“I check my balance every morning like a ritual I can’t quit.” That was a comment under a money video last month, and it had thousands of likes. Not from people in debt. From women who earn well, own businesses, can order the expensive olive oil without thinking. We check because checking feels like control, not because we need to know.
We’ve all read the emotional spending articles and nodded along, then bought the candle anyway because it was Tuesday and the week felt long. The candle wasn’t the problem and we know it. We’re good with money, actually. So why can’t we relax about it?
A lot of what passes for financial responsibility is actually anxiety in a nice coat. And it plays out differently depending on where the worry decided to lodge itself.
What money anxiety actually looks like when you’re not broke
sia.bartrum@gmail.comSome of us became the Careful One. You know, we have the buffer, the spreadsheet, the savings account we top up even when it doesn’t need topping up. Someone once described this as “hoarding money instead of experiencing life,” and it landed uncomfortably close. We can afford the trip, but we’ll probably still feel guilty booking it.
Or you might recognise yourself more in the Curator. The one who’s done the research, owns beautiful things, looks like she has it together. But you shop when you’re stressed, or bored, or just a bit flat, and you’ve started noticing it doesn’t actually help. The mood lifts for an hour and then you’re back where you started, just with more packages to open.
Or maybe you’re the Builder, the one whose feed is full of women who paid off mortgages at 34. You know comparison is pointless but the knowing doesn’t seem to help, so you keep optimising, keep adding income streams, keep hitting goals that never quite feel like arriving.
Money and mental health: the connection we don’t talk about
None of these are problems to fix, really. They’re just patterns worth noticing. If you recognised yourself in the Careful One, you’re not bad with money. You’re managing an old fear that never got the memo that things are different now. If the Curator sounds familiar, you’re not shallow. That late-night shopping is doing emotional work, it’s just not doing it very well. And if you’re the Builder, you probably already know rest would help. It just feels like something you haven’t earned yet.
The question worth asking isn’t “how do I get better at money.” It’s more like: what feeling am I asking money to manage, and is it actually working?
How to spot emotional spending (and what to do instead)
Here’s a small experiment. Next time you’re about to check the balance, or add something to the cart, or say yes to a project you don’t want, just pause for a second. Notice what’s happening in your body. Tight chest? Buzzy head? A sort of low-grade dread? That’s useful information. It tells you money has become a stand-in for something else, and no amount of budgeting is going to fix that part.
This isn’t about being more disciplined. It’s about being more curious.
Three financial self-care rituals that actually help
A few things worth trying, if any of this landed:
A weekly check-in.
Ten minutes, maybe Sunday evening. Cup of tea, notebook, one small task. Pay a bill, move some money, look at a number you’ve been avoiding. The point isn’t to be productive about it. The point is to break the pattern where money only gets attention when something’s wrong.
A pause before purchasing.
Not a rule, just a gap. Before you buy something over a certain amount, wait a day. Not to stop yourself, but to notice what happens in the gap. Do you still want it? Did you forget about it? Did the feeling you were trying to fix go away on its own? This stuff is genuinely interesting once you start paying attention.
A ritual fund.
This one’s for the Careful Ones especially. A small amount set aside each month that exists to be spent. Not saved, not invested. Spent on something that makes life feel better. A massage, a beautiful notebook, a morning off. The practice is learning that money can circulate without the world ending.
We’re not bad with money, most of us. We’ve just been asking it to do a job it was never designed for. Managing our financial anxiety, measuring our worth, proving we’re okay. It can’t do those things. But once we stop asking it to, it gets a lot easier to enjoy what it can do, which is buy us time and beauty and ease when we actually let it.