concerns. So because I work in mental health and I know that there has been great stigma around reaching out for support, regardless to whether you have a mental health diagnosis or you're just going through it because the life is life-ing. Many people have something, whether it's a significant financial trauma, and that could be that they grew up in poverty. That could be that they are underemployed, under insured, under resourced, underfunded. So you see where I'm going here with the under and I think that a piece of that just adds on to the weight of the shame that people are carrying because like, I can't wish myself out of it. I can get a second job, but then I burn out. That impacts my health. I don't have the time or the resources to kind of take a day off because maybe I don't have PTO. Maybe I don't have childcare to go to the doctor. Maybe I'm under insured, or maybe I have insurance that's great, but it doesn't have a decent prescription plan and I can't afford my medication. Marci: Right. What people don't realize is even the people in the best neighborhoods or with high paying jobs are living paycheck to paycheck. That this isn't just for people that have low income. There are, there are people that have high income. There are people that came from from privilege through their parents, whatever, and you know their job that they have doesn't earn as much as their parents earned, let's say, or they live a more expensive lifestyle and certainly more expensive than they can afford. That they haven't generated the savings, the emergency. They figure if they pay their credit card monthly minimum, that they're doing okay, and they budget for well, as long as I can make the minimum I can, I can keep going. So it's scarier that the lack of education. You know, people who have money want to learn about it, and they're the ones who can afford to make the mistakes. And it's the people who don't have money or who are living those tight budgets that really need to make the effort to learn because they are that one bad choice, whether their's or someone else's, away from flipping into poverty. Yeah, and then if you think about and I've lived in New York City my entire life, so even though I've visited several different states, you know, there are things that when you grow up in a larger metropolitan area that they don't necessarily resonate with you. In contrast to people that may live in smaller town, smaller communities that also play a role. So a situation that comes to mind is, you know, New York's popular for bordegas or corner stores, and yes, you can get a lot of your basic needs, groceries and things that are really random, and you're like, why is this even in here in a bodega, But the markup is very significant. But you're paying for the convenience of the fact that you didn't have to cross the street. You just have to walk out of your building or walk out of your house and walk to the corner or the middle of the block or whatever have you to get what you need. Now, if you are on a fixed income and let's say you need to buy your basics - bread, milk, cheese, eggs, things of that nature, you can get all of those items. But if you go to the grocery store that's maybe five, six, seven blocks away, you might be able to save money and get it cheaper. Or if you live near let's say a Target, Target sometimes is even cheaper than going to the grocery store. But then there's the accessibility piece. And in New York you can take a bus, you can take a train, A lot of us walk, but what if you live in a rural county in Florida and you don't have a car. And the only store that you have accessible to you is like right outside of your development or your complex. You have to get what you need because that's your only option. So we don't talk a lot about the relationship between our finances and accessibility because sometimes we don't have access. Sometimes it is the privilege. And these are also uncomfortable conversations to have because that also means that we have to admit we don't know something, we don't have something, we don't have access to something, and then that makes us feel that shame, that guilt, a lot of these negative emotions that we're already fighting against because again, life be life-ing and we are constantly in survival mode. And when people are like, oh, but people say we're in survival mode all the time. The way I break that down is it's really easy for us as people to be negative. Nobody knows why. So it's like, damn, I messed up. I stubbed my toe against the bed again. Oh I'm such an idiot! Or I you know, burnt some scrambled eggs. Like this is easy, like a baby could do this. Like what's wrong with me? It comes out very easy, it's very casual. And people are like, I don't understand why, it's just something I've always done. And part of the reason for that is because it speaks to that survival mode. Now, even if we don't and everybody has trauma, there's big T trauma, little T trauma, but everybody has trauma. But the reason I bring this up is because we've had so much transpire in our lives, we don't realize how hyper vigilant, how aware we are that something is gonna go wrong or badly because we're always prepared for it. Because that is a survival instinct that we have had. It's literally in our DNA, like