Boost your self worth to boost your net worth.
Why this money advice pisses me off. Plus an interview with Louise Morris.
Hi and welcome to The Ladybird Purse, my weekly newsletter about women and money. I’m not a financial advisor, but I’m about to be a money coach - stay tuned!
Recently I read a book I’d seen recommended as the single best book about healing your relationship with money. But I hadn’t got very far before I read the words boost your self worth to boost your net worth and it pissed me off.
Of course self worth isn’t unconnected to our relationship to money - I suspect that in the past, spending money as fast as it came in, feeling more comfortable with less, underearning (still), etc., was and is likely to do with my own (mostly past) struggles with self worth - but this book seemed to be completely disregarding structural issues, putting the onus on the individual, which I know, again from experience, can leave us feeling guilt and shame when we can’t magically fix our money problems.
And claiming a direct correlation - better self-esteem will lead to a higher income - is demonstrably bollocks.
I mean, improving your self worth is valuable in and of itself. And, yes, if you don’t value yourself that may well have an impact on how much you earn. But boost your self worth to boost your net worth? It’s rarely that simple.
Most of the time I think I’m pretty great but that doesn’t seem to be magically making money appear in my account.
And if you reverse it, well, some of the richest men in the world quite evidently hate themselves.
The author went on to quote Suze Orman:
You can’t fix a financial problem with money. You can only fix a financial problem by fixing yourself… You always have to go within to see why you are doing without.
Again, demonstrably untrue. So many financial problems can be fixed with money. So many! (That’s why they’re called financial problems!) If the bank is planning to foreclose on your mortgage, try telling them you’re working on yourself, see where that gets you.
And then I was reading through an old post to prepare for the follow up and Manisha Thakor’s differentiation between money worries and money problems jumped right out.
"Money problems," Manisha explains, are "issues that can be resolved with financial solutions, tactical solutions."
For the individual or family, it's things like credit card debt, student loans, retirement savings, childcare costs, etc. On a community or society level, it's things like wage stagnation, inflation, wealth inequality, healthcare costs, etc.
Money worries, on the other hand, "require emotional and intellectual solutions."
She writes, "[Money worries] are a collective aching, a feeling that I will never measure up no matter how hard I try."
Money worries are about self worth. Money problems can and are solved with money. It does no one any good to conflate the two. Apart from, perhaps, someone trying to sell you a book about healing your relationship with money.
This week’s interview…
…is with Louise Morris
And next month, I’m going to be talking to Louise about money (obviously), her career change, freelancing - including decision-making, difficult conversations, negotiation, etc. - and I’d love to include questions from subscribers.
Anything you’d like to ask Louise (or me!), please comment on this post or you can email me.
If you’re not a paid subscriber already, I’d love it if you’d consider upgrading. Paid subscribers receive a second weekly post - and will soon get a preview of my money coaching course - along with access to three (3) years of archives.
If you would like a paid sub, but can’t swing it right now, email me and I’ll sort it.
An interview with Louise Morris
Louise is a writer, educator, and former consultant paediatric, neonatal, and trauma surgeon, exploring the intersections of reflection, leadership, and creative connection.
After 18 years in the NHS caring for children and families, she now writes full-time, with a focus on decision-making, career transition, feminist leadership, and everyday joy.
Alongside her writing, she is developing a portfolio of work that includes reflective writing circles for clinicians, strategic support for solo founders and leaders, and in-person gatherings for creatives seeking deeper connection.
Louise lives in rural Nottinghamshire with her husband and two young children, and serves as a non-executive director at Lemon Jelly Press CIC, an independent publisher amplifying unheard voices.
What is your relationship with money currently?
Conscious.
There were things my husband and I had planned before I lost my job - things like having storage built and a utility room in the house that we'd had quotes for, but it's all gone on hold. There's currently a sense of pause, and we'll frequently say 'when there's a second income coming in again'.
I'm very aware how fortunate I am that we have the safety net of the savings I'd earned from working extra shifts, such as when covering the resident doctors' strikes last year, so we've been able to keep on top of the mortgage and bills so far.
I'm aware that occasionally in the past I've been somewhat impulsive with purchases, so currently I'm being quite careful and limiting my spending to be much more considered, such as judiciously spending on learning as I navigate creating a new business.
What’s your earliest money memory?
My grandparents had a wooden money counter where coins stacked up inside and it had markings to calculate the amount it held by the height of the coin tower. I loved to play with it, empty the coins, count them myself then refill the counter and check that the numbers matched. I learned money maths pretty young because of that!
What advice would you give your younger self about money?
