I love free honest money. I was 10 years-old when I found my first $20 bill on a grassy field. That was shortly after my family and I have immigrated to the U.S. With my parents’ combined income being less than $2,000 a month at the time (providing for a family of 4), you can imagine what that $20 bill meant to me. To say I was super excited would be an understatement.

Are All Free Honest Money Equal?

However, not all free honest money has always been equal for me. I don’t ever recall having picked up a penny off the ground. For some reason, picking pennies just never seemed worth it to me.

As for my husband, while he wouldn’t waste calories to pick up one penny, he’d spend the calories to pick up two plus pennies. And he’d get very excited about this kind of free honest money. Just a few months ago, we even joked that if one million people on earth would be willing to share a penny with us once a year, we’d have $10,000 of free honest money. This is a large sum of money! Even pennies add up to being worth something.

For years, I teased him about this money habit of his. I didn’t appreciate the value of a penny back in the days when I was growing up in a low-income family. At our current financial standing, the value of a penny is worth even less to me. I didn’t understand why my husband bothers to pick up pennies. For a long time, I never asked him.

A Transformative and Significant Moment

Then, one day this past April I finally asked him.

Here was what he said to me: “I believe these pennies appear in front of me for a reason. The universe might be sending me a massage. When I welcome these pennies into my life, I might be sending a response back to the universe that I’m receptive to free fortunes. Who knows, maybe one day bigger things (worth much more) might get thrown my way. We don’t know how the forces or attractions of the universe work. For now, I am just going to keep my eyes open for these pennies that appear in front of me and show appreciation towards those who’ve left them behind for me. Money is money.”

His response took me by surprise. I didn’t know so much was going inside his head each time he reaches down to pick up pennies.

I don’t always have a healthy relationship with money. And I shared some of those in past posts here on the blog. At that moment, I realized there’s so much I can learn from my husband.

After having spent a few days pondering what my husband have said, I’ve decided to adopt this money habit into my life. Since then, I’ve picked up six pennies, one penny each time. And each time, I feel a little weird about it, but I quickly move past those feelings. I’m just going to continue to practice showing appreciation on the small things that come my way and keep my eyes open.

On a daily basis, I don’t show enough gratitude with what I have. By keeping up with this money habit, I hope this new behavior (and mindset) will steer my relationship with money in positive ways.

What’s Free Honest Money to You? Where Do You Draw the Line?

As much as my husband is excited about picking up pennies off the ground and keeping them, for years he wasn’t so sure what defined free honest money or what to do about such money when the values are on the higher side.

I recall one incident that occurred several years ago when we stopped by a car wash place. When my husband got out of the car to purchase the car wash tokens, he found a bag of quarters (worth about $20 as we later counted) sitting above the coin machine. Instead of taking the bag of quarters and bringing it back to the car (there was no one else around), he came back to the car and told me about it while speaking in a very soft tone.

He didn’t know what to do with that money. Part of him wanted to pick it up and part of him didn’t know if that was the right thing to do.

We ended up taking the money. Nobody came back to ask about it during the 10 minutes we were there. If someone had came back for it, I would have had us still keep it (if they had not seen us picking up the money). My husband would have done differently.

What’s free honest money to you?

As you pick up or found money, at what point does your conscious tell you it’s okay to keep that free money and be alright with that decision? Where do you draw the line?

Do you believe that there’s a reason free honest money is showing up in front of you, regardless of the amount?

Are you doing this one money ritual to grow and attract wealth?

If not, will you be trying to build this money habit into your life now that you’ve read this article?

What I’ve learned from my husband: keeping my eyes open for opportunities and be receptive to them even when those opportunities appear small.

Do you have money habits you practice that have made a positive difference in your life?

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