Leading with Power & Purpose

119. Women & Wealth: Strategies for Financial Freedom and Empowerment

• Sabine Gedeon • Season 5 • Episode 119

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What role are your childhood experiences with money playing in your current financial identity? Did you learn the value of a dollar or the weight of financial stress? Understanding this hidden influence can be the key to unlocking healthier spending habits and financial freedom.

In this week's episode of Power, Purpose & Prosperity, host Sabine Gedeon speaks with Christine Beese, CEO of Untangle Money, about the challenges women face in financial literacy and decision-making. Christine went from dropping out of high school to pursue an athletic career, to successfully building a career within the Financial Services sector.

Listen in as we explore the systemic barriers and the emotional aspects of money, along with the need to align spending with personal joy. 

Key Takeaways:

  • The importance of addressing financial anxiety, particularly among women
  • The emotional and psychological aspects of wealth and money management
  • The societal messaging around money and differences in financial literacy between men and women
  • The impact of gender bias in economic theory and the need to empower women in making financial decisions

What You Will Learn in This Episode: 

  •  (02:17) Christine shares her unconventional career path, from dropping out of high school to becoming an engineer and later transitioning into finance.
  •  (05:48) Christine talks about starting Untangle Money in May 2020 and the challenges of balancing work and family life.
  • (11:17) The challenges women face in male-dominated industries, including imposter syndrome and the impact of caregiving responsibilities.
  • (15:56) Christine offers advice and support for women experiencing challenges in the corporate environment, emphasizing the importance of self-validation and seeking small ways to make progress.
  • (21:46) The significance of planning, mental health care, and finding supportive communities in personal and financial growth.
  • (25:25) Exploration of healing from traumatic experiences related to money, self-worth, and the impact of upbringing on financial beliefs.
  • (29:37) Insights on generational wealth, financial literacy differences between men and women, and the impact of societal messaging on financial behaviors.
  • (35:14) Discussion on the emotional attachment to money, finding joy in spending, and the holistic nature of wealth.
  • (43:59) Overcoming perfectionism and embracing mistakes as valuable lessons and not to strive for perfection.

Connect with Kristine

Book Recommendations:

  • Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men
  • Who Cooked Adam Smith's Dinner?

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HOST INFO:

Sabine Gedeon is a dynamic force in the world of leadership and personal development. As the Founder of Transformed Leadership Institute and CEO of Gedeon Enterprises, Sabine leverages nearly 20 years of experience to guide clients in both startups and Fortune 500 companies. Her unique approach combines human-centered principles with tech-enabled solutions, delivering customized programs for leaders at all levels to tackle crucial leadership and talent development challenges.

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ADDITIONAL SUPPORT:

Download Free Resources - https://sabinegedeon/gifts
Get Coaching Support: https://meetwithsabine.as.me/Discovery

Sabine:

Well welcome. Happy Friday. I'm your host, Sabine Gideon, and I am excited to bring you another installment of the POW of Money series. So without further ado, I wanna introduce this, uh, amazing powerhouse. So, Christine Beezy is the c e o of untangled money and helps women reduce their anxiety and gain clarity about their money. With over a decade of experience in the finance industry, Christine shares the strategies employed by high net worth individuals with the masses she believes healthy conversations around wealth, including knowing where you are today, where you wanna go, and how you will get there. So, perfect timing for our conversation, with that, welcome to the show, Christine. So excited to have you and to jump into this conversation.

Kristine:

Yeah, I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for having me.

Sabine:

Absolutely. All right, so we're gonna get into the amazing work that you are doing over at Entangle Money and how you even, you know, shifted from the, the multiple career paths that you have had, uh, in your short time on Earth. But before we get into that, tell us a little bit about, you know, your career journey and, and some of the catalysts or big, big life events, if you will, that led you to making the transitions that you've made so far.

Kristine:

Yeah. Um, I started out, so I actually dropped outta high school, which I think a lot of people find, uh, surprising. But I skated full-time and then I got my g e d at night school and then, and then studied engineering. Um, so I had already started at, on a bit of an untraditional path. Um, so. I became an engineer. I was actually out in the oil and gas industry here in Canada, so the Texas of the North. And it was during the boom time and I made lots of money, which is a bit garish to say, um, but I'm trying to normalize that, right. It, it's, I think it's important that women do make money and, and, and are confident in, uh, you know, saying that they were successful. So, I, I had a small company. I had hired a bunch of my friends. We did a lot of great work. I made quite a bit of money and I didn't know what to do with it. So I went to a bank and I talked to my bank branch advisor, and it was a really uncomfortable conversation. And I, I hadn't studied oil and gas engineering. It was just, um, I had studied something in more of the tech space, but we had just had a bust in that space and oil and gas was booming, so it was just somewhere I could get a job. So I wasn't really passionate about oil and gas, but I was really interested in figuring out how to make my money work for me. Because I, there was something there. I knew I was supposed to do something with it, but I, I was an engineer. I didn't know. So I started reading all these books and I went back to school and I got an mba, and then I ended up on Canada's largest trading floor. I became a static analyst. Then I ended up helping invest money for wealthy Canadians. And then I, I had children along this time at this time, and I, I sort of felt this real career plateau. It was su, it was as if suddenly I wasn't the rising star. I wasn't being seen as a high potential employee anymore. I wasn't being, I was, I felt like I just wasn't getting traction there. I. And I, and, and something happened at work where they wanted to expand their women's initiatives, but they didn't have any meaningful progress to show for them. So they were spending all this money and they weren't getting any me meaningful progress. Um, and I was a mom and I was like, I want, really wanted to give back to the world in a way that I maybe wasn't as important for me when I was getting established. And so for the second half of my career, I wanted to give back to this conversation about women and, pushing that conversation forward so that, you know, I spent my whole life in male dominated spaces. So I was looking at the intersection between women and money and financial planning. When I invested money for wealthy individuals. They all had a plan. My job was just to execute that plan. But when I looked at my friends, we were all. Investing, but we didn't really know, like with no end goal or like, there was no plan in place, so it was hard to know what we were doing. So that's how it kind of came about. And then we've learned a lot. I thought it'll be simple.

