There is an old fable about a wise King who pushed a big boulder to the middle of the busiest road in his kingdom. Everyone who walked by simply went around it. No one attempted to move it.

Then came a poor peasant, carrying a load of vegetables. He put down his load, walked over to the boulder and tried to push it aside. It wouldn’t budge. He strained and struggled until finally it moved. Slowly he pushed it to the side.

On the road where the boulder had been, he noticed a purse. He opened it up and saw it was filled with gold. There was a note tied to the purse: This is the reward to anyone who moves the boulder.

Moral: Every obstacle is an opportunity in disguise. The bigger the obstacle the greater the reward.

Here’s my question to you:  What’s the boulder in your path? Tell me about it in the comments below.

I recently had a flash back to a class I took over 30 years ago, titled “Women, Money and Power.”

I had attended countless financial classes, read countless money books but this one class forever changed my relationship with money—and, much later, my approach to teaching it.

On the first day, I remember sitting in a circle, in the middle of which was a clump of white netting, like a bridal veil, flung carelessly on the floor.

The instructor walks over to the netting, scoops it up, and announces: “This is what we’re going to do in this class. We are going to lift the veils that cloud our understanding of money.”

Underneath the netting was the Wall Street Journal, which (ironically) I’d recently subscribed to, but couldn’t understand a word. I was about to find out why.

“To lift the veils,’ the instructor continues, “We have to get in touch with the decisions we’ve made about money, most of which were made early in life and are now unconscious. These decisions are like veils that get in the way of our financial understanding.”

She pats her head. “The more we can see in here, the more we can see out there.” She points to the newspaper.

I’d like to share a story that Sharon Salzberg, an author and meditation teacher, tells about a yoga retreat she attended.

“Every other student in our class,” she wrote, “was far more limber, easily flowing into pretzel-like poses. Almost worse, they all seemed to know the traditional Sanskrit name for each move.

One day as my teacher, John, was demonstrating a pose, he made an awkward-looking movement, then rebalanced. Coming out of it he asked, “What just happened?”

One by one, my classmates offered a Sanskrit name for that extra little twist. Finally, John turned to me and repeated his question, “What just happened?”

 I replied: “To be honest, I think you fell.”

Here’s the good news about creating wealth. Believing that you can do it, or not, is inconsequential. You just have to decide that’s what you want and be willing to do whatever comes next.

Powerful intentions produce sheer miracles. There’s a sort of magic inherent in a strong intention that will carry you through the toughest and scariest of times.

Here’s a 2 part exercise for creating a powerful intention.

I’m often asked this question: I want to become wealthy, but how do I do it?

I am tempted to respond with a line from Hope for the Flowers by Trina Paulus: 

“How does one become a butterfly?” she asked pensively. “You must want to fly so much that you are willing to give up being a caterpillar.”

In other words:

You must want to soar so much, that you’re willing to give up playing small and staying safe.

Because creating wealth is about far more than amassing riches. It’s about becoming the powerful woman you were born to be, soaring higher that you believed possible.