The Currency of Connection: How to Create an Exquisitely Kick-Ass Relationship with Money

Acknowledgments

This book is a collaboration, even though I have been the only one sitting on my bed writing it for the past few years. It is a reflection of so many people who have influenced my experiences of life and touched my very being. And of course, it would not be possible without the help of those who guided me through the insanity of the whole new world of publishing. It really does take a village and I want to thank mine.

I knew in third grade that some day I would write a real book, but it was Julia Murray, my high school English teacher, who actually taught me to write and gave me the confidence to realize that I had a gift. Thank you, Mrs. Murray, for being such a strong task masker and never letting us off easy.

Then there is the team at Sympatico that kept me going in the early stages of this process and pushed me to get this material out. Thank you, Carlene Wegmann, Kelli Cotner and KarenBeth Glunz for keeping me in the real world when all I wanted to do was climb in my cave and write. I absolutely could not have done this without the help of Emmett Skiles, who kept me moving forward and helped deliver the early Currency of Connection seminars. I am so grateful for your patience and your get it done attitude, but especially thankful for you friendship.

Thanks to my good friend Barbara Opyt for organizing the writers’ group that gave form to my ramblings and for setting up my table of contents. I will always be grateful for the hours and hours of great food and conversation and for sharing Trixie with me. I may have put on a few pounds but it was worth it!

Tucker Bass holds a special place in my heart for her endless enthusiasm for all of my crazy schemes and for her prolific and determined brainstorming that resulted in the title of this book. It is perfect!

Obviously, I could not have created anything so organized, grammatically correct and intelligent without my incredible editing team, Marc Schwarz, Stacy Hale and Barbara Munson. Marc, you did a great job holding my hand through the forest of confusion and pushing through a ridiculous delivery schedule. Thank you! Thanks also to Patti DeNucci and Steve Harper for connecting me to such thoughtful and sharp folks at just the right moment. I love how you both walk your talk.

Judith Manriquez has probably earned a few extra gold stars in Heaven for her amazing gifts of collaboration and in teaching me how to use Wordpress and create an authentic website. The halo comes for consistently convincing me that it was going to be easy.

I went through three cover designers before I found Nelly Georgiana. She managed to listen to me all the way from Romania and understand what I wanted this cover to portray. Her knowledge, speed and kindness continued to impress me throughout the whole process.

Writing a book turned out to be a bigger project that I ever envisioned, both in terms of actual production and maybe more importantly in terms of the internal challenges that such a long project brings up.

Thanks to Rick Silva, who kept me focused on the big picture and was the first to fully appreciate my gypsy/engineer Self. You are a damn fine coach and even better friend. Thanks to Marilyn Levin from Global Sufficiency Network who opened doors to sufficiency for me so that I could learn to say yes even with a full schedule.

Thanks also to Joanne Pope, Grazier Rhea, Lark Howell, Blair and Al Reynolds and Henry Donald for keeping me connected to my roots at just the right time. Thanks to Nancy Abraham for loving me just as I am and always being there when I really needed a friend. Thanks to my sister, Milton Draper and my brother Jess Draper for putting up with their preachy big sister and for having faith that I could actually do this.

This book would have been pretty boring without the stories and trust of all of my clients who hopefully learned from my mistakes and who taught me so much. I also want to thank the people of New Zealand for teaching me that a collaborative society really is possible.

I also want to profoundly thank all of the men in my life, who have taught me so much about who I really am. You know who you are.

Last, and most importantly, my deepest love and gratitude go to my beautiful and amazing children, Luke King and Cierra Savatgy-King. Thank you Luke for all of the wonderful graphics throughout this book and your patience and willingness to take that on. You went way beyond the call of duty. But mostly, thanks for just being in my life, for never acting like you were embarrassed by your mom and for teaching me to see life differently. Your depth, humor and sheer presence never cease to amaze me. Thanks for being exactly who you are! You are my rock! And thank you Cierra for reading every damn thing I ever sent you and giving me immediate feedback. But more importantly, thank you for choosing me as you mom and gracing me with your amazing light, your incredible kindness and your beautiful trust. You are my rockstar!

I am not sure why I was blessed with two such old souls in such beautiful bodies, but I am incredibly happy that you are both part of my journey.

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Part I: From Scarcity to Sufficiency: Principles for Shifting the Cultural Paradigm

Chapter 1: Why Abundance Is Not the Issue!