Sabine:

It hasn't been,

Kristine:

uh, we learned a lot, we did made a lot of mistakes and we've been really fortunate to be called in by the people we're working with and you know, telling us. You know, I, I really felt judged when you said that, or, you know, I really didn't see, feel seen when you didn't include this, or we've been really, we've been really fortunate, um, and we think we have come up with something that really helps women and, and is making a difference. And, and, you know, we see it, we see a 30% reduction in financial anxiety, which is women's number one source of stress. So I feel that I'm. Doing what I had set out to do, as in pushing that conversation, making the world better. Now I just need to figure out how to get more people, um, aware of it. So, yeah.

Sabine:

Yeah. So when did you actually, uh, start untangle money?

Kristine:

The year May, 2020. So I had a two year old, a four year old, and a six year old at home. And that first year we probably got three months worth of work done. Okay. It was, it was just not a productive year, but it was an important year for. Um, just making sure everybody got through everything, with all the uncertainty and, and that we were safe and healthy and yeah. Managing. So it's been three years, but it feels more like two and a. Yeah.

Sabine:

Yeah. I, uh, I wanna circle back to that too. So a, a few gems that you dropped there. So, you know, first of all, like, kudos to you, because obviously your, your passion towards figure skating caused you to drop outta school. But that didn't, that didn't st you didn't stop there, right? Like, you continue that pathway and then the, the piece that I love is that you. While there is a, a slight social discomfort with talking about money and saying that, you know, we make a lot of money, or you made a lot of money during that time, I like the fact that you were real vulnerable and honest and that you, like, you recognize there's still a little discomfort in you saying that even though you live in this space and you have, you know, allowed others to be. Super, super successful. Um, I think that that's important to highlight because, you know, part of or big reason why we're having this conversation is so that we can get more women comfortable with having conversations about money, comfortable looking at where they're, where they are experiencing discomfort and stress when it comes, uh, to money. So thank you so much for, for modeling that in real life and it wasn't even planned.

Kristine:

Yeah. Um, It's interesting, we, we sort of walked into a use case we weren't expecting, which is we talked with a lot of entrepreneurs and, and you know, we hear this all the time from women. I don't wanna take advantage, I wanna be able to help people. Um, and what we, we help them do is they, you know, they come in and they, they make this amount of money and it, they're covering all the costs that they need, but they miss the retirement piece. They miss building up a saving or investing for their retirement. And when we show them what it costs, it almost, it's almost like it gives them that. Validation. There's something there that we, a lot, just a lot of female entrepreneurs seem to need to justify their price. Um, and when we show them and they're like, oh, I, I really need to make, raise my prices. And um, it can be a hard conversation for women cuz we do feel this sense of community. We do wanna give back. We do want to add value, we don't want to take advantage of people generally. Um, and so it can be challenging to sort of square those two things. Success with feeling like. You're not good enough or, or that, that someone else has to pay more for that. You know, I think that can be, it's very, it's, I, it's find it fascinating.

Sabine:

Yeah. So, uh, just so I understand, you work with entrepreneurs and, uh, professionals in the traditional corporate tracks.

Kristine:

We work with regular women. So if, um, how we define that is to work with the wealth management industry. Um, In Canada, the minimum is usually a million dollars in investible assets so that you can get an a wealth advisor. Otherwise, you're serviced by the bank branch generally. Um, some of, there are some places you can have a little bit less money, but that's money you can invest with them. Um, And so we would work with anybody who doesn't qualify for that. And sort of probably when you're getting up to the$200,000 in income, you probably need better help. Or you'll probably find someone who's building a book of business and they'll work with you. But below that, regular women, we wanna give them better, a better decision making tool around their money.

