Week 2 Money Native 101, looking for places to grow

Oct 30, 2012 | Articles

When Liz told me she wanted me to write twenty-one stories, I panicked a bit .  . .before I even got started. Then I looked at the sample stories Liz shared with me, and looked at the story prompts she provided and I realized, to my relief, I was in somewhat familiar territory. These types of stories are personal narratives. They are not inventions, they are revelations. The goal is to honestly explore who I am and from there get a direction of where to go.

But what did all this have to do with Money Native? How will these stories help me cultivate my money-making life?
The answers to these questions became clearer to me after the writing—in the listening and feedback exercise. I read each of my stories — my memory blurbs — to Liz. She offered no critique or praise of my writing or content, but instead offered observations about the feelings my stories evoked for her, words and phrases that stuck with her, and places where she wanted to know more. My role was not to defend my stories or to explain the context of my memories, but to simply accept her observations of what was written.

For me, the story exercise clarified the themes of my life, and helped decipher recurring patterns. By writing them, I was able to explore my choices, my dreams and my fears. And as an impartial listener, Liz was able to help me listen to myself. She guided me through my stories from a different perspective and helped me realize where I’ve felt empowered, where I’ve felt limited and, in the concrete world of money-making, where there are opportunities to combine my strengths and my passions, opportunities to integrate the professional and the personal. The twenty-one stories are seeds that have all germinated into little sprouts.  My job this week is to cull my crop until I’m left with the seven that show the most vigor and promise to grow in an ever changing world.

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