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What if you could get more of what you want in life? But not through pushing, forcing, or pressure.
You can.
When it comes to money, time, and energy, no one’s gonna turn away more.
And Kate Northrup, Bestselling Author of Money: A Love Story and Do Less and host of Plenty, is here to help you expand your capacity to receive all of the best.
As a Money Empowerment OG who’s been at it for nearly 2 decades, Kate’s the abundance-oriented best friend you may not even know you’ve always needed.
Pull up a chair every week with top thought leaders, luminaries, and adventurers to learn how to have more abundance with ease.
Collective financial stewardship in a couple can become one of the most life giving activities that you do together because it's about your life. It's about creating a life that you truly desire to live, and I can't think of anything more romantic than that. Welcome to Plenty. I'm your host Kate Northrup and together we are going on a journey to help you have an incredible relationship with money, time, and energy, and to have abundance on every possible level. Every week, we're gonna dive in with experts and insights to help you unlock a life of hunting.
Kate Northrup::Let's go fill our cups. Today, we are talking about money and your honey. How to talk to your honey about money. So during our recent relaxed money enrollment, we had more students enrolled than ever before. And we had more students enrolled than ever before of one particular type, although of all types, but there was one particular trend that I noticed.
Kate Northrup::And that was that we have more couples than ever in the program. So in Relaxed Money, if you are joining the program with a romantic partner who lives in the same household as you, you can take the program together for the price of one. So it's an amazing opportunity to dive into financial healing with your spouse or your romantic partner if you're not married. And it just absolutely warms my heart to see the breakthroughs that these couples have. The number one thing I hear from this work is I am not fighting with my spouse or my partner about money anymore.
Kate Northrup::Like, we're able to talk about money, and it's actually fun. And now we're on the same page, and now we've combined our goals, and now we're working together towards something. In so many couples, first of all, we're not taught how to manage money with another human when we have a shared life. Like, nobody teaches that. You know, people just there's like all this stuff about weddings, and what are your wedding colors, and like, what are the flowers gonna be, what's the theme, what's the dress, like, all this stuff.
Kate Northrup::And wonderful. I mean, my wedding was definitely one of the top three days of my life. I absolutely loved my wedding. So glad we did it. And also, those things do not set you up for a successful relationship.
Kate Northrup::You know, and and again, whether you're married or not, the same thing applies. There's such a dearth of there's of information and education around finances in general, and, like a dearth meaning a lack. And so I'm really here to help fill that in. Now my own personal story is that my parents were on really different pages financially. They just have super different approaches to money.
Kate Northrup::They have very different paradigms around money, and it gave me the opportunity first of all, it was, like, a little stressful, I'll be honest, being in a household where there was not clear communication, there was not two people being on the same page, there was not an alignment in terms of how there was an alignment in terms of like general values. You know, my parents really valued education. They really valued experiences. Those were the things that they felt great about spending money on, so they were on the same page there. But in terms of their overall philosophy, they were not.
Kate Northrup::And so it created this situation, which many people I'm sure listening have the same thing, where instead of two people walking next to each other going the same direction, supporting each other on the path. Instead, it was like two people walking away from each other trying to get to their goals, but ultimately, because they weren't on the same page, they were both thwarting each other's efforts because there wasn't that clear communication and clear systems and clear combined goals. I wanna say, in order to have a great relationship with money and your honey at the same time, you don't have to want all the same things. Right? Like, you get to have your own financial goals.
Kate Northrup::Your partner gets to have their own financial goals, and then you get to have shared financial goals. So it's all part of the puzzle. The missing piece for most people is clarity because we have so much emotional baggage around money, and we bring that emotional baggage to the financial conversations because most people have never done any kind of healing work around their relationship with money, and so they take out all their baggage on their partner. And then we get into avoidance patterns, we get into resentment patterns, we get into lying and secrecy or half truths, we get into a feeling I think I said resentment already. That's a really, really common one where one part of the couple wants x y z.
Kate Northrup::Maybe it's to save for retirement to for early retirement. Maybe they're wanting to become work optional. And then the other partner is a real spender and goes just on these spending benders and does not consult the other person. And so it feels like, oh, this person is thwarting all of my efforts towards my financial goals. There's also situations where both people, you know, Mike and I are both spenders.