it has been passed down no matter how affluent or whatever, or you know, good stock or breeding that we came from. It's at one of our basic things that we need to survive. Because as people, as human beings, our major goal is to reproduce to be able to keep the species alive. So we have to have our heads at a swivel to make sure that we're maintaining our safety. So because of that, all of that, all that language translates into that, but we don't necessary realize. Oh, we have to put time and effort and energy into switching that mindset and changing it into something more positive as opposed to leaving it fixed in the negative because it's usually negative. So that takes retraining and rewiring of our brains. And if we have a lot of little t traumas or a lot of big T traumas, we have to do even more work because trauma does rewire the brain. So if we have financial trauma, because let's say maybe grandma got her car repoed and she couldn't get to work, and she lost her home and she had to move in with her sister, and then we were all doubled up in this apartment and then it was maybe three generations living in there, and we had to share clothes and all of these things. Then sometimes the scarcity mindset slips in because we kind of had to make do what we had. We had to jimmy rigg things. And we had to kind of get creative and get it together, and that's how we came up. So that's the default. So even if we're doing a little bit better or we're in a space where we feel like we have a little bit more flexibility, there comes some shame at times, especially when these individuals are like, oh, remember how hard we have it. You can't be wasteful. You can't blow your extra salary or your bonus. Ooh, you're going out to dinner. That's a piece of it. And then if you come from an immigrant community where your family, whether it's your parents, your siblings, immigrated from another country and they had limited resources, there's a lot of similarities there as well. That's also a source of financial trauma that we don't really talk about. So when we hear first gen, second gen kids are doing things, like there's a lot of internal work that they have to do when they surpass some of the expectations of their parents, which they wanted because that's why they came to this country. But there's a lot of undoing too, and their money story gets caught up in that. Marci: So how do we break some of these cycles and how do we reach these people that I mean, let's face it, if you're struggling day to day, you're not going to an accountant. If you file your tax return at all, you are going to one of those free sites you're doing whatever have access, some libraries have free tax filers, preparers there, or whatever else. But you're getting whoever you're getting. When I was in college, I volunteered with Volunteer Income Tax Assistance, so I would help these people prepare their tax returns. At that point in time back in the Stone Age, this was manual on paper forms, and they would see me one year and then I'd graduate and they'd see someone else. So they didn't get any continuity of financial care, any continuity of financial education. They basically got their tax return prepared and hopefully a refund off of it. But there was no opportunity for them to, whether through education or through coaching or for whatever, to break that cycle. Paula: Yeah, it turned into oh, this is thing I have to do because you know, the government needs their money, so like I have to do my taxes. And it gets challenging too because even with the window of time. So I believe there's some stipulation in, Marci, this is your you're closer to your wheel house, so please correct me if I'm wrong. There's some stipulation that W2’s and 1099’s and those forms need to be sent out by a certain time. Marci: Well that's by the company that is, so they need to be sent out by the end of January, so you should have yours theoretically by the beginning of February, and now that more of them are distributing them online. Obviously, at the time they send it, you virtually have it in your email box or the link to it with you use your code, But you still have to prepare the tax return to get your refund, and if you are unhoused, and then where do these forms go if they don't go online? And I imagine that there are people out there who don't have smart phones, who don't have access to continual email, that don't have access to to those things. So the question is how how do we help them break the cycle? Because they don't want to be on welfare, they don't want to be on social assistance. They would like to get to a point where they have a more stable life for themselves. You know, and they're thinking, Okay, well, I'll learn about money later on when I have some. Paula: Yes. Marci: And if you don't learn about it, getting some is going to... You can't learn how to swim after you get out of the water. You have to, you have to learn before the boat sinks. Paula: No, absolutely, And part of the reason that I even brought that piece up is because like that brings up triggers for people. Because it's like, Okay, I have to wait either for this thing to come in the mail or get it from work, or just like you said, I may not have access to technology that's gonna enable me to maybe access it