Episode 1100: Conflict and Your Money

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 1,100 of the inspired stewardship podcast. This

[00:00:08] Wendy Gentry: is Wendy Gentry from baker university. I encourage you to live your life from the inside out. And one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend, Scott, maybe.

[00:00:22] Scott Maderer: our finances are not secure. It makes us feel like we are not secure. That's the underlying emotion. That's the underlying feeling that's going on. And when you recognize that means if there's a money, conflict going on. That's why people react so strongly because at the end of the day, it feels like their personal identity is actually being attack.

[00:00:50] Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcasts. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you [00:01:00] must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling in the inspired stewardship podcast, we'll will learn to invest in your.

[00:01:09] Invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world.

[00:01:16] In today's episode about investing in yourself through stewarding your treasures. I talk with you about how conflict can affect your. I share why you need to understand the feedback between conflict, communication and finances. And I also share the reason you need to deal with the conflict rather than avoid it.

[00:01:35] As we talk about stewarding your treasures. Wouldn't it be great. If you could support this podcast and do it without costing yourself an extra dime. It turns out you can. All you have to do is use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. When you're ready to make a purchase via Amazon and a small commission, we'll come back to support the show.

[00:01:57] If you enjoy the show, when you're ready to buy [00:02:00] from Amazon, just use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. This week, as we talk about conflict, let's talk a little bit about conflict and how it affects our. Know the truth is that when they do surveys, they find roughly 70% of people say that they feel stressed out about something related to money.

[00:02:25] They feel frustrated or angry or deprived in some way, conflicted about their money. And if it's a couple situation, at least 30% say that money is a source of conflict and problems in their marriage or in their relationship. The interesting thing about that is if you recognize that if seven out of 10 people feel stressed about money and 30% of folks are having conflict with their significant others around money, there's often different ways [00:03:00] that money can create conflict, rather that's you as an individual or within your relationship.

[00:03:07] And I think it's important to recognize that the major reason why is because money isn't really just about math. It's not just about numbers. It's not a physical thing that we think about. And just in terms of dollars and cents, instead money is deeply tied to our emotions. It's tied back to things that happened to us as children.

[00:03:32] It's tied back to how we feel about ourselves, whether or not we feel successful, whether or not we feel freedom, whether or not we feel secure. All of these sorts of emotions come up within us, whatever we're dealing with money. And then. A couple situation. Each of you have your own set of emotions and history and experiences related to money.[00:04:00]

[00:04:01] I really think that 30% of people feeling that it creates conflict in their relationship is less about the other 70% feeling that it does it and more that they're just not even talking about that. In truth. That over and divorce. What money is listed as one of the major causes of divorce, because people have different spending happens.

[00:04:29] Habits, people have different beliefs about money. People have different fears about money. And the truth is if you don't communicate about those things, if you don't talk about them in a way that doesn't create more conflict than it adds to the conflict that you've had. Because conflict, communication and finances are all emotional issues that are interrelated because what ends up happening a lot of times is there's a difference in [00:05:00] how we approach our finances.

[00:05:02] That is seen as a conflict. And then if we begin to fight about it, if that communication is not an open discussion without the emotion involved, but focus on what's going on and why do you feel that way? Not in a factual, attacking way, but. Recognition that we've got different perceptions, different beliefs, even if we've been married a long time, we probably don't see everything exactly the same way.

[00:05:30] And when you recognize that and begin to communicate in a more open way, then it begins to lower some of the stress. But you have to recognize that our finances are a lot often for many of us tied deeply to security issues, emotional issues, feelings of. And so whenever our finances are not secure, it makes us feel like we are not.

[00:05:58] That's the [00:06:00] underlying emotion. That's the underlying feeling that's going on. And when you recognize that means if there's a money, conflict going on, that's why people react so strongly because at the end of the day, it feels like their personal identity is actually being attacked, who they are.

[00:06:19] And what is their personal worth is being attacked. Not just some sort of thing. I can't get the item that I want. It's less about the, what can I purchase or what can I not purchase and more about how does it make me feel on a deep level? So I often, whenever I'm working with clients, we start working on finances, but over time, Inevitably other things come up around communication around identity, around deep feelings of worth, because our money is tied intimately to those emotions.

[00:06:59] And when you [00:07:00] recognize that, then you begin to recognize that even if there's something relatively small, that's going on that at first glance, you're like this really isn't that big of a deal. You probably actually still need to deal with. Because over time that small disagreement creates a growing conflict and that growing conflict is going to slowly create a wedge until eventually that conflict has grown to such an extent that you end up being one of those statistics that I was quoting earlier, the divorce that says that money fights and money issues.

[00:07:39] Was one of the causes of us splitting our relationship up when you recognize that these sorts of identity issues are deeper than you can recognize that it's no longer just looking at a number or looking at a budget instead, it's about making decisions and identifying our [00:08:00] values and then getting in alignment.

[00:08:03] And if you're an individual and you've got conflict with your money, it's about digging in and doing the hard work to make sure that you really understand not just the math, but the why behind the math, because that why is always more important than the numbers as a coach, the doing the budget part, somebody can go.

[00:08:28] That's not hard, but really digging in and figuring out what's important to you and why it's important and how you can achieve it. That is the hard work that is the powerful work. That is the work that often we look at and go, oh yeah, that's not that big of a deal. And yet that's the source and the solution to the conflict that you may feel.

[00:08:57] Thanks for this.

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