The way we manage money says a lot about us as people. It signals, amongst other things, the difficulties and the relationships we have with ourselves and with those around us. The parties of the festive season, the cost of family meals and meeting our colleagues for drinks at the pub lead to the realisation of our relationship with money. There are people who spend more than they should; money is their escape. Others, on the other hand, are so retentive that they can't even enjoy what they eat. In all cases we need to ask "why is it at these times that we spend so much?" "Are we trying to hide from others what we lack in non-material areas?" To manage our money without it weighing us down is indicative of our mental health. Those who manage it well are in the habit of managing their emotions well too. Given that economic independence is a necessary condition for personal autonomy, material conflicts signal, in the end, a difficulty with being free, autonomous, independent and in charge of ones internal world. Some people need to depend economically on others, but also there are individuals who like to dominate others in this sense; few people are not conscious of this. Someone who flashes money about probably doesn't know what he has. In his fantasies, he owns more than he has at his disposal in reality. An internal tendency drives him to keep in his own hands that which he has and to limit his dependence on others. In our world, economic capacity and power are the same thing. When your shortage of money reaches extremes, you are dependent on somebody else's willpower. Here is an example - a story about someone we will call Sylvia. Sylvia did very badly over the holiday season because she always spent more than she had. When she found herself without any money, she asked for it from her partner, a generous man who never blamed her for how she managed money. She bought lots of presents for the whole family. Behind this extravagance, was a search for recognition. The equation was as follows: if she wasn't given everything that she wanted, she spent all that she had. In this way, she denied her own inadequacies and those of others. Besides, by asking her husband for money, Sylvia tested whether he would give it to her if he had it. She wanted to test her partner's support. By this unconscious process, she identified herself with her father and put her husband in the place of her mother, who was the money manager of their household. In this way, she put herself in a dependent position in respect of her husband; a position both childish and demanding. In the same way as our parents control our bodies while we are babies, there are adults which put themselves in this situation when, incapable of managing their money themselves, they solve their problem by depending totally on others. They want, even though they deny it, that someone controls them. They have chosen to be dependent instead of being free. |
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