I’m Lynda, the Money Mentalist
I started my career as an accountant when I was 17. I love numbers, to me they tell a story of your business and your life. I read them like others read novels. I graduated from University with a B.Com. After working for several accounting firms, when I was 7 months pregnant with my daughter (now nearly 33), I began my own practice. I remained in Public Practice until 2010 when I sold my business to return to university to study Psychology.
In the middle of all of this, my marriage ended. Anecdotally, 70-80% of relationships break up because of money and this was true in my situation. I was devastated, and an emotional wreck. Even though I was an accountant, which meant I had a sound knowledge of my own financial situation, that didn’t really help me going through my own breakup. Emotions completely took over. I felt I was completely on my own. I came out the other side servicing $600,000 of debt.
It may seem a strange change in career path from accounting to Psychology, but it made complete sense to me. What I had realised in my years in practice, is that accounting (and money) isn’t just about the numbers, it is also about the emotions that go behind the numbers, it’s how we see the world and how we make decisions all stem from our relationship with money.
I graduated again this time with a Post Graduate Diploma in Arts (Psych). I continued to specialise in Money Psychology by continuing my training with Professor David Krueger (author of the Book ‘The Secret Language of Money’) and became a certified Money Mentor Coach.
WHAT CHANGED
- I learned the distinction between a budget and a money plan.
- I started saying No to myself and others about things that didn’t really matter to me and saying yes to what really mattered to me.
- I learned how to make the tough decisions that helped me turn my life around.
- I rewrote my own Money Story.
The Money Mentalist was born, and I now spend my time working with individuals and couples helping them understand their relationship with money, how to communicate about money to each other and how to make better financial choices. I use my accounting expertise to help them build a Money Plan (I don’t use the term budget) which gives them the confidence to manage their money to reach their financial goals.