Keeping Finance Personal

1. Personal Finance is Deeply Personal, Not Just Numbers

I believe that being good with money has nothing to do with numbers.

Beyond the math. Traditional finance focuses on formulas and budgets, but true financial well-being is rooted in who you are. Your unique identity, lived experiences, values, and how you perceive the world are the real drivers of your money behaviors. Trying to apply generic advice without considering your personal context is why many people feel stuck.

Identity matters. Your social and personal identities—like age, race, gender, sexual orientation, mental health, and socioeconomic status—shape your financial journey. These identities influence the opportunities and barriers you face, impacting everything from earning potential to spending habits. Understanding this connection is the first step to creating a financial plan that actually works for you.

Identity economics. This concept highlights that people make financial decisions based on their sense of self and desire to belong, not just rational economic factors. Marketing leverages this by selling lifestyles, not just products. Your spending can be influenced by a desire to fit in, escape parts of your identity, or proudly embrace who you are.

2. Find Safe Spaces to Learn About Money Without Shame

That is the power of unsafe spaces: they keep you silent in fear of shame.

Judgment hinders learning. Many people feel inadequate or stupid when trying to learn about finances, especially in environments where questions are discouraged or met with condescension. This fear prevents understanding and isolates individuals in their struggles. Financial literacy is low across all generations globally, proving you are not alone.

Lack of representation. The financial industry often lacks diversity, making it hard for marginalized groups to find advisors or institutions where they feel safe and understood. This can trigger fight-or-flight responses, making open conversations about sensitive financial topics nearly impossible. Women, especially women of color and 2SLGBTQIA+ individuals, face significant barriers.

Cultivate your space. You don't need a traditional financial advisor to find support. Safe spaces can be online communities, trusted friends, mentors, or creators. Identify your "red flags" (signs of an unsafe space) and "green flags" (signs of a safe space) to guide your search. Prioritizing learning in supportive environments is crucial for building confidence and taking control.

3. Your Mental Health Profoundly Impacts Your Finances

If your finances are at risk, so is your mental health, and the cycle continues.

Intertwined struggles. Mental health challenges can lead to financial difficulties (lack of motivation, impaired decision-making, anxiety), and financial stress can worsen mental health (worry, shame, isolation). This creates a challenging cycle where it's hard to know where to start. Financial worry is a top stressor for many.

Coping mechanisms. When struggling mentally, people often turn to coping behaviors, sometimes leading to unhelpful financial habits like avoiding bills or overspending. These actions provide temporary relief but can worsen the long-term financial situation.

• Lack of motivation: Difficulty managing finances, avoiding accounts.
• Impaired decision-making: Impulsive spending, poor long-term choices.
• Anxiety/Worry: Avoiding financial tasks, constant stress about money.

Building security. Creating financial peace of mind, like saving a safety fund (3-6 months of expenses in a high-yield savings account), can provide crucial breathing room when mental health is poor. Automating finances can also help when motivation is low. Addressing both mental health and money simultaneously is key.

4. Work With Your Brain, Not Against It (Especially if Neurodivergent)

It’s not that you’re bad with money, but rather that you don’t have the right tools to support you.

ADHD and money. Neurodivergent brains, like those with ADHD, often struggle with executive function (planning, organization, time management) and motivation in traditional ways. This can lead to challenges like impulse spending, missed payments, and difficulty sticking to budgets, often labeled unfairly as laziness or lack of willpower.

• 65% of people with ADHD find money management harder.
• They are 4x more likely to impulse spend.
• They struggle with delay discounting (undervaluing future rewards).

Different motivation. People with ADHD are often motivated by pressure/urgency, interest/passion, competition/challenge, and novelty/play, rather than just "shoulds." Applying these motivations to financial tasks can make them more manageable.

• Pressure: Set deadlines, use accountability partners.
• Interest: Gamify tasks, listen to music, body double.
• Competition: Savings challenges with friends.
• Novelty: Change up methods, locations, or formats.

Neuro$picy strategies. Tailor financial systems to your brain. Automation is crucial for consistency. Visual tools (trackers, vision boards) help keep goals visible. Focus on one goal at a time to avoid overwhelm. Accept that tools may need to change over time as novelty wears off.

