Episode 88 Title: What If Money Was Never the Real Problem?

In this episode of Designing in 5D, Jodi sits down with Jennifer Edwards, a certified financial planner and financial wellness specialist with advanced training in financial therapy, money trauma, and the psychology of money.

This conversation goes beyond budgets, spreadsheets, and retirement planning. Jodi and Jennifer talk about the deeper stories we carry around money, why so many people feel shame, fear, avoidance, or panic when it comes to their finances, and how the nervous system plays a major role in the way we make financial decisions.

They also explore the connection between money, safety, home, relationships, and self-worth. Whether you are looking at a remodel, a life change, a divorce, a business decision, or simply trying to understand why money feels so heavy, this episode offers a more grounded and compassionate way to begin.

Jennifer shares practical ways to start shifting your relationship with money, including one simple phrase to carry with you:

“I can be trusted with money.”

This episode is for anyone who is ready to stop making financial decisions from fear and start moving forward with more clarity, safety, and intention.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of Designing in 5D. I'm your host, Jodie Peterman. I'm so excited to have you on today. And our guest, Miss Jennifer Edwards, is a certified financial planner and financial wellness strategy specialist, strategist as well, I'm assuming, with advanced training in financial therapy, money trauma, and psychology of money. She's worked with hundreds of people and couples across every income level, people with great jobs, solid education, and even professional finance advice who feel stuck, stress, shame, or conflict around money. I cannot wait to learn all the things, Jennifer. Thank you so much for being here. Hi, Jody. Thanks for having me. Yes. So tell me a little bit about how you got started into this, like what everybody has that one moment. They're like, it just kind of gives them purpose and they go on. So I would love to hear yours.

SPEAKER_00 0:53

So I actually started off my my life as a um, I was just a stay-at-home homeschooling mom, so plenty busy. And then when my kids started getting into that age where they didn't need me to be so directly oversight, so much direct oversight over their education, I was more like kind of moving pieces and managing their resourcing. I was like, I kind of have time and energy for another career. And one of the things that had been so impactful for us was when we started working with the financial advisor, how much relief that provided. We actually started working with someone in 2009. So it was right after the crash, our portfolio had decreased 40%, just like what the market did, because it was a broad portfolio. And to work with someone on money to help get that objective view of what was going on and what was necessary for our situation was just invaluable. I went to my advisor and I said, How do I do what you do? What does that look like? And it seemed like a pretty straightforward process, something that I could do from home. I could do the education and the review thing and then take a test. I'd already had a bachelor's degree, so that was that was done. So I entered the field and I went into uh because I don't live in a major city, so there aren't any firms here. So the firm that we worked with was just launching a foundation. I asked, hey, can I work for the foundation? Because you have to have 6,000 hours of experience to become a certified financial planner. Yeah. And so can I be kind of part of the start of this? And I'm willing to like drive to different places or meet with people online, like I can be really flexible with it. And um, they were generous enough to let me get involved there. And so that's how my career started. I worked for that nonprofit for eight years, and we had two-year engagements with our clients. So they had an educational component, and then uh they would meet with an advisor, a dedicated advisor to them for two years. And what started we had to we branched outward in in COVID to be able to meet with people from all over the country. We were no longer limited to our geographic region. And that's when I started to see, because I was meeting with people from all over the place, started to see these patterns emerge of different value systems and beliefs around money that were really foundational. And I was like, my training did not prepare me for this. Like my when you come into a financial planning firm office, the ups the assumption is that, you know, you want to retire in your in your 60s and you want to live off of a, you know, a diversified portfolio of assets. Maybe you have a business that you're looking to sell, that you interact with money in a certain way, that your assets have these certain characteristics, that your plan in terms of like, I'm gonna hit this point and then I want to be self-sufficient in retirement, you know, not entirely self-sufficient, like you're gonna probably get social security, that kind of thing, but not so much relying on children. And these are just assumptions that when I started to work with other people, I'm like, they see things differently. And they see things differently from the Western European colonial type of economic structure that we have in the value system that we have there. And I was like, I'm not I was not trained for this. So I I'm a voracious reader. I love to get information. I'm like, I've I'm I want to figure this out. And I just found that there was a dearth on this in on this whole subject, like cultural value systems and beliefs and you know, how people interact with money. It's like we got to the behavioral part. We're starting to see financial behavioral, uh, you know, there are designations that deal with that that say, hey, we're actually like operating from biases and things like that. But the real internal experience, the trauma of it, that's one of my trainings, like that's just not talked about. The trauma of the system, the economic system, and how that affects especially marginalized communities, but all of us really in general have that shared trauma of the economic system that divides us. It's really about division. I'm human beings, we want to be together. We're better in harmony. And then when structures come in to separate us, it traumatizes all of us. So I left that job. I love that work, but I was like, I want to be part of the solution for this. And so I left that job. And that was a big financial like wellness journey for me, too, because it was like very structured and it was, you know, reliable income. And now I'm gonna go off into like the great unknown. And then trying to kind of still stay in balance. It was like, ooh, that was a big journey. I'm still I'm still on in it.

