Hi, I'm Sasha (Say-sha) and I came to this work the long way

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I spent years being the person who understood money technically and struggled with it personally. I could explain behavioral finance frameworks in a classroom and still find myself making decisions that didn't line up with what I knew. It took my sons, and then a long stretch of self-examination, to realize I had been trying to solve an emotional problem with financial tools and knowledge.

That's when I started learning about emotional intelligence. Not as a credential, but as a real life, everyday practice. I was teaching myself a new language of emotional words I desperately needed. What I learned changed how I work with people, how I interview guests, and why I built this show.

Financially Inked is where I bring all of it together. The financial expertise. The behavioral lens. The belief that real change doesn't come from better spreadsheets. It comes from understanding the story you've been telling yourself about money, and deciding whether it still fits.

Every episode, I sit down with someone: an expert, an entrepreneur, a person who rebuilt after a financial loss, and I ask the questions most interviewers don't. Not just what happened, but what it meant. Not just the mistake, but the mark it left.

Sasha Grabenstetter, AFC®, BFA™ is a financial educator, speaker, adjunct instructor, and co-author of All My Money: Change for the Better and Serving with Purpose: The Path to Pro Bono Financial Planning. She holds an Accredited Financial Counselor® designation (2015), a Behavioral Financial Advisor™ designation (2022), and a master's degree from Texas Tech University. Before launching Financially Inked, she co-hosted the Heart of Advice podcast and created Family Financial Feuds from concept to post-production.

She lives near Dallas with her spouse, two sons, and several financial fat cats who have strong opinions about portfolio diversification.