Kate Northrup::So left to our own devices, we just both will just spend money. Not on, I mean, not on things that I would consider quote unquote frivolous, like not on like luxury goods that just sit around, for example, but on sports equipment or health equipment or experiences like concerts with VIP tickets or, you know, like, we love we just love experiences. We love that. And, also, we don't wanna be in a situation where with our spouse, we're either egging each other on in our unconscious behavior or where both of us are doing unconscious behavior but not talking about it. So step number one let me just have some coffee.
Kate Northrup::Step number one is this. You gotta do your own money work. And you gotta get clear on not only your own money story, like what history are you bringing to your relationship with money with your with your partner, and you also need to find out about their money story. Because when you partner with someone, you are not just partnering with them. You're actually partnering with their entire lineage.
Kate Northrup::Right? Like, we know this. People come with families, people come with baggage, but when it comes to money, let's say your partner had grandparents who lived through the Great Depression, and that was an incredibly stressful time. That memory, that stress, and financial trauma actually is going to live in your partner's body, believe it or not. And that's gonna be impacting your money conversations and your money life today.
Kate Northrup::So number one, you gotta do your own money work, know your own money story, and then know your your partner's money story. So before you even get into the dollars and cents, before you even get into the numbers, get into what history are we bringing to the table. And you can actually do the money healing work, the money story work together. And we do that in the Relaxed Money program. I actually give you a guide for how to do that.
Kate Northrup::So that's number one. Number two is you need to decide, okay, are we going to have full combined finances? Are we gonna keep our finances totally separate, or are we gonna do some kind of hybrid system? Now I know couples who thrive financially who have all different combinations of these things. There's not a right choice, but I will tell you every single time the wrong choice is to not have clarity and to not have clear agreements.
Kate Northrup::So what I see 90% of the time is that couples who struggle with each other financially where there's a lot of tension around money, it's because there are not clear agreements, and there's a lot of unspoken agreements where frequently assumptions are made, and one person thinks everyone agrees, and the other person has a completely other set of agreements in their mind, and the two sets of agreements do not match. We have to verbally, and I actually think in written form, another step we take in Relaxed Money is called the abundance agreements. We have to sit down and actually create abundance agreements, not only for ourselves, but also within our household. So for example, our abundance agreement in Mike and my household is that all of our finances are completely combined. I have some investment accounts that I had before, and Mike has some land he had before.
Kate Northrup::So there's, like, those things. We we don't they're not all shared, but fundamentally, Mike and I have had the same income source since 02/2011. It is our company, so it would make no sense to separate it. Technically, we, you know, we both pay ourselves on payroll, so we do have separate salaries, but it all just comes out of the business and goes into our shared personal checking account, and it keeps everything really easy. So we have our shared company.
Kate Northrup::We have our shared personal checking account. We have our shared high yield savings account. We have of course, we have individual, like, retirement accounts because that's how those things work, but essentially all the money is shared. I know there are financial experts who especially will say to women, you always need to keep some money off the side to yourself. If that makes you feel safe, please do that.
Kate Northrup::However, don't do it in secrecy because financial secrets will fester, and they will create an abscess in your relationship where there's an energetic leak and there's a lack of trust and it eats away at the foundation of your relationship, and then you won't be able to be all in with each other because even if another person even if the one person in the relationship can't put their finger on it, when there's secrecy of any kind, especially around finances, it leaks the energy, and over time, the relationship will very likely fizzle out. I mean, I'm not saying we have to tell everybody everything all the time about everything, but, like, if you're stashing away a separate, you know, a separate cash account and you're doing that in secret, that's that's gonna eat away at your relationship. So if you're gonna keep money separate, fantastic. If you if I know one couple, for example, where they take their money and each person has their own paycheck, and so they keep everything separate where they have two separate personal checking accounts, and then they have a shared household checking account, and they've just made an agreement that one person pays, you know, puts in the money for the mortgage, this other person puts in the money for the groceries, this person puts in the money for like the kids, you know, activities, this one puts in the money for vacations, and they just have that as an agreement and that works great for them.