Sabine:

Yeah. All right. There's so many places that I could go with this. So, and, and the other thing that I, I wanted to touch on that you mentioned, uh, during your intro there is that. Know, you had climbed up the ranks in traditional, you know, work environments, and then you had children and you felt, and you experienced this, uh, plateau, right? Whether it was real or imagined or whatever, but like, you felt it, you were experiencing it. And so I think that's another key point for us to bring up because, you know, when you look at wealth building or you look at long term, um, you know, comfort if you will, with, with building out whatever that, that end goal is gonna be, um, more so than men. We as women, we have to step away from the workforce more often, right? Or, and even when we do and we come back and we're swinging, there's still now other considerations that are taking place, right? And, and chatter in our heads around, am I still good enough? Am I still smart enough and whatnot? Yeah. And so there is a, there is a hard cost to. Having to leave the workforce and come back, um, and reacquaint yourself and reprove yourself, and then go out and then come back. And, and so I think that that's an important thing to highlight, uh, for those who are listening, that this is, this is common. And, and it's a huge part of why the pay gap exists. I mean, there are other reasons, but it, it's a huge part of why it exists. So I'm curious, you know, as you started to feel like, okay, I'm not able to make the impact that I thought, you know, I could make. And, you know, the environment is also not reflecting back to me. You know, what I would want at this stage. What, what were some of the things that you worked through or had to think through or, mindset work that you had to do to help you get to a place where, one, you were able to mill build up and maintain your confidence, um, so that you can recognize what was happening and then also take that step into, you know what I, I wanna do something different.

Kristine:

Yeah. Um, It was a, so there's a few things that you've not, you're not sure of when you're in the situation, or at least I wasn't sure of when I was in it. I didn't know, was it the industry or was it the company, right? Like was it specific to the organization I was in and its culture or was it at the industry? So I did try a different bank just to see like was it maybe the. Just the organization. There were less women at that one. Maybe there's more women at this one. Better representation. They seem to be doing better things in the space. Um, they had a women's initiative that was very promoted. Um, and then it was also about, how do I mitigate all of the, all of the things that I need to be able to do in life find? So for me, that's financial. How do I pay for daycare? How do I make my mortgage payments? How do I. Um, you know, feel like I'm not negatively impacting my family. And, and you know, a lot of people have generational needs, so caregiving, so we can be sandwiched. You might have elders that you're also supporting financially. So how do I find ways to structure my life that, that we can, that this will be a good experience for, and I'm not being detrimental? And so one of, one of those things was, you know, we, we live in a smaller house. We have, we rent out a basement. Those that kind of helped us have income that wasn't, that I wasn't generating some of my previous investments give us a little bit of cashflow. So I was able to kind of, and I'm very fortunate in this way, but I was, I mean, we're able to live just kind of comfortably enough that I can do this and take this on. But that was a huge conversation. And then, um, you know, imposter syndrome, I don't even know if we wanna go into that, but you, you know, how do I, like the entire industry is telling you you're doing something wrong. It, it can really. Uh, great on you. So we were, I was so fortunate. We came across the World Economic Forum, says that financial planning should look different for men and women because of our, exactly what we said, babies different life cycles, different caregiving responsibilities, and, and, and we live longer. So, you know, when you, you get these little moments that really you hang onto as an entrepreneur when you're trying to do something that support and bolster that you're on the right track and you have to kind of. I think you have to ha want to take a risk sometimes, you know, you just wanna make a change and, and if you feel like it's safe to do, you, you can do it. I think, I think it's even more impressive when people feel do it and they don't feel safe doing it. Cuz I think sometimes they're not given any options and they, they're able to overcome that and still transcend it. So, um, I think I was fortunate and. And I hope I answered your question actually.

Sabine:

Yeah, I have a couple of, of, of follow ups and thoughts there. So, you know, interesting enough, I, I had a discovery call with, with, and this, well, it's a client, but during the time of the discovery call, she also was in a, uh, male dominated, environment. And, you know, at the time maybe there were like one or two, above the director level that were women. And while she was very, you know, proficient in her job and, and excellent in what she did, like, and she kept getting tapped on the shoulder to rise up, she had this resistance because she le literally said, you know, I feel like I have a target on my back. I feel like the minute that I step into this higher level role, right, and this, this more visible role. Um, not only are the expectations gonna be different, but now, you know, obviously you have to, your being is a lot different and, and that shifts. So Obviously you, you were able to evaluate like, is it the environment that I'm in? Is it the banking that I'm in? Like, and then you kind of just made the decision that, you know what, no, they're, it's time to go, uh, it's time to go. But for those who are still in corporate environments and they're feeling that right, regardless of whether, they had to step away for child childbirth or other things are happening in the organization. You know, just knowing what you know today, like what advice would you give them? Um, in terms of just first steps on just moving just a little bit past all of the fear and all of the inner critic that's happening in the moment.