SPEAKER_01 5:27

But I think we're all still on it. I think it just constantly pivots. It constantly pivots.

SPEAKER_00 5:32

I partnered with the University of Arizona. We're doing some research on financial socialization and race. That will turn into a book and resources for people, hopefully be able to come up with some training for advisors and working with people, their couples, families, individuals, so I can now start to put together more tailored to each each individual's experience with money than traditional financial planning would usually address.

SPEAKER_01 5:58

So you were a stay-at-home mom, and then your portfolio, your say, I'm assuming the way you talk about it and how it might emotionally have affected you is that's your safety, right? A lot of people view that nest, that nest egg as their safety. So as you see that nest egg going down in your stay-at-home mom and you're homeschooling your kids, was there any lessons or anything there that you used to teach your kids with as you went through that?

SPEAKER_00 6:22

Uh, absolutely. We're we were, it's I wasn't as open with money as I would know to be now that I've had this my wellness training and all of that stuff, but we were pretty open compared to the average family in terms of how we talked about money and that kind of stuff. And so my children were very much aware of like, okay, we have this basket of assets. It's just stocks and bonds and mutual funds. And it's decreasing because of the way that the economy is set up. We had lots of discussions about like why the housing bubble burst. We were very lucky. My husband works for the government and and his income remained stable and we were never overextended. We we had a buffer, and that buffer diminished. Like most people, everything diminished in some ways. And and so we were able to, you know, just kind of talk about like what was actually happening. And we were, we definitely talked about how, you know, we were young enough that that I was like, I'm pretty sure that this is part of the process, but I'm not exactly sure what to do. And here was what what really was the kicker for me and what made me want to work with someone, a professional, was because I like to learn, I was like, well, I will go out and I will figure out like what did people do? And the advice was so varied and so inconsistent. You had, you know, educational leaders saying, this is what you do in this circumstance, and people in the, you know, financial services industry with, you know, 20, 30 years experience saying, This is what you do. You're gonna, you know, you're gonna put it all in gold for a while, and then, you know, you're going to uh pull out of cash and then you know, we'll tell you when it's time to get back in. Or some of them actually said the right thing, which is unless your plan dictates that it's time to sell, you should do nothing. That was the real answer. That doesn't sell very well because people work people want to have an action, right? That's what stress, the stress response in the body does. And so they capitalize on that and they're like, let me help you move your money. And that's how they make they make money is by moving money, not by doing what's actually like the best thing for you, which is hey, if you're 30 and you had a diversified portfolio, the last thing you want to do is sell all of those assets and then miss some of the best high performing days because you have no idea when those are going to happen. When when the when the we're gonna hit that trough, we're gonna bottom out and people are gonna go, okay, this is low enough. And I missed out on some of those. I don't even, I don't even want to think about what my portfolio would be like if I just had stayed the course because it would be hundreds of thousands of dollars better for sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:51

It's hard to know all that. Well, I think that that's really good to while you're going through your own, like, what do I do? Getting into the moment where you can teach your kids that. What an incredible moment for them to get all of that knowledge and information as it was flowing through you. I think that that's amazing. And the other point I was just I wrote down that I wanted to make was just like the safety factor of it all. Like, I think a lot of people make decisions sometimes out of fear before they can sit and think. Like, not sometimes you just want to protect pardon.