5. Trauma Shapes Your Relationship With Money

In order to change your relationship with money, you need to address your trauma.

Trauma's reach. Trauma, whether "big T" events or sustained stress ("little t"), impacts feelings of safety, security, and worthiness—all tied to money. Financial trauma itself (poverty, job loss, economic abuse) directly affects finances, but any trauma can manifest in money behaviors.

• Financial trauma examples: Living in poverty, chronic financial stress, economic abuse.
• Trauma responses in finances: Avoiding money, overspending, underspending, lack of boundaries (undercharging, not negotiating).

Brain and nervous system impact. Trauma triggers can shut down the prefrontal cortex (critical thinking), leaving you in survival mode (fight/flight/freeze/fawn) and unable to make logical financial decisions. This dysregulation narrows your Window of Tolerance (WOT), making it harder to cope with stress.

Healing is possible. Working through trauma, ideally with professional support (EMDR, somatic therapies), is essential for long-term financial change. Somatic practices help reconnect with the body and widen the WOT. Creating a "Trauma Evacuation Plan" can help navigate triggers and return to a grounded state.

6. Your Childhood and Culture Form Your Money Story

By the time you are old enough to really think about your money behaviors and patterns, they’ve already been created.

Financial socialization. Your money story begins in childhood, shaped by what your caregivers explicitly taught, what they said around you, and what you observed or felt. These experiences create subconscious "rules" about money, debt, saving, and wealth that influence adult decisions. Even siblings in the same household can develop different behaviors based on interpreting these dynamics.

Family systems and culture. Beyond explicit lessons, family systems and cultural background deeply influence money views. Concepts of wealth, value, giving, and financial responsibility vary widely.

• Cultural examples: Communal funding practices (Susu, Harambe), value of gold, expectations of supporting immigrant parents.
• Family dynamics: Hearing parents fight about money can link money to stress; witnessing frugality can instill saving habits.

Navigating expectations. Cultural pressures, especially for children of immigrants, can create tension between collectivist values (supporting family) and individualistic Western ideals (prioritizing personal wealth). It's crucial to identify these influences and decide which "rules" serve you now.

7. Old Financial Advice Doesn't Fit Today's Reality

While they have gathered invaluable knowledge from their experiences, we shouldn’t be blindly applying their formula for success.

Changing landscape. The financial world has drastically changed across generations, making advice from older generations less applicable. Millennials and Gen Z face different realities than Baby Boomers or Gen X.

• Education costs: Skyrocketed since the Boomer generation.
• Debt: Younger generations carry significantly more student loan debt.
• Income: Millennials earn less than their parents did at the same age.
• Housing market: Prices have increased dramatically, making homeownership harder.

Catalysts for change. Traumatic events like 9/11, the 2008 financial crisis, and the COVID-19 pandemic expose flaws in systems and accelerate societal shifts. These events impact generations differently, highlighting the need for new approaches.

• 2008 Crisis: Revealed predatory lending, shattered trust in institutions, impacted job and housing markets.
• Pandemic: Questioned work norms, highlighted systemic inequities, increased financial stress for many.

Forge a new path. Learn from past lessons (e.g., importance of safety funds, diversifying investments) but adapt them to current realities. Don't blindly follow outdated formulas. Focus on increasing income, building skills, and making informed decisions based on today's economic climate.

8. Align Your Spending with Your Personal Values

When you’re able to shift your spending to support your core values, it feels like always putting on an outfit that fits perfectly.

Values as a compass. Personal values are fundamental beliefs guiding what's most important in life. When financial habits conflict with values, it creates internal resistance, guilt, and shame. Aligning spending with values brings clarity and fulfillment.

• Identify values: Reflect on experiences where you felt misaligned or truly alive.
• Define values: Understand what each chosen value means to you personally.

Values-based spending. This means being intentional about where your money goes, ensuring it supports what matters most. This isn't about restriction, but about conscious choices that feel good and reduce guilt.

• Examples: Supporting local businesses (community value), donating to causes (equity value), spending on experiences that align with personal growth.

