Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Aseel El-Baba. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alright, Aseel thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

Born and raised in Lebanon, I was always a person who asked existential questions. In a troubling and unstable environment, I struggled to make sense of the world and I constantly aimed to find meaning beyond my existence. My first business cards were designed at the innocent age of 10. While I was hiding in my brother’s room, scared from the chaos outside, I wrote my first job title “The Changer”. I knew that I had a deep desire to create a positive impact in our world.

Fast forward, I spent a decade working in the Canadian Financial Sector, particularly as a Financial Planner managing a portfolio of $100M on Bay Street. While I enjoyed helping clients with crucial financial decisions, I realized that the conversation was missing major elements.

Money is a deep cause of complex emotions and is connected with all the areas in our lives. As advisors, we were talking logical strategies with clients; when in many cases we needed to dive deeper and explore the emotions and beliefs around money. After being called a therapist by many clients, I went back to school to become a Psychotherapist, pivoting into the world of Financial Therapy in March 2020. I became the first Financial Therapist in Toronto.

When I look at the world, there are 2 major sets of challenges:
– Individual challenges: issues pertaining to our own individual lives such as our relationships, marriages, health, career, overall quality of life , etc
– Global and systemic challenges: global warming, racism, wars, inequities, etc.

At the root of many of these challenges, money is somehow connected to them. I totally believe that Financial Therapy is a modality not only for personal transformation but also global and systemic change.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I am a former award winning Financial Planner, the first Financial Therapist in Toronto, Trauma of Money Method Practitioner, and fully trained in Psychotherapy. I am on a mission to fill the gaps in our financial services industry by helping my clients with their emotions, thoughts, and beliefs around money. My practice offers an opportunity for economic healing and financial empowerment.

I also co-founded the Mindfulness and Money membership. This integrative digital learning program is informed by community experts and real, lived experiences. Anchored in financial therapy, Mindfulness & Money is designed and delivered to optimize engagement and invite everyone to join the conversation. I believe that healing happens in community, so this membership allows for participants to learn, grow, heal, connect, share and transform together.

Mindfulness and Money is here to help participants transform their relationship with money and uplift their mind, body, and soul. Each month, members are introduced to new Mindfulness & Money themes, allowing them to explore their own relationship to money and develop personalized tools to achieve financial wellness.

My purpose:
– I want to heal people’s relationship with money to help them live in alignment with their values.
– I want to destigmatize the topic of money and create space for an open, honest and powerful dialogue so that breakthroughs can naturally happen.
– I want to disrupt our dysfunctional beliefs and attitudes about money and wealth.
– I want to inspire people to adopt the abundance mindset and cultivate a collaborative, connected and compassionate society.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

In my financial healing journey, I am constantly faced with beliefs that I need to examine and redefine for myself.

The main beliefs I operated based on are:
– Money is a struggle
– Money is the root evil
– Money corrupts people
– Being a successful career woman and a raising a happy healthy family are not possible. Something has to give.

The one that I want to expand on in this answer is the last one, especially since I am a new mother.

I knew that when I was ready to have my baby, I wanted to redefine how I work. I wanted to build a business around my life and not the other way around. I needed to learn how to trust myself and also lean in and ask for support. They say it takes a village, because it really really does.

I am constantly trying to examine myself when I experience financial anxiety and explore the root of that. At times it is because I am tight on cash, other times it is because I am judging myself as a working mother trying to finess the perfect balance.

The new belief I need to install is that I am absolutely capable and worthy of success and happiness. This means building the impactful global business of my dreams while also raising a kick ass generation.

One way to keep a belief is to not question it. When I am rewiring my old beliefs, I poke holes in them by challenging them and finding real examples of the world of things I want to accomplish. Coupling that with a mindfulness and self care ritual creates a solid foundation for new beliefs to spring.

Can you tell us the story behind how you met your business partner?

I started my business in March 2020. It coincided with Covid, which was a major financial stress for many people. I had planned my business strategy around offering personal coaching packages, employee workshops and speaking engagements. All of these services where in person and had to pivot digitally. I also recognized the need for group therapy spaces to allow for community support, especially during these times.

After leading few financial therapy cohorts, 3 of my clients forwarded me an article in the Globe and Mail to read. I rarely have anyone sending me a newspaper article, and on that day 3 people did. It was titled Mindfulness and Money by Rhiannon Rosalind. I read the article and instantly knew why my clients thought of me. Rhiannon was deeply opening up about her own Financial Traumas. She was the CEO of the Economics Club of Canada, a national organization that hosts policy makers, economists, and large business figures to discuss matter of the economy. Rhiannon confessed that even though she learns alot from her position, something is still preventing her from applying what she knows. She still struggles with money in her own life, despite the fact that she is having money conversation and developing financial literacy programs across the country.

I knew instantly that I needed to connect with her. I was intimidated by her Bio. She had interviewed people like Barack and Michelle Obama, Amal Clooney, and many more. She had been recognized as Canada’a top 100 women of influence along with many other prestigious rewards. I did not allow that to stop me and I messaged her on LinkedIn.

My first message was:

Hello Rhiannon,
I had 3 people send me your profile last week when you wrote about money and mindfulness. I went over your profile and felt so energized seeing how aligned our work is. I would love to have a virtual coffee with you and learn more about you and your work. Perhaps there can be room for collaboration or simply a meeting on like-minded and like-hearted women.

Rhiannon responded and our first meeting was magical. We connected so profoundly. Rhiannon had just launched Conscious Economics and did not know about Financial Therapy. She knew something was missing in the financial literacy space and was waiting for someone like me to join forces with.

It has been 3 years since that connection started. Today, Rhiannon and I are the co-founders of Mindfulness and Money, the title of the article that brought us together.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.holisticoptimalwealth.com/ and https://www.consciouseconomics.ca/mindfulness-money-membership
• Instagram: @aseelbaba and @consciouseconomics
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aseel-elbaba/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@ConsciousEconomics