March 20, 2026 • 19 mins
Money conversations in marriage can feel complicated, emotional, and easy to avoid. In this episode, I’m sharing the most common questions I got after speaking to a room full of moms about unity in marriage and money.
We’re talking about what to do when your spouse doesn’t want to talk about money, how to budget when your income changes every month, why money conversations get defensive so quickly, and what happens when one spouse carries all the financial stress.
I’m also walking you through my simple framework for healthier money conversations: the 3 Ts — Time, Tone, and Turf. Because before you ever talk about the numbers, the way you start the conversation matters.
In this episode, we cover:
- What to do if your spouse avoids money conversations
- How to handle budgeting with variable income
- Why defensiveness shows up around money
- How to stop carrying financial stress alone
- The 3 Ts of healthy money conversations: Time, Tone, and Turf
If money has been a source of tension in your marriage, this episode will help you start having calmer, healthier, more productive conversations so you can build together.
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Audio Only - All Partici (00:00):
Hello, my legacy builders.
This week I had the pristinehonor of speaking with a group
of moms, all about buildingunity around money and marriage.
Now, this is a special groupbecause it's actually my old mom
group that I got to speak infront of.
But after, after some time away,it was so nice to go back and be
(00:22):
there with all of them.
So when the talk ended, I got upand I gave what I thought was
pretty good.
New speech.
When it ended, several womencame up to me.
And we started chatting and whatstruck me was that almost every
conversation circled around thesame theme.
Three questions I'm gonna talkabout here today that I got from
(00:44):
them.
But a lot of them are rightaround the same thing.
One mom said, I know we need totalk about money, but my husband
doesn't wanna sit down and havethe conversation relatable.
Another set.
Our income changes every monthand I don't know how we're
supposed to budget.
Yep.
I've been there and another momquietly admitted that every time
she brings up money, he getsreally defensive and eventually
(01:06):
then she stops trying.
If you're listening today andyou're like, that sounds exactly
like my house, you're not alone.
It's what my house used to soundlike too.
Money conversations are one ofthe most emotionally loaded
conversations couples have.
Not because couples are bad withmoney, but because money touches
security.
Identity and responsibility.
(01:28):
Today, I wanna walk through thethree biggest tensions that
couples run into when they tryto talk about money.
And I'm gonna give you a simpleframework that can make those
conversations go a whole lotsmoother.
Before we get started with intoanswering the questions that I
was asked, there's one tool thatI wanna give you that's gonna
make these conversationsdramatically easier.
(01:48):
I call it the three T's.
It's time, tone, and turf.
Laura (01:52):
You are listening to the Money and Legacy Podcast with
Laura Sexton.
I'm helping families pay offdebt, grow wealth, and build a
legacy without sacrificing whatmatters most.
This is where money feels easy.
Audio Only - All Participan (02:06):
The three T's of a healthy money
conversation.
Before you ever talk about thenumbers, you need to focus on
how the conversation starts.
That's what these three T's areall about, time.
First of all, friends do notambush the conversation.
Money, conversations go badlywhen they start in the middle of
(02:26):
a stressful point.
You know, the worst time whenwe're trying to get the kids out
of the door for school, it's notthe time to bring it up.
Also not the right time duringanother argument.
An argument is not the time tobring up.
Well, you didn't.
No, no, no, no, no, no.
That's not the right time.
Late at night when everybody'stired and spent a horrible time.
(02:50):
'cause now I'm tired and now I'mangry.
Or I'm half asleep and I'm notpaying attention.
And then you feel slighted.
Another time to not have thisconversation right after looking
at your bank balance, you willattack instantaneously because
you see something that you don'tlike.
Another really bad time for allof us moms is while the kids are
(03:12):
running around now, I think thatit's important to have
conversations.
About money in front of yourchildren.
I think it's important to havearguments in front of your
children because I don't wantthem to ever think that, oh, mom
and dad never fight.
And so a good relationship isone where there's never an
argument that's not reallyhealthy.
But I don't want you to have aknockdown, drag out brawl.
(03:35):
I don't want it to be asituation where you're just
going after each other andfighting, like that's not what
we want.
I think there's a way to dohealthy conflict, and I think
that there's an unhealthy way todo conflict and a lot of times
with money, because our identitygets so triggered.