Chapter 2: Transactional and Relational (or, Sir Isaac Newton Meets Quantum Science and the New Biology)

Chapter 3: Using Both Left AND Right Hemispheres

Chapter 4: Masculine AND Feminine

Chapter 5: Physical AND Spiritual

Part II: Identifying Our Personal Obstacles

Chapter 6: Let’s Get Personal

Chapter 7: How You Got to You Are Here

Chapter 8: Your Money as a Relationship 89

Part III: The OARSS Process™ Manual: Practices To Honor the Tide and Create from the Freedom of a Sufficiency Mindset

Chapter 9: Practical Tool #1: Observing Sensationsand Learning to Read Energy

Chapter 10: Practical Tool #2: Asking Questions

Chapter 11: Practical Tool #3: Releasing the Big Bad Boogie Man and Reclaiming Your Freedom About Money

Chapter 12: Practical Tool #4: Setting a New Direction—Creating From Our Deeper Truth

Chapter 13: Practical Tool #5: Setting a New Direction—Designing A Deeply Profound Relationship with Money

Chapter 14: Practical Tool #6: Showing Up in the Natural State of Sufficiency

Part IV: Cultivating Collaboration

Chapter 15: Standing on the Edge of a Cultural Evolution

Chapter 16: Putting It All Back Together Again: Life as a Collaboratory

List of Figures

Figure 3.1: Brain Hemisphere Functions

Figure 4.1: Masculine-Feminine Descriptors

Figure 5.1: Creating an Integrated Money Culture

Figure 5.2: Scarcity vs. Sufficiency

Figure 7.1: What Children Really Hear

Figure 9.1: Emotions and Sensations

Figure 9.2: Chakra Chart

Figure 12.1: Freedom Wheel

Figure 13.1: Creating a Relationship with Your Money

Introduction

Once upon a time, when I was a much younger and less experienced coach, I naively asked two daring questions to a packed house of workshop participants. The first question, When was the last time you had sex? elicited plenty of response. The room was full of laughter, outrageous suggestions and goofy giggles.

My second question, however, created one of those uncomfortable moments that I am still trying to forget. Even though I was only asking for a number, the question shocked the room into absolute silence and the tension was as thick as a coastal South Carolina summer. Not a single person in this previously rambunctious group was willing to shout out their number. I was living every public speaker’s worst nightmare and I had absolutely no idea what to say or do next. Obviously, I lived through the evening, but I didn’t ask that particular question again for over 10 years.

What was the simple little question that packed such a punch?

How much money do you make?

Most of us spend our lifetime focused on money, yet as a culture we find it harder to discuss than our sex life, our health, our addictions or any other skeleton lurking in the closet. We spend an inordinate amount of our precious time earning it, saving it, spending it, trying to manage it, worrying about it, holding our breath or bitching about it, yet usually we cannot talk honestly and freely about it—even with family and close friends.

Some of us do our best to avoid the importance of money. Some go to great links to seek it out, control it and collect it while still others are hiding both their brilliance and their vulnerability behind their money. Even for many of those who have devoted years of study to discovering themselves, to making deep spiritual inquiries and to living a purpose driven life, money continues to create fear, confusion and fog along the way.

Money is a man-made invention, yet we let it determine our choices of mate, career and direction in life. We define success by the collection of some arbitrary amount of money. Then we categorize ourselves (and others) based upon that definition. And in maybe the single most backwards shared thought on the planet, we all make up stories about who we are as human beings, about our inherent value—based on our feelings and interactions with money!

Money and power are inextricably linked to our personal survival and emotional well-being, but they are also central to every war, environmental controversy, human rights issue and political debate out there. I believe that our experience with money is both an internal, spiritual dilemma and a practical, cultural cluster mess, and that we will have to examine both at the same time. It is not an either/or proposition. We probably cannot resolve either our own self-esteem issues or the challenges of our time without bringing both our internal relationships and our cultural beliefs about money out into the open, into the light of day.

True Purpose and Potential of Money

Unfortunately, the truth is that we have, at best, a minimal understanding of our personal underlying beliefs or our limiting cultural patterns with money. We have even less awareness of the true purpose and potential of money. What I found is that an amazing world awaits us when we awaken to the real purpose of money and then find our own authentic place in that new world.

So what is this well hidden purpose of money? Although it might surprise a lot of people, the real task of money is not to facilitate commerce or trade; it is to foster connection!

The earliest uses of money were to cement alliances, to celebrate rites of passage or to keep the neighboring tribes happy with gifts. It was a natural outgrowth for the need for connection and organization when the size of the human race grew beyond the capacity of a small group to stay in touch. Even at Native American Pow Wows, at Middle Eastern bazaars and at European marketplaces of more modern times, the primary function was originally social and spiritual in nature. Trade came as an outgrowth of the need to be connected to each other.

History tells us then that money was originally invented to facilitate human relationships! This means that money has always been about connection!

