Your relationship to money is important.
Do you tend to be a spender?
Do you tend to be a saver, or are you somewhere in the middle?
Depending on the “money messages” you heard as a young person, such as “Money doesn’t grow on trees,” or “You can’t take it with you, so you might as well spend it,” your relationship with money can either match your mate’s relationship with money, clash with it, or land somewhere in the middle.
Regardless of your relationship to money and your mate’s relationship to money, it’s of great importance that you and your mate are able to talk about it constructively.
With money comes emotion. The emotion might be concern or fear. It might be excitement or the anticipation of earning more. Most likely, you and your mate do not have the same emotion around money, and even if you do, you still need to share your feelings around it.
Sharing your feelings is the springboard to be able to then make decisions around money, knowing that neither of you will get your way 100% of the time. Do yourselves a favor and know that going into any financial discussion.
Case in point:
Recently, I saw a huge crocodile water slide at Costco. I said to my husband, “I want to get that for our grandson!” This thing is not cheap! My husband looked at it and said, “We’re not getting that.” We jumped into a decision without first expressing our feelings and it felt like a wall went up between us.
Being a relationship coach (believe me, it’s not always easy living with me because of what I do for a living), I said let’s talk more about this.
A few times the following week, we touched on this topic. I was able to say how much joy it would give me and our grandson to have this big blowup crocodile slide in our front yard all summer, not to mention the joy it would bring our neighborhood kids.
My husband told me he felt “very uncomfortable” having this slide in our front yard because of liability issues and the cost bothered him, as well.
Long story short, we agreed on a middle-ground solution … we’re getting a slip-and-slide instead.
I didn’t get my way, and my husband, who didn’t want anything in the front yard, didn’t get his way. We found something with which we could both live.
Please remember: Before you make any financial decision of import, give yourselves the time to talk about your feelings about the possible purchase first! By laying that groundwork, you’ll feel better about the agreed-upon solution.
If talking about money in your relationship is a sore spot and just too difficult to do on your own, I can help navigate that with you. You can connect with me HERE.