Kate Northrup::To me, that's too much administrative and it wouldn't work in our relationship, but it wouldn't make sense because again, Mike and I have the same shared income stream. So that was number two, is you gotta get clear on are we all in shared expense shared finances? Are we all out totally separate finances, or are we going to do some variety of hybrid? So that's great. And that's your abundance agreements.
Kate Northrup::That's part of your abundance agreements and and creating your, as I call it, a relaxed money cash flow management system. Now number three is this really comes up and is common. It's not gonna happen in every relationship. It's not gonna be relevant in every single relationship, but it comes up a lot with my students, and that is this. I'm a stay at home mom, and I don't make the money, so I feel like I have to ask permission to do anything that I wanna do, or I don't make the money, so therefore, don't feel worthy of being involved in the investing, in the financial management.
Kate Northrup::So there is and I did a whole episode on this. I can't remember the episode number, but we'll link it below in the show notes where I talked about essentially needing to become a financial adult. And what I see for women in particular and and please, I'm not please don't take this as a judgment. It's just a trend. Okay?
Kate Northrup::This is not a judgment. It's a trend. And I I know it well because this was me as well. I see women, grown ass women, who act like little girls when it comes to their finances. And they say they want all this abundance, and they say they want security, and they say they want financial freedom, but actually they're acting like a child, wherein they are willingly allowing someone else to control the money, and they get the secondary gain, and the secondary gain is when you are benefiting from a behavior that you say you don't want to do, but because you have a secondary gain where you're benefiting from it, you keep doing it.
Kate Northrup::And so the secondary gain of financial avoidance or feeling like someone else controls the money because they earned the paycheck, the secondary gain is you don't have to be a grown up, and you get to be a child in that area of your life. And if that's a willing choice that you're making, if you're like, no, even though I'm 42, I actually want to be a little girl when it comes to money, fantastic. Knock yourself out. But if you cannot say verbally, I I am willingly, consciously choosing to be a child when it comes to money, then you better put your big girl panties on, and begin to engage. Because the other thing underlying under the surface here is that when there is, and this actually, by the way, can happen with any gender, any gender identity, any kind of couple, it absolutely can happen in same sex couples as well.
Kate Northrup::When there's one partner who is quote unquote the breadwinner, and then the other partner who is more on the home front, and that, I have many friends where actually it's the nontraditional, where the woman is the breadwinner and the man is the stay at home person, or same thing with same sex couples. What ends up happening is we recreate toxic societal structures right within our homes, right within our own kitchens, and we can say we're a feminist all day long, or what you know, that we're progressive all day long, but then right at home, we give away our power to the person who makes the paycheck, and we feel like, oh, they have control. I already talked about that. But the thing underneath the surface here is systemic, one of the things. And the systemic issue is that in our culture, we don't value caregiving.
Kate Northrup::And so there's so much unpaid labor going on, so whoever is making sure lunches are packed, making sure there's food in the fridge, making sure boo boos are kissed, making all the dentist appointments, handling the the birthday presents, making the holidays magical, like making sure there are clean clothes, and that everyone has the right size shoes, and like all of that stuff that actually makes the foundation of a life like caregiving, that tends to be unpaid or low paid labor in our culture. And that's simply because of thousands of years of patriarchy, of only celebrating that which is about conquering and visible results, and going bigger, and going faster, and profits over people, and all of that stuff, it's a whole other thing. But if you are in a relationship where you are not quote unquote the breadwinner, or where you are the breadwinner, and you are in any way devaluing the contributions of the person who is doing more of the caregiving, the house householder behaviors, whether that person is you or whether that person is your partner, we gotta call ourselves in and say, hey, in what way am I reflecting the larger overarching culture in my own unconscious bias where I'm more valuing the paycheck earning and less valuing the person and the contributions of the unpaid, often invisible labor that makes the breadwinning possible.
