A Penny for Your Thoughts

IF YOU’RE READING this magazine, you’re probably a “money person.” Perhaps you’re even working with a Certified Kingdom Advisor® to align your family finances with biblical principles (which is a fantastic step). But there’s one important person who may be feeling left out of the process.

Your spouse.

In the debut issue of Faithful Steward, I mentioned that one of the main reasons for money friction is that we simply aren’t valuing what our spouse values. One of you thinks it’s obvious that you should use extra funds on a memory-making vacation with your young kids or grandkids, while the other thinks it’s obvious that the kids are too young to even remember the trip, and it’s far better to build up the college fund.

Neither is right or wrong; you simply value two different things. Yet if we want a great mar­riage, especially around matters of money, we have to try to understand and honor what our spouse values. Seems logical, right?

This next caution may not seem as obvious, yet it is vitally important. If you’re the one who primarily manages the finances, reads the finan­cial books, and listens to money podcasts, you may have a blind spot. You may unintentionally be signaling that you don’t care about what your spouse values. A Common Trend When my husband, Jeff, and I conducted a large research study with more than 3,000 men and women for our book, Thriving in Love & Money, we saw this pattern everywhere. Almost two-thirds (64%) of participants in the nationally represen­tative survey felt that they knew more than their spouse about “managing money for our long-term happiness and well-being.” In other words, both spouses usually have opinions that may not match their mate’s. When one spouse is a “money person,” the disparity is amplified. Unless both of you are equally into analyzing your monthly spreadsheets and listening to call-in talk radio shows about finances (which does happen, at times), one of you probably has even stronger opinions about the right way to handle money choices. And for a money person, those opinions usually trend in one direction: toward saving, long-term planning, caution, and careful adherence to a budget. If you read that line and thought, “Well, of course we need to adhere carefully to a long-term plan and a budget!” you just made my point. A Potentially Uncomfortable Truth

Take a deep breath and digest this truth: There are other ways of viewing and valuing money. Based on our survey, in the vast majority of marriages, one person is likely to value something different: a bit more spending to enjoy today, more flexibility, and a budget that builds in a lot of give and take.

So, here’s the question to ask yourself. If you are more of the “money person,” have you listened to and incorporated your spouse’s desires into the family plan? Or have you (without intending to) essentially dismissed them? Have you truly tried to understand why your spouse feels so strongly about that vacation even though the kids are little and even though there may be less in the college fund? Or have you assumed that it’s obvious the college fund should be the priority?

Here’s the thing: maybe it should be! But the only way to decide that is if you decide it together. And it’s very common that when one partner is a gung-ho money person, the other feels like they have no say. They are “not allowed” to have the opinion that shorter-term spending is worth the trade-off to the college fund or to trust that you will figure a few things out down the road. You may be uncomfortable with a different approach because it introduces a sense of uncertainty. But guess what? You are already in­troducing a sense of uncertainty—just not in your finances. Instead, you are introducing uncertainty in your marriage. Without realizing it, you may have been signaling to your spouse—perhaps for years—that their preferences don’t matter. That is far more important to attend to right now than the amount in the college fund. How to Move Forward

Here’s a three-step guide to help you start the conversation:

STEP 1: Each of you shares your answer to this question: “On a scale of one to five (where five is ‘completely’), how much do you feel that your money preferences and opinions are fully understood, valued, and incorporated into our decisions?” STEP 2: If either of you feel like anything less than a five, begin an ongoing conver­sation about why. Commit to a new approach in which both of you will learn how to hear and honor what the other person values, even when you don’t always agree with it. STEP 3: To help with this process, read Chapter 3 of Thriving in Love & Money togeth­er and discuss what each of you values.

You may not end up doing anything differently in your finances, but ensuring that both of you feel heard will make all the difference in your marriage.

---

This article was published in our Faithful Steward magazine, a quarterly publication filled with encouraging stories, biblical teaching, and practical tools to help you grow as a wise and joyful giver. If you'd like to begin receiving Faithful Steward, consider becoming a FaithFi partner.