To be a little less trusting in the concept of a 'career for life' - because things change. I've changed, too. The fact that my career was my sole source of income meant that I probably stayed in an unhappy job for longer than I might have.
There was a sense of enormous insecurity - with the relentless uncertainty of temporary jobs but at the same time being trapped by the salary, and feeling unqualified to do anything else. It's taking a lot even now to unpick all of that.
So I think I'd tell younger me to value myself, stop working for free, stop self funding work courses/conferences etc 'for the CV' and think about how to create my own security by way of several income streams, with some coming from things I love to do!
What’s the biggest money mistake you’ve made?
I think it's probably that I chose my career, and the specialty within that career based on what seemed enjoyable and having been inspired by role models I met along the way.
What I didn't take time to consider (or perhaps dismissed as less important, at the time), was the path I followed had very little in the way of earning potential outside of emergency work in the NHS. And being a small specialty, permanent jobs are few and far between, so when I found myself without one, my options were limited.
Many medical careers lend themselves to private practice, or work in industry, health promotion or wellness. But my specialty was so niche that I haven't found a direct use for the very specific knowledge I have, so now that I've left I'm starting over and trying to create a new path without an income at all, at first.
The other money mistake I'm currently making is that I'm still paying for all of my medical memberships such as GMC fees, Royal College and BMA subscriptions, indemnity insurance etc. Because to stop all of that will close the door more finally. I'm almost ready, but it's a big step, so at the moment I'm having to write off the expense.
I'm very grateful to have managed to save enough to cover these months out of work, and for the support of my husband who has trusted me to take the time that's needed to work through what to do next.
What’s the best thing you’ve ever spent money on?
Beth Kempton's writing courses. Coming across an ad for Beth's Winter Writing Sanctuary at Christmas has opened possibilities I couldn't have dreamed of.
I left my old career in July 2024, and spent the next few months applying for jobs in consulting and pharma and not really knowing what to do next. I've never been a writer, though I quite enjoyed it at school. But something clicked in those nine days when I followed that course, and I found my writing voice and a community here on Substack. So even though money is tight, my husband and I agreed that I could invest in her intensive course 'Ink and Flame', and it really has changed my life.
I'm still learning. I have ideas bubbling constantly. It has led me to realise there are other elements to my previous career that are entirely transferable to the world outside medicine - I'm an experienced leader, decision maker and educator, and I thrive when empowering others - all work that I did every day as a surgeon. So there is much I can offer, and at last I'm excited about what might come next.
Do you have a pension? If not, do you have a plan?
I do have an NHS pension, but I have no idea what it's going to be worth, having left 18 years into my career. NHS pensions are super complicated and though I know I need to investigate so that I can plan what I need to do going forwards, it's just feeling a little beyond what I can manage at this point when my finances are at their most precarious and I need to focus on earning again in the short term first. It's on the to-do list, though.
What would you do with £10,000?
Right now, I'd be very boring, breathe a sigh of relief, and stick it in my current account where it would pay the next couple of months of mortgage and bills.
What little treat would you buy with a tenner?
I'd take my son and daughter to a little coffee shop in a neighbouring village and have a milkshake with them while we sit outside and watch the ducks on the pond. It's perfect especially at this time of year when there are ducklings!
If you were me, what would you want to ask women about money?
A friend told me a couple of weeks ago that she almost won the Euromillions lottery. She matched all the numbers bar one, which was a single digit different from the winning number. She won around £1000, but sat looking at the ticket for a long time thinking about what might have been if that digit was the right one and the win had been £100 million.
Her husband said it wouldn't change anything for him, he loves everything about his job and would still work full time. She said she'd give up her job in a heartbeat. So I guess, and this feels like a big question for me given my career transformation, the question would be: if you won the lottery tomorrow, would you still do the job you're doing? And if not, what would you do with your days?
Louise also founded Livestack
If you’d prefer not to subscribe, but would still like to support me/this newsletter, you can make a one-off payment:
Brilliant. I’m a bit of a self-help addict and fall into this trap repeatedly. i’m also self employed in a fickle industry where self-help-talk and myth-making have a lot of room to flourish. Thank you for this reminder that sometimes (often) it’s not about embodying my worth, it’s about the money.
"You can’t fix a financial problem with money."
This reminds me of that sex and the city quote by carrie - "the only thing a girl needs to get a date is another date." I really think that the thing that heals our relationship with money is SOME MONEY. I don't even (just) mean interest on savings. It's just as much that, as soon as you can relax and not feel terrified of scarcity they our nervous system can settle and we can start to make bolder, more potentially lucrative choices, and/or use our time to invest in ourselves. Very hard to do that if you are living hand to mouth and terrified of debt.