If you look around at the world today, our collective money issues lie somewhere deep at the root of every major global problem we are facing. Unthinkable greed, overconsumption, environmental abuse, mass poverty, outrageous military spending, and the global financial crisis have caused us finally to hit bottom. While waking up from this hangover may not be easy, there has never been a more compelling time to shift our collective relationship with money. The subject of money is the last taboo and the final horizon in the evolution of our human consciousness.
Almost every relationship encounters challenges or outright conflict around money at some point. In my experience, few couples know how to communicate effectively about this highly charged subject in a way that is compassionate and supportive. No wonder many marriages disintegrate and fail over money issues! Issues and conflict around money remain a leading cause of divorce, which leaves in its wake not only financial consequences but emotional devastation as well.
Left unmanaged and without proper and timely help, money issues will eventually chip away at the foundation of trust and intimacy in our relationships. Without trust, intimacy cannot survive, and without intimacy, love withers and dies. The good news is that if couples recognize and manage their money dynamics early in their relationship — or, better yet, before they live together or marry — they can learn how to work through and heal their differences.
How can we do this if we can’t even talk about money calmly and rationally because the subject is so taboo, triggering, and unsafe? Therein lies the challenge and what I most hope to assist you with. The money coaching strategies and support in this book will help you to achieve the understanding and compassion you need to foster the love and intimacy you both desire.
Breaking Free of the Money Taboo
According to the Cambridge Dictionary, a taboo is “something that is avoided or forbidden for religious or social reasons,” and therefore, talking about a taboo subject is often considered wrong or distasteful. In the past sixty years, we’ve opened the door to exploring many historically taboo subjects, such as sex, ethnicity, religion, and politics; and in doing so, we have expanded and evolved both our individual and our collective consciousness. As a reward for these efforts, we have all witnessed and experienced greater openness, acceptance, and tolerance in the world at large.
Yet somehow, money has remained a vastly unexplored taboo, and there is more than sufficient evidence to show that this taboo is simply not serving us. The emotional and financial pain and consequences that couples experience are taking a toll and costing them far too much. It is time to break free of the money taboo and heal our collective money issues.
Facing the Money Shadow
Any area of our lives that remains off-limits to talk about openly, honestly, and without fear can become a “shadow” part of our being. In Jungian psychology, the shadow or shadow aspect represents a part of our unconscious mind that contains repressed aspects of ourselves. Carl Jung wrote that “everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individual’s conscious life, the blacker and denser it is.” In monetary terms, the shadow represents unconscious money patterns or behaviors we may possess that are harmful to ourselves or to others.
One example of this is when a person secretly invests a large sum of money without the knowledge of his or her partner and then loses the money, creating an extreme financial loss and feelings of betrayal. This has happened with many of the couples in my practice, and in each case, shadow influences were present in the partner who had secretly invested. In one couple, the shadow aspect of the husband had to do with unacknowledged anger toward his wife. Rather than learning how to address and communicate his anger, he acted out his feelings through secret behavior that ultimately sabotaged their finances and their relationship. Fortunately, they were able to heal and resolve this betrayal, but sadly, it doesn’t always work out favorably. Many marriages fail due to the shadow influences in one or both spouses that manifest in negative behaviors, secrecy, and betrayal.
Let these stories be a cautionary tale for us all, because to the extent that we are unwilling to move beyond the money taboo, we all stand to carry a part of this shadow inside us. Every day, we hear news about some individual (or corporation — they have their own shadow aspects) who committed an act that no one saw coming or was, by all accounts, not in keeping with his or her core personality. This is always followed by statements like “But he was such a nice guy; what happened?” from those who knew the person. Our shadow aspects are generally hidden deep within us. Most of us work hard to overcome these tendencies, but we often discover the money shadow in others only when we get hit between the eyes.
In relationships, the money shadow can show up in a number of ways, but perhaps one of the most common is financial infidelity. According to a survey conducted by the National Endowment for Financial Education, over 58 percent of those surveyed reported that they hid money or purchases from their spouse. Over 34 percent indicated that they had previously lied to their spouse about their earnings, debt, or finances. What makes us do this? Our own unexplored money shadows. How can we change this? Let’s start by getting out of the money closet, which is the first step to breaking free of the money taboo. We have everything to gain by doing this and increasingly more to lose if we continue to keep the deadbolt locked on the door. Can we really afford to lose any more? I don’t think so. Today, with millions of people reaching their financial breaking point, the stakes are getting higher and the consequences are far greater than ever before. Financial planning will never be an adequate solution for the money issues that cause financial conflict, self-sabotage, and disharmony in relationships.
Humans have had a rather precarious relationship with money since it was first created. Historically, whenever we have lost our way with money, becoming increasingly greedy, overconsuming, and overindebted, we have experienced major economic challenges. Couples would be advised, as an ounce of prevention, to use this book as an opportunity to do some inner work and reflection. Given our individual and global economic challenges, this is not a good time in history to live in denial or, worse, arrogance. The spiritual and physical laws of the universe are such that great imbalances seldom are tolerated without consequence.
Whenever the doorway to any subject or issue is closed or off-limits, we remain trapped on the other side, without access to what might be possible, including solutions, understanding, and healing. Taboos are the breeding ground for fear, limitation, misunderstanding, and pain. Until we pry open the door and begin to explore the taboo subject of money, we remain imprisoned in systems that keep us stuck, fearful, and contracted. Once it’s opened, we can begin to explore and discover new possibilities. We can learn new ways of being that are more expansive and allow us to feel safe enough to reflect and respond in healthier, more life-affirming ways.
In most families, when we are relatively young, money is established as a system of punishment and reward. This is where some of our money patterns and flawed beliefs take root. At the core of this is the gradual forming of an underlying belief that only if and when we are “good” are we worthy of receiving money. In sharp contrast, when we are “not good” or perhaps even told that we are “bad,” we can develop the flawed belief that we must be unworthy of having or receiving money. I believe that people keep an unconscious tab of the things they’ve done wrong in their life that serve as evidence of why they have not experienced more money, success, or happiness. This unconscious checks-and-balances system is deeply flawed, simply because, as human beings, we are always worthy. If you are here, you were given the gift of life for a reason, and therefore you must be worthy of all life’s possible expressions, including money.
When money (not unlike food, one of our other addictions) becomes a bargaining chip that parents use to get their children to behave and conform to their needs and desires, much can go wrong. This form of parenting can create a pattern of contradiction and confusion that is challenging for a child to understand and integrate. Another unpleasant side effect of this unconscious and seemingly benign form of manipulation is that those children may grow up to become adults who easily confuse their self-worth with their net worth. They may come to expect and believe that they get what they “deserve” or “do not deserve,” which is a direct reflection of their value and self-esteem. Virginia Satir, one of