SPEAKER_00 9:27

It's almost all the time. It's not sometimes. Yeah. This is why uh, you know, with money, it being an emotional, and when usually when we make an emotional decision, we're making an irrational decision, which is almost always a mistake. Yeah. So yeah. It feels like the rug is just pulled right out from under you because you have this, you know, this expectation, especially if you're, you know, an you know, a nice upward swing and you're always seeing your money kind of grow and you don't recognize that like the reason that you're able to capitalize on long-term returns that beat inflation is because there is inconsistency. If it was a sure thing, then you wouldn't have that high rate of return over time. That's why things like bonds don't perform as well, because they're more stable in terms of their return. And so there's less uncertainty about what you're going to, you know, potentially earn from that asset. So yeah, that that is, and I didn't know all of that, of course, at the time. I I had read, you know, all the books in my library, and it's a very small library, because we live in a small town, but I, you know, I kind of had this understanding of like, okay, I think I know what I'm doing a little bit. And then that happened. And I went to my husband and I'm like, I I cannot mess this up and I don't know what to do. It's too important because we're, you know, DI what we do, Gen X, we just do it ourselves, right? We figure it out. And I was like, I I this I don't know what this means. And it's we have one shot at retirement. It's like a lot of things in life. We can be like, I didn't quite do what I wanted to do there. Let me do it again a different way. And you can't do that with retirement. You hit hit an age where you want to stop working and either you have the assets to sustain your lifestyle or you don't. Right.

SPEAKER_01 11:06

And that's where the fear factor comes in and trying to get somebody. So you layered in a lot in the beginning, talking about separation and social and different trauma. Can you, it's a lot of stuff and it's a little, it's it can be a little scary and a little overwhelming. So can you just put that into like what that's like for like an everyday person? Like, how does that play out in reality for the average person?

SPEAKER_00 11:29

Main thing that I want people to understand is that the economic system that we live in is inherently traumatizing. So it separates us from other members of the human race and divides us into classes, divides us into, I would use Isabel Wilkerson's word cast, racism is part of that. It's uh, you know, letting us know certain people are more valuable than others and their contribution to society is more valuable than others. And so that that and I don't know if you've ever talked about trauma, but it's definitely related to spaces. In fact, they have shown that, like if you have uh, let's say you go through a nasty divorce and your your spouse moves out of the house, but you're left in the same house as where, you know, where you were living together. They they have proven time and time again it the it it is really important to change that space, to tell your nervous system that you are now in a new situation. Even if it's changing the bed spread or just, you know, painting a wall, you have to signal to your nervous system through your eyes and through your brain that you are no longer in that system when if, you know, where you were with this person that isn't treating you well, where you didn't feel cared for and loved and needed. And so, you know, that's basically on a global scale what's happening with with money is that we're sort of in this space and we're operating in this space that tells us, you know, that it tells our nervous systems, you know, it's really not fully safe out here. Certain people have access to resources and certain people don't. And if you're one of those people that it you don't feel like you have access to resources, that's very real. And we just we want to acknowledge that the system is set up to do this thing. And then we move from a place of blame and shame, get out of those two things, because that doesn't help any of us, to a level of ownership and responsibility. What do I have control over? What can I how can I change my internal experience? Because if you can regulate, even in this traumatizing situation, which we're all in, you can learn to go. I want to be conscious about this. I want to approach my experience with money with curiosity and non-judgment and understanding, like all of these uh extra external factors that affect it, then you can you can still move forward in a healthy way.

SPEAKER_01 13:45

Yeah, that makes so much sense. So I just went through a divorce and we were living in the same home. And I can tell anybody that's listening, I thought everything was fine. We were amicable, like it's just living our life. And then it just got to a point where I just couldn't sit still. I was jittery, I wanted to be gone all the time. It was just my nervous system saying, like, it isn't safe. There's an move forward with where you need to be, the person that you want to be in the same situation. And so I ended up, we couldn't, we couldn't sell the house, we couldn't, you know, whatever. So I'm in a situation where I'm actually house sitting for somebody for four four months. And so when I got here, I was even in a panic coming here because then all of a sudden I didn't want to come here. I was literally like, I'm the nice pack everything in a nice neat little container and take it with me. I literally, when I got the okay to move in, I was grabbing brown paper bags, shoving stuff in it, throwing it in my vehicle, and just driving here. And when I got here, I was in a little ball on the floor, like crying, like, I just want to go back. Like this didn't feel safe. I just want to go back. And I'm like, you know, it's only for four months. I'll be okay if it's only for four months. And then like after the third day, I'm like, I never want to leave. Like it's so amazing what your body tolerates or or what you do to just get by. And then when you get yourself, you take the brave leap, you just get yourself out of that situation, or like you said, paint a wall or change out the bed cover or just get yourself some fresh flowers or something just to change up the space a little bit, what that does. I I can't even tell you what it did for my nervous system and for my business and for everything else. It's been incredible. Just get yourself out of the situation.

