#11: How do you teach money to kids with Tania Vasallo

Bilyana Ivanova: Hi, Tanya, welcome to unlock your child School potential podcast. I'm excited to discuss topics like money, mindset abundance and manifestation, and how we teach them to kids.

Tania: Thank you. I'm excited to be here and be in this conversation that's so needed.

Bilyana Ivanova: Please tell us a bit about yourself and your journey with money.

Tania: Yeah. So I was born and raised in Spain, and at the end of Franco's dictatorship. So there were some things that got carried over there, as well as my family from my dad's side is very patriarchal, not only the country and the culture, but having 7 brothers, my dad and one sister, and she's the youngest there was a lot of information that was passed down to me. Of how we relate to money, and  the unspoken message was basically that a man is a financial plan, you know, like Don't worry. You don't have to worry about money, men will always be there. You'll either marry the right guy that'll take care of you, and if you don't find the right man to marry, then you'll have a brother that'll take care of you, and if you don't have a brother it'll be your uncle or your dad. But it was always like this given message that the men  are the ones that know better, or know more about finances. And I think that's done at the service to the women and to the men too, because it's putting a lot of pressure on them. What if a man doesn't know  how to do certain financial things, and then they feel bad because they're not  at that level of expectations for them.

Tania: Then there’s my mom who’s American. So I've had the opportunity to come and live in the States, and I've been living here for over 20 years now. and that gives you an interesting perspective, having a Spanish father and American mother, the merge of both of these cultures.

But there was also an opportunity to empower myself to learn about money, to heal my relationship with money to understand the beliefs that were passed down to me about money, and that I don't have to sign off or buy into those beliefs because it doesn't have to be that way. You know we get to create our own story with.

Bilyana Ivanova: In your opinion, what is a healthy relationship with money?

How can we cultivate one?

Tania: I think that a healthy relationship with money is understanding what money can do for you, what money can do for your community, not fearing it, not being in a place of lack mentality like “There's never enough, or I have to work really hard for money” . Really questioning, being curious with your beliefs about money, what were you taught about money?

And then you can come to a place of understanding that these were just beliefs that were passed down to you, whether it was your family, your culture, your religion, your the media, your teachers.  All of those things are influences on us and what we believe about money. So if you can start understanding it you can become aware of it. Understanding also that money is not good or bad. It's just the meaning that we give it. Money is just neutral honestly, and it's become such a taboo subject like oh, it's this bad thing, or people with money are bad people, and corrupt and just understanding that  that's not true, either. There's bad people with a lot of money that are corrupt, and there are people with a lot of money that do amazing things in the world, and there are  poor people that are corrupt, and there's poor people that do amazing things.

Tania: So we really have to have a perspective on it, and having a good relationship is like a good relationship with a person. If there's this  flow, and there's interaction between money and yourself like you're not scared of it. You welcome it, you treat it with respect.  Are you throwing your money? You have coins everywhere, or the bills. How do you keep your bills in your wallet? Do you pay for things with gratitude? When you do an exchange of money is it done with gratitude? And from a place of like oh, my God! I'm supporting someone else. Yes, they just supported me here. I'm going to pay you.  We really want to look at it as a relationship with someone else with a person. If you're ignoring money, it'd be no different than ignoring your partner in a relationship or a friend than a relationship.

Bilyana Ivanova: That’s an excellent point! You shouldn't be ignoring money. it's something that we all use, and we have to learn and study the subject. 

Tania: I wish they taught this at schools, honestly, because we've injected so much fear and taboos like “you shouldn't talk about how much money you may earn, you shouldn't talk about the money that you lost. We've attached such an identity of ourselves to money. And it should be just a conversation with the idea of understanding it. Because, like you said, money touches everything. Unless you're living out in the middle of nowhere like maybe in the Amazon, and you're hunting and fishing for yourself and you’ve built your own home, you're gonna need money. You're gonna have to do a transaction to buy clothes, to buy health, to buy schools, to buy education, whatever it is, you're using the money. You're gonna need it to transact. So you want to create a good relationship with it -  how you relate to money, how you're putting it out there, how you receive it. 