In today’s world, money can still fill our need for connection—not just to one another or even for one another, but as a spiritual tool to grow into ourselves. Money provides an endless opportunity (also sometimes known as a challenge) for the birthing of our true greatness. All of our experiences of life— with relationships, health or money—are simply to awaken us to our own individual potential and then to tap into the capacity of humanity as a whole.

People have been wrestling with how to reach their potential, with their relationship to their particular brand of God, with their contribution to the whole and with their own personal value for a very, very long time. But how these pieces fit together, especially in relation to money, might not have been possible until very recently. The planet seems to be approaching the tipping point in our cultural and spiritual evolution. Many, many people across the planet now have the capacity and time for deep reflection. More and more people have the resources that free them from a focus on simple survival and allow them the time and attention to explore questions about spirituality and the pursuit of happiness. We also have a huge population, especially in the developed world that has reached an age where they are looking for more than just financial fulfillment.

At the same time, we have a world perched on the edge of mind-boggling and massive change—both environmentally and economically. Not only do we have the capacity to blow ourselves up and radically alter the weather patterns of the planet, but we also have the ability to communicate across borders and share information like never before in the history of humankind.

This means that we are now reaching a point that global culture itself can shift. It also means that we can now wake up to the reality that our relationship with money is inextricably linked to our spiritual awakening—as individuals and as a planet.

I believe that now is the time for us to look at money from deep within the context of our consciousness, as part of the same holistic conversation within which many of us now examine our health and our relationships. Because money is necessary to our survival and it is in our face at every turn of modern society, we have a strong motivation to deal with money—one way or another. This makes it a memorable teacher. It also makes it a very powerful partner.

Waking Up Through Our Money

Ultimately this book, this ongoing experiment, is about shifting into a living awareness of our own magnificence. Our greatness already exists. We don’t actually need to add anything external at all, including money. The truth is that nothing is broken or in need of repair. There is nothing to fix, acquire or prove. Like the spider, which with no instruction whatsoever always weaves a perfect web, completely unique to its particular family, we too already know how to create our own perfect life. No one needs to teach us—it is already part of our very Being. We go to workshops, take courses and read books in search of our perfection. Yet, we already are—stupendously…enough!

The problem is that we don’t believe our truth! Therefore, most of us do need to re-learn how to let ourselves emerge from the patterns that dim us down and have us twisting into this season’s latest fashion of pretzel. Most of us need constant practice in re-training our thoughts and developing our awareness of our own brilliance. Most of us need reminders that life is actually happening through us, instead of to us; that we are responsible for how we show up in our own reality. And all of us need a community of practice that supports our awakening.

Like the acorn, we need nourishment and favorable conditions that allow us to grow into the mighty oak tree. And just like the acorn, we will never grow into being a pine tree or a palm tree or an Abraham Lincoln, no matter how much we might admire or envy such creations. We are already us, we just need to crack the hard shell and emerge—healthy and thriving, reaching for the light.

What would happen if we got back to the original purpose of money? If we made our interactions with money focused on the things that matter most to us? What if we used money to not only connect to others, but to assist in connecting to our own inner knowingness, to our deeper truth and authenticity?

Sometimes, we tend to get so caught up in the content of living—the details of our current financial situation, health issue or relationship challenge—that we often miss the most important information of all: the context. We are spiritual beings in physical bodies and whatever is happening in the physical dimension is simply a reflection of what is happening in our consciousness—in the energetic, invisible world of Being-ness.

Sensations

Every conversation in any relationship—whether between you and a spouse, you and your body or you and your money— is full of layers of beliefs and patterns that result in certain subtle but very powerful energies. These energies impact our bodies as physical sensations. Some are obvious like when we fall down and scrape a knee; others are less noticeable like the hair rising on the back of our neck when we are uncomfortable. It is also these sensations that give us the data to recognize our context, to identify how we are actually being in the physical world. This is the stuff that we have to get very quiet to notice and discern, but like the wind it can create mountains out of molehills or, conversely, drive people to astonishing works of beauty and contribution.

We will study how to use sensations in relation to our interaction with money later, but it is worth noting here that an awareness of sensations is an important tool in waking up to our own brilliance and creating the life that we know is waiting to burst forth from us. We all know that money is important (everyone tells us so), but most of the time our thoughts about money makes us feel like we are being chased by the proverbial lion in the jungle. It is our awareness of sensations that can shift our experience of money to feeling more like a lover’s hand— reaching out, inviting us to that oh-so-sweet slow dance, where we breath deeply and feel safe and protected, cherished and known.

