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• The Financial Wisdom of Ebenezer Scrooge : 5 Principles to Transform Your Relationship with Money
Ted Klontz, Rick Kahler, ...

HCI, 2005 - 200 pages

average customer review:based on 26 reviews
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   highly recommended  highly recommended






A good book on money beliefs

Most people will get a lot of a lot of value out of this simple and easy to read book. The book is designed around beliefs in relation to money and finance, which the authors call 'money scripts'. Basically, the book is based on psychological paradigm applied to personal finance. If you're familiar with psychology, therapy and to some extent personal development, you will be familiar with many of the ideas and concepts in this book - denial, the feeling feelings, aspects of wounding in childhood and how beliefs are formed, being in the present and so on. The authors use therapy in their approach of working with people in a one-on-one context including techniques like psychodrama in order to connect with the feeling of the feeling (rather than just the mental concept) in order to release that feeling (i.e. the psychological paradigm that repressed and negative feelings need to be felt and expressed in order to be released).

Most books on finance do not give more than a cursory look at beliefs (if at all) and then they just list a lot of the common beliefs that people have around finance, and usually suggest something like affirmations as way of dealing with them. Their treatment is usually superficial and often derivative. In contrast there's a broader and much more useful treatment in this book. The real value that most readers of this book wil get is that there is discussion of the many different types of financial beliefs and their permutations that people have, where they came from and their likely impact on their life. That is, you will very likely see aspects of your beliefs in these pages, which makes it much more powerful then just seeing a list of beliefs or fears like 'I'll never have enough money'.

There are a number of exercises in the book that you will find very valuable to do. They're not difficult and often don't involve much time although they may sometimes be confronting, if not revealing, and may provide the awareness and impetus that you require to make change in your life. There are tools also that you can use on a more ongoing basis to make change in your life. Unfortunately, as the authors acknowledge, awareness is sometimes not enough to change a belief (something most other books on finance tend to overlook). They provide a practice of re-scripting the belief in this book and discuss the psychodrama type technique used in their seminars although you wont have access to this just by reading the book. While I have my own practice for beliefs (and there are many alternative one could use), what the book lacks in this sense is something to deal with the belief on the energetic level.

The book cleverly weaves the story of Ebenezer Scrooge in order to illustrate their perspective. It certainly makes the book a more enjoyable read than some of the other bland business titles out there and they are to be commended for the excellent research they did on the story. Also, lending to the authenticity is some of the author's own personal stories around their financial histories.

There are, however, a number of assumptions, beliefs, conclusions and connections that in the book don't necessarily hold true in all circumstances. Take for instance the idea that 'For many of us, this pain is the tool that inspires change. If we're lucky enough, we get to experience it while we still have time to alter things. Once more Scrooge is about to experience the pain that brings about transformation.' A belief that pain is the best way to bring about transformation is not a really powerful belief IMHO for someone who wants to be successful in their life. Or take another comment 'Let's face it, life isn't always joyful, nor should it be. Perpetual and unrelenting joy without pain is impossible and is often a form of denial.' So I'd recommend that you read the book with an open mind, as there is an underlying viewpoint (based heavily on the psychological paradigm) that guides their interpretation of the Dicken's story to derive some generalised financial principles, and to what a healthy financial situation would look like, that is not always transparent.

Next, to the model the authors use - it is one of financial 'enlightenment', based on a five stage process:

1. Denial and intervention
2. Exploring the past
3. Understanding the present
4. Contemplating the future
5. Transformation and action

My simplest, summary of that would be, come out of denial about your past and understand it and what caused it and the limiting beliefs you hold, come into the present and see reality as it is, use tools of transformation to heal the past or wounds you have (based on feeling the unexpressed feelings), come into the present where you can live in more abundance and authenticity, and then contemplate the future you would like to create. The authors use the 'death' as an advisor model (i.e. what would you regret if you died tomorrow, how would you like people to have seen you, etc.) for examining what is important to you and then designing authentic goals based on this insight. Finally, take new actions based upon these realisations using a slightly varied model of SMART goals.

Importantly they warn at the end about financial counselors and I'd suggest extending that to all counselors and therapists who have not done any inner work (or rely heavily on one type of modality), since they can unconsciously project their interpretation reality and unexamined belief systems onto you. Even today, I'd suggest it would be very challenging to find people to work with that have that degree of depth in their own self-awareness. Having done my own healing and therapist training, I realise that many therapists, as well meaning as they are, just don't have that depth of self-awareness and tend to just run their model or training on you. Many of the people in my therapist training course had done little or no therapy or inner work on themselves and had little desire to pursue that to any depth. Moreover, many people with university psychology degrees have not done any deep inner work themselves. It's the old saying, 'when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.' I almost shudder to think of people with a specialist background in finance running a very basic and limited knowledge of therapy on the client.

For instance, I had a therapist trainer that believed that it took two years of deep therapy before any real progress could be made and at least 10 years before substantial transformation could occur. How long do you think it might take for her clients to change? (And the client would be oblvious this expectation or belief the therapist had of the healing process). Others believe you must undergo substantial pain in order to heal... 'original pain' is what some call it. How much suffering do you think their clients would go through before they could change? While it's true many older people actually did experience this kind of process of healing (and I feel for them, many did it real tough), I don't think that necessarily needs to be the case today. I say this because it's important to check out the belief systems behind the methods, teachings and teachers you use. Most people don't. They take what they read at face value with little or no relfection upon it and choose teachers and teachings simply because they are popular in the public domain.

The authors do provide a few questions at the back of the book that you could ask such a potential financial therapist. As mentioned earlier in my review, and also the book, simple awareness of your beliefs may not be sufficient for you to be able to change them... you may need to work with someone else. So you'd need to be able to make your choices with discernment.

In summary, The Financial Wisdom of Ebenezer Scrooge is an easy read, the some of the tools and insights you will find to be powerful and each chapter has a useful summary and points for application at the end. It covers the topic of beliefs better than anything else I've read in personal finance. While I think there are a few shortcomings, they're relatively minor. All in all, it's a good read with some useful tools, that are made powerful when you explore them and apply them in the context of your own situation.

Thanks for reading my review.

Best wishes to you on your financial journey... I hope you experience an abundance of all good things in yours and your loved ones lives.


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Life Lesson Learned from A Story Passed on For Generations

The three authors take a good look at the story of Ebenezer Scrooge and pull out valuable lessons about money and the emotions behind them. This is a great book for anyone who really wants to understand their relationship with money. The exercises are easy and yet thought provoking. A great read for the holidays.









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Not your average investment book

As a syndicated credit and debt columnist with [...] and Scripps-Howard I see a lot of financial material and hear a lot of sad stories surrounding money. This rather unique book took me back to my roots as a psychiatric, financial and credit counselor when it dealt not only with net worth but self worth. It will help many people learn how to see and live with money not just for money's sake but as a way to free their inner-selves with a guiltless freedom borne of financial security. The points in the book will help rescript your life and attitude about money by showing how money alone can't fill those holes in your life. The authors go on to show you how to build a strong vision of your future and to live a life that has greater passion, meaning and integrity than you may now think is possible.
I recommend that you take the time to read and think about this book before your ghost of Christmas Future comes calling!


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Impressed Financial Advisor

The book is great at showing root causes of money dysfunction in a simple format based upon a well known story. Anyone can understand it and I highly encourage all to read it.


Review of Financial Wisdom of Ebenezer Scrooge

good integration of practical and spiritual. Helps consolidate the lessons of the other book by same authors, Conscious finance.


reviews: 1, page 2, 3, 4, 5, 6



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