Kristine:

So the first thing I really wanna state to all those women is, Please don't think it's in your imagination. There's a lot of research that supports what you feel and there's a lot of research that show, you know, you can look at the glass cliff that shows that it's true. Right? There is, and, and you know, especially if you experience intersectionality, sometimes you have to not only be the only woman but the only person of color or the only gay person, or like there's, and. Those communities are not only looking to you to advance the cause, so there's pressure of being the perfect only or the perfect one of a few. Um, but then also there's this idea that maybe you didn't earn it and, and all these other things, um, tokenism. And so please, please, please know that despite all the gaslighting, you're probably gonna hear and all the. Um, imposter syndrome, you are probably feeling something that is actually true. And that act that took me a long time to come to realize that I wasn't just not perfectly contorting myself into the being the imperfect employee. and then I think there's things you can do while you're still working to test, um, what you're doing. So for me, I went to Hackathon, that was a Woman's Focus hackathon, and it was like I had found my people, you know, I was like, oh, like, um, and, and so that was a weekend event that I could go to. Um, and so maybe you could start a newsletter or start a Facebook group or, I don't know, find a small way to test whatever it is. Maybe it's informational interviews with people at that in a different, um, you know, industry, but they still use your role. So like, finance, ops, hr, marketing, every business needs these. So a lot of our skills are transferable. So maybe it's having conversations with people in inside that industry that you're thinking might be better fit, um, and making sure that you're, you know, learning about it, getting the ins and outs, finding out what's the same, what's different, and, and. So finding ways to almost like bolster yourself, but without, without a lot of risk on the table. So doing that slowly, um, that's, that's where I would start. And if you can afford a coach, um, Some of my greatest moves came during times when I had professional coaches, and sometimes I think it's so funny that I, you know, I had to coach most of my life as a skater. Why do I think it's so weird to have a coach as a, as a professional? And, um, so I, I, this one woman I heard speak, she's a, you know, powerhouse in Canada, and I just love the way she addressed the me Too question. And I kept talking about it and I kept talking about it and my coach said, I really want you to go tell her. What it meant to you and ask her to be your mentor. And I, I only did it to satisfy my coach. I didn't do it thinking, you know, like, she must get, I don't know, like whatever. So I was like, I just wanted to come back to my coach and say I did it. I'm coach full. And, um, and the woman came back, she said, I was happy to give you half an hour for coffee. Let's sit and then see where it goes. And, and she's still a mentor of mine today. And, um, And so, yeah, like finding what you, I don't know. It's a bit of self-discovery, finding what you need and then finding small ma ways to move in that direction and they, it bolsters you. You feel like I'm doing something and you it. Then the politics become less important cuz you're kind of opening windows because you see all the doors are closed. Like find your windows and open them.

Sabine:

Oh, I love that. I love that. And actually, you, you, uh, made the way, uh, for the next question that I was gonna ask is really around, you know, some of the. Internal work that needs to get done, right when, when you're making a transition. I mean, it could be from, you know, one level to the next level, or it could be you're moving from one job to another job or city or whatever the case may be. But I think the thing that I've recognized within myself and certainly within my clients, um, and just the space that we're in, right? We call it coaching, consulting, whatever it is. There's not enough talk around the, um, the growth process and what that looks like. You know, we're always excited about the end result of growth or the end result of, of moving and taking a leap into something new. But there's, there's a deep ditch that happens before we get to that mountaintop. So I was gonna ask, I'm curious, especially for you having been on the mountaintop and having to mm-hmm. Reconcile within yourself that, like, essentially you're starting all over again. What was, what were some of the support mechanisms you had in place or that you put in place to help you through? That process in addition to planning in addition to your husband, in addition to like all of the financial pieces? Like what, what were some of those more emotional or, um, mental and even spiritual things that you had in place? Yeah. Well, I've done, um,

Kristine:

I've done a lot of counseling. I, I think I was pretty early on that I struggled with the depression a lot. Um, especially with ending, and I think it's coming out, it's not so unique or it's pretty common amongst athletes. You, you have such a strong identity. Tied to being an athlete and a high performer. And, and it's really, I found it really easy to make decisions, right? So we're like, am I gonna have a beer? Probably not. It's not gonna help me. You know, I'm, it's not gonna improve me as an athlete. Am I gonna smoke? Probably not. Right? And, and like, am I gonna make good food choices? So it, it was a real strong North star. It was a real identity that was tied in. And so I did a lot of work around that, and I think through some, so if you have access to a therapist of any kind, there's so many different styles. There's so many different people. I think most of us have some sort of trauma in our system or some sort of places where we overreact when we shouldn't, you know, like, um, I think there's just a lot of great work that can be done around mental health and, and. And, and working on yourself and, and to your point, right? Uh, I think we get excited about standing on top of the mountain. And, and, and sometimes we forget that when you zoom in, you know, there's a, there's depth pits of despair and like, just protracted pits of despair you have to climb out of. And, and, and the goal isn't that to avoid the, the downs, the goal is to come out higher than when you went in, right? So it's like, it could be a long plateau, but if you're here, that's still, that's still movement in the right direction. So it's not about, Culminating with some end goal. Actually. Everything in life is a journey, right? It's, it's, it's moving positively in, in a different direction, in a way that is important to you. So, you know, we talk about planning, um, and we call, we call it a financial plan. And for some reason people are, I don't know what that is. And I'm like, but you know, if you were to eat healthy, you put a meal plan together. If you wanted to run a marathon, you might have a training plan. It's no different with your money. Um, and then when you come back to sort of, Tools that you put in place for being an entrepreneur. It's similar, right? You have, you put in a pla, you put a target, um, and some of them are completely unrealistic and you have no idea. Um, and then, and you put plans in place to get there. So what did I specifically put in place? I, I definitely kept working on my mental health. I, I definitely look for ways to, um, have outlets. You know, exercise is important for me. Um, And, and I've, you know, having the mentor, having a coach from times I, I, I don't have one right now. It's a bit too expensive for us. Uh, but I do have mentors and advisors that I've met in the ecosystem, so they kind of serve a similar purpose. Um, and it's if you can, if you can find your tribe or finding places that inspire you. Cuz sometimes the neat thing about the internet is now we can find people that can help. Us feel community even when we're isolated. So that's great, but finding the ones that work for you and leaving the rest behind, right. Find what works, leave the rest, um, so that you can be inspired in moments when you need that, right? Like I would, I would be totally lying if I said, It's been a great journey the entire way. Like there are days where I don't wanna get outta bed, I feel like I failed everyone. I feel like the, like a giant neon loser sign on my forehead and, and you just feel like it's not working. And then randomly or serendipitously some, something comes up and people are like, oh, if someone says something nice to you, like I, I, this, the one that I remember the most. Right now is, is still this woman saying you, I don't think you understand how much you've changed my life. And like I I, I've said it a few times because I hear it a lot when I need to. And so it's just, you know, little things can really move the dial a lot. And, and being graceful with ourselves and knowing that we're on a journey and, and we may never get to the top of that mountain, but maybe we were never supposed to be there. Maybe it was, maybe we were supposed to go a different way anyway.

