Financial Insecurity & Relationship Boundaries: The Connection (Read Time: 4 min.)

Do you feel insecure about money (making it, saving it, keeping it)?

Where, in your life, do you feel that resources are scarce?  

What do you attribute to your lack of financial stability?

Whenever financial insecurity is a recurring theme in your life, there tends to be a few things at the heart of it:
1) You don't trust that you'll be able to handle whatever comes.
2) You fear that life will not provide the opportunities and resources necessary for your survival (let alone your thriving).
3) You secretly blame others for your lack of financial security and you feel justified in expecting them to step up to the plate so you can have what you need.

Now... how does that relate to healthy boundaries?

Here's the issue: If what you identify as the source of your well-being (the cause of your financial security or insecurity) is any living person outside of yourself, you are putting all of your safety, security, and peace in the hands of someone who is bound to fail you. 

Why are they bound to fail?

Because the only Source you have is God and anyone else you give that responsibility to lacks the capacity to fill the role.  What winds up happening, then, is that you have all of these expectations for a person who was never built to fill them.  What ends up happening from there looks like something out of a soap opera script.  You demand more.  You expect more.  You argue over unfulfilled obligations and all because you created relationship boundaries that hinged upon demands and expectations the other person was never designed to fulfill.  Before you know it, disappointment leads to anger, frustration, guilt, and resentment... and then you wonder why your relationship is on the rocks.

You've set the wrong relationship boundaries 

out of a fear of financial instability.

Let's get very clear on this:

1) No one HAS to financially provide for you but you.  The sooner you get on board with this, the more powerfully you will design your financial life using healthy boundaries.
2) No one CAN financially provide  for you in a way you aren't ready and willing to receive.  Reciprocity is as important to financial security as making an investment is to receiving a return.  In life, people don't get what they want; they get what they believe they deserve.
3) Money flows to the people who don't make money their god.  When money rules your life and it's the only thing you think about or worry about, it becomes the thing you worship.  Worshiping something that has no value is a waste of energy and time.  Put money in its rightful place: it is a means to an end.  When you can see money as one energetic vehicle through which you travel in life, you will also understand that making it and keeping it aren't about what other people will and won't do for you.  It's about what you will and won't do for yourself.
4) Making financial prosperity a condition of love turns a relationship into a transaction.  If what you wanted was a business deal, there was no need to get married.  Simply get a contract, a business partner, and a good lawyer and you can hammer out the details later.  Romantic partnership is not about tit-for-tat financial contribution.  The vows say "for richer, for poorer" but most people would rather it be "For richer and for richer."  Love doesn't work that way when it's real.
5) There's a difference between fiscal responsibility and financial scapegoating.  You want a relationship where there's equitable financial responsibility, not one where people are blaming each other for what money can't buy, they can't earn, or for the things they find themselves having to live without.

So these points are all pretty clear... and you've heard them before.

What's the bottom line?

The bottom line is this:

It's not enough to hear it or read it.

You need to start living it.

1. Stop expecting that it is your spouse's job to provide for your every financial need.
2. Stop acting like your parents (by giving birth to you) owe you every extra penny they have... and you're 27, 37, or 47 years old.
3. Stop blaming the economy for your financial woes.  Own your role in racking up debt, making foolish purchases, and not investing or saving wisely.
4. Stop looking for an easy way out.  Money may be about flow but wealth isn't built in a day.  You want it?  Develop a specific numbers goal and then be prepared to work at it for YEARS...

And, of all the things I can say that will help you manage both your financials and the boundaries of your relationships, it's this:

Stop thinking the Source of your provision is anyone other than God.
You are creating a faith block and a life hold when you deny God's role in giving you EVERYTHING you have.

Make no mistake: 

Your employer did not pay your mortgage last month.  God did...