Snake Charming

When I was taking my North Star life coach training, we each were asked to fill in the blank. "Money is __________". The people that answered first said things like "money is freedom", money is a river", "money is travel". The filled-in blanks all contained positive connotations. I thought to myself, "uh,oh, I'm in trouble, my money metaphor is 'money is a snake'". Snakes are slithery, slippery and scary and it didn't help that I had just finished the last Harry Potter book with its images of snakes and snake countenances. My connotations were definitely not positive. So, I put the metaphor aside and didn't think about it much until I was coaching somebody about money. At that point, I realized that it was time to stop procrastinating and deal my feelings toward money as evinced by my metaphor.

I thought about the metaphor off and on during the day, and that night just as I was falling asleep, I turned it around. "Snakes are money". I thought to myself "okay, how do I turn snakes into money" and the picture of a snake charmer popped into my head. Without snakes, snake charmers have no livelihood or money. Snake charmers are in control of snakes, and in cultures outside of North America, snakes have very different, very positive connotations.

The notion of being in control seems to have freed me from some of my anxiety about money. I have known for some time that I have always had enough money to do what is really important to me. I've always feared, though, that there would be a day, when I wouldn't. I am a snake charmer now and the money will be there if I do my work. And within days of turning my metaphor from scary and negative to one positive and strong, I had several money-earning opportunities come my way. Some were low-paying; some were higher-paying. Some were doing things I love; some were doing things that I can do and do well but don't love. The point is that I can choose and if I choose according to my true self, I will indeed live a "charmed" life.