Superior financial decisions and poor financial decisions! If you are making superior financial decisions, then it is great. But if most of your financial decisions are poor then you must know the root cause of these decisions. These decisions may be linked to Money Disorder. So let’s understand this in more detail.
Everyone makes a poor financial decision now and again. This is normal and, to the extent, we learn from our missteps, even necessary. Single, isolated, or rare financial mistakes, do not qualify as money disorders. Money disorders are persistent, predictable, often rigid patterns of self-destructive financial behaviors that cause significant stress, anxiety, emotional distress in major areas of one’s life.
People in the grip of money disorders can’t change the faulty beliefs or unhealthy behaviors, no matter how much chaos and misery they cause. Typically, they know they should change their behaviors, but they just can’t seem to do it. Or, even if they’re able to shift their behavior for a time, they’re unable to make the changes stick. Often they feel intense shame about the behaviors and may hide them from others and even from themselves. This only postpones any resolution of the issue and further hinders change.
One type of money disorder is ‘money worship’. The core driver of this behavior is the belief that having more money will lead to greater happiness. Individuals with this disorder are obsessed with the idea that obtaining more money is necessary to make progress in life and, at the same time, convinced that they will never have enough money to fulfill their needs or desires. Younger, single, and low-net-worth individuals are more likely to engage in this behavior, which has also been linked to a higher probability of carrying over credit card debt from month to month.
A Real Story
MOLLIE: My husband and I struggled and fought over money matters often. Neither of us had any sort of financial map to guide us. Neither of us had savings or risk management strategies and we lived paycheck to paycheck for the most part. I struggled to figure out a way to get some kind of relief from the anxiety I felt, to learn how to manage money in my life. With my husband, I would try to control, threaten, cajole, manipulate, withdraw, argue, cry, plead, bargain, always driven by my fear regarding finances. So it was these financial issues that led us to couples’ therapy over and over, but the focus was seldom about the financial issues that had become a wedge between my husband and me.
Hurricane Katrina blew the lid off of things, so to speak. Our home was flooded and our investment property was destroyed. My business was temporarily lost—I hoped it was temporary—so my income was at a standstill. My community was devastated and so many things I counted on for security—my income, my spiritual community, my neighborhood structure, my local friends and family, even my faith—all of those were challenged. Though I had a great marriage in so many ways, my money issues reared up like a dragon. It demanded healing or I knew I would lose more than a lot of material things—I would lose my marriage.
The Core of Money Disorder
Mollie and her husband managed the situation and their marriage was saved. But like most of us, they didn’t take that step until things were at a crisis point. They limped along, struggling with money issues without ever actually dealing with them. This created more stress, which put the animal brain as an in charge. When your animal brain is activated, you will automatically default to using your money scripts to guide you in your financial decision-making. To the degree that those scripts are faulty or incomplete, your decision-making will be, too. That’s at the core of money disorders.
The money disorders stem from family dysfunction, emotional difficulties, profound painful childhood experiences, or—most often—a combination of these factors. Similar to other compulsive or addictive behaviors, money disorders are symptoms of unfinished business related to a troubled past. The self-medicating aspects of these disorders may help us temporarily avoid difficult feelings and psychic pain. However, the relief this offers is only temporary, and it comes with its own set of emotional, relational, and financial side effects.
Symptoms of money disorder may include any or all of the following.
- Anxiety, worry, or despair about one’s financial situation
- A lack of savings
- Excessive debt
- Bankruptcy, loan defaults, or both
- Conflict with family, friends, or colleagues around money
- An inability to sustain changes in financial behaviors
Discover the Money Scripts
The most irrational money behaviors make perfect sense when we discover their underlying money scripts and the context from which they arose. When these problematic behaviors become habitual they can lead to significant problems in relationships, work, psychological health, and general—not to mention financial wellbeing.
Unresolved childhood issues, financial traumas, and other early flashpoint experiences make up the framework of all financial disorders. These disorders themselves take many forms and are not mutually exclusive. We can show signs of more than one, in varying degrees, in varying situations, and at varying times in our lives. These disorders may be persistent but they are not static. And the scripts that underlie them rarely change, at least not without conscious effort and hard work. As no two people are identical because of wildly different backgrounds, experiences, family histories, and ways of seeing the world, these disorders also don’t look exactly the same from person to person.
Financial Wellness
Researchers Dr. So-Hyun Joo and Dr. John Grable listed several factors contributing to financial wellness as
- Maintaining reasonable and low debt
- Having an active savings plan
- Having and following a conscious spending plan
- Lack of conflict with family/partner around money
- Experiencing high levels of financial satisfaction
- Experiencing low levels of financial stress
For financial wellness, there are several tools or programs available nowadays, one of them is Financial Health Management (FHM). This is a debt relief method designed to help consumers handle their debt issues in both the short and long term. In the short term, an FHM company helps an indebted consumer leave debt by using an established debt relief method. In the long-term, an FHM company provides resources to help its clients change their financial behavior and maintain their “financial health” in the years after they leave debt.
To reach this goal, a company provides resources, usually online, that can help both past and present clients better manage their finances. These resources might include savings tips, online budgeting tools, or educational articles about credit and debt. These items are offered to encourage positive financial habits and help people avoid returning to debt in the future. (Inspired from ‘Mind over Money’ by Brad Klontz)
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