We become angry and defensivemore than we become, willing to
(03:58):
accept something that is saidabout us.
And so I think you should trythis instead.
Try something very simple.
When you're in these moments,try something very simple like,
could we set aside 20 minutesthis weekend to look at our
finances together?
Now this is going to change theconversation from an attack in
the moment to a plannedconversation, and that gives
(04:21):
both sides time to plan whateverit is they think they need to
say during an argument.
You're in the heat of themoment.
You're not gonna say the rightthing late at night, you're
tired or you're not evenlistening.
You have to make sure that youhave a planned conversation,
that you are able to.
Converse without attacking.
(04:42):
And that leads us to T numbertwo, your tone.
You should be curious and notaccusatory.
Now, tone is often where theseconversations are gonna fall
apart.
If the conversation sounds likeyou spent too much money and you
always do well, the otherperson's gonna immediately feel
criticized.
Even if you don't attack likethat and you're like, look, you
spend too much money and youalways do.
(05:04):
Instead, you should trycuriosity.
All right, hun, help meunderstand what happened here.
Or I'd love for us to feel morepeaceful about our money.
Can we look at this together?
Curiosity lowers defensiveness.
Now, I also don't want you tocome in and ask the question in
(05:26):
an accusatory fashion you spent.
Way too much money on guests.
Can you help me understand whathappened here?
Okay.
See, do you see how that tone isnot the right one?
It's, Hey, hun.
Seems to me like you spent a lotmore on groceries this month
than you did last month.
Can you help me understand, whatwas different this month from
(05:46):
last month?
That's going to invite you intoa conversation that's going to
give you a chance to really diginto the root of the issue as
opposed to accusing, at whichpoint the other person just
becomes immediately defensive.
The third thing, and I thinkthis is very important, the
third T is the turf.
Choose neutral ground where youhave the conversation actually
(06:09):
matters.
Money.
Conversation should not happenin the car.
In passing from opposite roomswhile someone is distracted.
And sometimes there's one placein your house where you're just
gonna get more heated, and I'llgive you an example about that
in a second.
For most of us, we should sitdown at the same table, laptop,
(06:30):
open paper out, no phones atall, nothing that's going to go
ding and distract you.
But neutral ground helps theconversation feel like teamwork.
Now I had a client who everytime she would sit down at the
kitchen table and talk aboutmoney, she'd get very, very
angry.
It was a very interestingsituation and it stemmed from a
(06:51):
childhood memory that she had ofher dad sitting down at the
dining room table to do thebills on Sunday, and he would
just get incredibly angry andworked up.
So we found that for her and herspouse, they could not have the
money conversation at the diningtable.
They had to go outside.
But once we moved to theconversation, to their back
patio, and they'd sit on theirfurniture and they were
(07:12):
listening to, the birds chirpingor the crickets or whatever,
they could have a, like a calmconversation about their money.
And so that became their weeklyrhythm.
They'd grab a cup of coffee, orin the evening they grab a cup
of wine and they go sit outsideand they'd have these
conversations.
These three things matter a lotto what I'm about to tell you.
(07:33):
I'm about to answer the fourmost common questions I got
after my Unity speech that Igave, and so I wanna answer them
for you because if they'recommon in a room full of 125
women, I'm going to assume thatthey might be common for you as
well.
Question number one, what if myspouse refuses to sit down and
talk about money?
(07:55):
This is one of the most commonquestions, period, not just
after this conversation that Ihad.
Many couples will fall into thepattern of one spouse being
worried about money and theother avoiding conversation.
One worried spouse is going topush really hard and the other
one is going to withdraw evenmore.
Sometimes this looks likedisinterest, but it actually is
(08:17):
fear or shame, or the otherperson is holding so much on
their plate already.
They can't simply take anotherthing on.
Many people are going to feellike they've made a mistake.
They don't understand money.
Well, they're already failing,so they avoid the conversation
entirely.
Instead of starting with, weneed to talk about the money.
(08:40):
Try starting with, I want us tofeel more peaceful about money
together, or I don't want eitherof us having to carry the stress
alone.
Money conversations work bestwhen they feel like teamwork and
not an interrogation.
This is a great place to come inwith curiosity.
If you are the spouse that'sdoing a.
All of the money coming in andsaying, honey, what would it
(09:04):
look like for us to do thistogether?
