magical mortar and pestle

Your current financial situation is a direct reflection of your inner relationship with Money. If you don’t like your finances, something needs to change in your relationship. This is where Alchemy comes in.

Alchemy is the art of transformation. With roots in ancient Egypt and classical Greece, Alchemy comes from a time when there was no distinction between science and magic. The mysteries of matter and consciousness were inextricably linked (as they are again, in today’s quantum physics). These ancient studies gave birth to modern medicine, psychology, chemistry, and even Sir Isaac Newton’s work on gravity.

The ultimate pursuit of Alchemy was the “Philosophers’ Stone,” a substance believed to turn worthless metals into gold. While Alchemists through the ages slaved in the laboratory, their metalwork concealed a spiritual process, a Philosophers’ Stone which had to be kept hidden from the Church: this was the process of inner transformation. Two principles are involved here: 1) turning lead into gold was an outer demonstration of inner transformation, and 2) the seed of the solution (the gold) was hidden in the problem (the lead).

I invite you to use this chapter to discover your own Philosophers’ Stone—your key to wealth and inner transformation—hidden in your relationship with Money.

Before we proceed, let’s review some guidelines I adapted from Alchemist tradition:

Rule #1: As it is above, so it is below.
What shows up in your head is going to show up in your life. This chapter will be using fundamental Relationship Coaching skills to help you transform your relationship with money from a dead seed into a flowering garden. A seed comes to life as a living, thriving, fruit-flowering plant…in the right environment. So, too, your own prosperity. Your potential for financial abundance is there, waiting for the necessary environment within you. Your relationship with money is like the soil that feeds or starves your economic growth. As long as you have hidden beliefs that cause you to unconsciously repel money, perhaps “protect” yourself from wealth, your garden will not grow.

Rule #2: There is no scarcity.
A wealthy client once explained to me how he had overcome poverty. “The amount of money out there in play every day is limitless, beyond our comprehension. Money is everywhere,“ he explained. And it’s available in proportion to “how big your funnel is to take it in”. He had learned to tap into the Source. This relationship supported him.

Rule #3: Consciousness gives you choice.
I assert even a small change in your relationship consciousness can have a huge impact on your material life. You get what you choose, but first you need to know what you’re choosing.

How do I know this? I experienced this transformation myself.

My story:
For years I was struggling as a life coach. I had trouble attracting clients who would pay the fee I wanted. I found myself avoiding discussions of money as long as I could. The whole subject embarrassed me, and my discomfort translated into making clients uncomfortable too. I was “doing” all the right marketing things–networking, newsletters, sample sessions–and getting nowhere. I was not making a “grown-up” living.

What was in my way, I wondered? My coach and I took a look at my relationship with Money. What were my stories about Money? What is this entity I’m in relationship with? What’s going on with this relationship?

Two discoveries popped out: Money didn’t feel safe or reliable, and Money caused separation. (My family would swing between being rich and poor over and over again, and Money was a “reason” for family members not to talk to each other for decades.) If my experience of Money were given personhood, he’d look like a tall, scary, dirty Biker who caused fights at parties. This is the kind of guy I’d be watching carefully, always making sure to keep a safe distance. No wonder I wasn’t bringing Money into my life!

This was not the relationship with Money I wanted to have. (And it wasn’t the relationship I wanted to model for my clients either.) So I created a new paradigm. I fired the Biker persona and put a tall, dark, handsome and romantic suitor in his place. He wore tails and carried a bouquet of red flowers. He wanted to woo me. Can you imagine what it would be like to be wooed by Money? I related to him in a whole new way. This was the guy I wanted to have a relationship with. He loved me. I would do anything to make him happy.

I asked my new Money what he wanted from me so he could stay with me.

Money responded, “Appreciate me. Love me. Stop treating me like a monster.”

I immediately saw how I had been treating him like a monster every time I hesitated to state my fee or didn’t demand payment. My behavior changed immediately. Over the next week four people called me out of the blue to hire me as their coach. I could feel my mouth wanting to move in the familiar patterns that would talk them out of the sale. I had to literally bite my tongue and shut up and let them hire me. You don’t say no to gifts from your beloved.

Whenever I received a check, signed a new client, came across some unexpected income, I graciously thanked Money for the gift. I wasn’t just thanking an abstract concept of abundance—I was thanking a person who was real to me. And this version of Money was valued and invited into my life.

From then on my business and income kept growing. Within six months I had accrued such a waiting list of clients that I had to add group coaching to my services. I didn’t have to look for my new clients; they were finding me. And all I had changed was my inner dialogue with money.

Now it’s your turn:
If you want to improve your financial situation, you must first uncover the negative beliefs that shaped your relationship with Money. Get out some paper and respond to these questions. (Writing creates clarity and speeds your change.)

