Overcoming Money Anxiety

When Money = Safety: An Unhealthy Equation

The only difference between me and this AI image is she’s thinner and I’d never wear those pants.

Anyone who’s ever had a drink with me in a bar, read this substack, or listened to one of my podcasts knows that I’m not the most grounded or balanced person when it comes to my relationship with money. 

There is a reason for that. Growing up, I thought we had money because we lived like we did, then my parents got divorced and it turned out we did not. My parents did have lots of credit card debt that they racked up trying to keep up with the Jones. In my teen years, I watched my mom sob while telling me she wished she could buy things for me but she just couldn’t do it. In high school, I got accepted to a private college and I can still see my mom standing in the kitchen, leaning on the counter over the sink, blowing smoke out her nose as she said, “Great.” Without a hint of excitement. “Let’s figure out if we can pay for this.” Thankfully, Uncle Sam and a few of his friends named TAP and Pell Grant showed up alongside a school scholarship, allowing me to escape to college.

The result of watching my parents struggle financially is that my relationship with money today is a bit funky. I’m not bad with money. I have no debt. I save. I shore us up for our retirements. My issue is more that I don't feel like I will ever have enough money to be safe. The thought of losing a job or a downshift in the market takes me directly to fears that our life will look like an episode of The Walking Dead. 

I thought for many years that once I made a certain amount of money, saved enough in the bank, and continued to be smart with my spending habits, I would feel safe, but that has not been the case. I’ve been thinking a lot about this recently, and observing myself and it seems that the more money I make or save, the more money I feel I need to continue to make and save. To add to that, I’ve recently started panicking about retirement. I lay in bed at 3 am wondering how much we will need to save so we’re not eating cat food in our late 70s. 

I’ve been living in this space for quite some time and instead of working on this issue, I’ve developed systems to save money and live debt-free. I have some very intense Google Docs and Sheets about our finances and multiple accounts for moving and shifting money to earmark for future spending or getting the highest interest rates. I’ve got a financial advisor. I’ve got the safety cushions in the bank. 

But I still feel like I don’t have enough. 

It’s clear that somewhere along the way, I came to believe that money equals safety. I’m pretty sure that’s a deep-down belief that I wasn’t even aware I held until recently. That brings me to my point. I think there are lots of us out there who know that we aren’t necessarily healthy with money, but we are struggling with what to do next.

I’d like to move beyond the fear. I’d like to live in a place where I am using my financial systems because it’s smart and I’m a math geek who likes when balance sheets are balanced. What I don’t want more of is constantly calculating our money for the month, the year, the rest of my life in some attempt to soothe myself like I’m sitting in a corner, rocking back and forth, muttering, “Everything's okay. Everything's okay. Everything's okay.”  

There are obvious steps I could take like therapy. There’s looking at family patterns of what’s been taught to me about money. Perhaps some journaling action around my feelings of money would be helpful. There’s also mindful work to be done. The Headspace meditation teachers who I co-host the Dear Headspace podcast with are all the time talking about the S.T.O.P. acronym for anxious moments. It stands for Stop. Take a breath. Observe. Proceed. 

I know this all, but when I'm scared, I still feel like I’m back with my mom watching her cry. 

On the positive side of things, I think that understanding that you’re in the middle of a problem is the beginning of working toward solving it. 

I’m trying to figure out what is the active work to be done to reframe my relationship with money. It would be nice, for example, if I could see that I had about 18 years of bad times with money, but I’ve also had 35 years of positive experiences with money since then. 

I can’t say exactly what the path forward is, but I can say I’m ready to delve into this work and I hope that slowly over time, I will be able to reframe the fear. I'm excited about this journey. I’m excited about the idea that I might be able to free myself up from some of the money anxiety that I live with. What space would that create in my life if I’m not worried about money? Is there more room for joy? Fun? Laughter? Peace? 

As part of this journey, I’ve invited Kara Stevens to be a guest on my substack. You may know her as the Frugal Feminista. She’s an author, a coach, and a financial expert who helps folks change their relationship with money. We’re going to have a deep discussion on the topic: you know why you’re messed up with money, now what?

So if you want to grow and have a healthier relationship with your wallet, make sure you come back next week to check out that audio interview with Kara! 

Until then, if you’ve been reading along, nodding your head, and feeling seen, feel free to share your thoughts or feelings in the comments. Sharing means feeling less alone. That’s a great start to the whole big shebang of a journey.

See you next week!