faster. And then what do I do? Because I may not know where to go,I may not have the skills or the abilities to even you know, navigate one of these free sites, or have the technology to be able to do it. I may ask a friend or a coworker, and then, because I know it's something I need to get done, I don't necessarily know if where they're sending me is reputable, if they're going to do a good job. I don't necessarily know what questions to ask. I'm also at the mercy of this person, and the hope is that they do a good enough job for me to get a refund. And then I have a lot of feelings about refunds because I'm like, Okay, y'all already got a tax free loan out of me, and I don't get no interest. But that's a different story, and there's all of this surrounding that, and that brings me to thinking of a client that I worked with that she didn't file taxes for like six years. Because as soon as the discussion of the tax season came up, she begun to freeze, and she called herself an ostrich. She would put her head in the sand. Because like it was just too much to deal with because she didn't have systems in place, and we were able to identify that part of the reason she didn't have systems in place was that she grew up fearing what that meant. Because that was something that her parents were fearful of. Her father he was disabled, so he was unable to work. So mom was holding down the house with one income, two children, two adults, and at one point three adults when Grandma came to live and who was also on a fixed income, So that that was a generational trauma that came up for her. Around just taxes. That's just not even all of the other financial things, because she was also divorced, had children. You know, there are other themes that come up. So one of the things that we talked about is just like what are some of the things that you have heard, at least heard from other people around money management, around tax planning, around with like what are some of the terms even if you don't know what they mean, because a lot of times as people, we do not give ourselves credit for what we actually know. We don't think we know anything, or it's just like, oh, that's not my wheelhouse. Like I'm not a CPA, I'm not a tax professional accountant. But there are things that have been floating around that you actually may know a little bit more than you think. So, for example, she was, somebody in an old job had convinced her to sign up for a 401K. So she was having money that was taken out of her check and she didn't even remember where the information is. So it's never something that she was able to kind of log in and access and you know, utilize, you know, the or look at the statements for. So I said, we're gonna leave that for right now, because like that's not one of the priority areas she identified that she wanted to reach. But one of the things that she identified, she's like, you know what I'm paying for you know, my child who's in school right now. I don't have additional resources to be able to figure this out. And I said, okay, YouTube University. Every time I say that to people, they'd be like, oh my god. But the reason that I bring that up is because if we think about the resources that we do have access to. And don't get me wrong, there are people on YouTube that do not know what they're talking about. But let us also kind of filter through what we have access to to look at what the building blocks are. And that's somebody that felt comfortable with technology. I've also worked with somebody who was an older individual and though they were trying to get the hang of it, didn't feel like super confident in like navigating the laptop that they were gifted. They would write down like all their questions on a pad, or like things that came up over the course of like the week or until like we met, because they wanted to make sure that, you know, we talked about these certain areas, so we identified some of the questions that were coming up around Okay, I'm getting closer to retirement, I don't know how this is gonna work. Or a client who is graduating college and is completely terrified of being in the real world because the only job that they've ever really had was like in the summer, and they didn't make enough money to have to file taxes. So it's like, where do I go. Or I'm hearing my friends have high yield savings accounts? What is that? So it's just like we're hearing these terms, but we don't necessarily know what they mean. So it's just like, Okay, we can look them up. Like you can google that. Some of y'all still got dictionaries, We can look them up. We can start with the basics because I look at it and this is also how I describe it and not just my therapeutic work, with my coaching work. Think of it like Legos. Even before all the Lego playsets that, like you know, Star Wars and the flowers and the retro things got really popular, back in the day when I was a kid, we had colors, and we had sizes, and we had our imagination. And we built. So we just need one piece to build on. Keep going from there. And what ends up happening is as you increase your knowledge base, you also increase your confidence level. Whether that's to ask additional questions, identify additional resources, go to that friend or colleague or coworker that you