• What negative things have you heard about money?
• What are some of the negative ways money has shown up in your life and in the lives of those around you.
• What beliefs get between you and prosperity?
• Dig deeper and deeper. You may hit several blank spots before you find the deepest beliefs that have truly driven your relationship with money.

Give Money personhood in relationship to you. If these darkest experiences of money were a person, what would your version of this Money “person” be like?

Make Money real. Who is this Money monster? Is it male or female? Tall or short? How is Money dressed? How do you feel about this Money?

How does Money feel about you?

Can you imagine that they way you relate to this Money villain could be impacting the way money is showing up in your life?

End that relationship, baby!

Create a new relationship with Money. What kind of Money person could you open your heart to? Is this a person who lights you up—who you’d want a relationship with even if he weren’t Money?

Negotiate with this new Money:
What does your new Money want from you to make this relationship better? What action are you going to take to demonstrate to Money that you take his request seriously? Make this new relationship real.

Money is like any other relationship; it comes where it’s invited and appreciated. It rarely comes when it is chased. It can be your partner if you listen to it. The more you care for this relationship, the more money you will attract. Here are three final tips:

1) Appreciate money! When a penny shows up on the sidewalk, thank Money for the gift. Don’t worry about denomination; appreciate everything. Think of how good you feel when you are valued for even a small gesture. It’s the same for Money. Every time you practice receiving and appreciating, you train the universe to send you more. Show the universe what you value.

2) By now your capacity to receive is growing. You’ll notice other stuff creeps in to limit the flow through your funnel to abundance. This stuff may look like clutter, broken appliances, old e-mails, toxic people, time wasters or other energy drains. Clean house! Make space for what you want by having the courage to release what you don’t want. You teach the universe how you want to be treated with every choice you make. And nothing gets the universe’s attention like saying “No.” It’s your quickest ticket to miracles.

3) The most important place to make space for what you want is in your head. Clean out fear and pessimism. Plant love and trust instead. Your thoughts are your seeds, and you can grow flowers or weeds. What do you choose to grow?

Copyright 2003 -2008 Morgana Rae… OBVIOUSLY. Wanna reprint it for your blog or e-zine? Just send me a request. Thanks!

What is Financial Alchemy? Here’s what I shared in an interview Steven McCrory did with me for Magical Blend Magazine a while back:

Morgana: what is Financial Alchemy?
Financial Alchemy is the transformation of your relationship with money, and when your inner relationship with money changes, you see the outward results in your life.

What do you mean by relationship with money?
Your relationship with money is as real and dynamic as your relationship with another human being. If you were to say to your wife, “I don’t trust you. You’re going to leave me. You’re the reason I can’t do what I want with my life. You are responsible for war and suffering. You are the root of all evil,” how would that impact your relationship?

Not well.
What if she said those things about you?

I’d feel terrible.
Would you want to stick around someone who said those things?

Probably not.
Exactly. And those are things we say to money all the time. Why would money want to stick around? We push it away with beliefs we may not even know we have. If something is evil and keeps you from happiness, of course you’re going to protect yourself and push it away.

I understand the pushing it away part. Could you explain what you mean about money wanting to stick around?
This is the Alchemy part, the change in the relationship. I make money a person. Making money into a person you want to have a relationship—as opposed to this villain you have to have in your life—creates an emotional resonance instead of an intellectual exercise. And money can speak to you, tell you what you need to do to create a better relationship. It’s magical.

How did you come up with Financial Alchemy?
My own experience. Where else do things come from? For the longest time I struggled with money. As a coach I was helping people sell films and book television series and realize their dreams. But I was uncomfortable talking about my fees and asking to be paid. Can you imagine? Actually I find this dynamic is very common among caring, spiritual, service oriented people. Especially women. Before anything could change, I had to look at my internal relationship with money. I took a look at negative beliefs and experiences I hadn’t thought about in many years. Family members stopped talking to each other for decades because of money. I was embarrassed to live in a two-story home when my friends lived in apartments. I was afraid of being called spoiled, of not being liked. No wonder I pushed money away! I had formed this idea that money got in the way of love. Given a choice, I choose love! If my negative ideas about money became a person, I think my money person would be a big, scary, violent biker who didn’t bathe. Ick. That was my old money. This relationship had to go. So I fired the biker, and I thought about who I would like to have a relationship with. Who would I love to receive from? Meet my new money: a tall, dark, handsome man who wears an elegant tux, carries a bouquet of red roses, and woos me. He loves me, and I want to make this relationship work!

Sounds like me.
You’re married.

Yes I am. What happened when you changed your money guy?
That very month strangers started calling me out of the blue and hiring me. Within six months I had added thirty new clients and started a waiting list and group coaching to handle the overflow.