SPEAKER_00 15:21

When I teach people, you know, how to let's say we have somebody whose nervous system has taught them, and so many of us have been taught that money is not safe. It's not a safe thing to interact with, that there's all kinds of rejection and abandonment and confusion and lack of worth it for like how does that play out?

SPEAKER_01 15:41

Like, how does some people are like, I love money, you know, like uh people are probably listening, I love money, I have a problem with money, I want money, whatever. But like, how does that, how does that play in?

SPEAKER_00 15:52

So let's say your nervous system has as a child you had some experiences, or as an adult, you had some experiences that were not fully processed and that you didn't really, you know, go through to what is the narrative that I'm telling myself around this experience. So I'll just use budgeting because I see that one happen sometimes with people where um they they literally it's like every every time they try, they're like, okay, I'm gonna get up and I'm gonna get, I'm gonna get going with my budget and I'm gonna track my income and expenses, and I'm just gonna make sure that like I'm spending and saving where I want to and all this kind of stuff. And then it's like, it's like your body knows that's not safe. So you cannot create a habit if your body is saying, this is literally life-threatening. And that can come out of, you know, maybe you saw your mom hovering over a pile of bills and crying, and nobody told you what that was or what was happening. And you, your poor little brain as a child developed a story around that that said something like, you know, well, let's just stay away from money, because that looks really scary. And so you just can't, you can't actually interact with it in a in a healthy way when your nervous system says this that you know, this just isn't safe. It can come out in avoidance tendencies, it can come out in worshipping tendencies, like you want to be seen a certain way. I see this happen with people who grew up with a lot of scarcity. Sometimes they'll grow up and they're like, I need to look like I'm wealthy, even at the cost of actual wealth. Need to, I need to have, you know, play the part. I need to have, you know, nice hair and nails and go on expensive vacations and, you know, have a have an expensive looking car and all of those things that tell the world that I have value because our self-worth and our net worth in our culture are highly related. So there's, but once we start to examine that and they go, I'm being drawn to these things because it's actually, you know, my nervous system saying this is where, how we survive. Yeah, that's really incredible.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

There's a lot. Do you have like any, or is this part of the book, or is there some resource that you have that you can let people know about where they can go prompts maybe that they could sit down and just begin, like, what do I think of money? Like how, what what are some of the things that questions people can ask themselves? What's figure out what the relationship of money is, then maybe they can find the block and start working on chipping away at reframing their nervous system around that block and letting go of it.

SPEAKER_00 18:18

So if we go to my my website, Breakthrough Financial Wellness, the way that you get on our email list is if you want a money beliefs inventory. So that's really kind of where that starts. It prompts you to start looking at what, you know, we we start with a beginning of a sentence and then you're supposed to fill it in without thinking. It's supposed to be whatever your subconscious thinks about that subject. Like money is this, rich people do this, I deserve this, other people deserve this, you know, like whatever your subconscious does before your conscious mind comes in and makes a judgment about, oh wait, maybe that's not what I should be saying, you know, when you when you just your total, yep. Your total, like it, it it what it shouldn't even, it'll it'll uh arise without even effort. It just bubbles up to the surface as soon as you're you you know you give it a prompt. Understanding each other's money stories. So I do this with couples, it's almost one of the first places we talk once we discuss what financial wellness is. And I though my structure for the way I work with people is a combination of educational units that you do on your own and then one-on-one meetings with me so that we can be more efficient in delivery of all this information because most people don't understand how to do it. So you you do it at home, you you do this, you know, you understand each talk about each other's financial histories, your the story and the narrative that you have around it. And it's usually just like, what did money look like when you were growing up? And when I when I meet with people, because I also meet with um pro bono people, and it's almost always I can tell them what their history with money is. I'm like, did it look like this? How do you know that? I'm like, I can tell from what you're doing with money now that this is what it would have been like when you were interesting.

SPEAKER_01 20:02

The psychology of money too. Interesting.

SPEAKER_00 20:07

This requires deliberateness. And so, you know, I my my encouraging to people is to start with nervous system regulation. So you can even just Google, like, how do I regulate my nervous system? Everybody's gonna there's all it's all good. It's bringing your mind and your body and your spirit into alignment so that and and there's a non-judgment about it where you're just noticing, you're like, oh, this thought is coming across. That's interesting. I don't have to say that that's a good thought or a bad thought, just a thought.

