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How to Deal With Getting Rich Quick
A windfall can come with guilt, anxiety, and other complicated feelings
Two years ago, I dreamed of some kind of windfall. By day, I worked as a web editor at a literary magazine. By night, I pitched and wrote my own stories, fighting through sleepiness.
It wasn’t the most lucrative arrangement, and I was very acutely feeling the squeeze. I had to sell a book, I thought, or win the lottery, or discover some incredibly valuable painting in a dusty stack at a flea market. But then, as if I’d made some sort of Twilight Zone–esque pact with the devil, the universe gave me what I thought I wanted in the most awful way it could: My father died, suddenly, leaving me as the sole beneficiary of his estate.
I spent the next few weeks in a daze, sorting through his possessions, dealing with all the logistics that are dumped into your lap when someone you love dies. He’d always been the person I turned to when I needed advice or support, and it felt almost comically cruel that he wasn’t around to help me navigate the aftermath of his death. There was also the issue of his money, more than I’d ever had in my life, now sitting in my bank account. I didn’t know how to feel about it, and for a while, I didn’t want to think about it at all — it was a reminder of the man I painfully missed, and ignoring it felt easier than confronting the fact that he was gone.
Eventually, though, I knew I had to start getting back into normal life, which now meant financial stability. I did some smart things with the money, like pay off a student loan that had been hanging over my head for years, and some not-so-smart things. I bought with abandon. I let myself forget the financial discipline that I’d built out of necessity.
Today, two years later, I’ve had a crash course in spending, saving, and navigating the complicated emotions that come with a surprise windfall. Here’s what I’ve learned from my experience and from experts I consulted — including some things that I learned only in hindsight.
Move slowly
When you come into money, “the first thing to do is nothing,” says Brooklyn-based financial planner Kristen Euretig. Like me, many people have been mentally spending their imagined…