Wow. Do you have any other success stories?
Every time I do a seminar I get phone calls from attendees with miraculous stories of jobs and contracts and checks coming in that they didn’t expect. The biggest windfall that I heard of was a twenty thousand dollar contract. [note to readers: my current record is $87,000 within a few hours of our first session.] I’ve posted some of the letters on my website at www.howtobeamoneymagnet.com. My own income jumped from $900 to $5000 in one month. I was amazed.

Just by changing your relationship with money?
The key is to keep the conversation with money going. Money isn’t going to rescue you, but money will be your partner. How can you be a better partner to money? What actions can you take to make the relationship better? Action is what makes change real. Keep asking money how I can make the relationship better. I see money as a spiritual teacher who challenges us to be more creative and courageous than we were being. Money is just a metaphor for the universe itself. You can fight the universe or you can seek to learn from it and love it. Especially when it’s challenging. That’s money.

How is your approach different from other prosperity programs?
Nobody else has made money a person. It’s a lot easier to do what needs to be done when you’re in love. I clearly bring a lot more feminine energy to a subject that tends to be very masculine. I think we need both the masculine “doing” energy and the mystery of feminine magic. Abundance and prosperity come from unexpected places…

How do people get Financial Alchemy?
Go to www.howtobeamoneymagnet.com. You can sign up for the next seminar or order a CD. If you only get one thing, I recommend getting the workbook “Financial Alchemy: Twelve Months of Magic and Manifestation.” It’s a combination of Financial Alchemy and my secret system for manifesting all of my goals for the last three years. I use it every day. I know you’ve had great results with it too. Everything’s available at www.howtobeamoneymagnet.com. Remember, your abundance and prosperity serve the world!

This was my response to a coach who was struggling with a client who refused to connect with her emotions in coaching, a client who believed emotions belong in “therapy” instead.

Here’s what I wrote:

There are different styles and different opinions on what we define as “coaching”.

The International Coaches Federation says:
“Professional coaches provide an ongoing partnership designed to help clients produce fulfilling results in their personal and professional lives. Coaches help people improve their performances and enhance the quality of their lives.

Coaches are trained to listen, to observe and to customize their approach to individual client needs. They seek to elicit solutions and strategies from the client; they believe the client is naturally creative and resourceful. The coach’s job is to provide support to enhance the skills, resources, and creativity that the client already has.”

Your clients isn’t wrong in her expectations: ICF doesn’t say a word about emotions. She could probably find a coach out there who only works superficially (not a good coach). Her expectations don’t match your approach. She needs to be educated without making her wrong. I recommend you have a conversation with her about how you work, and why you use your approach.

Here’s an example. I received a great email response from a listener to one of my Financial Alchemy teleclasses. The writer wanted to know why she had to go “down the well” if she already knew her limiting beliefs.

The first step of Financial Alchemy coaching is to take a client down the rabbit hole, much farther than they knew was there. This may look counterintuitive–isn’t the point of the process to reconnect clients to the abundance and prosperity of the universe? We have to create POLARITY. The first step of Alchemy is “negridio,” the blackening. It works.

Stuff may show up here around child abuse or other hurts, just by digging into negative memories of money. It’s all related. (For those of you who are freaking out right now and thinking I’m overstepping my role as a coach, my clients are creative, resourceful, and whole. I’m very careful to tune into clients who are not well, and to steer them to something other than coaching. I’ve coached this process hundreds and hundreds of times, and I’ve never had a problem.)

Here’s my “why” for dragging my clients down the well in the beginning, insisting that they set aside every positive thought they have about Money: I’m firing up there neurology for change. Einstein said, “We cannot solve problems with the same consciousness which created them.” Information comes to us and new neurological connections are created during heightened states of emotional excitement. This is NLP talk for why we do process coaching.

Here’s a quick and easy HOW for getting a client out of her head. I do this a lot with professional women in traditionally masculine fields–lawyers, accountants, CPAs. I ask my client to stand with her feet spread as wide as her shoulders, and to bend her knees and rock at her pelvis, as if she were hula dancing. “Speak from your hips,” I’ll say.

There are a few reasons this works–I learned this from a coach who spoke at my local PCMA chapter. She has a book on “Four Energies.” I’m taking clients who are stuck in fire (Just do it!) energy into water (give and take) energy. There’s a whole area of somatic coaching that uses body wisdom.

I suspect your client wants more from coaching than she’s allowing herself, but the last thing you want to do is push when she resists.

thou shalt not hear, see, nor speak any negative vibrations

So there’s this movie that purports to share the biggest secret of the ages, carefully hidden until now, blah blah blah. Don’t get me wrong–this is an immensely uplifting, feel good movie. It has value. And it’s also full of crap. What exactly is their “secret”? It’s not like Think and Grow Rich or The Power of Positive Thinking, or The Law of Attraction have been kept hidden by some cabal of powerful business men. None of this is new, and none of it’s a secret. In fact these are the titles of immensely popular and influential books over the last century.

