Everyone is unique. Each client’s unique journey to financial empowerment is also a journey of accepting their own authentic needs and desires and creating systems and plans tailored to meet these.

To support this journey effectively, I must practice what I preach and that means showing up as a coach authentically grounded in my own self-acceptance as far as possible.

As such, I will be a great fit for some people and not others and that’s ok. I want to work with clients who are as enthusiastic about working with me as I am about them.

I will always prioritise fit over profit. Sometimes I’ll have an initial chat with someone and it becomes clear I’m not the right person to help them. Perhaps they would benefit more by regulated financial advice or debt advice. Perhaps they’re looking for someone with a different approach from mine. Perhaps the rapport just isn’t there.

If that happens with us, I’ll do my best to point you to another source of support. I trust and invite you to be as honest with me.

In my work I always try to be kind, which is not always the same as being nice. Nice is either saying “good vibes only” or “poor little you”. Kind is compassionately acknowledging reality and looking for what we can improve.

Clients, especially those in debt, often come to me carrying shame, anxiety and a big pile of unhelpful stories about what they “should” have done differently. Since I don’t have a time machine, we can’t fix the past. Kindness means letting go of judgment and instead approaching these past choices with curiosity. What can we learn from them?

I encourage my clients to be kind to themselves; to know they have intrinsic value and don’t need to strive to deserve security, comfort and wellbeing. I see having our financial lives in order as a fundamental type of self-care.

Many coaches talk about becoming your “best self”. While this is a noble aspiration, I also seek to support my clients’ “worst selves”. In other words, I will always look for solutions that still work on the most stressful, exhausting, and miserable days. The pressure to be a “best self” even when faced with bitchy coworkers, seasonal allergies, unexpected vet’s bills and a broken washing machine can become another excuse to unkind to yourself.

Kindness means allowing for normal human variation in mood and capability. Kindness makes us more resilient, so we can keep going when life happens and progress is harder to sustain.

Finally, kindness means looking for ways to make money management as simple, light-touch and flexible as possible. In particular, as someone with ADHD, I understand the importance of working with your brain and your personality, not against it.

I encourage my clients to show themselves the same level of kindness they would give to a best friend, small child or beloved pet. I do not recommend restrictive budgets or time-consuming life admin. Instead, I often suggest automating tasks where possible; including treats in spending plans; and consciously balancing the wellbeing of our present and future selves.

Mutual accountability is fundamental to the relationship of trust that underpins successful coaching.

Many of my clients find the accountability of reporting their progress to me as their coach invaluable. The way I see this is that I help you achieve, by helping you keep the commitments you make to yourself. I’m not here to shame any lack of progress, but to validate how far you have come and find ways around any barriers as they arise.

In terms of my own accountability, I am committed to the Wise Monkey Professional Code of Ethics.

Professional boundaries are important and exist for the wellbeing of client and coach alike. I tend to err on the side of caution when it comes to not overstepping my role. While coaching sometimes means facing difficult truths and intense emotions, I am not a therapist and I will not push clients to make traumatic disclosures that I am not qualified to help them process and heal.

I work to make my practice is as inclusive as I can.

Feedback is welcome. I am always learning.

My degree is in biochemistry and my scientific training influences my approach in a number of ways. I study to base my practice on tools, techniques and principles that have been researched and found to be effective wherever possible. I look to best practice in my field and also consider critically what I have found to work well in my own years of experience.

That said, I do not believe that I am an especially rational person. In fact, all the research evidence shows that human beings in general are not very rational and there’s no reasons why I or my clients should be any exception. As such, it can be helpful to embrace some of our irrationality rather than fighting it.

For example, a person with multiple credit card debts at different interest rates would pay those debts off fastest and at lowest cost by focusing on the debt with the highest interest rate first. However, if focusing on the smallest debt first would allow them to experience the satisfaction of getting a win more quickly, this could be more motivating and give them a greater overall chance of sticking to their plan to become debt-free. The best plan is the one you can keep. It’s not always the most “objectively” and rationally” correct one.

However, I do not believe in the “Law of Attraction” or in universal “energies” that we control with our minds. I believe that optimism is helpful. Being clear and specific about our goals is helpful. Proactively looking for opportunities is helpful. Improving what is within our control is helpful. Asking for what we want is helpful. Seeking to forgive ourselves and others, so we don’t carry bitterness is helpful. I do not believe that any of these actions mystically “manifest” good for us. They change our behaviour and attitudes, and other people respond to that. They increase our overall wellbeing and put us in the right mindset to take advantage of good when it comes. None of this requires being “energetically aligned” with money.

You can make all the changes you need to reach financial empowerment for yourself. Money is a tool you use, it is not a force that is attracted or repelled by your mindset.

Money is a topic that can feel very heavy and serious. This is understandable when it is linked to so many important areas of lives. However, taking money too seriously can block us from thinking creatively about our best way forward.

When we approach our finances with a spirit of play and curiosity, we can let go of the difficult emotions surrounding money. This lets us see possibilities and opportunities we would otherwise miss.

Games, visualisations, and creative exercises are a way to reach deeper truths about ourselves that our sensible, grown up minds prefer to ignore. Our most childlike selves often have something important to teach us. Play and humour help them to reveal what we need to know.

Finally, life is frequently absurd. It is only right to laugh at it.