Bilyana Ivanova:  Yeah, that's true. That's true. We need to nurture the right beliefs about money that will serve children well into adulthood. I have some limiting beliefs from my childhood, for example that money is hard to earn. That is something my father instilled in me, so it would be great if I could spare my daughters that same struggle. Do you have any money blocks that you're still working on?

Tania: We all have money blocks. We all have money beliefs that are limiting us. Like you have to work hard to earn money.  For me it was the same thing, I think it came from both sides. And there's like this pride of how hard I worked for my money and for my success.  But it doesn't have to be that way.  You can learn to work hard. I'm not saying to be lazy and just expect money to dump on you, but  you could also come from a perspective of like “Oh, I can work hard. I can work smart, and I can also learn how to invest my money and have money work hard for me instead of the other way around.” So that's definitely one money belief that I've had. And the reminder is that just because you listen to this or you read a book about it, or you take a course you're not going to be done with the work that we need to do of dissolving these money blocks, because we have to remember we've been carrying these for years. If you're 50 you've been carrying this for 50 years. If you're in your forties or in your thirties this has just been passed on, and most likely this has been running the show for you for all these years.

Tania: But there's so many different money blocks that I've encountered with my clients, working hard to earn money is one. There's never enough, or money is bad, or money is a rootable evil, or people with money are bad. These are all limiting beliefs that aren't true. It's just the meaning of the story. We've given to money beliefs because we've acquired them from our own parents, from our own culture, from the media, from our religion, from all these different backgrounds.

Bilyana Ivanova: Yeah. And money beliefs are not taught in school. So it's up to us as parents to bring awareness to the topic. Can you tell us some tools and practices for parents to start in the process of educating their children about money beliefs?

Tania: Yes, I think it starts with ourselves first. That's the first thing. Because you can't expect to teach your child things if you can't catch them on yourself, like I've caught myself, and I've done a lot of this work, but when I have my 9 year old, you know, come up and we're at a store, and she's like. I want this, and I want that. I want all these other things, and I've caught myself at moments saying what was repeated to me as a kid you know like. No, we can't afford that right now. And that's like one of the big no-nos that I don't want to be using. I don't use that phrase. it's not an empowering phrase. It's an excuse phrase, because when you think of “I can't afford it “you're taking away the power that you have. You have to remind yourself to reframe that phrase to “How can I afford it? And do I even want it? “ The question is, do I want that thing? Because if I do want it, then the next question should be, “How can I afford it?”  Because maybe you don't want it. And so when I've had my daughter come up to me the easy response or the automatic response is “We can't afford it.  Just shut up. I don't want to keep hearing it. That's basically what I'm saying to her. So you have to reframe that. And the first place, like I said, is awareness with ourselves, like what story have we been telling ourselves, and and start correcting that and reframing, and start having a different relationship with money, and then passing it down to our kids.

Tania: Like with my daughter. Now, if she really wants something, or she has a dream of something. I want to position it in a way where I don't want to squash the dream. I don't want to say we can't afford it, because what if this is really her dream. I want to support her in her dream. But I'm not gonna buy it for you. So I want her to become resourceful, and that's what we have to remind ourselves that we are all resourceful and we have imagination. We have creativity. We are capable of imagining what it is that we want. Here's the thing: no one wants money for the sake of money. So anyone that says I want a 1 million dollars, I would say, “Well, why do you want a 1 million dollars?” What you really want is to buy the home, or you want to travel, you want the feeling of what that thing can afford you. 

