There are conversations that Antonella Gularte hears over and over again. Women who already have their own income, who work, start businesses, or even earn more than they imagined a few years ago, but who still feel uncomfortable when talking about money. They find it difficult to spend on themselves, set a price for their work, or think about investing. The money arrived, but their relationship with it changed much less than they expected.
“We women were taught to manage scarcity, to stretch what we have, and to feel guilty when we spend on ourselves,” says Anto. The phrase does not appear as a criticism, but rather as a description of something she has seen repeated for years in the women who come to her programs and training spaces.
For Antonella Gularte, the conversation about economic independence often stops halfway. Learning how to generate income is important, but not enough. You also have to learn how to take care of money, make it grow, and make decisions with it. Otherwise, the feeling of dependency can still be there, even when the numbers change.
An analysis published by El Cronista in 2026 regarding female investors in Latin America points out that women achieve better results than men in risk-adjusted returns. The report attributes these results to behaviors such as researching more before making decisions, maintaining a long-term perspective, and sticking to the chosen strategy even during moments of volatility.
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For Anto, that data shows something that is rarely placed at the center of the conversation: the problem was never women’s ability to manage or invest. In many cases, the difficulty appears earlier, in the way they learned to relate to money.
The fear of money does not always present itself in an obvious way. Sometimes it looks like prudence and other times like the habit of letting someone else decide. It can also appear in the guilt that some women feel when they start earning more or when they consider the possibility of investing in themselves.
“Real independence isn’t about billing a lot; it’s about having your money work for your freedom,” says Antonella Gularte.
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The idea runs through much of his work. Talking about money, he maintains, is also talking about autonomy. About the possibility of choosing which projects to accept, how much to charge, and how much time to dedicate to something that no longer works. These are decisions that seem financial, but often start somewhere else.
Antonella Gularte has observed that when the relationship with money changes, decisions regarding work and daily life also change. Some women feel empowered to set boundaries they previously avoided. Others stop accepting opportunities that do not suit them or allow themselves to consider goals that once seemed too far out of reach.
“Earning money without knowing what to do with it is still being dependent, only with more cash,” says Anto.
The phrase is often uncomfortable because it challenges a deeply rooted idea: that generating more income, on its own, guarantees freedom. For Antonella Gularte, true independence begins a little earlier, in the way a woman learns to view money and the place she believes she deserves to occupy in relation to it.