Money as Soul Mate

Most of us can at least imagine an incredibly joyful, safe and fulfilling relationship with a Soul Mate—someone who gets us, who always has our back, who loves us unconditionally and with whom we love to spend time. Now imagine this same sort of Soul Mate relationship, kicked up a notch or two—with money! Money is already here to help us move through our blocks, our bad habits and our limiting beliefs. It is already part of the experience of moving toward unconditional self-love and teaching us to see our own existence in the context of our Soul’s awareness. Even though money, through no fault of its own, has acquired a bad rep over the centuries, it is surprisingly one of the most powerful partners for self-actualization, connecting to our purpose and growing into our own greatness.

But the extra kick, the booster rocket? That comes from money’s capacity to connect us to one another. How we choose to earn and use our money directly and repeatedly impacts very large numbers of people across the globe. Since we are constantly exchanging money during a day, this means that we have a lot of opportunity to connect (positively and negatively) with those who share this experience of life with us.

Money is potential—both internal and external—waiting to be put into play, waiting to be a conscious part of integrating the spiritual into the physical journey of our lives! It is a Soul Mate waiting to reach out and dance with us in a lover’s embrace.

Purpose and Organization of This Book

If you are waiting for your ship to come in or for a knight in a shining white Ferrari to rescue you, this book is likely to make you slightly seasick. If you expect ten easy steps to a super-sized bank account in five short weeks, then I suggest that you too find a different route to fulfill your fantasy. This is not another book about how to make more money. Our culture already provides a wealth of great material for learning how to navigate relationships and health issues from the inside out. We also have plenty of practical resources full of useful information about how to earn, manage or save money. And there is no shortage of great self-help books about redefining wealth or creating abundance. This book is none of those. Instead, it is an evolutionary journey into the surprising and untapped world of money as a relationship!

This book and the programs that go with it are about using our relationship with money to open our minds to a new way of seeing, a new way of doing and most importantly a new way of being in our own lives! This is the world of exquisite sufficiency. I cannot promise you greater amounts of anything even if you apply yourself fully to all of the exercises in the book, but I can promise that if you follow the steps and do the work, that you will be able to navigate the relational field of life with far more awareness. You will feel differently about your life—including your relationship with money.

I know that deep transformation (both individually and culturally) needs both knowledge and action. So although this book is an exploration about our culturally derived relationship with money, it is more importantly a personal workbook about our relationship with our Selves, the Divine and one another. It is my effort at sharing not only the sometimes surprising concepts that I have learned on my inside/out journey into the land of money as a connector, but also the practical, nuts and bolts steps that I have learned from over 17 years of coaching. It is both a photo album, using words to paint pictures of new knowledge and perspectives, and a practical guidebook, so that you too can experience a fundamental shift in your life.

The book is somewhat circular (like life) and flows from a focus on the cultural issues about money (Part I) to an exploration into our own personal obstacles (Part II) and what we can do about them (Part III). Finally, we bring it back to the beginning, but with a new perspective so that we can collaborate and create by evolutionary leaps and bounds toward a sustainable, fulfilling and nurturing future for all. I suggest that you do read the book from the beginning for the first time through, but the exercises and practical tools will be more useful the more that you use them.

The Evolutionary Opportunity

This is essentially a how-to book full of both well-thoughtout concepts and activities to experientially integrate what we already know in our guts to be true. It is designed as a how-to for a particular part of our selves. The ability to make profound evolutionary shifts is clearly not the job of our ego, but rather some deeper part of ourselves. Many call this the authentic self. I prefer a term that one of my favorite teachers, Craig Hamilton, coined.

The Evolutionary Self is that part of us that is thrilled with the new, that welcomes change and exploration of life’s purpose, that doesn’t resist the opportunity to evolve or to say YES! to life. This is the self that in coaching terms lights-up. That glow-y, engaged, luminous, grounded, wise, positive, expansive, excited and vibrant Self that is aware and alive with a higher sense of everyone’s potential. This Self thrives on progress and growth and yearns to evolve humanity, to co-create a better world. This is the Self that grows the acorn into the oak tree.

I believe that we sit at the edge of an evolutionary impulse that can move human kind into a radical and collective realignment with wholeness, purpose and grace. Life has always been an extraordinary process for creative potential. What is different now is our growing ability to perceive and then actualize this divine engagement that is our natural birthright. Hopefully, this book propels us further in that direction by helping you to step into your own magnificence and then share that radiance with the rest of the world through your own kick-ass relationship with money!

Welcome aboard! I am honored that you are along for the journey and I look forward to discovering what we might create together.

Part I

From Scarcity to Sufficiency:

Principles for Shifting the Cultural Paradigm

"The mind is like a parachute – it works better when it is open."

-Frank Zappa

Chapter 1

Why Abundance Is Not the Issue!

Do you ever wonder if maybe evolution has lost its way? Clearly civilization today resembles the Sorcerer’s Apprentice—on crack!

To refresh your memory, in the original poem by Goethe or the subsequent movie by Disney,