The Nitty Gritty Of Bringing Your Money Stuff Together

The Devil is in the detail and so is the doorway to your juicy, intimate, connected and heart expanding relationship. 

As you dive in deeper and get to merge your lives, remember these two golden rules…

Be Specific

Specificity is vital when coming together and designing your joint vision and how money will support it.

Too often we presume another person knows what we mean and we get very sloppy with our language using vague and generalised words.

Most money conflicts arise from misunderstanding each other's money world. When you accept you have different money worlds and don’t need to make that wrong, and instead get curious and apprentice yourself to understanding the other’s world - that is when magic happens.

Make It Fun

Your money stuff and your financial wellbeing is vitally important - but don’t confuse important with boring or heavy.

The more you can make your money stuff fun, the more you can make your money conversations filled with playfulness and heart - the better you will be at it - both directly and in the way it weaves through your relationship.

Make getting to know each other fun! 

Make creating your Wealth plans and money management systems fun.

Make this a game of discovery - a marvellous treasure hunt.

Manage your self judgement, because if you come into this joint inquiry full of self judgement or shame you will project that and turn the play waters very murky indeed.
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>>> Go to this article “WAYS TO DISCOVER YOUR PARTNER'S MONEY WORLD”  to find sets of fun and powerful questions to help you discover each other's money world.
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Answering these questions together is a great way to get another person's views on money, their past money experiences and how it has impacted them. It gives you a barometer on how connected or disconnected they are from their money stuff. Also how mature, evolved or sophisticated they are financially. Using a word like sophisticated or evolved might sound judgmental but it is not meant to be. If a person has never invested before or consciously managed their money flows, they might not even know investing and financial freedom is an option.

Here are some additional fun games to play that can lift the energy around these conversations.

What Would You Do if….

Ask and answer this question. 

What would you do if right now you were given a hundred thousand US dollars? 

It's a great way to enter into a money conversation without making it personal. Notice if there's a tendency for money conversations to become awkward or uncomfortable, or if one of you becomes fearful of being judged or shamed by the other. Just notice…. Fascinating! 

When we find low pressure ways like this to elicit our values and understand each other's money world, we get so much juicy data to use in creating a set of money agreements and a vision that works for you both.

Creating the money conversation muscle with low risk / low impact themes helps build a powerful foundation for future money conversations. 

This type of question is more useful when you're getting into a new relationship, but it's really useful even when you've been in a relationship for a while - as it also ensures we don’t drop into just presuming we know the other person.

Also Remember to….

Stay Curious and Listen

When the other person answers, really listen to their responses. 

Will they immediately go out and spend the money? What will they spend it on?  

Or do they value their financial safety and say something like "I'll put X amount in for my emergency fund".

The ways we direct money, like how we direct our energy and our time, gives us a very good indication of our values.

"I'd pay off debt” v “I’ll go on a crazy wild holiday and blow it all” show very different value sets.

“I'd give some to charity" v "I’ll invest it all" v "I’ll top up my retirement  ?IRA / ISA / tax-free savings account" gives you massive insight into what they are already doing financially.

Ahhh. they have debt, they already invest…

Noticing their language and the words they use.

And pay the same attention to your answers. 

Notice the differences. Laugh about them and get curious by diving in further. 

“Let's explore that a little bit more. It is really interesting that you would do x,y or z… Why is that important to you? How would that make you feel?”

This is really interesting because it can reveal if you have different rules about how you treat different “types” of money. 

Earned money, free money, found money may be treated completely differently.

Ask the same question but say… 

If you have a hundred thousand US dollars saved - what would you do with it?

What’s a Big / Small Amount of Money 

This game reveals the differences in a fun way

Both write down your answers to these two questions on two separate pieces of paper each.

• How much is a BIG amount of money?
• How much is a SMALL amount of money?

Then reveal them to each other and discover how crazy and weird you both are.

Notice what comes up for you when you do the big reveal. Remember to laugh at your craziness and take to heart the lesson that specificity is your friend.

As you design your money management systems and agree on principles you will operate within, be specific.

Don’t just say…

If we are wanting to spend a lot of money we need to make the decision together. If you have very different definitions on what a big or small amount of money is - this will lead to disastrous situations.

State the number.

If we want to spend over X amount let’s agree to check in with each other and make those financial spend decisions together.

Now do this one around time.

Both write down your answers to these two questions on two separate pieces of paper each.

• How much is a BIG amount of time?
• How much is a SMALL amount of time?

Then reveal them to each other and discover how crazy and weird you both are with regards to your definitions of time.

Time and money confusions are huge conflict triggers in relationships.

Hey honey, I won’t take long….

Please get back to me in a short time on this…

If you're not specific on how long , not long is… or what a short time is, you are setting yourself up to be disappointed and your partner up to fail.

Be specific about time and money 

In Part 9 we dive into the nitty gritty of real numbers. This is where the real heat gets turned on. There is nothing as effective as specificity and real numbers. The saying goes… The devil is in the details. That often proves true… and the angels are in there too. So is real connection and intimacy and if you want that - you have to be prepared to dive right in.