Tania: So in the case of my daughter, for example, she has this dream right now. I don't know if it'll live on, if it's just a 9 year old dream, and then she won't have it in a couple of years. But nonetheless it's a dream. Her dream is to build an animal sanctuary, and to save as many animals that she can on the planet.  She wants to buy land and she's been looking into land, and then she wants to have chickens on our land, and we can't have chickens where we live. So instead of saying, “We can't afford it, or that's a stupid dream, or why, why do you want to do that?” you want to encourage them.  So I'll ask her, “Well, why don't you do some research? How much will this land cost, and let's look back even more like, how much does it cost to feed your chickens every month like what animals are you gonna have in the sanctuary?”  And so she's like 3 horses, 10 chickens,and 2 dogs. You want to keep creating that curiosity with them

and ask them questions. She'll tell me all these different things that she wants, and then I'm like, “Well, how much does it cost to feed a horse per month? Why don't you do some research? So we know how much money we would need for this?” That way it empowers her  as it'll be in real life when she becomes an adult, to become resourceful, to become creative, to become solution driven. We all have the same power we can create, and we can manifest the things we want  but we have to believe in ourselves. If you've grown up in a place where your parents didn't believe in you, or money was a struggle at home, or your parents ended up divorcing because of money, then those are the money beliefs you're caring right now. So as a parent you really want to work and be cautious of what you're feeding your children and empower them.

Tania: If we go to the store now could I buy her the things that she's wanting? Yes, but I also want her to give value to money because money really is an exchange. So I'll be like “Well, if you really want that thing how about I pay for half of it, and you pay for the other half?”

And then she might say, “Where do I come up with the money?”  “You can save from your allowances, or from maybe a birthday gift. Or what could you do to generate money?” 

Bilyana Ivanova: If they are presented with the option to buy it themselves they think much more deeply about “ Do I really want it? Do I really need it?”  So they give value to money. And I don't want to raise entitled kids, because even if I can buy them the things they want, they shouldn't be able to just buy anything.  You have to think if you need it, if the price matches the value that the item brings. So yeah, I completely agree.

Bilyana Ivanova: Do you have any ideas on the ways they can earn their money aside from allowance?

Tania: I like to turn it around instead of me giving her an idea I ask her to use her imagination.  And sometimes I give her ideas. She's all into birds, and she's also very creative and artistic, so I'll be like “Remember those birds that you drew? Why don't you turn them into bird cards  and then that way we'll get them printed? You can sell these bird cards and the money that you get you can use to pay for your horseback riding classes, or for anything that you want to buy. You can wait another month and ask for this for your birthday or you can come up with stuff like that.” We have some friends that do state sales, and they've allowed her to set up a little table where she was. She made all these necklaces. She found fossils in our yard. And so she was selling the fossils, and she was selling the necklaces, and I almost stopped her with the fossils, because I thought to myself, “No one's gonna buy fossils that are in your backyard”. But people did buy the fossils, too. It wasn't just the necklaces. So we have to be careful of not stifling them, or thinking what we think is the right thing to sell, and let them be driven by their creativity. You can give them ideas, but I think you want to allow  the children's imagination to see what they can come up with, maybe they are artistic and they can sell their art. 

Tania: We've done this, too, we pull out things that we don't use anymore. We tend to donate. But some of the times I could be sold second hand.  In the beginning of the year she got rid of 18 bags of things, and she wanted a new PET in the house, a cockatiel. And we said that we weren't gonna pay for it. We'd help her a little bit, but if she really wanted that cockatiel she needed to figure out how she was going to pay for it. So she had a thing of magma tiles of magnets, and she sold that on Craig's list. Obviously we helped her so it was like a second hand thing. She sold several of her things that she no longer needed, and so she saw the value in that. So I think it's about finding ways to empower the kids. They can do a lemonade stand,  the typical traditional  cliche thing of making money. One of her friends is making dog portraits because he's very good at drawing, and so he's just doing it for a little amount of dog portraits for friends. So yeah, I think there's so many possibilities for the kids to come up with ideas of how they can make money. Could they clean the house, or could they clean a certain area? I remember one time she wanted to do a hair styling place like manicure and massages with a friend, and I was like I don't know how that's gonna work, but I’ll let her do it.  Let them be and feel rejected too, let them have that experience. 