Sabine:

Yeah. self-compassion is, is huge on this journey, whether you're an entrepreneur or not. If you have a passion and a desire to do something great, to make an impact or leave a legacy in the world, um, it's, it's going to take a lot and it's going to take a lot from you, and it's gonna require that, you know, as, as you're pouring out. You are also allowing other people or other things to pour back into you so that you can continue on the journey to make the impact. Um, so a couple of of things that you said that I, I just wanna touch up upon and then I, I wanna talk about how, um, you know, specifically based on the clients that you've worked with, where you see, um, you know, the pitfalls and where you see like the, the light bulbs turning on and, and people being very successful. But before we get into that, one of the things that you said earlier was around, you know, the women entrepreneurs like, or even when they come to you for financial planning and feeling that resistance around, you know, looking at the money and deciding Right. And just being like, oh, this is just enough. Um, I have a theory on why that is, and part of that is because of my own. Um, a journey towards healing around money, and since some of my clients, you know, part of what. As I look back on my journey, part of what kept me from, you know, charging what I should have been charging or even getting to a place where I was consistently looking at my money, is because it required me to put that mirror up. It wasn't just about money. It was my entire identity. It was my self worth. Yeah, it was, all of these things were tied to it, and so based on my experiences, like I, I didn't even realize as a full-blown adult that I had all of these traumatic wounds tied to this. External thing. Yeah. Um, and so, you know, going through that healing process, it forced me to do a couple things. It forced me to look at myself and take accountability for the decisions that I had made. Right. Knowing or unknowing. Consciously or unconsciously, whatever it was, just looking at it without judgment and taking accountability that I made these decisions. It also forced me to have to look at my parents and my caretakers and look at how they manage money and the messages that they, you know, that they transferred onto me about that. And, you know, in, in that process in itself was a healing process because then I could separate. My beliefs, my actions and my experiences from theirs. And realizing that a lot of what I had been taught, I was just recreating it based on their experience. And, you know, I'm, I'm an immigrant from Haiti. My parents were born in Haiti, right? So it's like you're coming from almost really nothing, right? And so I didn't realize that even though I was like successful in corporate and all these other things, that I was still carrying a lot of their messages. And then the third part of that, right, was first taking accountability to separating myself from their beliefs around it. And then the third was having to make the decision that they're like, I had to draw a line in the sand, um, between me and my family. And, and, and I don't, that doesn't mean like a, like completely disconnect, like, I'm not talking to you because I had money issues. No, but it was more of like, I have to draw a line in the sand because what, what? What the generations, if you will, before me believed in thought about, like were exposed to. I had to draw a line in the sand and say, I'm not doing that. And as communal, uh, individuals and humans, that is a hard thing to do. Like our entire, like life existence is about, you know, being accepted and being part of the tribe and everything else. And to have, it's one thing when the tribe kicks you out, right? We are, we're surrounded by all this. Fear and our subconscious about being kicked out from the tribe. But it's another when you have to make the decision to walk away from the tribe. And that's painful and it's a process and it's, it's uncomfortable and no one talks about it. So oftentimes, especially when I was in my thing, you think you're crazy. You're like, How could money be the thing that is creating all of this havoc, not even outside. I mean, it does affect outside, but inside of me. And so, you know, I, I think it's important that we highlight that piece because obviously you went through it, right? And you're, you're working through the process. You're supporting people through it that, you know, when they're listening to this, they're not just like, oh my gosh, here they are talking about money again. And it's just like, no, actually it's bigger than money. It's, it's your, uh, identity. It's your self worth. Yeah. It's all of these things that are intrinsic that, you know, often you don't see.