Is there something that you cantake off my plate in this arena
and something I can take offyour plate in another arena?
That's a really great way to goabout this.
Or if you were the person thatdoesn't have anything at all to
do with money, going to them andsaying, honey, I would really
love it if I could be involvedwith the money.
(09:25):
What would be one simple thingthat I can do just in the
beginning?
I just wanna do one simple thingto get started so that we can do
this together so you're notdoing it all by yourself.
You can even blame it on me,say, I heard this lady talking
about how when one personcarries all of the financial
stress that it can make them,angry or defensive.
(09:46):
And I, I know that if you'recarrying it all by yourself, you
might become resentful of me fornot helping.
And I just wanna make sure thatwe are the healthiest team that
we can be.
Blame me.
I, I'm happy to be your mutualbad guy.
Let's talk about the secondquestion, and I get this all the
time, especially when I workwith actors or people in real
(10:06):
estate.
I get the question, how docouples handle a variable
income?
Uh, that's not exactly how themom asked it.
She said something along thelines of, our income changes
pretty drastically every month.
How are we supposed to budgetthat?
Again, this is very common forcommission jobs, business
owners.
People that make most of theirmoney based on overtime,
(10:26):
seasonal income, that kind ofthing.
The mistake that many peoplemake is trying to build a budget
based around their best month.
Happens all the time.
I happen to be one of thosepeople where I'm like, I'm going
to plan to make X number ofdollars and it's gonna be
amazing.
Like last year I was, I got to apoint where I was like, oh, I'm
(10:48):
gonna hit 10 K month every monthBut when you start making it in
your brain, if you make anythingless than that, you start to
think that you're failing.
It's crazy how your mind works.
It's girl math.
I don't.
The best thing that you can dois build your plan around your
lowest reliable month.
Think of that as your baselineincome.
The baseline should cover yourfood, your housing, your
(11:08):
transportation, your essentialbills, and then if anything
extra comes in, above and besidethat, you should decide ahead of
time and intentionally where itgoes.
Any of the extra money can gotowards paying off debt, saving
for future expenses, investing.
It's very important though thatyou also save up a hill and
(11:29):
valley account, especially ifyou are a business owner or
you're in real estate, thingslike that, that have huge
swings.
You wanna have a hill and valleyaccount or seasonal work, people
that do seasonal work whereyou're, you build decks and
you're really busy in the summerand you're pretty not busy in
the winter.
That would be a really greattime for you to build up a Hill
(11:50):
and Valley account for yourbusiness and business Reserve
spending.
Two things that are important,the Hill and Valley account is
for your personal income.
So for at home and the Hill andValley account says when we have
those big, big months, I'm gonnaput some of that money aside and
the Hill and Valley account.
So if we hit a valley, one ofthe low months, I have money set
(12:11):
aside that can supplement that.
Retained earnings in yourbusiness.
Say if the business doesn't makea set amount of money, I'm still
gonna be able to pay myself andmy employees.
Consistency does not come from apredictable paycheck.
Consistency in your home,hitting your goals at home comes
from a predictable plan.
(12:33):
If you don't have a predictableplan and you need help setting
that up, please feel free toreach out to me.
I'd absolutely love to have aconversation with you like I did
with this mom.
Question number three.
What if money, conversationsturn defensive?
I really had to think about thisone.
It's been a very long time sinceI've been in a money
(12:53):
conversation with my husbandwhere either one of us got
defensive, but it does come up.
So I was thinking about it and Iasked her some specifics.
I'm not gonna share those withyou here.
And I had to think about it fora hot minute because oftentimes
when I have a couple that I'mworking with.
One of them starts to getdefensive.
(13:15):
I shut it down really quicklybecause there's no point in
sparring with each other.
I don't like fighting eachother.
I'd rather us fight togethertowards, defeating a common
enemy.
When this happens, though, amoney conversation is going to
be a trigger.
It's gonna trigger.
Feelings of failure.
(13:35):
You don't think I did enough foryou?
You don't think I work hardenough?
It's gonna trigger fears ofjudgment like she doesn't think
I'm a good enough husband.
It's gonna trigger some pastmistakes, maybe some shame
rearing its head.
If someone hears you overspentagain, what they're often gonna
feel is You think I'mirresponsible.
