Hi all
for most of my conscious life, I have been purposely oblivious (i.e blocked out) to the fact that my father's side of the family (divorced parents) is quite well off, financially. I have sculpted my personality and behavior around the belief that I don't have the money; my father has it and he can decide he wants to give it to me or not. probably because I was also living with my mother (joint custody, lived in the same town for most of my and my brothers' childhood), who was not left with a lot after the marriage, that living in debt was "ok" and that she doesn't have money, therefore I don't. I haven't been the best at making it over the years, but ever since my father and I agreed he would stop backing me up financially (after i got my degree in 2009), I have been ill at ease with the way I have been looking at and managing my money, mainly because of my own ineptitude and because it seemed to slip through my fingers. I have been living over my means for a time, had to dip into my savings to get myself out of overdraft. since then i have gotten a bit smarter about my finances but still had this nagging feeling i was living too large, since I couldn't stay afloat. don't know if I actually was, since there hadn't been any over the top expenses at those times, rent was a low percentage of my income, i was single but i didn't go out so much, didn't spend the money on clothes, or tools or travel or much other than a few music shows a year, psychological therapy and car gas / maintenance. but something was definitely broken - i was in the red zone and couldn't figure out why, which also strengthened my feelings of "have-not". then came a few revelations - a course I had taken, MMM's blog and a few others - that showed me I could do much to help myself and that not all is lost.
recently though, my father has been repeating phrases like "after I'm gone" (i expect he still has a few decades but one never knows), gently referring to the assets he has accumulated in his life and how they will transfer to me and my brothers. I don't know if that is true and even how much he actually has. He actually said to me, when we were discussing me and DW's plans of expanding the family, "don't worry. know that you are more privileged than most and if you need help I will be there."
this really throws me off. I don't want to be thinking like "when is he going to die so I can get my hands on the stash?". I don't want to be better off than most just because I (apparently) come from money. I'd rather live humbly and well under my means so I can keep it up for as long as possible. but I am seriously struggling with figuring out what to make of my father's words.
any thoughts? or am I too much into the spaghetti brain?