trust, maybe for a recommendation, or just like how do we do this? Not maybe not how I do this? Or how do you do this, but like, how is this something that gets done? And just to add on, I think something else that we could also do a really good job at for those of us who have people that feel comfortable enough to talk about money, have like those conversations like people had Mary Kay parties and Tupperware parties. Let's just get together and be like, oh, man, Like I got a checkbook and I was like, who writes checks anymore? My friend was like, I do, because that's how I pay my rent. And then my other friend was like, really, because I just Zelle my landlord and I just make sure that I put rent, the month, and the year. I even put his whole name in it, just in case so that there's no confusion, because him and his wife… And they were like what these weren't things that some of the other people were even thinking about. Or the fact that when you get a mortgage, you know you can just have like it direct deposited to the mortgage account. Like I have, I've been a homeowner for a few years now. I didn't know that, like they can take care of like my property taxes and my homeowner's insurance all in that one payment. I thought I had to pay like these different people. So I asked, what are the ways that I get these things paid? Because I didn't know. My mom rented. So it's just like, how do we begin to have conversations. Let's start with the people, and hopefully we have at least one person that we feel comfortable enough with to have just general conversations and kind of like access what to they know. Because we're already in a place, in a space where we feel like, oh, I could tell how about this ridiculousness that's happened at work, or this fool that I, you know, got together with from a dating site but he ghosted me. But it's alright because he wasn't ready. If we can talk about those things, we can kind of talk about Man, I had this overdraft and that wasn't cool. But I don't know, okay, but oh, have you tried this? Or oh, like, here's another alternative to hear about what other people are doing. Or even if you don't want to put your own situation out there, oh I saw this thing on the news or TMZ or World Star. I don't even know if people are still looking at World Star. But like, you know, social media and kind of like make it broad to hear like people's thoughts and feelings about it, with if you don't feel vulnerable enough or safe enough in those spaces to kind of identify your own personal situation because it gets the mind going about what possibilities are. And it also helps you feel less alone because many times, especially when it comes to finances, we feel like we're doing it wrong, we're messing it up, we're not gonna have any future, and it's just us. And the amount of people that are struggling is a lot. Like I mentioned, I'm a homeowner. I'm responsible for all of this, when something breaks. We're like and you know what, sometimes I'm like, well, I thought I was gonna buy new tires for my car, but instead I might be buying a new washing machine because mine is making like funny noises. Marci: Yeah. Paula: So it's just like also like how we're looking at the world. And with that washing machine, did I put money aside for those tires and now I have to use toward the washing machine? Am I going to use a credit card? Am I going to use a store card like a Best Buy? Which I'm not because the interest is ridiculous, but like, what are my options? Because the sad reality of it is there's always options. Sometimes there are two bad options. But we have options. So I think that those are some of the ways that we can kind of get started, and I have, I'm still holding out hope, and I will until my dying breath that financial literacy will be something that is taught in schools from since young and it's something that we can build on the same way we build on English and math skills. That these are skills that we can also build on because knowledge is the way that we also set ourselves free from some of these things, because we can create other opportunities. But that's a hill I will die on. Marci: Well, I agree with you. I don't know how we can teach it in schools from the beginning. You just kind of integrate it into the math and that becomes some of the story problems that you talk about, have more and more of them have a financial component. You know, where you talk about not just he had five apples and someone took three apples, and how many apples did he have? And how many people could he make apple sauce for and whatever else, but you have the financial aspect of it. That's more than just doing the math part of it, but understanding the bigger issue of it. So you know, I think finding mentors and finding quality mentors, especially for financial is hard because you know, yes, you go to YouTube university, or you figure out who you want to follow on TikTok or Instagram or whatever else, and you don't know who they are. Now I hold myself out as a CPA, well that's because I am a CPA, but unless you look me up, you may not know that I really am. Unless someone reports someone and says, well, this person is faking it. You don't know what people are and what they say they are, what's real and what's quality of that. You have