SPEAKER_01 20:36

Um and we talk a lot about nervous system regulation on here, and we talk about different techniques and tools in the toolbox to have.

SPEAKER_00 20:43

So this is So go back to go back to all of those podcasts and and get that way. And then then the next step is really starting to put the situation that you're avoiding with money. So you try to figure out, okay, how do I want to behave with money differently? And usually when you're in one of those meditative moments, you know, your higher self or your future self, if you give it time to like kind of come to the surface and say, this is the next thing that you should work on. And I really try to help people be intuition-led through that because there's always something better we can do. And what's the next best step? You know, it's it's usually like, again, if you don't think about it, if you just kind of let that come to you, that will usually tell you. So um, let's say it is that you should most people just don't have a spending and savings plan, and that's a really easy way to start. So let's just say it's that that you you're gonna do a meditation where you think about doing it before you actually do it. Then your nervous system might kind of go, whoo, we don't like this idea. And then you settle it down, and then you you let that come. Say, here's an emotion, it comes, it's not bad, it's not good, it's just a thing that we're experiencing. It's just a physiological response to a stimulus that hasn't fully been processed yet. We're gonna process it, we're gonna give it its space and it's time. And it's due honor. Then we are going to say, hey, we can serve we survived that. See how we survived that? We survived that thought about doing this thing. And then the next time it might be like, I'm just going to sit down at the table where I would be doing my budgeting. And I'm and there I'm going to, you know, imagine that I am actually in the process of going through my bills and itemizing my expenses and maybe listing out the debts. Maybe it's like, man, I don't even want to look at what those numbers are. It's just so terrifying and shaming. Again, this is one of the reasons why I start with, I use a seven-layer financial framework that I, financial wellness framework that I developed that helps us see all of those factors, including those societal factors, that have contributed to where we are with money right now. Because in our society, we like to say, well, if you're in financial trouble, that's because you weren't either disciplined enough or you didn't have enough willpower. No, you're not smart enough, you're not disciplined enough, something's wrong with you. If you were, then you know, you'd you'd be fine with money. And I'm like, ooh, there's so much more to it than that. So once we get to that place and we decrease that shame, then we can come forward, you know, and arrive at the space in a in a healthy way. That's incredible.

SPEAKER_01 23:12

So when a client starts and you onboard them and you take them through your seven-step process, what is it like from start to finish, like time investment-wise?

SPEAKER_00 23:21

So one of the things that I've tried several different um approaches, and this is what I've landed on. I think it's really working, is that the initial process is you just have to have the bravery to set up a call with me. If you go to my website, that's going to be the big like call to action is just book a consultation call. It's totally free. It's 20 minutes. It doesn't take much time, but it takes a lot of courage to say, I'm about to tell somebody what my experience with money is right now. And it feels, you know, like I said, we've got all these outside factors that tell us that we're we're in trouble and that, you know, we're to blame and we're deficient. So when you, you know, just know that those words will never come out of my mouth and I will always be on your side. So you initially have that call and then we just kind of have a quick conversation, like, I'm pretty sure I can help you. I can't, I point you in the direction of a resource that can. So if it's not a good fit for the kind of work that I do, I say, you know, I've got your email address. I'm going to send you the resources for things that I think would be better. And then if you are like, yeah, I think you and I should continue talking, then I send you out a link for a second, more comprehensive discovery meeting. That one is where we really outline like what that's where I get the full information of like all of your financial picture. And then I start to put together in my mind, okay, here's what you're facing, the classes that you would need. So I have these lessons that I drop to you every week. Well, that's that's as fast as you can do it. You could take more time if you want to, but but they're based on your situation. So, like when I work with entrepreneurs, I have an entrepreneurship and emotions money. I mean, a class, right? So they're gonna get that. But if you're not in entrepreneurship, then you don't need to have that lesson. So I don't. And if you're a couple, you're gonna have, you know, if you're in a romantic partnership, you're gonna have different classes than if you're a single individual or a divorced individual. If you're divorced, you're gonna have a different thing because that that comes with a set of traumas that is different from just being single. It's single parents, you're gonna have, yeah. Parents are gonna have a different set of curriculum. It's just like what applies to you. And then we put together this custom package of the courses that would benefit you. And then however many one-on-one sessions you might need with me to get from where we're trying to go from A to B. And I really am like, let's get through this, not just like an indeterminate coaching therapeutic, like you could talk with me about your money problems for five years, and you know, I could just rake in the dough, but that's really not what I want to do. I want you to get to a point where you are interacting with money more healthily, and this process usually gets people there pretty quickly. They get the information, they're told how to center their nervous system. It's always like, hey, if you sit down for a class and something you hear triggers that response in you, pause it. You say pause, and then you follow that, that little, that little jolt to your system that goes, we don't like this, or something here that that seems scary to what that origin story was for that. And then you s nurture it. You say, hey, I can see it's like a little part that you can talk to in yourself. You can say, I can see how when I was a child, you would have come up with that solution for keeping me alive was to avoid money or to hoard money or to spend to show people that you are valuable or um whatever the, you know, the the reaction is around. Then when you feel calm and you'll feel centered, then you can press play again. Right.