Tania: At the state sales she even had a sign that said that 50% of the money that she received for the necklaces was gonna go for the animals. She was gonna donate it to the animal sanctuary, which is another component. That was great because she actually took $50 of the money that she did. She had like several $100, and she went to the wildlife center here with the envelope with cash, and she gave it to them, and they said that they were gonna make a plaque with her name and put it with one of the birds that she wanted to sponsor. I don't know if it was a hog or something that would have her name. That is such a sense of pride for a kid. It's not just money for them and for their needs and what they want, but that they are giving back to a cause they believe in. 

Bilyana Ivanova: Did she come up with that herself? To donate half of their money?

Tania: No, I think that we suggested it. Ever since she's been young I've had like the 3 little jars she puts her money in. We've practiced this on and off. Any money that would come in she would put in these 3 jars. One was for her, for whatever things she wanted, another one for a cause that she believed in, and she's always been a big advocate for animals. So for the shelters, for birds, for anything. And the third one was to make the money grow. You take the money, and if you don't touch it in a year or 2 years, it grows kind of like a tree.  I think that the concept of giving back to the animals was very powerful, because she also saw that a lot of people bought necklaces because they were animal lovers. Maybe they wouldn't have bought it if it weren’t for the animals. Well, here's an extra $10.  She saw the power of what she was able to create, not just for herself, but for for the cause that she had in mind.

Bilyana Ivanova: That's an amazing experience.

Tania: It's a wonderful idea for anyone that has kids to encourage them and just empower them. I think the bottom line with this is to empower our kids to learn about working for money. because there's a transaction. We don't have to attach it to the belief that you have to work hard for money. It's just work you have to do. You have to offer someone else value. You made these necklaces. They're a value. They like them. They're buying it. They're transactioning with you, you’re working for the  money. But also what money can do, what it could do for the community, what it can do for the causes you believe in, and then how money can grow if you learn the right ways. Now she's starting to understand the stock market. She'll look through our phone on the app, and she'll tell you if apple is up or tesla's down, because we look at those in the morning. I wish I would have learned these things at that age.

Bilyana Ivanova: My daughter just made her first investment a few months ago, and she's been asking very excitedly: how is my investment going? Is it up today?

Tania: That is great. How old is your daughter?

Bilyana Ivanova: She's 9. She’s the same age as yours. But she's showing a lot of interest in that area. My 7 year old is not so curious. How do we get children to just want to know about money and the way it multiplies if they're not curious themselves?

Tania: That's an interesting question.  Maybe curiosity will come a little bit later for your 7 year old.  My daughter has shown interest, and maybe because I've been in this arena for a while. And so she hears me talk about certain things. So maybe that's what's created the curiosity for her. But for kids that don't have a curiosity yet  my suggestion is to to start them out with those 3 little buckets when they receive money.  So what are you gonna do with it?  If you get  $10, put 4 of them in here for you,  $3 for a cause that you believe in.  Ask her “Who can we help? Do you want to help the homeless? Do you want to help the animals?”

Bilyana Ivanova: She usually just gives her money to her sisters.

Tania: That's so interesting. Why does she give it to the sisters? 

Bilyana Ivanova:. So yeah, I don't know, she's just so generous with all her stuff. She just gives it away.

Tania: That is amazing. So here's what I would do. I would say, ”Look, I love his quality in you that you're so generous. And here's what I'm gonna suggest. When you get money I want you to give to yourself, instead of giving it all away. If you still want to give some to your sisters then that's great. But let's talk about people that are homeless, or kids that don't have gifts and that don't have clothing, or those that don't have food. Let's talk about the environment. Let's talk about animals. Who should we give this to? You don't have to go in depth because they're young, and you don't want to traumatize them either. And because you're so generous, let's give to the money so that money grows. How about that, how cool would it be? Because if the money grows then you'll have more to give away. So we’re presenting it this way - and she gets to value herself too, saying, “I'm giving a little bit to me, a little bit to charity, and a little bit to the cause of money growing. So we have more to give to other people.