Kate Northrup::So all that to say, all that to say, if you have a dynamic where one person makes way more money than the other person, we need to begin to put a bigger value on all the unpaid and the invisible labor, so that the person, maybe who isn't earning the paycheck, but who is making the earning of the paycheck possible with all the foundational aspects of living a life, and all the caregiving aspects, and all the logistical aspects, When we do that, the person who is more in the caregiving role, more in the at home role, then will feel entitled to participate in the family finances in a much more robust way. And here's the truth. If you are a woman, the average age of widowhood is lower than you think. More students enroll than ever before, and we had more students enroll than ever before of one particular type, although of all types, but there was one particular trend noticed. And that was that we have more couples than ever in the program.
Kate Northrup::So in Relaxed Money, if you are joining the program with a romantic partner who lives in the same household as you, you can take the program together for the price of one. So it's an amazing opportunity to dive into financial healing with your spouse or your romantic partner if you're not married. And it just absolutely warms my heart to see the breakthroughs that these couples have. The number one I'm not saying you're gonna end up a widow, but I'm just saying statistically speaking, fifty percent of marriages end in divorce, and the average age of widowhood is younger than you would think. And so all that means is that the likelihood of you if you are a woman, the likelihood of you finding yourself in a situation where you actually are in charge of your finances is very high.
Kate Northrup::So why would you not get engaged now? And it also, I just want to say, it makes it really fun. Like, there is this isn't just like be a grown up and put on your big girl pants and whatever. This is the opportunity for you to step into a greater relationship with life itself. Because when we show up for our household finances and we take a look at them and we make conscious choices around them and we align our spending with what's important to us and we get on the same page around our financial goals, believe it or not, collective financial stewardship in a couple can become one of the most life giving activities that you do together, because it's about your life.
Kate Northrup::It's about creating a life that you truly desire to live in. I can't think of anything more romantic than that, quite frankly. So number three, if you are in a relationship where one person is the breadwinner and one person is not, we really need to do some unpacking around that, especially if you are feeling a lack of empowerment around being engaged in the finances and feeling like you have to quote unquote ask for permission in order to have what you want, in order to spend money. So that was number three. And then number four is you get to sit down with your person and really get into their heart, and find out what is it that makes them come alive.
Kate Northrup::And maybe you knew twenty years ago, but maybe it's changed. You know, we evolve. We change as humans. So what a fun date night activity to go out and ask each other about what makes your heart sing? What do you imagine for us ten years from now, twenty years from now?
Kate Northrup::What are the things you want to make sure you experience in this lifetime? What are the top three moments that you remember that you've already experienced in this lifetime? What do those things have in common, and how can we intentionally align our finances so that our life is made up of more of those? And then you can each ask each other these questions, you can write it all down, you can figure out what the common aspects are, and then make a plan to have your financial life actually support the life you both want to live together and individually. So that is what I have for you today.
Kate Northrup::That's how to get started talking to your honey about money. We had number one, you've got to do your own money healing work, and you've got to understand your money story and your partner's money story. Number two, you need financial agreements, abundance agreements in your household that make it clear, how are we doing our money? Who's paying for what? How are we doing this?
Kate Northrup::What are the agreements we have? Then number three, if there is a discrepancy in earning, and a breadwinner and a caregiver, or some combination of those, we need to do some unpacking around those dynamics and look at the unconscious bias and the ways in which we are or we are not fully participating and being a full adult or not. And then number four, we get to really get into each other's hearts in a beautiful way and begin to align our spending and our investing with what we truly value, which ultimately, at the end of the day, comes back to love for most people. Money gets to support the expansion of love in your life. So talking money with your honey in a beautiful way is one of the best foundational processes you can do for that.
Kate Northrup::So that's what I've got for you today. If you're already in Relaxed Money with your partner, you are in the right place, my friend. I've got you. We're gonna do this together this year. And if not, I hope that these four steps get you started to talking money with your honey in a beautiful way.
Kate Northrup::Enjoy. What if managing money felt effortless? You've worked so hard to earn money, so why does it feel stressful? Well, I wanna introduce you to something brand new that I've created called the money reset because abundance starts in your body, not in your bank account. This free audio experience will help you rewire your nervous system for wealth, stop the money in money out cycle and create a foundation for true wealth, and relax into a new relationship with money.
Kate Northrup::Plus, it comes with the five minute calm cash flow ritual. So you can have financial clarity and magnetism anytime you want. All you need to do to get the free money reset is go to katenorthrop.com/reset.