(13:56):
That is why the tone matters somuch in the three T's, because
if you go in instead of blamingsaying, why did you spend this
much money on this thing?
Instead, you wanna make surethat you were saying statements
about yourself.
They need to be I statements,not you statements.
Help me understand whathappened, or, I would love to
(14:18):
make this easier for you nexttime.
Can you tell me where theroadblock was here?
Can you tell me what obstacleyou came up against that made
you make this decision?
Curiosity is gonna invite yourpartnership in instead of
creating a conflict.
Question four, what happens ifone spouse carries all of the
money stress?
(14:39):
Really what she was asking was,Hey, I do all of the money in
our family.
What should I do?
What could I do?
How can that change?
That's essentially where she wascoming with this question.
This is another thing that Ihear all the time, and that's
why it was.
One of the main key points in mytalk, you wanna have unity in
your marriage.
(15:00):
You wanna have unity in yourmoney so that you can have unity
in the way that you raise yourfamily.
Many husbands will feel likethey're carrying the full
financial responsibility for thefamily, and sometimes that's
because they are carrying thefull financial responsibility
for the family.
I think of my best friend whohas.
Completely abdicated her role inmaking the budget.
(15:21):
Looking at the numbers, shedoesn't want to, and you know
what?
For her family, that works justfine, so we're not gonna change
anything.
But I do think that for 99% ofthe families, the best way to do
it is for you to have some sortof buy-in.
You need to be able to know howto go and pay the bills, should
something, God forbid, happen toyour husband.
When one person feels like theentire weight of the financial
(15:43):
responsibility is on them,stress will build quickly.
Money should never be just oneperson's job, even if one spouse
handles the bills.
Both partners should understandthe income, the debts, the
goals.
You need to be able to log intothe accounts.
Money works best when bothpeople are building it together
(16:03):
and money works worst when oneof you is intentionally in the
dark.
At no point in time should onepartner be able to turn off the
money so the other partnercannot get the things that they
need.
Unless the person that's tryingto shop has an addiction of some
(16:23):
sort that is draining the bankaccount and puts the whole rest
of the family at risk.
And by that I don't mean youwent and bought gas twice this
week.
You should have only had to buyit once.
So I'm turning your credit cardoff.
I don't mean you spent too muchon groceries.
I gave you a hundred dollars tofeed our family of five and you
(16:45):
spent two, that's not what Imean.
A hundred dollars to spend a, tofeed a family of five,
especially here in SouthernCalifornia, is highly
unreasonable.
Can it be done?
Sure.
But the key here is that moneyproblems are rarely.
Math problems.
In fact, I would say they'renever math problems.
Money problems are mindsetproblems.
(17:07):
They're conversation problems.
The goal isn't to solveeverything.
The first time you have aconversation.
It's not a one nightconversation.
We're done.
The goal is to start talkingagain, if you're one of these
people, it's like, well, wedon't have money fights because
we just don't talk about money,and I like it that way.
Let me tell you, theconversation that you're not
(17:28):
having is the one that will saveyour marriage if you are
constantly walking in separatedirections.
If one of you is walking in thelight of knowing what the money
is and the other one is walkingin darkness, you might be
parallel, but it's possible thatone of you is walking in a
direction away from the other.
(17:49):
This is a very simple, not easynecessarily, but a very simple
way for you to walk in tandemtogether.
If you're wondering where tobegin, start with one simple
question.
What do we want our money tohelp us build?
That question alone can open thedoor to some really powerful
(18:09):
conversations, and I think thatyou should have a dream meeting.
You should have a dream meeting,and that means sitting down.
No electronics, lights turn lowand let's dream in pictures.
Spell it out.
I wanna be able to see eachblade of grass.
I wanna smell the smells thatyou're smelling.
I wanna know exactly what youwant.
(18:29):
And the reason for that isbecause if we can dream it, we
know exactly what we're walkingtoward.
Even if we have those days wherewe're walking parallel with each
other and then our courses veeroff a little bit, we know where
we're ending up, and our courseswill go back together and end in
the same place.
We don't always, as couples,we're not always reading in the
same paragraph.
(18:51):
We're not always reading on thesame page, but we need to be in
the same chapter of the samebook.
If after this conversation youwere realizing that you and your
spouse could use some clarity orsome guidance, or you just need
help getting the same chapter,I'd love to help you.
