The taboo around money is costing you money
Why you feel shame around money, how that hurts you, and how to break out of it.
Ask yourself: in your close relationships, are you more comfortable talking about sex—or money?
For many of us, especially in the U.S., it’s sex. In other words, we find it easier to talk about the intimate details of our bodies and our desires than we do our bank accounts.
Why is that? Wharton professor Wendy De La Rosa theorizes that in a hyper-individualistic culture, we personalize our financial successes and failures; we chalk them up to either our choices or our character.
She argues the resulting shame-based taboo hurts us in at least two ways:
It stops us from problem-solving collectively—from crowdsourcing information from our friends about, say, how to consolidate our debt or negotiate a better mortgage rate.
When you can’t talk to your friends or family about something as intimate and important as your financial situation, you are stifling those relationships; you don’t fully know one another.
So what to do about it? Professor De La Rosa suggests you take some calculated risks. Try sparking a conversation with someone you trust and see how it goes. You might unlock a mutual thirst for tackling this loaded topic.
Click to hear or watch my conversation with Wendy on the pod today. She has tons of other suggestions for harnessing human psychology to better manage your finances. Paid subscribers get a cheatsheet below, with key takeaways and a full transcript.
Also, a programming note: I’ll be doing a series of live meditations + conversations during inauguration week. I’ll start on Sunday (January 19th) and go through Wednesday—each day at 3:00PM ET. It’s a reconvening of the “renegade sangha.” There will be special guests. The world is insane—but you don’t have to be.
Episode cheatsheet
The big takeaway
Wendy De La Rosa, a professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, says that our environment shapes our financial decisions more than willpower alone. She talks about the importance of changing our surroundings and using technology to improve our financial habits, and also addresses the need to overcome financial shame and taboos.
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