Voting with your money. Your financial decisions have a broader impact. You can support issues you care about through spending, investing (socially responsible options), and donating. While privilege affects capacity, even small shifts accumulate over time.

9. Build Equitable Financial Relationships Through Openness

Money plays a critical role in relationships.

Money and relationships. Financial disagreements are a leading cause of divorce. Money impacts dynamics, domestic labor, and future goals. Avoiding money talks creates an unstable foundation.

• Common issues: Differing attitudes, mismatched priorities, debt, financial infidelity, overspending.

Beyond 50/50. Achieving equity means fair distribution based on circumstances, not just equal splits. This applies to both paid income and unpaid domestic labor. Traditional gender roles often lead to unequal burdens, especially for women.

• Domestic labor: Often falls disproportionately on women, even if they also work. This unpaid labor has significant value and impacts capacity for paid work and financial management.

Open communication. Talking about money, including childhood experiences, trauma, values, goals, and expectations around roles and labor, is crucial. It requires vulnerability, active listening, and avoiding judgment.

• Tips for money talks: Schedule dedicated time, start with general questions, share your own story, take breaks, avoid criticism.

Managing finances together. Strategies vary (joint accounts, separate accounts, proportional splitting), but transparency and mutual understanding are key. Having some separate savings can provide independence and security.

10. Ditch Society's Definition of Success and Wealth

Society defines success as having a prestigious job, driving an expensive car, and owning a beautiful house.

External metrics. Society promotes a narrow definition of success (prestigious job, high income, material possessions) and wealth (debt-free, high net worth, homeownership). This creates pressure to constantly "work hard" and "aim higher," leading to burnout, comparison, and feelings of inadequacy if you don't fit the mold.

• Consequences: Internalized capitalism (self-worth tied to productivity), chasing "more" endlessly, using material goods to mask struggles.

Systemic barriers. The reality is that success and wealth are not solely dependent on individual effort. Systemic inequities like wage gaps (gender, racial, disability) and the impact of historical oppression (colonialism, slavery) create significant barriers for marginalized groups, making the "formula" unattainable for many.

• Wage gaps: Women, especially women of color, 2SLGBTQIA+ individuals, and disabled people earn significantly less than white cisgender men for the same work.
• Wealth gap: Historical and ongoing discrimination prevents equitable wealth accumulation for Black and Indigenous communities.

Redefine your terms. Question societal expectations and define success and wealth on your own terms, based on your values and desired lifestyle. Focus on how you want your life to feel, not just what it looks like externally.

• Ask yourself: What is my definition of success? How much money do I need for my ideal life? What does wealth mean to me?

11. Rewrite Your Money Story Through Intentional Action

Each small habit that you gain and choice that you make adds up to a changed life.

A lifelong journey. Rewriting your money story is not a one-time event but an ongoing process of learning, adapting, and making intentional choices. It involves integrating everything you've learned about your identity, trauma, values, and the systems around you.

Framework for change:

1. Let Go: Release old narratives, limiting beliefs, shame, and resentment. Forgive yourself and others. Decide which parts of your story no longer serve you.
2. Find Support: Build a strong network of safe spaces—people, institutions, and resources—where you can learn, ask questions, and feel understood without judgment. Curate what you consume.
3. Take Action: Define your long-term financial goals based on your reimagined vision of success and wealth. Use tools like the SMART goal acronym and the Goal Pyramid to break down big goals into manageable action steps. Reverse engineer your vision.
4. Check-in: Regularly review your finances, mindset, mental health, and other relevant life areas (the "finance M+Ms"). This helps you stay on track, adjust as needed, and reinforce positive habits. Schedule it like any important appointment.
5. Celebrate: Acknowledge and reward every win, big or small. This reinforces positive behaviors and helps you build a healthier, more positive emotional relationship with money. Create a celebration routine that feels special to you.

Small steps, big impact. Like the story of the grandma's walking habit, consistent small actions build a strong foundation. Focus on making 1% improvements and celebrating progress. You have the tools; now it's time to live out your new money story.

Last updated: May 12, 2025