It's very easy to schedule aclarity.
Call withme@accelerateyourlegacy.com
(19:13):
slash clarity call, and iftoday's episode made you think
of someone who needs to hearthis conversation, please share
it with them.
Because when couples startbuilding together, money stops
being a source of tension.
It becomes a tool for buildingthe life that you really want,
and I really want you to getthere.
Alright, legacy builders.
(19:34):
That's it for this week.
Go out and make a difference.
Hello, my legacy builders.
This week I had the pristinehonor of speaking with a group
of moms, all about buildingunity around money and marriage.
Now, this is a special groupbecause it's actually my old mom
group that I got to speak infront of.
But after, after some time away,it was so nice to go back and be
(00:22):
there with all of them.
So when the talk ended, I got upand I gave what I thought was
pretty good.
New speech.
When it ended, several womencame up to me.
And we started chatting and whatstruck me was that almost every
conversation circled around thesame theme.
Three questions I'm gonna talkabout here today that I got from
(00:44):
them.
But a lot of them are rightaround the same thing.
One mom said, I know we need totalk about money, but my husband
doesn't wanna sit down and havethe conversation relatable.
Another set.
Our income changes every monthand I don't know how we're
supposed to budget.
Yep.
I've been there and another momquietly admitted that every time
she brings up money, he getsreally defensive and eventually
(01:06):
then she stops trying.
If you're listening today andyou're like, that sounds exactly
like my house, you're not alone.
It's what my house used to soundlike too.
Money conversations are one ofthe most emotionally loaded
conversations couples have.
Not because couples are bad withmoney, but because money touches
security.
Identity and responsibility.
(01:28):
Today, I wanna walk through thethree biggest tensions that
couples run into when they tryto talk about money.
And I'm gonna give you a simpleframework that can make those
conversations go a whole lotsmoother.
Before we get started with intoanswering the questions that I
was asked, there's one tool thatI wanna give you that's gonna
make these conversationsdramatically easier.
(01:48):
I call it the three T's.
It's time, tone, and turf.
Laura (01:52):
You are listening to the Money and Legacy Podcast with
Laura Sexton.
I'm helping families pay offdebt, grow wealth, and build a
legacy without sacrificing whatmatters most.
This is where money feels easy.
Audio Only - All Participan (02:06):
The three T's of a healthy money
conversation.
Before you ever talk about thenumbers, you need to focus on
how the conversation starts.
That's what these three T's areall about, time.
First of all, friends do notambush the conversation.
Money, conversations go badlywhen they start in the middle of
(02:26):
a stressful point.
You know, the worst time whenwe're trying to get the kids out
of the door for school, it's notthe time to bring it up.
Also not the right time duringanother argument.
An argument is not the time tobring up.
Well, you didn't.
No, no, no, no, no, no.
That's not the right time.
Late at night when everybody'stired and spent a horrible time.
(02:50):
'cause now I'm tired and now I'mangry.
Or I'm half asleep and I'm notpaying attention.
And then you feel slighted.
Another time to not have thisconversation right after looking
at your bank balance, you willattack instantaneously because
you see something that you don'tlike.
Another really bad time for allof us moms is while the kids are
(03:12):
running around now, I think thatit's important to have
conversations.
About money in front of yourchildren.
I think it's important to havearguments in front of your
children because I don't wantthem to ever think that, oh, mom
and dad never fight.
And so a good relationship isone where there's never an
argument that's not reallyhealthy.
But I don't want you to have aknockdown, drag out brawl.
(03:35):
I don't want it to be asituation where you're just
going after each other andfighting, like that's not what
we want.
I think there's a way to dohealthy conflict, and I think
that there's an unhealthy way todo conflict and a lot of times
with money, because our identitygets so triggered.
We become angry and defensivemore than we become, willing to
(03:58):
accept something that is saidabout us.
And so I think you should trythis instead.
Try something very simple.
When you're in these moments,try something very simple like,
could we set aside 20 minutesthis weekend to look at our
finances together?
Now this is going to change theconversation from an attack in
the moment to a plannedconversation, and that gives
(04:21):
both sides time to plan whateverit is they think they need to
say during an argument.
You're in the heat of themoment.
You're not gonna say the rightthing late at night, you're
tired or you're not evenlistening.