SPEAKER_01 26:44

So when people like find a trigger, like they have that little moment, like whatever that is, and they get through that pause. What's the better way? Can you have a simple approach to start talking about money without spiraling down or blaming? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:00

So I first it's just that awareness that an emotion is is actually we we decide that those are good or bad. It's just a set of physiological responses, right? So we would call rage a certain set of physiological responses. Your body heat is going to increase, your blood flow is going to increase, your muscles are gonna tighten and get ready for a fight, right? It's just we've just put this word on it, that that's what that means. And then we have decided that certain physiological responses are uncomfortable and undesirable. So we try to avoid them. And our body really, there isn't anything that it does that isn't right for us. So if it's telling you that, if that's if you look at that emotion and that that response, that trigger as a piece of data, just go, and then that's where I say follow the why. Why am I thinking this? Why am I feeling this? What is coming up around it? Recognize that it it would totally make sense. Whatever that story is behind that, this behavior makes sense in light of your specific ex circumstances and your experience and the way that your body interprets the world. So, you know, when that when you have that response, instead of going, I don't like this, I don't like this, just kind of white knuckle and try to get through it or or try to really most of us what we do is medicate out of that by some kind of consumption. Our, you know, our world tells us that if you're feeling uncomfortable, things wrong. And that's that's not true. We're meant to go through cycles of, you know, uncomfortableness, which is data, tells us something, something is important to us, something is dangerous, something matters, what needs our attention, and then relief. Then something else will come up and we'll need to give it some attention. So there's never like a bad emotion. In fact, it's like I really don't like using the word negative emotions or positive emotions. They're all just objectively, you know, our body trying to communicate something with us. So when you have that experience, it's just like coming to it going, This isn't bad. Give it space, give it space if I need to excuse myself and go into the bathroom and cry for three minutes, start carrying some mascara around in your purse if this happens, you know, no big deal. And then you give it that space and then you say, Okay, what was what was behind that? Let's say it was your boss came in and said, you know, I appreciate your effort here, but this could have this could use some work. And it looked like maybe, you know, this we'd we talked about it looking this way and you didn't quite measure up to, you know, our expectations or whatever. That's probably going to trigger in you um a feeling of rejection, a story around abandonment, a story around lack of value or worth, some time when, you know, on the playground or at home or a brother or sister or an old boyfriend or somebody said something to you that said, you're not worth my my time and effort. Right. And so you when you just say to yourself, Oh, that's what that came from, that's absolutely totally irrelevant to my worth, but I can see how I came up with it. And then you start to tell your nervous system, yeah, this is and I always start with compassion toward those parts that created those stories. Like they were doing the best they could with the knowledge that they had and and the um, you know, the immature way that young brains interpret the world. But there's nothing to be ashamed about in it. It's just that in society, we have said, you know, big girls don't cry, or we have said, you know, men, men don't show emotions, or we have said things like we have a whole movement around the fact that black lives do matter because it's a response to the fact that they feel like they don't. It that didn't they didn't just imagine that. They were told for hundreds of years that if you have dark skin, you're somehow lesser than human. So, you know, we just have to kind of go, all right, this is what's going on here. My nervous system is having this response. I'm going to follow the why into the story, give it some compassion, and then the next time around, what you usually start to see is a diminishment. Because you can jump, you get through to the point where you have the reaction and you have the non-judgmental response to it. And then it gets closer and closer and closer and closer. It might take take a day or two for you to go, that's what was going on. And it really doesn't have anything. But then you get better at it and better at it and better at it. And pretty soon it becomes fairly instantaneous. That's kind of what wellness looks like is like this is happening, this is the story, this is what it meant to me. It's just, it's just a fact. It's just a thing. It's it doesn't define me.