Kristine:

Yeah, it's so powerful. There's actually a course up here called the Trauma of Money that I'm hoping to take in the fall cuz I've heard nothing but great things. And I think everybody has trauma around money. Rich, poor, middle. I, I think we all it. It's so important. To our ability to, you can't do any, like, everything relies on money. So it's so important to our livelihood that I think we all have trauma around it. It's and to degrees. Um, so. One of the things that's super interesting, if you look in the research, we, you know, um, we say we reduce financial anxiety in women by 30%. You can't make it go away completely. You could be Bill Gates and he still has anxiety around money, but it may not be the same anxiety about the same thing that you and I have anxiety around money. Um, but you can't get rid of that anxiety completely. And that's just to show how deeply embedded it is in our lives. So, so we have that intermittent thing and so I think I'm really glad you brought that up about generational, um, wealth and also the women's desire to take care of their community. There are so many women that we see that, and at the end of the day, we do not judge. So this was something that I had to learn. We just give you the information hope that you make and, and how, and we give you some guidance, but in the end, it's ultimately up to you to make the decision. So we've met a lot of women who. put all this money into their children and don't have anything left over for themselves. We see that time and time again where they literally run outta money five years after they retire. They're just probably not gonna retire. Um, and they're, they're paying for their kids' education and there's nothing wrong with that. It's their money. They need to do what they want in life. But in terms of being able to take care of yourself, it can be. You're limiting your options to do that later because you, it's harder to work when you're older. It's just going to be more challenging to have a livelihood and, and, and so you're depending then on your child to maybe take care of you. And I do wanna distinguish multi-generational homes from what we typically see here in the west. Um, we, here we tend to get, you know, Get all these assets and then decumulate. So we, we tend to build up all these savings and then we spend them in retirement. Multi-generational homes are actually much smarter and we see it a lot more here in Canada. Kids living with their parents much later. Um, kids building, um, like bunkies for their parents in their backyards, you know, laying away housing and things like that, these multi-generational, um, lives because it is sometimes the only way to make money work. And then you're not, you're not seeing this like, You know, um, accumulation and decumulation of money. So it, it is a really great way to live. But when I talk about the, the kids and the taking care of others and not putting yourself first financially, I'm, I'm not talking about multi-generational living. I'm talking about, you know, just not ensuring that you have enough for yourself and then you are kind of at the mercy of other people and what they choose to do. So hopefully they choose to do the right thing by you. But that's, you know, that's, that's a different conversation. The other interesting thing we see is that the difference in financial literacy between men and women isn't as big as we think. And it, and most of us have pretty much the same amount of literacy. Right. We were taught, most of us were kind of taught the same thing, which is. Pretty much nothing. So I don't know where we like, oh, you find it on the floor. Oh, here's the financial literacy. I must have dropped it. Like, I don't know where we thought we were supposed to get it from and why we think men are so much better at it, but women are better savers. We're better at investing all the stats. Play this out. Um, but all the messaging that we get is that men are better. And when you look at the messaging that they get in men's magazines versus the money messaging that's in women's magazines, the men's magazines are all about building wealth, empire building, aspirational. You can buy that car, get that watch, you can, you know, you should be the breadwinner women. It's all about stretching your dollar, um, giving it away to charity, you know. Supporting your community. Philanthropic. It's not about wealth building. And that's part of why, that's part of why I try and make that decision to say I, I like having a lot of money and I wanna make a lot of money, you know, and I have made money, a lot of money in the past cuz that's not messaging we hear for women, from women about women and what women are supposed to do. We're supposed to. Lead all the nonprofits and, um, and take care of our family, and we internalize that and then we action on that. So, uh, again, it's not, we're not telling you what to do. I, we just want you to have all the information so you can make a more informed decision about what you're going to do.

Sabine:

Love that. Really great points. Um, something that I wrote down when you mentioned it in, in terms of men having anxiety about women, I was reading this, uh, book, I can't remember her, her name right now, but it's The Worthy Project. Um, and I'll be sure to include that in the, in the show notes as well. Um, so in that she talks about how. Uh, Warren Buffet is known to, you know, go to McDonald's every single morning. And depending on how the market is doing, that's what he's going to use to make the decision of whether or not he's gonna order his regular breakfast. And so we all know like, this man is not hurting for money, but literally, like if the, if the market takes a downturn, like he. Like we're, we're talking a few dollars here. Like he will not spend the few dollars. Um, but if it's high, then he'll get his normal breakfast, which is just, it's just crazy to me. Um, but at the same time, it just, It just highlights more so, you know, not necessarily men versus women, but just like human nature and where, you know, where we have, where we all have challenges, where we all suffer. Um, and you know, while society, to your point, paints this picture of like, You know, men are just super confident with money. Like they all got it and all that other stuff that, that's great, but that's, that's not necessarily true.

