On Easter Sunday, I stumbled upon a live stream of a YouTube channel called “Bible Meets Business.” I joined just as a businesswoman, whose name I unfortunately don’t recall but was definitely Kenyan, was giving her keynote address.
What caught my attention was not just her demeanor but also the nature of her business—milling and packing maize meal. It was further intriguing when I later learned that her net worth was in the millions of US dollars. Naturally, I stayed tuned. But it was the one statement she made in her address that really got me thinking.
She pointed out that money has earned a place of secrecy in our lives, and this secrecy about money, in her opinion, was a major obstacle to wealth creation. She argued that money should be something we talk about openly—just like we discuss how we are doing and how work is going. I was surprised that I agreed with her. In an intuitive way, she made a lot of sense to me.
Let us think through this together. When someone asks you how we are or how work is, and we tell them (hopefully honestly), we inadvertently invite counsel or encouragement depending on what we shared with them. In that brief exchange, we listen and mentally sift through the responses of our inquirer to pick insights that we can use to make our experiences of being (how we are) and working (how work is), better. In other words, she was suggesting that by eliminating the well-being of our money from our social discourse, we denied it the benefit of potentially useful insights that could aid its well-being.
Despite this explanation, the idea of speaking openly about the well-being of our finances might still sound bizarre. But take a moment to think about it again. When someone asks, “How are you?” or “How’s work?” there’s an inherent openness in the question, inviting you to share how you really are, is there not? If things aren’t going well—whether in your personal life or at work—the question leaves room for you to express your struggles. By asking how you’re doing, the person inquiring is, in a way, offering themselves up to support you, even if only by listening. So, it wouldn’t be strange to mention any challenges you’re facing in your life or at work, right?
Now, let’s consider the contrast with money. You could be struggling financially, say, overwhelmed with debt, and feeling trapped by it. Yet there’s little to no space to openly talk about it—let alone get support. So you would continue silently on your path of financial struggle, with no insight available to ease your burden or worse, going right on to make one bad decision after another, each one worse than the one preceding it. So, imagine if someone asked you, “How is your money?” and not just once but as regularly as you often get asked “How are you?” and “How is work?” would this not present several opportunities to interrupt this downward spiral to financial despair?
Now, I’ll ask you: “How is your money?”
Is it “fine,” like the standard responses to “How are you?” or “How’s work?” Or is there something else? What if I pressed further and asked, “How is your money, really?” What would your answer be? Is it not enough? Stagnant? Disappearing quickly? Not growing? Or simply non-existent?
You know, while I have never been asked before how my money is? I know for a fact that my money is a certain way. There is a whole lot of words to describe my financial well-being at several points in my life, and I am pretty sure that there is a way to describe your own too. For me, there have been times when it was not there. Then there were times when it was not enough. Other times it was stagnant and then there are times when I was occasionally satisfied with how things were. What about you?
This -the well-being of our money- is just one of many things that can be said about money. In fact, this is the first of a yet to be decided number of articles that I’ll be sharing this month, on the topic of money.
While these articles will not be exhaustive in terms of understanding money, I’m convinced that the few insights that I will share with you will get you thinking a little bit more, better or differently about money. Even better, if you pick one or more of these insights, it might mark the beginning of a life-changing financial journey. Stick around, and we’ll dive into these ideas together.
Regards,
Anna Grace
