- Do you argue about money, how to spend it, save it, who should manage it, who should be in charge, make the decisions and have authority or final say?
- Perhaps you have different ideas about needs versus wants, what's important and what's unnecessary or wasteful?
- Does one of you earn more than the other? Perhaps one of you doesn't earn as much or isn't working at all and you feel inferior or unentitled to an equal say or share about the resources. Or as the person bringing home the paycheck, you feel underappreciated or taken for granted and taken advantage of.
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Many couples don't even talk about money openly or clearly, and things just happen that create fear, anxiety, resentment, and distance. The conversations may have gone underground because of shame about mistakes made or feelings of inadequacy or perceived incompetence, past fights that got really ugly, or divergent ideas and assumptions that haven't been identified, much less understood and worked-through.
Along with sex and children, money completes the trinity of most charged and common topics that couples argue about. Often one has an attitude of abundance (live for today, we made this, we can make more) while the other opperates from a place of conservatism, caution, or even scarcity (save for a rainy day, what if the job or business comes to an end, what if one of us becomes incapacited, etc.)
It's not just about money, and people will often find themselves feeling and even saying this when they're arguing. How money, as a resource, is handled in an intimate relationship/partnership is a statement about beliefs and personality styles, about values, priorities, power, control, security, vulnerability, empathy, respect, and personal responsibility.
It's no wonder that conversations about money get avoided, put off, or quickly heated and overwhelming, when they are conversations about all of these aspects of you and your relationship.
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Don't go it alone! Having an experienced, neutral third party to help you understand your own thinking (and feelings) about money and finances, as well as those of your partner, can transform these conversations from frightening to enlightening, from conflictual to collaborative.
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