Kristine:

Um, you mentioned Warren Buffet as well, and he has one of my favorite money quotes of all time, which is if you take care of the pennies, the dollars will take care of themselves. So, or look after the pennies, the dollars will take out care of themselves, and it's not about a scarcity mindset. So one thing we really wanna be careful of is we don't wanna create a scarcity mindset. I think it's easy to do with women and we hear a lot about, like, we hear our spendings frivolous, we get a lot of these signals that we spend money terribly, and it's not true. Um, but so we wanna make sure that you discover your joy and you like, what is it that when you spend money, you feel good. Then focus on that. Try and maybe even spend a little more on that. Cause it's kind of like fat to nutrition, right? Like we need fat to be satiated. We need joy in our spending to be satiated. Like otherwise, we know from research, we just keep spending. If we spend on staff and it doesn't float our boat, we will just keep spending that money and we'll get into debt and trouble. So we really, you wanna align? You're spending with what brings you joy. And I think that that part is missing from Warren Buffet's quote. So when you're watching the, the pennies or you're watching your daily spending, make sure you're getting that return on all the work you're doing, right? It's not, there's no point working if we're not gonna be happy in life. And just make sure that, that you're spending your money there and try and get everything else for your cheap or don't get it at all, right? Like, Figure out what, what drives you? Or like, I mean that, like what lights you up inside? It could be food, it could be clothes, it could be makeup. I don't care. Just find what is it and then focus on that. And if you have a lot of them, then you gotta like focus on one or two, um, and then, and then try and get the rest for free. And, and it's a really thing, something I think is really missing in all these financial literacy things where don't have the avocado toast, don't have the coffee. If you really love the coffee and that, that makes you feel perf. Uh, when I, I, when I first had my coffees, I felt really professional. It felt like, you know, I'd just been a student. I got this like, fancy coffee. It meant a lot to me. It was worth it. So I, I, I want people to have comfort in knowing that the way you spend your money isn't wrong. You might just need to focus it more, right? Focus it. And then that way you are not spending all of the money because you can't. Find that joy.

Sabine:

Yeah. Yeah, and I think the other thing that I would add to that too is that because there is such an emotional attachment to money, that we're also very conscious and checking in on what are the emotions that are coming up, or what are the emotions that are driving. Our, our spending, right? Because it, it's one thing to have a budget and it's one thing to go in and do the spreadsheets and do all those other things, but you know, there are seasons in our lives where, maybe things aren't going right. And so we're trying to avoid the emotions of everything that's going on. And now that's reflecting back in, okay, I'm gonna buy this course and I'm gonna take this course and I'm gonna do this, and it doesn't even have to be as explicit or, as, as pronounced as like, I'm just going on these, uh, shopping sprees to Nordstrom's. But you have to look at wealth or I, I advise people to look at wealth holistically, that it is emotional, spiritual, mental, physical. It is financial as well. It's relational, so we can always identify when things aren't. Going well in a particular part of our lives. Like that's when you do that check-in to say, okay, well where else is this showing up? Yes. Um, so I mean, that's more time than, than we have to, to spend on this, but I think that that's the, that's the whole beauty of having these conversations because it's multi-dimensional. It's not just women need to pay more, mo may pay more attention to money, or women need to negotiate more, or women need to, you know, do this. It's, it's holistic. Um, and so hopefully for those of you who are, listening, you know, you've taken some tidbits away in terms of the tactical and the practical things that you need to do to. Get to a place where you're building your confidence around money. But I would also encourage you, you know, during this conversation, and I've said this on the, the previous shows of the series, check in with yourself. Check in with your own body. Are you feeling resistance? And did, did your chest tighten up? When we started talking about money? Did you know, feel it? Did you feel it in your stomach? Were there parts of your physical body, your emotions, whatever. That felt uneasy because that is a sign, that is a sign that there is room for you to grow in that space. in order for us to really shift this narrative around money, around women, around wealth, around our comfort with it, we have to be willing to examine. All parts of us, um, as it relates to our relationship with money. So that come 2030 and beyond, we're not, you know, we're not squandering it away or we're not abdicating our power, um, in, in society.

Kristine:

I love that word, abdicating. And so one of the things that we definitely talk about and I think is missing often in the finance industry is what we teach. Often the theory is the mathematical input. It is one input in the decision making process. The part that's overlooked is the emotional part. There's a, there's one of the things that women can really do to help themselves with money is we, we tend to sit on too much cash. It's a depreciating asset, but we see it as safety as well. So, um, and we don't necessarily see the investment as safe. So one of the things that people say is, women just need to invest more money. And what we say is, The emotional side is what it is. Let's say I'm making up numbers, 30,000. The mathematical need is 3000. Hopefully there's an envelope of opportunities so you can feel, you can get the mathematical input, you can get the F emotional input, and within that, use those two points to make the decision instead of just the one or just the other. These are insufficient on their own because they don't address both parts. So I really, I love when you say you need, you feel it because. There's a reason why we we're not, we usually don't do things that much in our own. We're like, we we're intuitive. You, you nailed it. There's, we tend to be slower to buy some things, which is actually really clever cuz because we have less money. Right. We have less of it. So we need to be more judicial when we, when we spend, there's just so many things that we do so well intuitively. And I don't want, and I hate when the finance industry is like, you're doing it wrong, and you're like, no, you're just, it's just another data point, right? It's just another piece. In a bunch of different things in, in the, in the stage of the life, in the chapter of the life that you're in, that, that help inform the decision and you're gonna make the best one you can. At that point, my fear is that we just don't get that input, or we're given it in such a distasteful way that we ignore it or we don't like. You know, discount it, and then we're not able to make the best decisions for ourselves. So I love everything you said there. It's super important.