So what’s the secret?

Esther Hicks found hers and teaches through the voice of Abraham. Wayne Dyer found his and he teaches the Power of Intention. Byron Katie found hers and teaches The Work. I found mine, and I teach Financial Alchemy.

But even these aren’t the secret.

Cause you can do everything “right”–the mantras, the meditations, the visioning, the vibrations, the positive thinking–and not see a change in your circumstances. You’re still waiting for that abundance and prosperity you’ve been promised. Give yourself a break. You’re not doing it wrong. You’re not less worthy. There’s nothing wrong with your vision board. You’re just where you are. Right now. We all take a turn in that dark night of the soul.

“Be a light unto yourself,” the Buddha taught. Take all these teachings in, and take them all with a grain of salt. There’s an old Irish adage that says you have to do your own growing, no matter how tall your grandfather is. Nobody else’s law is your law, not even the Law of Attraction.

I believe in a strong Tendency of Attraction. Don’t get me wrong–I’m all about attraction. I think about something and a few days later it shows up. But a law of attraction? Like always attracts like? Not really:

Twenty four years ago, I was in rapturous love for the first time. I was getting straight A’s and awards in high school. And I had just come home from my first trip to Europe. It was a very high vibration time. Until I was hit by a car, went into a coma, and came out with a serious brain injury that destroyed my life for a few years. I had to let go of everything I knew about spirituality at that time just to survive. In this instance, at least, like did not attract like.

While I may quibble with the Law of Attraction, I choose to believe in a Law of the Highest Good: everything happens for the highest good. Everything. You just have to survive it first.

So what really is “the secret”?

Sure, there’s more and more evidence of a connection between mind and matter. There’s a connection between you and the universe itself. “As above so below” is the first law of Alchemy. How you access and express those connections is unique to you. You have to find it yourself.

What you discover will probably look A LOT like what other people have been saying for the last 10,000 years, but it’s different when it comes from you.

Other stuff will look very different and may be even more important. It’s your contribution. In fact this may be what you’re here to teach so others can discover their own secret.

Every personal discovery changes history forever.

We all have to reinvent the wheel at some level for ourselves. I cannot presume to have your answers, only suggestions. The finger the teacher points at the moon is not the moon itself. That’s the only “law” there is.

“It cannot be coincidental that her name is an echo of that magical, feminine healer of Camelot.”
April Natalee Gee

Morgana Rae is an internationally acclaimed life coach, author, and professional speaker, and she is regarded to be the world’s top Relationship with Money coach. Morgana’s groundbreaking program for attracting wealth has featured her in Entrepreneur Magazine, United Press International and The Wall Street Journal online.

A certified Master Results Coach and mythologist trained in NLP, hypnosis, and co-active coaching, Morgana draws on these skills and 20 years in the entertainment industry to create fun, dynamic exercises that transform your life quickly – with stunning results. Morgana’s known as the coach with a “magic touch”.

Morgana is the owner Charmed Life Coaching, a successful life and business coaching company. She has coached thousands of clients over the years, many from as far as Norway, Australia, Singapore and India. Morgana guides entrepreneurs, artists, healers and humanitarians to thrive in their purpose, attract more than they chase, and make things happen with ease, flow and synchronicity.

Morgana wrote Financial Alchemy: Twelve Months of Magic and Manifestation, and she’s a contributing author to the bestselling books Heart of a Woman in the Workplace, and Inspiration to Realization — ranked a “must read” by Entrepreneur Magazine. Her articles have appeared in nearly 100 magazines internationally.

As a leading expert on wealth manifestation, Morgana is a popular speaker and frequent television and radio guest. Morgana delivers keynote addresses and breakout sessions at expos and conferences from Los Angeles to Oslo.

Morgana’s Financial Alchemy books, cds, interviews, articles and classes have impacted the lives of hundreds of thousands of people worldwide. Morgana writes, speaks, and coaches from a desire to witness a whole world of intentional, empowered, abundant living!
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Now for the fun stuff:

Morgana’s mother named her after King Arthur’s sister, Morgana Le Fey. Morgana Le Fey (Morgana the Faerie) was a priestess with magical healing powers. She resided on the mythical Isle of Avalon, where she cared for Arthur at the end of his life.

Morgana’s grandmother co-created the original Renaissance Faire in California.

Morgana was a professional ballet dancer in Los Angeles and Boston to get over childhood obesity.

She graduated high school as a National Merit Scholar despite being homeless her last semester of high school, and despite suffering a terrible car accident that had put her into a week-long coma in the eleventh grade.

She then graduated from Smith College with a B.A. in Religion.

Morgana continues her studies of world religion and mythology. Studying different spiritual traditions helps her keep perspective in her own life.

Contact Morgana.