You have to make sure that youhave a planned conversation,
that you are able to.
Converse without attacking.
(04:42):
And that leads us to T numbertwo, your tone.
You should be curious and notaccusatory.
Now, tone is often where theseconversations are gonna fall
apart.
If the conversation sounds likeyou spent too much money and you
always do well, the otherperson's gonna immediately feel
criticized.
Even if you don't attack likethat and you're like, look, you
spend too much money and youalways do.
(05:04):
Instead, you should trycuriosity.
All right, hun, help meunderstand what happened here.
Or I'd love for us to feel morepeaceful about our money.
Can we look at this together?
Curiosity lowers defensiveness.
Now, I also don't want you tocome in and ask the question in
(05:26):
an accusatory fashion you spent.
Way too much money on guests.
Can you help me understand whathappened here?
Okay.
See, do you see how that tone isnot the right one?
It's, Hey, hun.
Seems to me like you spent a lotmore on groceries this month
than you did last month.
Can you help me understand, whatwas different this month from
(05:46):
last month?
That's going to invite you intoa conversation that's going to
give you a chance to really diginto the root of the issue as
opposed to accusing, at whichpoint the other person just
becomes immediately defensive.
The third thing, and I thinkthis is very important, the
third T is the turf.
Choose neutral ground where youhave the conversation actually
(06:09):
matters.
Money.
Conversation should not happenin the car.
In passing from opposite roomswhile someone is distracted.
And sometimes there's one placein your house where you're just
gonna get more heated, and I'llgive you an example about that
in a second.
For most of us, we should sitdown at the same table, laptop,
(06:30):
open paper out, no phones atall, nothing that's going to go
ding and distract you.
But neutral ground helps theconversation feel like teamwork.
Now I had a client who everytime she would sit down at the
kitchen table and talk aboutmoney, she'd get very, very
angry.
It was a very interestingsituation and it stemmed from a
(06:51):
childhood memory that she had ofher dad sitting down at the
dining room table to do thebills on Sunday, and he would
just get incredibly angry andworked up.
So we found that for her and herspouse, they could not have the
money conversation at the diningtable.
They had to go outside.
But once we moved to theconversation, to their back
patio, and they'd sit on theirfurniture and they were
(07:12):
listening to, the birds chirpingor the crickets or whatever,
they could have a, like a calmconversation about their money.
And so that became their weeklyrhythm.
They'd grab a cup of coffee, orin the evening they grab a cup
of wine and they go sit outsideand they'd have these
conversations.
These three things matter a lotto what I'm about to tell you.
(07:33):
I'm about to answer the fourmost common questions I got
after my Unity speech that Igave, and so I wanna answer them
for you because if they'recommon in a room full of 125
women, I'm going to assume thatthey might be common for you as
well.
Question number one, what if myspouse refuses to sit down and
talk about money?
(07:55):
This is one of the most commonquestions, period, not just
after this conversation that Ihad.
Many couples will fall into thepattern of one spouse being
worried about money and theother avoiding conversation.
One worried spouse is going topush really hard and the other
one is going to withdraw evenmore.
Sometimes this looks likedisinterest, but it actually is
(08:17):
fear or shame, or the otherperson is holding so much on
their plate already.
They can't simply take anotherthing on.
Many people are going to feellike they've made a mistake.
They don't understand money.
Well, they're already failing,so they avoid the conversation
entirely.
Instead of starting with, weneed to talk about the money.
(08:40):
Try starting with, I want us tofeel more peaceful about money
together, or I don't want eitherof us having to carry the stress
alone.
Money conversations work bestwhen they feel like teamwork and
not an interrogation.
This is a great place to come inwith curiosity.
If you are the spouse that'sdoing a.
All of the money coming in andsaying, honey, what would it
(09:04):
look like for us to do thistogether?
Is there something that you cantake off my plate in this arena
and something I can take offyour plate in another arena?
That's a really great way to goabout this.
Or if you were the person thatdoesn't have anything at all to
do with money, going to them andsaying, honey, I would really
love it if I could be involvedwith the money.
(09:25):
What would be one simple thingthat I can do just in the
beginning?
I just wanna do one simple thingto get started so that we can do
this together so you're notdoing it all by yourself.