Sabine:

Yeah the last thing that I'll close with, uh, as it relates to this, that it is a process and it is a journey. Um, so as you're listening to us, you know, we don't have it all figured out, right? And we're figuring it out as we. As we evolve in our consciousness and our awareness, and also as we heal from our own, you know, money wounds, if you will. Um, we're learning new things.

Kristine:

Something? Well, I, I just love the word abdicate because I, I, like, I just think that that is my biggest fear is that, um, when you don't understand, like, like I feel like there's a financial literacy tax, right? When you don't understand finance, your finance is enough and you don't to an expert, but you just need like a baseline. Then I think. You pay a tax because someone or something, or some, the system takes advantage of you. And I like that idea of abdicating that responsibility if that, that is what ultimately happens when we don't take care of ourselves in this way. I just, it's the perfect word and I've never heard it put in that in this context before, and I just love it.

Sabine:

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Well, I wanna be respectful of your time. I know we, we could talk for hours over here. Um, so I just wanna, uh, get through the, uh, blitz section with, uh, three key questions that I've been asking all of, uh, all of my guests here. So, you know, first question, knowing what you know now, if you could go back to a younger version of yourself and give her a piece of advice that you think would've been a game changer, what might that be? Um,

Kristine:

Some of the best lessons you're gonna learn is when you make mistakes. It's not about not making the mistakes, it's about figuring out how you overcome the mistake or repair the mistake or fix the mistake or move on from the mistake that is. I think I spent so much like that perfectionism. I spent so much time trying to be perfect and avoiding mistakes that I missed some of the lessons that happened when I made them. And I, and I grew part of that journey thing again, so, I love

Sabine:

it. I love it. And as we future forecast years, decades from now, and you're looking at, you know, the impact that you've made in in the world, what do you want the narrative to be?

Kristine:

I wanna change the world of finance for women by giving them the decision making tool so they can make the best decisions for themselves. I just don't think we get all enough information and I think it leads us to make choices that aren't in our best interest. And I think it keeps us unpowerful. I think it gives other people power over us cuz we, we end up not having enough at the end. Yeah,

Sabine:

absolutely. Uh, I, that that power is just another thing that has just been resonating in my spirit. So I, I think the next series is going to be around embracing power or even just healing our relationship. With what, uh, what power is and how we can demonstrate it. So, uh, thank you for bringing that up as, as a great little seed, uh, for those of you who are listening or watching. Uh, so be on the lookout for that. And then the last question is our second to last question. Uh, I believe readers are leaders. Right? Uh, a lot of what has helped me, um, heal around money and, you know, break through some of the, uh, limitations and traumatic things that I had experienced was through reading. I'm curious, are there any books in this space that have been pivotal for you in terms of your, you know, your ability to move from corporate to starting your business and, and now supporting others?

Kristine:

The one that helped me discover gender design was called Invisible Women by Caroline Rietta Perez. She talked about how if we disaggregate gender, um, in our data, we'll actually get two distinctive peaks. But we tend to, we tend to under. Under survey women and we, so we design around and we don't disaggregate, so we design around the man's peak and that has a lot of unintended consequences. Um, Rine McCall talked about the mother, she talked about mother adv. Convention and who, who fed Adam Smith. I might have that one quite wrong, but Adam Smith is like the father of economics and he talks about the economic man. But his, he lived with his mom his entire life and he completely left his mom out of the economic theory. And she, he thi she thinks that if women had written economic theory, it would be a lot more collaborative cuz we wouldn't be fighting each other for resources. We would've been like, Hey, do you wanna share? So that's a fascinating book that talks about like, How women have been left out of the economic narrative, or she has two fantastic books. Um, and then anything, uh, there's a podcast called The Story of Women that focuses on books written by women in, in dif in this space, and I found all of them inspirational. So I, those are some sources that I, I love reading. I read a lot. Sorry, it was hard to nail it down to just one. Sorry about that. Yeah.

Sabine:

So ki what, what was the name of that second book?

Kristine:

Um. Katrina Markal was, she had, she had the mother of invention and then who cooked? Adam Smith's dinner was the other book by her talking about economic man and how women were really left out of the. Philosophy and building blocks of, of economic theory and, and, and how we just ignored them.

Sabine:

Right. Um, and then, so last, uh, question, you know, for those who are watching live or who are listening to the show, uh, when this gets released, if they wanna connect with you, if they wanna learn more about un untangle money or they just wanna, you know, ask a question, uh, what's the best way for the listeners to reach out to you?

Kristine:

We're at Untangle Money on most socials that we're on. And then the website Untangle money. Uh, it all leads to me as well. And you can learn more about what we're doing there and, and, and, and sign up for a newsletter and, and you'll get us in your inbox a couple

Sabine:

times a month. Okay, awesome. We will be sure to include the books and the book links as well as, Christine's, information, uh, so that you can connect with her. And I'm always available if you have questions, if you have comments, if you wanna learn more about, uh, the show or even the work that I do, uh, please feel free to reach out. You can do so at support@sabinegideon.com. With that, have a wonderful rest of the day and we will be back soon. Take care.

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Sabine Gedeon

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