I think I’m becoming a gold digger. Or perhaps that’s what they call women who love money, enjoy being taken care of and have gradually become less interested in pretending that financial comfort isn’t important to them.
I’m not entirely sure when this transformation started, but lately I’ve found myself being a little more honest about the kind of life I want, the kind of relationship I would enjoy and just how much I appreciate a man who can make my life easier.
And before anyone starts forming opinions, I have spent a considerable amount of time trying to make my own money. I have tried things, abandoned things, started businesses, explored opportunities, spent hours researching ways to earn online and probably entertained a few ideas that should have remained in my head.
I have a business, I have products, I have equipment I still want to acquire and I have an entire list of things I want to accomplish. So perhaps I am not looking for someone to rescue me. Perhaps I’m just becoming less enthusiastic about the idea that I must do absolutely everything myself.
There was a time when I was much more interested in finding every possible way to make money. If someone mentioned an online opportunity, I wanted to know about it. If there was a platform people were using to earn, I probably went looking for it. If someone claimed they had found a way to make money from something I had never considered, I was curious.
Blogging, advertising, websites, digital products, guest posting, online services, physical products, different platforms and business ideas. I have gone down quite a few rabbit holes.
Sometimes I would find something interesting and immediately start imagining how I could incorporate it into my existing businesses. Other times I would get excited about an entirely new venture and start thinking about the name, the website, the products and how much money it could potentially make.
I have discovered that my brain is particularly creative when it thinks there is money to be made. Give me a financial problem and I can come up with five business ideas before lunch.
At some point, I even considered finding a politician who could buy me a large-format printer ahead of the 2027 elections. The arrangement seemed perfectly reasonable in my head. They needed campaign posters, I needed a large-format printer, and I could print their posters for them. Everybody gets something.
They get their campaign materials, I get machinery that would otherwise take me considerably longer to acquire, and perhaps I could use the same machine to serve other customers after the elections. I remember thinking about it and wondering why I hadn’t considered it earlier.
Imagine turning someone’s campaign requirements into an equipment acquisition strategy. I was not even thinking about politics in the way people might imagine. I was thinking about the printer. The printer was the main character in that particular business proposal.
I don’t know whether this makes me resourceful or whether I have reached a point where almost anything can become a business opportunity if I think about it long enough.
And that is the thing about needing money. It makes you creative, sometimes unnecessarily creative. You begin looking at people, platforms, opportunities, industries and random conversations differently. You start asking yourself what can be monetised, what can be sold, what can be offered, what can be improved and where the money might be hiding.
I have had moments when I wished I could simply find someone with the resources to finance a particular idea, buy the machinery I need and let me get on with the work. Not because I don’t want to work, but because I know what I could do with better equipment and adequate capital.
There is a difference between lacking ideas and lacking the resources to execute them. I have never particularly struggled with the former.
Eventually, after trying and investigating so many things, I began filtering. Not every opportunity deserved my attention. Not every income stream was worth pursuing. Not every business model made sense for me.
Some things looked attractive from the outside but required more time, money and energy than I was willing to commit. Others were interesting but distracted me from the things I already had going. I began understanding that I didn’t need to participate in every money-making opportunity on the internet.
I needed to identify what worked for me, develop it, improve it and give it enough attention to become something substantial. And for all the experimenting, researching and wandering around different possibilities, business kept bringing me back to the same place.
Creating things, selling things, developing products, building websites, working on ideas and trying to turn something I had imagined into something people could actually buy. That’s where I seem to find myself again and again.
Business is the route that makes the most sense to me, even when it tests my patience and occasionally makes me question every decision I’ve ever made.
But somewhere along the way, another realisation began taking shape. I don’t just want to make money. I want to enjoy money. I want to have it, spend it, save it, invest it and experience the comfort that comes with knowing I have enough. I want to stop treating every purchase as a financial decision that requires a meeting with myself.
I want to buy something because I like it, not because I have calculated how many other things that money could have paid for. I want to replace things when they need replacing, travel when I want to travel, furnish my home properly and enjoy beautiful experiences without feeling like I’m stealing from a more important financial responsibility.
I want to have money left over after taking care of the things that need taking care of. I want to experience what it feels like to have financial room.
And apparently, this is where my potential gold-digger era enters the conversation.
I have found myself thinking about relationships differently, too. I like deep conversations. I enjoy intellectual compatibility, someone who can challenge my thinking, exchange ideas and talk about things beyond the usual small talk.
I appreciate attraction and affection, and I enjoy the excitement of getting to know someone. But I have also realised that romantic interest alone doesn’t particularly impress me anymore. A man can tell me he misses me, wants pictures, imagines having children with me and talks about how much he likes me, but I am also interested in what kind of life he is capable of building and sharing.
I want more than enthusiasm. I want consideration. I want generosity. I want a man who understands that making someone’s life easier can be a beautiful expression of affection.
I want to be financially provided for. There, I said it. I would love a man who could comfortably give me at least KSh 50,000 every month towards my personal bills and basic expenses without turning it into a recurring conversation. I want someone who plans dates, takes me on adventures, buys me flowers and remembers that I absolutely love chocolates.
