Are You Money Blind?
I’m sure we all know someone who is money blind. They’ve got their head in the sand and can’t face thinking about their bank balance. And that person might be you.
What does it mean to be money blind?
Someone that is money blind has a habit of not looking at or engaging in their finances. They may not check their bank account, they probably don’t have a budget, and they just ignore it.
Most of the time it can be rooted in a feeling of shame or guilt if you overspend and just don’t want to admit it. There’s also likely to be some fear in there as money blindness is generally driven by unconscious anxiety associated with money that leads you to not look at it.
This fear or anxiety may stem from your past when money was scarce, or you may have gotten to the point where you just think you’re bad with money and avoid it.
How it can affect your life
There are quite a few reasons why being money blind can affect and impact your life.
Firstly it can harm you mentally as you’re likely to have increased anxiety and stress. Not knowing if you can afford to pay for things, or getting into debt can affect your mental well-being.
If you’re not in control of your finances you may miss payments, not pay bills on time or just not know what is due to come out of your account. This will make it hard to save or invest and you may find yourself in a pattern of living from payday to payday.
What can you do about money blindness?
The biggest step you can make is deciding to face your situation, and each step you make will become easier. Once you know you want to make changes you need to acknowledge your situation and take stock of where you are. Taking a step back and evaluating the situation you’re in will make it easier to come up with a plan.
But it’s not all bad, acknowledge the positives you got out of being money blind that you may want to emulate. Perhaps for you, it was because you didn’t want to feel restricted in your spending, so you’ll want a looser budget to allow for this.
Once you acknowledge these things you may be able to work out why you’ve become money blind and what triggers it. Then you can switch the thinking around to think about the benefits you’ll get out of letting this go and how life will look and feel if you confidently faced your money.
The biggest thing is communication
To become more comfortable with your own money situation you need to be able to normalise talking about it. Find someone you trust, be that a friend or family member, or perhaps a professional. Discuss anything to do with money, savings, debt, spending, investments, earnings etc.
Talking about things and saying them out loud will help take away the guilt or anxiety that you may have felt before. You’re putting yourself back into control of the situation. So if you have a bad day and went way over budget you can talk about it, and then move on.
You can’t expect things to change instantly, but getting into good habits will help you in the long run.
Are you money blind, or do you know someone who is?
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18 responses to “Are You Money Blind?”
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All About Me
Rhian Westbury
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Yes, I know a few people who are money blind. I, at times, have been their too! It’s important to have awareness when it comes to your finances!
It really is important x
Thanks for sharing the article about being money blind, Rhian. It’s definitely eye-opening and made me reflect on my own relationship with money. Always good to learn something new and gain a fresh perspective!
I have known a few people who’ve been like this. This is so alarming, thanks for sharing this with us. Very helpful and informative information.
I was once a money blind. I did not have any plan and did not know how to budget but I learned a lot. I learned to manage my finances well.
That’s great to hear, the hardest part is taking the first step x
Beautiful post. Powerful post. We all need to face the financial situation of the moment and build from it, plan it and be empowered.
You are doing great edu work here!
Your article on money blindness was an insightful read! It’s important to recognize our financial habits and find ways to overcome them. Keep up the excellent work!
I think we do become set in our ways and forget about things like petty spending. It is good to reel things back in and look things over with a new perspective.
Money blindness is something that can cause serious issues. It’s important to try to take steps to get on top of your finances and work out ways you can make savings, pay bills and have money left for treats.
Money blindness can cause many troubles. Getting into good habits helps us lead a purposeful life.
Money-blind does not serve anybody. Being truthful to thyself and implementing money budgeting would really alleviate unnecessary tribulations.
I totally agree, it can be so harmful to hide your head in the sand and not face it x
I agree it’s important to recognize how you positively and negatively interact with your money. Then go in and take control of what needs fixin’ 🙂
I love how you’ve addressed this in such a gentle way. Money can be pretty fun, and equally scary as you get older and invest more of it. Little by little, the more everyday it becomes, the task will seem like any other.
This post hit hard. I said to my husband over the weekend we need to grow up and take control of our money. Our biggest challenge is that we don’t earn a set income so he just kinda wings it each month which is not ideal.
Not earning a set income does mean you have to do a lot more planning, but the fact that you had that conversation means you’ve done the hardest bit, accepting you need to do something x
I’ve known a few people who have behaved in this manner. This is extremely concerning; thank you for informing us. This is very useful and informative information.