SPEAKER_01 31:19

I think a lot of people have gotten away from their intuition and have just relied on other technologies or different things to just come up with an answer or a solution for them. Yeah. Or, you know, just other things too. Like you said, you just don't deal with it or you self-medicate, whether it's eating or having another cup of coffee or whatever it is that you're doing or running an extra mile, something, you're doing that and you're you're pushing yourself away from your intuition. So um I think that what you're talking about is getting to that. And those little things that come up, those big things that come up are practices. And then sometimes, you know, you still have the big moments, but there's less big moments and more like little aha's. Okay, pause, let's regroup, and then giving your space to do that so that you can heal and move on. I think that's huge. Just summed it up. You're hired, Jody. A lot of times people listen, uh, we do do interior design, but we also talk a lot about that's the whole point of designing in 5D. It's it's the five dimensions of, you know, working through something, which is I love your seven, your seven layers of finishing. Yes, to implement your service with seven chakras. So it's just like, I just, I love that that reference. But when people are like, let's say they're they're listening and and they're loving what we're saying, but they're also at a crossroads because they're trying to figure out how they can afford like a remodel or a big investment or a life change. What do they need to understand before they decide?

SPEAKER_00 32:44

The important thing that I I always say when it comes to any kind of decision or spending is to, you know, regulate before you do that and try to get into that higher self-energy. That will help help you know what's really important. So let's say you're gonna, you, you plan on doing a remodel. You want to make sure that that is coming from that place of self-love, that it's not coming from pressure to perform, that it's not coming out of a place of like, oh, everybody else is remodeling their kitchen, so I better remodel my kitchen. When we, when we are acting out of any kind of fear, and usually the reactions are fear-based, fear of being judged by something at somebody, fear of missing out on something, fear of losing something that we have attached to. Uh, right. So just really kind of saying, why, why am I doing this? Is it coming from that place of, you know, total clarity and confidence and assurance and alignment, consciousness, just like you, you, you, you know, you you hit those terms every once in a while. You'll be like, I feel that. I feel like like the like I'm floating or like I'm I'm in flow or like I'm just kind of on top of the world. And whatever you're doing in that state is the right thing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:54

I'm a big advocate of picking a word for the year. And so I feel like it's becomes your true north. So, like, for example, last year my word was flow. And so I wanted things to flow and it started flowing at the end. I feel like I stopped fighting and started surrendering more. So flow started happening. But this year, my word is joy. So I have done talks and podcasts on picking your word and and working on your um your vision board and things like that. So I encourage people to pick a word. And then when they're coming to a big decision, a remodel, a big investment. So if your word for the year is balance and you're already starting a new job, your kids are in everything, and you're thinking, is this the right time to remodel? Because you really can't stand your kitchen. Maybe now's not the right time if your word is balanced. Gosh, Jody, is there ever a right time to remodel?

SPEAKER_00 34:49

Uh you you you just you just sort of have to know that, like, you have to be ready for the things that are gonna come, right? You have to, you have to know that, okay, this is going to be a disruptor. It's going to feel disruptive. And so we sit down and we prepare for the family. You know, you're used to things looking this way. We're gonna enter this space of un you know, uncertainty. And on the other side of that is something really exciting. And that's very much like if we're remodeling a house, honestly, wellness work is remodeling inside your house. It's remodeling inside of you.

SPEAKER_01 35:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:23

And it looks very much the same where it's like, I don't know exactly how this is gonna go. It feels like I'm on the edge of a precipice, but I'm gonna take a step into the dark and try to get just a little bit of clarity for the next day and a little bit of clarity for the next day, and go, okay, you know, if this means we're cooking out of a crock pot for a month, or if this means that, you know, we need to loosen our budget with regards to food or, you know, activities because we just can't stand being at home. We're gonna go stay in a hotel once in a while, or uh go to a resort and take the kids away and go, you know, play at the at the pool or the beach or something. Um, just being willing to say this is kind of what that work might look like.

