Financial Recovery: Developing a Healthy Relationship to Money [Paperback]

I had heard about this book before it was even available in print edition. Though I wasn't a big Kindle fan, I got the app for my Iphone specifically because I wanted to read this book. Am I glad I did. I have come across a lot of money books in my life but I don't think I have ever seen one like this. Not only did it speak directly to my own struggles with money but it did it in such a gentle non-shaming way.

There is a tone that this book has which lets you know she is speaking to you from her experience-- not some theory about how things ought to be-- but how things really are and what you can do to make them better.

Never once does she talk down to you. Instead, you know she has been there too and come out the other side. I have absolutely no trouble beliveing that this book's combination of wisdom and practical tools can finally help me heal the challanges in my relationship with money.

It doesn't feel like just another self help book--it actually feels more important than that. This book says something about money that we all, in these trying financial times, need to hear. OBTW- I loved reading the book on Kindle, I'm a convert to both Financial Recovery and Kindle!

So many books are full of financial advice, yet when we read them and then struggle implementing all their advice, we just feel worse. But not with McCall's book. The difference is that she writes about our actual relationship with money. She talks about the emotions of money. She goes into our history with money. Here is an expert who has spent decades in the trenches with real people and understands why people really do what they do with money and how they can change.

What I love the most about this book are all the stories. She shares her own very personal story of struggling with spending and debt. (She shares some of her painful money secrets that people in her life would have been shocked by at the time, if they had known.) And she shares the stories of countless clients she's helped guide over the years. Suddenly, you feel like you are not alone if you struggle with credit card debt or sometimes you spend too much, or you simply never seem to earn enough.

This book is very easy to read, and it takes the reader through understanding how and why they relate to money the way they do. She writes about being caught in the "money life drain" and how she has seen so many people simply try to work harder, only to not have it help their financial problems. She is very direct about addressing feelings of shame and deprivation and how this fuels our financial behavior. And yes, she shows you how to get out of debt and stay out of debt. She also covers how to track and plan your spending- topics that may be unpopular. But she makes a very convincing case how the new financial behaviors she advocates can truly change your life. By the time the reader gets to the last chapter called "Imagining Sterling Money Behaviors", you just want to BE that person, and you really feel like it's possible. (I've known Karen McCall for years and after I finished her book I ordered twenty copies of it!)

This book offers simple (but not simplistic) insights into how so many of us struggle with money issues. It addresses what is at the core of so many people's lifelong money troubles, regardless of their level of income. Money is just one of those things (like food issues, for example) where the solutions seem so easy for those who don't suffer with the challenges. Just eat less if you want to lose weight, right? But this author understands that fixing money issues and other crucial aspects of our lives just isn't that easy. McCall gets right to the core of the problem; difficulties with money aren't simply about how much money people have, but their essential relationship with money, and that this relationship can spring from not only family history, but feelings of shame and deprivation that drive unhealthy money behaviors. By disclosing her own process of Financial Recovery, and giving many case examples of clients who have used this process, McCall inspires others to find their own path toward real satisfaction and fulfillment, at whatever income level is right for them. She offers non-judgemental observations about patterns that people have in their relationship with money as well as practical ways to break those patterns and transform their lives. This is a money book--full of lots of practical strategies--but more than that, it is a money book with heart. It helps readers to look not only at their financial goals, but at the healing process that is necessary to achieve them.