Cultivate a healthier
relationship with your money
According to an article by Eileen F Gallo, everyone has a complex relationship when it comes to money and personal finance.
How you acquire, spend and manage money is largely due to two factors: the nurturing you received during childhood about money and values, and the way you organised this information in your mind.
This relationship with money lies on a spectrum. On either end of the spectrum is financial insecurity.
Being good with money isn’t just about knowing the correct information, but having the right attitude. Financial decisions are heavily influenced by unconscious emotional impulses and sometimes these impulses lead to an unhealthy relationship with money. Dr Bradley Klontz, financial psychologist spent time researching these unconscious patterns driving financial behaviour, which he calls ‘money scripts’. He identified 4 money scripts and highlight that people often have a mixture of all four money scripts but certain scripts exhibit themselves more strongly in different individuals.
These unconscious mindsets are typically tied to what we learn and experience as children and how we react to those experiences. “You could have children growing up in the same household experiencing the same thing. But where it goes for them is totally different”, Knox says. “One child might grow up to model the financial behavior they observed, while another will adopt a completely different mindset. But in both cases”, Knox says, “the response is driven by emotions”.
FOR REAL CHANGE, YOU CAN’T JUST
SCRATCH THE SURFACE
If you’re struggling to make progress or identify hidden beliefs, you may benefit
from working with a professional therapist. An outsider’s perspective may be just the thing to help kickstart the changes you want to make. “It’s not about being judged”, says Judith Gruber, a certified financial therapist. “It’s about finding the best in you and … how do you want to live your life?
What do you want to experience?”
Once you’ve identified the beliefs and behaviours you want to change, Melkumian suggests forcing yourself to do s mething that goes against those financial instincts. Having some practical experience with the new habits you want to build can boost your confidence and make it easier to gradually adopt a new money mindset.
As you take steps forward, have patience with yourself and be open to adjusting along the way. Changing what you believe about money and how you approach it isn’t about getting fast short-term results. “It’s really about committing to getting healthier and committing to … a new financial journey”, Melkumian says.
Remember...
it’s never too late to start your journey towards having a healthier relationship with money. To reach financial well-being reach out to our AskNelson counsellors.