to make guesses based on how they present themselves or who recommends them to you, or where that's coming through. So that's a little bit scary. One thing I recommend to people is almost everybody, almost every adult, has a bank account. Because you have to, to cast your paycheck to do whatever it is, you need a bank account, even if it's always overdrawn. Your bank is a great place to find a mentor of sorts. They offer more services than you are aware of. They want you to be successful, because if you're successful, you're going to have more money, which means they will have more of your money. So you know when you are looking at what your opportunities might be, where you can ask questions and where you can get information, a bank is certainly a place to consider. To see what they have, to see what they offer. It's frustrating that we have so much communication opportunity and yet there are so many scammers out there. You don't know who's what and what they are, and the fear of people knowing who you are. So I do have periodically people will email me with a question. I have a form on my website where they could even put their question and I wouldn't know who they are because I don't track who puts things in the form, and then I answer those, some of the time on my social media, as a question comes up, I'll say, okay, I got this question, and I address it, whether I know who the person is or not, I don't typically share it unless someone says, hey, I want you to use my name, which no one has ever done, which is fine because if you have a question, a lot more people have that question. You are not the least aware person out there. You are not the only person who doesn't know something, So ask the question. You know, we can go back to my app when you said people you know don't want to talk about something as it's personal. Well, if the question comes up on the app and you're talking about the hypotheticals, they don't have to know how hypothetical your situation is. That that question hit a nerve and you're talking from personal experience. You can say, oh wow, if someone had XYZ happened to them. So I think it's important to have those questions. You might find out you have a mentor you didn't realize. You might find out that you know the answer to your friend's question and they know the answer to your question. If you just figure out, find a way to talk about it. Start a book discussion group and pull out the financial literacy books you know they are available. Libraries are still one of the best free resources we have out there, and now with Hoopla and the other web services, you don't even have to go to the library to make use of their resources and to take the opportunity to learn. The cycle is not going to break without you putting in the effort. You can hire all the social workers. You can hire all the therapists and all the accountants, but if you're not going to do the work to create the change, it's not gonna happen. Paula: No. I agree with that, and I think that sometimes that is the scary part for folks realizing that, you know, as busy as their lives are, or regardless of how many hats that they wear in the places and spaces that they have to show up. Recognizing that I have to kind of carve out time to tackle this. Or not only do I need to carve out time, but it needs to kind of be in like an ongoing process can feel very daunting for people who are already feeling overwhelmed. But one of the, I guess questions or prompts that I pose is that is absolutely true. You do need to be in the place, in the space and have the bandwidth. But imagine what it could be like if this wasn't a thorn in your side, whether it's every payday or quarterly or every tax season, imagine what that could feel like. And then, or I might bust down my miracle question, which is, you know, every social worker's dream to make manifest is if everything was exactly the way that you wanted it to be with your finances or with your taxes, or you had no financial trauma or no scarcity mindset. What would that look like? And how would you know? Some people love the question, some people hate it, but it gets you thinking because it's just like, yes, you know what this is right now that you're feeling and how you're navigating or not navigating your space. But what would it be like if it's the complete opposite? Would it be like if you were on top of it or it was addressed? What space could that relieve in your brain? What space could that create your bank account? Like, what would that mean to you? And I think that because those type of questions aren't always framed when it comes to our financial place and space in life, it makes it harder for us to conceptualize it as a possibility. So I think that you know, in addition to like, you know these resources, even if you're having like a quiet conversation with yourself, like that's where it starts. Even if it's five minutes that's the time you carve out, or if you know you're in the shower, some people, you know, maybe will kinds of things with the shower, like, maybe that's your time. So it's not something additional that you have to find time for, it's just a time. Marci: See, and if they're listening to this podcast in their car or while they're out on a walk, then this is free education. This is