Your Money Marriage

We enter the world and begin our footsteps of life, like a blank sheet of paper. As we start our life journey, our experiences help to shape our story.  These experiences then develop into sentences that manifest into paragraphs then chapters of our story. During our life journey the chapters; both good and bad are re-written. 

One of the chapters in our book is about our “Money Marriage.”  It is unlike our “Real-Life Marriage” chapter, where we start off as young single adults, look around at our surroundings, notice an individual, who we would like to spend the rest of our life with. Instead, a money marriage happens automatically and there is no separation or divorce no matter how bad things get. How favorable your Money Marriage will be is based on the experiences that we acquire during our journey through life!

During childhood, our first relationship with money commenced when we received our first nickel, dime or dollar. We probably saw the money as a “freedom pass,” which allowed us to attain whatever we wanted, such as M&M’s or toy cars. Perhaps, we viewed the money as a special token to reserve until that special time of need. Today, you may be unable to reflect back on your magical money moment; nevertheless some past experience directed your path to your present relationship with money.

In your present money relationship, do you find yourself constantly at war when dealing with money matters? Think about it! As a child, did you learn your financial skills from your parent or guardian? Is money something you utilize to make yourself feel better, more important or gain friendships? When I was a child, my father taught me how to work hard and save my money, in order to discourage me from borrowing money from others. He would constantly tell my brother and me about one of his friends, who would come by to borrow money every two weeks. The constant borrowing of money affected their relationship. He did not want us to be borrowers, but rather lenders. I believe this helped to mold me into the conscious spender that I am today. Now, I’m not sure who or what has directed you towards your money relationship, but if you invest a little time to reflect on some of your past experiences, you will soon find out the answers. This week, “dig deep” and think “hard” about your personal relationship with your money.

This week’s post is about reflecting and understanding the journey of your financial life; hence it will allow you to figure out your financial DNA.  Are you a big spender? Are you frugal with your money, whereas the money has to scream help to get out of your wallet? There are many different types of money personalities, which stem from past or present experiences or principles in our lives. Now, based on your identified personality, how can your money relationship  improve? Yes, we all can improve our money habits! Even if you are a good steward over managing the money you have, you may not be good at sharing or donating any of your money! Why? Perhaps, you fear losing everything? Do you spend a lot of money on your children’s “wants” because you grew up not having a lot of things? We must learn to identify our own money personality, to see if there is a need for major change or “tweaking” to work on ways to improve it. 

As you think about your relationship with the “Almighty Dollar,” remember you hold the key to your great money marriage.  Unlike a significant other, you can really change the behavior in this marriage. How you manage this relationship, unlocks the door not only to your financial success, but the financial success of your family!

Consciously yours, 

Shareeke The Conscious Spender

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