H ard facts and figures help families claw their way out of financial quicksand. Rabbi Moishe Kohn guides lectures and trains coaches for Mesila an international organization that educates people about maintaining financial stability and self-sufficiency.
Is there one mistake or issue you see over and over again?
Yes the assumption that if you’re not aware of your financial issues or you just ignore them they’ll take care of themselves and go away. That’s not how it works! We always hear about people borrowing money to cover debt and while they’re borrowing they borrow a little extra “because we’re borrowing anyway.” One coach was just telling me about a family that was writing checks to cover old checks but what they don’t realize is that it snowballs — it actually spirals to the point where you lose all control of your finances.
How did you get involved?
About a year and a half ago Mesila ran a course for financial coaches in Yerushalayim for Hebrew speakers. My background is chinuch and life coaching — I’m a meishiv in Yeshiva Imrei Binah and I teach halachah in Sharfman’s seminary by day. A friend recommended me to Mesila for the course and I was one of the only English-speaking people there. The instructor asked for a volunteer to role-play a client so the class could watch coaching in action. I volunteered and I allowed him to show the group my actual income and expenses and so on to coach me. I guess Mesila liked me because soon after I began coaching families for them at night. Then I began doing workshops here and there. When the need arose for Mesila to train new coaches in the UK and US they asked me to do it — I’ve worked with more than 150 trainees since we started eight months ago. My partner Moshe Greenfield takes care of the technical and logistic aspects of the training and we’ve opened branches in London Manchester Brooklyn Lakewood and Monsey.