You can even blame it on me,say, I heard this lady talking
about how when one personcarries all of the financial
stress that it can make them,angry or defensive.
(09:46):
And I, I know that if you'recarrying it all by yourself, you
might become resentful of me fornot helping.
And I just wanna make sure thatwe are the healthiest team that
we can be.
Blame me.
I, I'm happy to be your mutualbad guy.
Let's talk about the secondquestion, and I get this all the
time, especially when I workwith actors or people in real
(10:06):
estate.
I get the question, how docouples handle a variable
income?
Uh, that's not exactly how themom asked it.
She said something along thelines of, our income changes
pretty drastically every month.
How are we supposed to budgetthat?
Again, this is very common forcommission jobs, business
owners.
People that make most of theirmoney based on overtime,
(10:26):
seasonal income, that kind ofthing.
The mistake that many peoplemake is trying to build a budget
based around their best month.
Happens all the time.
I happen to be one of thosepeople where I'm like, I'm going
to plan to make X number ofdollars and it's gonna be
amazing.
Like last year I was, I got to apoint where I was like, oh, I'm
(10:48):
gonna hit 10 K month every monthBut when you start making it in
your brain, if you make anythingless than that, you start to
think that you're failing.
It's crazy how your mind works.
It's girl math.
I don't.
The best thing that you can dois build your plan around your
lowest reliable month.
Think of that as your baselineincome.
The baseline should cover yourfood, your housing, your
(11:08):
transportation, your essentialbills, and then if anything
extra comes in, above and besidethat, you should decide ahead of
time and intentionally where itgoes.
Any of the extra money can gotowards paying off debt, saving
for future expenses, investing.
It's very important though thatyou also save up a hill and
(11:29):
valley account, especially ifyou are a business owner or
you're in real estate, thingslike that, that have huge
swings.
You wanna have a hill and valleyaccount or seasonal work, people
that do seasonal work whereyou're, you build decks and
you're really busy in the summerand you're pretty not busy in
the winter.
That would be a really greattime for you to build up a Hill
(11:50):
and Valley account for yourbusiness and business Reserve
spending.
Two things that are important,the Hill and Valley account is
for your personal income.
So for at home and the Hill andValley account says when we have
those big, big months, I'm gonnaput some of that money aside and
the Hill and Valley account.
So if we hit a valley, one ofthe low months, I have money set
(12:11):
aside that can supplement that.
Retained earnings in yourbusiness.
Say if the business doesn't makea set amount of money, I'm still
gonna be able to pay myself andmy employees.
Consistency does not come from apredictable paycheck.
Consistency in your home,hitting your goals at home comes
from a predictable plan.
(12:33):
If you don't have a predictableplan and you need help setting
that up, please feel free toreach out to me.
I'd absolutely love to have aconversation with you like I did
with this mom.
Question number three.
What if money, conversationsturn defensive?
I really had to think about thisone.
It's been a very long time sinceI've been in a money
(12:53):
conversation with my husbandwhere either one of us got
defensive, but it does come up.
So I was thinking about it and Iasked her some specifics.
I'm not gonna share those withyou here.
And I had to think about it fora hot minute because oftentimes
when I have a couple that I'mworking with.
One of them starts to getdefensive.
(13:15):
I shut it down really quicklybecause there's no point in
sparring with each other.
I don't like fighting eachother.
I'd rather us fight togethertowards, defeating a common
enemy.
When this happens, though, amoney conversation is going to
be a trigger.
It's gonna trigger.
Feelings of failure.
(13:35):
You don't think I did enough foryou?
You don't think I work hardenough?
It's gonna trigger fears ofjudgment like she doesn't think
I'm a good enough husband.
It's gonna trigger some pastmistakes, maybe some shame
rearing its head.
If someone hears you overspentagain, what they're often gonna
feel is You think I'mirresponsible.
(13:56):
That is why the tone matters somuch in the three T's, because
if you go in instead of blamingsaying, why did you spend this
much money on this thing?
Instead, you wanna make surethat you were saying statements
about yourself.
They need to be I statements,not you statements.
Help me understand whathappened, or, I would love to
(14:18):
make this easier for you nexttime.
Can you tell me where theroadblock was here?
Can you tell me what obstacleyou came up against that made
you make this decision?
Curiosity is gonna invite yourpartnership in instead of
creating a conflict.
