Bad money habits tell troubling tale

If the jackals have hooked up your car and the wolves are howling at the door to take back your furniture and you’re still wired with the last of your cell phone minutes on a quick Home Shopping Network purchase, you may want to reconsider your relationship with money.

It’s OK. It’s good to discover self-destructive financial habits. Just look at the executives of AIG who keep dropping hundreds of thousands of dollars on spas and hotels while the taxpayers pony up billions to cover the over-extended rears of corporate financial sloths.

“We can be incredibly child-like when it comes to our finances,” says Matthew Bowen, Ph.d, an Albemarle County psychologist who consults on personal financial matters and teaches a class on the topic at Piedmont Virginia Community College. “We are a materialistic society and, in our society, there are things to be gotten. For years we believed that anything was possible with credit and now we’re discovering that’s not the case. Of course, when things go wrong, there’s always someone else to blame.”

Merging interests

Dr. Bowen is a specialist in neurological psychology. He’s worked with injured patients, been involved in criminal and court psychology and with financial and estate planners. His interest in the financial world merged well with his experience as a psychologist. You can check him out at www.matthewbowen.net.

“I started looking at financial behaviors in the context of common diagnostics in psychology,” Dr. Bowen explained. “Financial behavior in families and individuals is very much tied to the psychology of family and relationships.”

Consider the scene above. If your financial house of cards is crumbling and you find yourself dealing out of the discard pile, you may have an issue.

“If you have underlying issues of depression, perhaps caused by a lack of self-worth, buying yourself stuff automatically makes you feel better,” he said. “You’re doing something to make you feel better, to feel good about yourself and it works. For a while. And then you return to the original issue because you feel guilty for doing it.”

Currency reveals much

Money acts like an X-ray, displaying a variety of psychological issues through the way it’s used, abused, saved and spent. It can highlight problems between spouses, parents and children and even family history.

“Often a therapist will come across a situation in private practice that involves monetary or financial behaviors and I sometimes consult with them,” Dr. Bowen said. “A real inroad to understanding yourself is to understand your relationship with money.”

How you spend reflects your innermost struggles. Unfortunately, financial therapy is as difficult as psychotherapy.

“People deny themselves, they over-indulge and they engage in fiduciary infidelities,” Dr. Bowen said. “Unfortunately, there’s no pill to address your psychological financial behaviors. You have to work to change behaviors and develop different techniques.”

This story has been edited to correct an error in identification.