What You Need to Know About Families & Money
Your money story starts long before your first paycheck. Family, culture, and lived experiences can shape how you think, feel, and behave with money.
What worked for one generation might not work for the next.
Talking about money can strengthen family relationships by creating a conversation centered on curiosity instead of judgment.
Event Summary
Partner: 1990 Institute
Location: College of San Mateo, California
My Role: Financial Therapist and Workshop Facilitator
Workshop: The Venture: Understanding Our Money Stories to Build Financial Confidence Across Generations
Topics: Financial well-being, emotional relationship with money, generational differences, cultural money stories, financial confidence, and family money conversations
Audience: Asian American youth ages 14–21 and their parents
About the Event
Roots & Wings is an annual symposium hosted by the 1990 Institute. It brings together young people, families, educators, and community leaders for a day filled with inspiration, empowerment, and meaningful conversations.
The symposium brought together an amazing group of speakers, including John Wang, host of the Big Asian Energy podcast; journalist and news anchor Dion Lim; and Jia Jiang, author of Rejection Therapy. The symposium had amazing in-kind donors, too, from On Waverly, a Chinatown book and gift shop, to Boba Guys.
The event's speakers explored themes of identity, resilience, cultural expectations, and navigating life across generations.
Why Talking About Money Across Generations Matters
Our relationship with money starts forming long before we earn our first paycheck.
Our families, culture, communities, lived experiences, and the systems we navigate all influence how we think, feel, and behave with money.
And sometimes, the money lessons one generation passes down don't land the way they intended.
For many Asian American families, financial narratives are deeply connected to survival, security, sacrifice, and family responsibility. These values can be sources of tremendous strength, but they can also create pressure, anxiety, and misunderstandings between generations.
As a mixed Filipina financial therapist, I was thrilled to partner with the 1990 Institute for its Roots & Wings Youth Symposium at the College of San Mateo in California.
The symposium gave Asian American youth and adults a chance to explore generational differences, strengthen their relationships, and better understand one another.
I facilitated a conversation I wish more families had: an intentional, supportive space to talk about money together.
Facilitating Financial Wellness Conversations Between Parents and Youth
As a financial therapist and financial wellness speaker, I spend a lot of time helping people understand the emotional side of money.
That said, I don't often get the opportunity to work directly with parents and their children in the same room. When I first started my career as a social worker, I worked a lot with youth and their parents, but this was new for me: bridging my past work serving youth and families with my current work as a financial therapist.
And it was a delight! I facilitated "The Venture: Understanding Our Money Stories to Build Financial Confidence Across Generations," a 90-minute interactive financial wellness workshop for Asian American youth ages 14–21 and their parents.
The workshop invited parents and youth to reflect on the money stories they'd inherited, the beliefs they wanted to carry forward, and the ones they might be ready to lovingly challenge.
We explored how different generations can have different financial priorities, even within the same family. For example, a parent who experienced financial insecurity may prioritize saving and stability, while their child may place a greater emphasis on financial independence or enjoying the present.
Through guided reflection and interactive conversations, I helped create space for participants to explore their financial values.
As a bonus, three thought partners from the community joined me and helped kick off our conversations by sharing their own experiences and money stories.
Two were wealth advisors, bringing perspectives from working with families and adults on their finances, and one was a youth advocate who attended the previous year's Roots & Wings symposium and has a passion for financial wellbeing after focusing on financial literacy for the past year.
Having voices from different generations and backgrounds helped us bring the conversation about money stories to life.
Outcomes & Takeaways: Honoring A Past While Creating A New Future
One of the most important messages I shared during this intergenerational financial wellness workshop was that we can honor the money stories we inherited without repeating the financial behaviors they created.
Think about a family where saving every possible dollar was essential to getting by. That approach may have helped an earlier generation survive financial uncertainty, create stability, and build a better future for their children.
The financial behaviors that helped one generation survive aren't necessarily the same behaviors the next generation needs to thrive.
Choosing to do things differently with money doesn't mean rejecting your parents, your culture, or the sacrifices that came before you. You can honor your family's financial legacy and make room for a new one.
Here's what the organizers shared about the audience's response:
"The response we heard throughout the day was incredibly meaningful. Youth and adults alike were talking about feeling seen, understood, and more connected."
What the 1990 Institute Said About Working Together
The 1990 Institute shared why they selected me to facilitate this workshop:
"Lindsay floated to the top in our research, and after watching her videos and then speaking with her directly, we knew she was the right person for this workshop. She had such a positive energy that we knew would connect with the youth. Her approach aligned so naturally with what we hoped to create: a space where both generations could listen, understand one another, strengthen their connections, and begin to understand their own money stories."
And when asked what they'd tell another organization considering a partnership, they shared:
"Absolutely do it! Lindsay brings a wonderful combination of expertise, warmth, and genuine connection to her work. She doesn’t simply speak to an audience—she engages with them and creates an environment where both the youth and parents felt comfortable participating and reflecting. She was a wonderful partner throughout the process, and we would be very happy to work with her again."
I'm grateful to the 1990 Institute for inviting me to be part of Roots & Wings and for recognizing the importance of bringing financial well-being into conversations about family, culture, and community.
Bring Financial Wellness Conversations to Your Organization
Whether I'm working with employees, students, families, or community members, my approach to financial wellness is rooted in the same belief: People deserve financial education that acknowledges their emotions, experiences, identities, and relationships.
Interested in bringing a financial wellness workshop or speaker to your next event?
Explore my speaking and workshop offerings and let's talk about what we can create together.