The First Step Toward Alignment

What trace am I leaving behind?

I recently had the pleasure of joining George Grombacher on Money Alignment Academy. George is a financial advisor, entrepreneur, and author who has spent more than 25 years helping people and professionals live and work with intention. Our conversation moved through many of the themes that are most alive for me right now: hope, empathy, abundance, legacy, money, spirituality, and the daily choices that shape the trace we leave behind.

One of the questions George asked was deceptively simple: What does hope look like?

For me, hope is not passive optimism. It is not waiting for the world to become less complex or less painful. Hope is something we practice. It is something we cultivate through small, daily acts of alignment.

In my book, Enlightened Bottom Line, I share the HEAL framework: Hope, Empathy, Abundance, and Legacy. These are not abstract ideals. They are lenses through which we can examine how we live, lead, invest, spend, build, and relate to one another.

Hope asks: What practices help me orient toward possibility?

Empathy asks: How am I showing up for the humanity of others?

Abundance asks: What is enough, and how can I keep resources circulating in life-giving ways?

Legacy asks: What trace am I leaving behind?

In our conversation, I shared a story about my grandmother, Stella Maria Forte, to whom the book is dedicated along with my mother. She ran a fashion store in London. One day, when the store was especially busy, she noticed a woman who was clearly struggling. Rather than rushing past her, my grandmother stopped and created space for her. Weeks later, the woman returned and told her that on that day she had been considering taking her own life, and that their conversation helped her choose to stay alive.

My grandmother would say that if she did nothing else in her life but create that space for that woman, it was enough.

That story has stayed with me because it reminds us that abundance is deeply connected to enoughness. So often we imagine impact as something grand, visible, or scalable. But sometimes the most meaningful legacy begins in a single moment of presence.

George and I also spoke about money as a form of energy. Every dollar we spend, invest, save, or give is a kind of vote. It shapes communities, businesses, systems, and futures. This does not mean every choice must be perfect. It means we have more agency than we may realize.

That agency is available to all of us — not only investors or executives. It shows up in where we bank, what we buy, how we lead meetings, how we support colleagues, and whether we pause long enough to ask: Is this aligned with my values?

I often think about the Indigenous concept of seven-generation thinking: honoring what we have inherited from seven generations before us and considering the impact of our actions seven generations into the future. That horizon can feel vast, but it can also be clarifying. It reminds us that the present moment is not isolated. We are part of a much longer story.

So the invitation is not to solve everything at once.

It is to take the first step.

As Martin Luther King Jr. said, “You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.”

For each of us, that step may look different. A conversation. A purchase. A pause. A post-it note on the fridge asking, “What trace am I leaving today?”

The work of alignment begins there.

Would love to hear your thoughts!

Jenna

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Jenna is the President of LightPost Capital, an investment and acquisition firm. She is an active angel investor and has invested in over 3 unicorns. She is also the CEO of Impact Experience.

In her groundbreaking book, Enlightened Bottom Line, Jenna Nicholas explores the powerful intersection of spirituality, business, and investing—an intersection too often overlooked in a world driven by profit alone. Drawing on moving stories of entrepreneurs, investors, and leaders who are living out this integration, along with cutting-edge research, Nicholas reveals how spiritual wisdom can guide ethical choices in finance and business.

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