Bilyana Ivanova: Yeah, I love that! It’s brilliant.

Bilyana Ivanova: When do you think we should start giving them their allowance for the whole month? So they can learn to manage their own money. I think that's a good practice to teach them some spending habits for the future.

Tania: Yeah, allowance is an interesting subject for me. When do you give them allowance? Are they earning it? Or are you just giving it to them?

Bilyana Ivanova: I'm just giving it to them. But I imagine that would be not just for toys and stuff they want to have, but also for clothes and their other needs during the month.  That's what I imagine. But I still haven't done that.

Tania: It's an interesting subject, and I still don't know exactly where I fall with it. Like you mentioned before, I don't want my daughter to feel entitled. Like oh, well, I want this, and I get this, or I want a certain amount of money every month, and I get a certain amount of money every month. I think we've already been doing a good job of just teaching her the value of money, that there has to be some type of transaction. You give me value of some sort, whether it's through chores or through something that you've done, that you've put together. And maybe this is my upbringing. But allowances for me were not given just because. I have friends that did have an allowance that was given to them every month. And I was kind of jealous of them because I had to earn my allowance through chores or through grades. I had to get good grades like if I had certain grades like. If I got like 5 a's, you know I'd get a little bit more if I got 2 b's, then it'd be a little bit less so there was a sense of purpose behind it instead of just like, oh, yeah, you need $20 to go out or whatever. And then I thought it was also unfair, because my sister is 3 years younger than me and sometimes they would give her the same allowance or a higher allowance than when I was her age. 

Tania: And it's interesting, because I think it's very different from one culture to another. In the States kids start working at age 15- 16. My mom has had summer jobs since she was 16 and in Spain you can't do that. I don't know how it is in Bulgaria. Butin Spain no one's gonna give you a job at 16. It just doesn't happen. I don't know, unless things have changed in all these years. So

you do need your parents to give you money because you can't earn it. That's why I think I don't have a set perspective of what an allowance looks like. It can vary from culture to culture, from household to household. And I think at every age it's going to be different, too. If they can't work,  can they help throughout the household, or doing chores or helping in another way where they're bringing value to the family, so that they don't become lazy. 

Bilyana Ivanova: We started giving them money for doing household chores, and then I was talking about that with my friends, and they were like, " No, the kids should know that they have to do the chores without money. That's part of being a family. They have their own responsibilities.” So there is a conflict there. 

Tania: I think it depends on the family, on the situation, on the income level. There's a lot of controversy in both ways, there's people that are very much like they should do it because they're part of the family. Then there's people like you. They should learn that's how real life is gonna be. You know you do something, you get paid for it, that's just part of it. I don't know, and then, if you just give it to them for not doing anything, does that create more of an entitled child? What happens if you're in a financial situation where you can't give them any more, what will that do to them?  Like I said, I don't have the right answer for it, but it's an interesting conversation.  Right now my daughter is not getting an allowance, but she has money saved up from the different activities she's done.

Bilyana Ivanova:  You mentioned horseback riding, does she pay herself  for the lessons?

Tania:  No, we are paying for those right now. But I think it's all about finding an agreement, having a discussion around it. Like “Okay, how many extracurricular activities are you doing? What are we willing to pay for it”  and just talk about it and say that's the budget you have.  But with the horseback riding lessons she loves so much  we pay for 4 classes a month.  If she wants additional classes that's where I'm saying “ Then do something about it  instead of asking us for it, because that goes out of our budget” . When she got this bird she paid for like 80 % of it. And we said, okay, that's great. You're 9. You saved up, and we'll pay for the rest of it, we're contributing too. We're helping you in the process of this. 

Bilyana Ivanova: I like that. Meeting them in the middle. That's a good point.

Bilyana Ivanova: What about some book recommendations? I'm an avid reader. So I always look for book recommendations on the topic of money mindset. not for the kids, but fo the parents.

