I'm a Western Sydney chick who grew up in a household where we didn't talk about money — and didn't have a whole lot of it either. I wore my cousin's hand-me-downs. Going to McDonald's was a fancy meal out.

But it was as an adult that I made my biggest money mistakes. Credit cards. Store cards. And then, in my early thirties, I gave every cent of my divorce proceeds — and everything in my business and personal accounts — to charity. A move I instantly regretted. It meant moving into a share house with four mates, and going into five figures of debt.

To say I was ashamed was an understatement. But that experience means I know what it feels like to not be at the age and stage you thought you should be.

I built back from less than nothing. Not because I had some brilliant plan, but because I finally sat with the money behaviour I'd been running from and did the actual work — building income, understanding why I did what I did, and learning how to invest.

Today I'm financially independent. I have choice. And that experience is why I now build financial education the way I do — as something you can actually use, not something you file away and feel bad about later.