Lately, and perhaps a result of the uncertainty around the length of the WGA strike and the atmospheric rains earlier this year that damaged my home and neighborhood, I’ve been snagged by a feeling of scarcity. It's dark, tangly and at times squeezes me so tight I can’t breathe.
As a result, I’ve been short-tempered with my family, question every expense with a tight-fisted attitude, lost my appetite and several pounds, and feel trapped.
In sitting with the discomfort of all this, I can’t help but think about how my dad was a child of the Depression and my mom grew up poor in Japan during World War II. My folks had a close relationship with scarcity and while I grew up surrounded by love in a lower income household, we were very cautious and conservative with money.
We always had food on the table, but we didn’t eat out at restaurants. We always had clothes to wear from shopping at K-Mart or Zayer, but didn’t dare go to Marshall Fields. We went on vacation three times when I was growing up, but never stayed at motels. We slept at extended family’s homes or in the back of my dad’s pickup truck. In many ways it was truly an idyllic childhood and I’m grateful for the laughter we had to counterbalance the stress of lean times.
But there was always this sense that the bottom could drop out tomorrow.
😬 Heat was set no higher than 63 degrees during the winter (in Chicago!)
😬 Dad would sit at the kitchen table and sigh mightily while paying the bills.
😬 Mom hoarded money so she wouldn’t have to hear my father question why things cost so much.
👩🍼 I started babysitting when I was about 9 years old so I wouldn’t cause my parents anxiety by asking for money. That led to a lot of scrappy jobs like cleaning houses and flipping burgers.
🎄 We had a fake silver Christmas tree that we stored in the attic and used year after year even when the aluminum “leaves” fell off.
🪑 The living room furniture had plastic covers and we were not allowed to sit on the couch or chair.
🍝 Wednesday was pasta night. Some weeks we had meatballs!
🥪 Sunday was ham or roast beef night, and we’d make sure there were leftovers for meat sandwiches during the week.
All this to say that I have a narrative in my head about money.
It goes something like this: Work really hard, save aggressively, triple check every spend, there will never be enough and don’t be foolish.
This scarcity mindset has reared it’s ugly head and I’ve had to ask friends for help. What I keep hearing is that I need to move into a perspective of abundance. I believe it. I believe energy attracts like energy.
But abundance doesn’t sit well in my body. It feels bloated, constipated, lethargic, entitled, privileged, even greedy. I don’t like the idea of “too much” or “more than I need.”
Feeling more stuck, I looked to deepen my understanding of abundance to social media. I’d rather go to Peru and have an Ayahuasca journey, but that’s not in the cards because of … scarcity! So I did the next best thing 😜 and reached out via Facebook to ask people what abundance means to them. (So appreciate the abundance of responses - see what I did there?)
Here are a few highlights:
An elegant sufficiency of infinite variety
Overflowing
More where that came from
Plenty today, plenty on the way tomorrow
A relaxed feeling of plenty
And then another category of responses around the theme of “community”:
So much goodness you have to share it with others
Contentment and willingness to share your harvest with others
Being in the fortunate position to share your love, time and money
And then another category of responses around the theme of “enough”:
Never having to worry about the basic things in life, like food or a roof
Torah answers that question: "Who is the rich man? He who is happy with his portion!"
There is enough for everyone
Having my needs (economically, physically and emotionally) met with ease
An appreciation for what you have
Final category around spirituality and perspective:
This amazing life we’ve been blessed with
Gratitude. When you turn to face all that you have, the world expands!
Freedom
Lots of love
What is landing the most for me is the idea of “enough” vs. abundance. Abundance steps on my values of equity, equality, fairness, and belonging. Enough aligns with my values of gratitude, curiosity, compassion, education - and of course, equity, equality, fairness and belonging.
So how do I access ENOUGH?
Before I answer that, I’m going to outline a format on how to get to the other side of a problem using my current scarcity experience:
☝🏽️ Differentiate between the problem and the symptom: I was feeling high anxiety about finances triggered by the massive rainstorms in Los Angeles that caused damage to my home. That was the symptom. The underlying problem was my scarcity mindset.
☝🏽️ Dig for the ROOT CAUSE of the problem and identify any mistaken beliefs: I grew up in a lower income household in which we lived frugally, planting the belief that there would never be enough. In looking at the truth, there was always enough and while there were lean times, we had an abundance of hard work, humor and frugality to make it all come together.
☝🏽️ Source multiple solutions to solve the problem: I didn’t fully do this. I asked friends to help me and they suggested I develop an abundant mindset. I latched on to that immediately (living other people’s values) and didn’t explore other options. But I got stuck on the idea of abundance (because it didn’t align with my values) so I sourced different definitions of abundance that led me to another solution. Develop a mindset of “Enough.”
☝🏽️ Choose one of the solutions that honors your values: I chose to honor Enough for the reasons above. I chose not to value abundance or the other definitions of abundance because they didn’t fully resonate or align with what’s currently important to me.
So back to the question of how do I access ENOUGH?
The key here is not to go hog wild. My business coach, Dallas Travers, says fast is slow, slow is fast. So what’s one small baby step that I could take to embrace this new mindset? I came up with several ideas: re-engage with my gratitude practice, look at the data (do we have food, do we have a place to live, am I paying all my bills), re-evaluate my budget and see where there’s excess, develop a somatic movement to embody enough.
I chose looking at the data and have combined that with gratitude journaling. I’m only a week in, but I’m starting to feel the difference. In recognizing that I have Enough, it’s calming my nervous system and I’m now able to do longer range planning to insure that we have Enough in the future. I’d like to think that my family is no longer walking on eggshells around me and I have noticed that I'm breathing a little easier.
The hard truth is that the damage to our home has a significant financial impact on our lives. I can’t bury my head in the sand, but a scarcity mindset and an abundance mindset are not going to lead me to a place of true safety and security. I have enough. We have enough.
To finish out the steps of how to get to the other side of the problem:
☝🏽️ Brainstorm baby steps to implement the solution. The smaller the better.
☝🏽️ Identify one of the small steps to take action on. Make sure it’s honoring at least one of your values.
☝🏽️ Take that step today.
☝🏽️ Assess and course correct as needed.
What problem are you grappling with right now? Is it truly a problem, or is it a symptom?
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Do You Struggle With a Scarcity Mindset?