Tania: There's so many. So there's one that’s coming more from the spiritual side, and for those that aren't religious, it might trigger you in a different way.  Edwene Gaines, is the author, and it's called “The 4 Laws of Pro the for spiritual laws of prosperity”. Another one is “ Think and grow rich” . Many entrepreneurs know this one from Napoleon Hill where he interviews back in the beginning of the twentieth century all the millionaires at the time. So he compiled, after 25 years

 of research, just interviewing the big people at that time to understand their mindset. There's also Wallace Wattles’  “Science of getting rich”. So that's more from the perspective of men, men, men, men. But there is a lot of great information in there.Also, Robert Kiyosaki with “Rich dad poor dad”.

Bilyana Ivanova: Yeah, you have to play the game “Cash flow for kids”. I think it’s a great way to introduce  the fundamentals and some practical ways to learn about multiplying money.

Tania: Yes, that is a great one. I have cash flow, but it's the adult version. And you just reminded me. I think I might get the kids version, because we've played monopoly, and I think monopoly is a good way to kind of understand a little bit with money. But our monopoly games have gotten vicious, and I think it brings out the worst of us. So I just don't like playing monopoly anymore. So maybe I'll look into cash flow junior for the kids. 

Bilyana Ivanova: I also wanted to touch on the topic of manifestation and visualization when it comes to money. Can you say a few things about that?

Tania: Yes. It all starts with awareness. Where are we right now? What are we thinking? What are our desires? A big component of manifestation is being aware of what you desire and start having that kid-like mindset of dreaming, of imagining. Things come into fruition from the non physical world, starting with a thought with our imagination. What is it that you want? What's your vision? What are your desires?Is it a home? Is it a car? And those are material things. How can you bring them into physical form? Everything that exists in the physical form in our world started with a thought. And so the first place I would  start is becoming aware. Start with visualization and imagining, and carve out time throughout the day to visualize, to imagine those things that you want. I can't tell you how many things I've manifested in my life, from homes to solar panels on my homes, to the cars to the trips. But it all starts because you're carving out time to imagine that to put that into form. It's like creating the movie in your head before it can come into physical form. So that's where I'd say that anyone should start with imagination, especially with kids. That's why I don't recommend squashing kids' dreams. You want those extra horseback writing classes? You want to do 5 classes a week? Where can we get the money for that? How can we raise the money for it?  And so that way you're helping and empowering them to come up with ideas, because that would be the next step. It's like, okay, I want to look into this trip, or I want this particular home that looks this way. How much does a home like that cost? So then you look into the research, and then you start understanding. And then the next question would be, “That costs a 1 million dollars, how am I going to get a 1 million dollars,because I don't have 1 million dollars sitting down.” But then you give that your brain, that exercise of having to come up with the 1 million dollars to be able to bring that asking these questions. So next time something comes up, you're just automatically asking the question in your head.

Tania: I have a great resource that we can give your audience and your listeners. It's called Amplify our abundance. It's a free guide full of practices to help you manifest your dreams, your desires, by amplifying your abundance, because we tend to be in the space of there's never enough. I don't have enough money we're in that mentality of lack. Instead of seeing all the abundance that we have around us.

Bilyana Ivanova: Thank you. Thank you for this empowering conversation. I got so many interesting ideas from you. Please tell our listeners about your podcast, and where they can find you and learn more from you.

Tania: Thank you for that. You can find my podcast. It's called “The courage to be”.

And you can also find me if you want this free guide, like I said, at www.amplifyyourabundance.com, and you'll get some of these resources, practices, habits that I've used in my signature program that's called Money Magic Miracles. In my first cohort  I had 28 women, and in 8 weeks they manifested over 1.2 million dollars collective. A lot of the practices that we have in this free guide are from there so you can start implementing and just get familiar with it. Download it. There's gonna be so many great things for you in there.

Bilyana Ivanova: Thank you.