The Financial Therapy Podcast - It's Not Just About The Money

As a financial planner and financial therapist, witnessing a client grieving over a financial loss is ubiquitous.  Financial losses include a job, a business failure, a poor investment decision, the loss of a significant financial asset like a car, home, cash, collectable, or precious metals.  Financial losses also include the death or disability of an income earner or breadwinner. The difference of the loss of a loved one from the financial aspect of a loss is that financial losses can be insured against to minimize the financial impact of a loss.  While insurance can mitigate the financial loss, it can’t remove the emotional pain of that loss.

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values.. 

Among people that have accumulated enough of a nest egg to pass on, my experience is there is little thought given to whom they will bequest the money.  It’s generally a forgone conclusion any inheritance will go to their children or grandchildren. The societal money script around leaving an estate in the U.S. is “Good parents leave all their money to their kids,” and “the more money I can leave my kids the better off they will be.” It’s not surprising then there is usually no thought or discussion on how to pass on an inheritance in a manner that doesn’t harm the kids and rarely, if ever, is there any discussion on leaving money philanthropically.

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values.. 

In the past when I read stories about scams, I often wondered how people could be so gullible. I assumed that the victims of fraud were the elderly or less educated, had suffered a recent loss of a loved one or who were isolated.  While there is some data suggests that one in five over age 65 have been targeted by email scammers, being scammed can happen to anyone.  Nobody is immune to fraud and sometimes people simply fall for scams due to the psychological techniques employed by fraudsters. Falling for a scam is not about the money.

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values.. 

The prevailing emotion experienced by many when any market is falling is anxiety.  The cause of anxiety is a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically when we anticipate a negative outcome to an imminent event or uncertainty.  First, whatever you are feeling, you are feeling.  That’s a fact. It doesn’t help, and probably is hurtful, to tell yourself you “should” not be feeling anxiety over the decrease in your portfolio.  There are many reasons why a person may feel anxiety around a decline in value.  Some could be because more information needed.  Other reasons are anchored in unresolved trauma from past experiences that may have little to do with the falling markets

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values.. 

Financial infidelity isn’t necessarily “the problem” in itself. It often is tangled up with other difficulties in the relationship, and it almost always will exacerbate those problems. Even though it is very damaging, it is something a couple can face and can heal from. Couples can recover from financial infidelity and learn to change the behaviors behind it. In my work with couples, we’ve seen some incredible transformations.

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values.. 

Not all money secrets add up to financial infidelity. Partners shouldn’t need to account to each other for every penny they spend. And saving on the sly for your spouse’s birthday gift is a lot different from lying about the cost of that new computer gadget you just had to have. Secrets cross the line into infidelity when they are for the purpose of protecting yourself from the consequences of your financial behavior.

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values.. 

Keeping secrets in a committed romantic relationship around other significant intimate relationships usually doesn’t end well.  While an intimate relationship with others can include people, they more often include intimate relationships with non-human relationships, like with substances, alcohol, food, and money.

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values.. 

One of the most important ways people learn is through observing the behavior of others. Albert Einstein once said, “The only source of knowledge is experience.”  “Telling” is not usually an effective method of teaching unless it is accompanied by “showing.” When it comes to helping clients build healthier relationships with money, one of the most valuable tools facilitators have is modeling healthy relationships themselves.  One of the most important components of becoming or hiring a financial professional is their ability to understand and change their own self-limiting money scripts and harmful financial behaviors.

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values.. 

For an individual, overspending or underspending is a problematic financial behavior that can adversely affect the quality of life.  For a couple, the adverse effect of overspending or underspending is multiplied and multifaceted.  Not only can the behaviors be life threatening, they can also result in the termination of the coupleship. There are five possible combinations of over/under spending in a coupleship.  Two don’t result in significant marital issues but can be financially and physically devastating.  Two are somewhat less financially devastating but potentially threatening to the success of the coupleship.  One usually includes both financial and emotional chaos.

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values.. 

“Be frugal.” “Save for the future.” “Live on less than you make.”  That’s my usual financial advice, and it’s well worth repeating even though too many Americans aren’t following it. Sometimes, though, I find it necessary to work with clients to overcome a different problem—underspending.  Huh? How can underspending possibly be a problem? Isn’t it a virtue to save and accumulate?

A podcast that blends the nuts and bolts of financial advice with the emotions that drive our money decisions.
Join Rick Kahler, CFP®, CFT™, as he blends practical financial wisdom with the emotional insights that shape our choices. Discover how financial therapy can help you make money decisions that truly align with your values..