SPEAKER_01 36:01

Yeah. I think what you're trying to say, well, not what you're trying to say, what you said, but in a different way is just being intentional about what you're doing. Like don't rush to do it, sit and make make sure it's and gonna intentionally align with what you have going on. If it's really what you do, your reason behind it, it's intentional. The word has been used a lot lately. It's a buzzword, it's been thrown around, but I feel like in this situation and also in design, you have to be intentional with all the designing up front so that we hand off documents to the contractor that they can use and to get the budget so people can intentionally select and choose parts of their remodel or new construction with visuals and having a dollar sign, then they can say yes to something. Breaking off allowances is like flying by the seat of your pants. You're saying yes to this, but you don't know how it's gonna affect this. And you're saying yes to that or no to that, and and you're going over budget and you're not really not really being careful with it because maybe you wouldn't have spent so much on that if you'd have known you would have had to sacrifice on something else. So we try and slow the process down, start with the designing first, and then move into the remodel and everything else so that people can see. So intentionality is huge for our firm for sure.

SPEAKER_00 37:13

And that's that's exactly the word consciousness, intentionality, deliberate interactions with money. And and you are gonna find that you're gonna come up with some resistance because you probably are gonna have a money belief that says that this isn't worth this. And that's really more of a belief of I'm not worth this. And so following that, like to why, why do I feel like I'm not worth having a space that I think is beautiful? And that that probably comes to, you know, early messaging that your your poor little brain had to interpret what uh imperfect people around you were doing. And and then to I mean, our society doesn't help us with this. No.

SPEAKER_01 37:52

I feel like we're we're kept from it. Well, I could go to that for everything. It's the same thing with the legal system, it's the same thing with the healthcare, it's the same thing with a lot of things. This is really, I mean, other things can go away, but your home, your wealth, like that's all that's people's safety net. They're what it's what well should be, you know. You need to have a space, a safe space to come home, to create, to be, to relax, to reset your nervous system. That's what your space should be for.

SPEAKER_00 38:19

And it really is both of those things, your your home and your wealth are facilitating relationships. Yes, that's that's what we're all living for. We're living for connection, and this is why the trauma is so real, is because it it separates us, but but the right kinds of home spaces and the right kinds of opportunities that can be purchased through wealth. They're they're all about um the things that we're real, you know, when we're on our deathbeds, that's what we're gonna be like. Did we, did we gather? Did we influence? Did we leave a legacy of, you know, letting people know that they were important to us? Yeah, that's beautiful. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 38:53

So I know that when I'm done, I'm going to go to your website and I'm going to download and get on your newsletter so that I can see uh where things are where my money blocks are. I'm assuming that's where it's going to kind of light up some things. I'm interested to see what that is. And um and I'm excited to book a call with you and see where that goes. I'm really excited on doing that. But if people are feeling overwhelmed, what's the what's the small first step that still creates movement besides downloading your download?

SPEAKER_00 39:24

I would say that that that very first step is acknowledging to yourself, saying maybe out loud the words, I I can be trusted with money. Start to put that everywhere you go because society's probably told you you can't be. And you have to, and your nervous system's gonna be like, No, you can't, no, you can't, no, you can't. And the more that you say that, the more that you expose yourself to that idea, I can be trusted with money, I can be trusted with money. And he loves me. I can be trusted. It's just an energetic force. It's it's totally neutral, it's valueless. It's the value that we place on it where that where that comes from. So just write it out on a post-it note. I can be trusted with money, put it on a few different places in your in your wall, and then try to make that call with me because that's where we're we'll really start to make some some progress.

SPEAKER_01 40:08

I love that. That is also very grounding and doable, very actionable steps. I appreciate that so much.

SPEAKER_00 40:14

We uh you can't write it down, make you somebody that you love write it down. Would you write this down for me? Because I don't believe it yet. Exactly. Everybody can write it down.

SPEAKER_01 40:23

Yeah, that's good. Or just say it and play it over and over in your phone. You can just listen to yourself play it. It's even better. It is so good. Well, these conversations are here to help you feel more believed in, more confidence, more clarity. And whether that's with money or design or the decisions that shape our future, that is what our 5D process is all about. So until next time, thank you so much for being here and to giving us all this great information about money and kind of changing the relationship that we have with it, Jennifer. I appreciate it. But remember to download this, share this, because if it affected you, it's going to affect other people as well. And sharing this is how we get the the word out there to let that people know that there's another way to do things. And until next time, remember to design a life you love with intention, grounding, passion, and always, always, always that tiny little sprinkle of magic. Thanks everybody. Have a great day.