I want to mention that my phone is cracked and have him decide that perhaps it’s time I got a new one. I want to talk about a piece of machinery my business needs and have someone who is genuinely interested in helping me acquire it.
I want thoughtful gestures, practical support and the kind of generosity that doesn’t make receiving feel like an uncomfortable negotiation. I want someone who enjoys providing, not someone who feels inconvenienced every time I have a need.
I know some people will have opinions about this. There is always a conversation about women wanting money, men being providers, independence and what relationships should look like. I don’t particularly feel like arguing with anyone about it.
I am not suggesting that a man owes me a particular lifestyle simply because he is interested in me. Nor do I think financial generosity should buy someone’s affection, body or commitment. I am talking about compatibility. About being honest that financial provision is something I value in a relationship and that I would be happier with someone whose approach to money, generosity and building a life together aligns with mine.
I don’t want to pretend that I am indifferent to financial circumstances when I am not. Money matters to me, and I would rather be honest about that than spend years trying to appear like the easiest woman in the world to date.
But I also don’t want to abandon my own ambitions. This is where things get interesting because I want both. I want to build a business big enough to run without my daily involvement. I want managers and employees who understand their responsibilities, systems that work, production that doesn’t depend on whether I woke up in a particularly productive mood and enough revenue to make the entire operation worthwhile.
I want Garo to grow beyond me. I want a proper business, one with equipment, capacity, a physical presence and a team. I want to be able to take a holiday without wondering whether customers are waiting for replies or whether an order has been completed. I want to spend time with my son, enjoy my home, travel, go on dates and have afternoons when the only thing I need to think about is what I feel like creating.
I don’t want to stop making things. I actually love creating. I want to make beautiful cards, design wall art, develop new gift collections and experiment with products. I want to enjoy the creative side of my business without being responsible for every single operational detail.
I want to be able to walk into my own workshop, find something interesting to work on, spend a few hours creating and leave knowing that the rest of the business is in capable hands. I want the business to make money even when I am not personally producing every item. I want my work to eventually give me time back. That is the kind of success I think about more often than I admit.
So yes, I want to make my own money, and I would also love to have someone else’s money making my life more comfortable. I don’t see why I must choose one desire and pretend the other doesn’t exist.
I can be a businesswoman and still enjoy being spoiled. I can be financially independent and appreciate a generous partner. I can have my own income and still want someone who takes pleasure in providing. I can build something substantial and still want to come home to a man who has thought about what would make my day better. Perhaps I have simply become less interested in the idea that independence must mean doing everything alone.
There is also something I am learning about the difference between wanting money and wanting the things money makes possible. I don’t wake up excited about banknotes. I think about what they represent.
A printer that works. Machinery that improves production. Bills paid without anxiety. A well-furnished home. A comfortable trip. A phone that isn’t held together by the hope that it survives another month. A business that can pay its employees. The ability to help my son, take care of myself and make decisions without having to first calculate whether I can afford the consequences.
Money gives me options, and I have become very fond of having options. I don’t want every decision in my life to be dictated by what I can or cannot afford.
Maybe that is why I have become more particular about what I want from people, too. I don’t want to be endlessly impressed by words. I want actions. I don’t want to have to keep explaining why something matters to me. I appreciate people who pay attention.
I want to be around people who are generous with their time, knowledge, resources and affection. I want relationships that feel mutually beneficial in the best sense of the word, where both people are happy to contribute and neither feels like they are being drained.
I want to give, too. I want to buy gifts, plan surprises, support someone else’s ambitions and make someone’s life beautiful. I just don’t want to be the only person doing the thinking, planning and providing.
And perhaps I am still figuring out how to reconcile all these desires. I don’t have a fully developed business empire yet. I haven’t acquired all the machinery I want. I haven’t reached the level of financial security I imagine when I think about the future.
I am still working through ideas, making decisions, figuring out what deserves my attention and learning how to build something that can last. I am still very much in the middle of becoming. But I am becoming more honest about what I want, and I think that matters.
So, am I becoming a gold digger? Maybe that’s what someone would call a woman who openly admits that she likes money, values financial provision and would rather be with a generous man than spend her romantic life explaining why generosity matters to her.
But I also know that I want to build something of my own. I want my business to grow, my income to expand, my assets to increase and my work to create opportunities for other people. I want to have enough money to take care of myself and enough freedom to enjoy the things I have worked for.
I don’t want to spend my entire life proving that I can survive without help. I already know I can figure things out. I have demonstrated that in more ways than I care to count. I have turned ideas into products, found opportunities where I could, explored possibilities and kept building even when the resources weren’t always there. I am proud of that woman.
But I also want to meet the version of myself who doesn’t have to be in problem-solving mode every day. The woman who has time, choices, comfort and people who genuinely enjoy making her happy.
I want the business. I want the money. I want the chocolates, the flowers, the holidays, the beautiful home, the functioning machinery and the freedom to spend an afternoon making something simply because I feel like it.
I want to be ambitious without being consumed by ambition. I want to be independent without refusing to receive. I want to be loved generously, live comfortably and enjoy the life I am working so hard to create.
Perhaps I am not becoming a gold digger. Perhaps I am simply becoming a woman who has stopped pretending that she doesn’t like gold.
And if that makes me a lover of money, I think I can live with that.