free we are your cheerleaders. We want you to be successful. How can we help you? Paula: No, absolutely. Marci: So, wow! This is, we covered a lot of stuff today. Paula: Yeah, I talk a lot. Maybe you noticed. Marci: I love that because you're staying in our topic, You're expressing information that people need to hear, and you have this warm tone of voice that creates this comfortable space. And of course, since this is audio only, they can't see that you are this warm, comfortable person that it's like, oh, yeah, I want to hear her talk. I want to hear her tell her stories and help me figure out how to create these bridges from myself from where I am to where I want to be. Paula: I appreciate that greatly because that is something that I definitely try to keep in mind in all lanes of my work. Especially because one of the big reasons that I was so captivated, I guess, is the best words to describe it, about social workers because there wasn't a lot of representation when I was coming up of people in mental health, of social workers that even look like me. So I always felt like it's important to see people that look similar to you doing work. Doing the work. Trying to model what things should look like and be like, or even that there's another possibility for you, which is part of also how I kind of came into the lane. Like I am the children, the child of immigrance, so like I know what scarcity trauma looks like. I do have ADHD back when way before it was trendy. And everybody said I have ADHD, but it's just like ew you have ADHD, like I remember that. Or the fact that you know a lot of times women either go misdiagnosed or underdiagnosed, or the co-occurrence of anxiety and sometimes depression is much higher with women. So a lot of what motivates my professional work is the experiences that I lived through as well. And I'm not saying that I lived through everything because I also like to learn, and there's a whole host of things I don't know, and it is easier for me now to say I don't know, but I also want to find out. Like if there's something that I don't know, and especially if it's something that could help me or someone else, I do want to find out. And I think that's really important. And on the coaching side of my work, I work with new and emerging school social workers because like, we need these people in schools. It's rough out here in these streets, and if they're burning out, who's going to be there for our children? So I just feel, I was very impacted by this, and as a result, I want to roll that impact forward in a more positive light. And I know that there are some things that affect so many of us, but we're just not talking about it. And you know what, we might not be ready to talk about it, but you know, we might be ready to listen. Because some people will listen and they won't say two things. But we're planting seeds. And at the very least, even if those seeds that we're planting here today do not turn into a deep forest that we can see in this lifetime, the hope is that in future ones that will be there based on the work that we put in today. Marci: Well, I, you already know I agree with you fully, that's why we're here. We're creating that space. We're planting those seeds, and we're helping, we're trying to help to create that path for the next people, to the next generation, the next however many generations, and that path will get smoothed out and it'll get comfortable. And because of the work we're doing right now, because of the work you're doing in all of these various aspects of, and I love that you are coaching new social workers. I mean, that's so tremendous. Paula: Thanks, and again motivated by the fact that I didn't have support. The person that supervised me was a special education teacher. She was wonderful, but she didn't come from a helping profession. She had educational pedagogy, not social work pedagogy. So it's just like you had to learn to build the plane while you were flying it. Not everyone should have to go through that. Marci: Well, you have built a fabulous plane. And while I'm gonna bring the podcast episode into a landing, I am going to say that I'm going to have you back because I just have to. You're too much fun not to have back, and you have so much wonderful information, and I love how willing you are to share your information and your stories and yourself. And if you’ve got anything final you'd like to say before I make my goodbyes. Paula: Thank you for having me on, especially as one of your first few guests. I am honored. I absolutely would love to come back. You're probably gonna have to shut me up again. And for those of you who are just kind of starting out in whatever financial journey that you are taking, just try to remember to give yourself grace. They say Rome wasn't built in the day. Your financial journey is your journey. I know a lot of times you like to focus on the destination, but there's a lot more richness to be had in the journey. So embrace whatever it looks like, every day we get one percent better. Marci: I will have a link to Paula's website and podcast, Why Don't We Talk About This in the show notes and this is MoneyMarci signing off from Marci Talks Money (and Life). And thank you again Paula, and we'll see ya. You got this. Paula: Until next time.