Question four, what happens ifone spouse carries all of the
money stress?
(14:39):
Really what she was asking was,Hey, I do all of the money in
our family.
What should I do?
What could I do?
How can that change?
That's essentially where she wascoming with this question.
This is another thing that Ihear all the time, and that's
why it was.
One of the main key points in mytalk, you wanna have unity in
your marriage.
(15:00):
You wanna have unity in yourmoney so that you can have unity
in the way that you raise yourfamily.
Many husbands will feel likethey're carrying the full
financial responsibility for thefamily, and sometimes that's
because they are carrying thefull financial responsibility
for the family.
I think of my best friend whohas.
Completely abdicated her role inmaking the budget.
(15:21):
Looking at the numbers, shedoesn't want to, and you know
what?
For her family, that works justfine, so we're not gonna change
anything.
But I do think that for 99% ofthe families, the best way to do
it is for you to have some sortof buy-in.
You need to be able to know howto go and pay the bills, should
something, God forbid, happen toyour husband.
When one person feels like theentire weight of the financial
(15:43):
responsibility is on them,stress will build quickly.
Money should never be just oneperson's job, even if one spouse
handles the bills.
Both partners should understandthe income, the debts, the
goals.
You need to be able to log intothe accounts.
Money works best when bothpeople are building it together
(16:03):
and money works worst when oneof you is intentionally in the
dark.
At no point in time should onepartner be able to turn off the
money so the other partnercannot get the things that they
need.
Unless the person that's tryingto shop has an addiction of some
(16:23):
sort that is draining the bankaccount and puts the whole rest
of the family at risk.
And by that I don't mean youwent and bought gas twice this
week.
You should have only had to buyit once.
So I'm turning your credit cardoff.
I don't mean you spent too muchon groceries.
I gave you a hundred dollars tofeed our family of five and you
(16:45):
spent two, that's not what Imean.
A hundred dollars to spend a, tofeed a family of five,
especially here in SouthernCalifornia, is highly
unreasonable.
Can it be done?
Sure.
But the key here is that moneyproblems are rarely.
Math problems.
In fact, I would say they'renever math problems.
Money problems are mindsetproblems.
(17:07):
They're conversation problems.
The goal isn't to solveeverything.
The first time you have aconversation.
It's not a one nightconversation.
We're done.
The goal is to start talkingagain, if you're one of these
people, it's like, well, wedon't have money fights because
we just don't talk about money,and I like it that way.
Let me tell you, theconversation that you're not
(17:28):
having is the one that will saveyour marriage if you are
constantly walking in separatedirections.
If one of you is walking in thelight of knowing what the money
is and the other one is walkingin darkness, you might be
parallel, but it's possible thatone of you is walking in a
direction away from the other.
(17:49):
This is a very simple, not easynecessarily, but a very simple
way for you to walk in tandemtogether.
If you're wondering where tobegin, start with one simple
question.
What do we want our money tohelp us build?
That question alone can open thedoor to some really powerful
(18:09):
conversations, and I think thatyou should have a dream meeting.
You should have a dream meeting,and that means sitting down.
No electronics, lights turn lowand let's dream in pictures.
Spell it out.
I wanna be able to see eachblade of grass.
I wanna smell the smells thatyou're smelling.
I wanna know exactly what youwant.
(18:29):
And the reason for that isbecause if we can dream it, we
know exactly what we're walkingtoward.
Even if we have those days wherewe're walking parallel with each
other and then our courses veeroff a little bit, we know where
we're ending up, and our courseswill go back together and end in
the same place.
We don't always, as couples,we're not always reading in the
same paragraph.
(18:51):
We're not always reading on thesame page, but we need to be in
the same chapter of the samebook.
If after this conversation youwere realizing that you and your
spouse could use some clarity orsome guidance, or you just need
help getting the same chapter,I'd love to help you.
It's very easy to schedule aclarity.
Call withme@accelerateyourlegacy.com
(19:13):
slash clarity call, and iftoday's episode made you think
of someone who needs to hearthis conversation, please share
it with them.
Because when couples startbuilding together, money stops
being a source of tension.
It becomes a tool for buildingthe life that you really want,
and I really want you to getthere.
Alright, legacy builders.
(19:34):
That's it for this week.
Go out and make a difference.
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