Three Steps We Took Toward A Unified Financial Vision

Dani's a nerd. I'm a free spirit. I don't say that to be mean, those are just the categories that we fall into in Financial Peace University. One isn't worse than the other, they're just different.

And they don't work together very well.

One of the things that frustrated Dani and I early on in our marriage is that both of us were relating with money differently—me as a spender/free spirit and she as a saver/nerd—and neither of us were making any headway with our financial goals. Rather, she wasn't making any headway with her financial goals because I didn't have financial goals at all.

After we went through FPU, however, and learned about the differences between savers and spenders—nerds and free spirits—a light clicked on. We realized why we were irritating each other so much. When I was able to set aside my selfish spending habits and see why saving was important to her, and once she was able to see how much enjoyment I got out of spending some of my hard-earned money, we reached an understanding. And then things started to change.

It was rough at first because we both had to make sacrifices. I had to recognize that I had a lot of unhealthy spending habits that were holding us back from paying off debt. She had to realize that some of her financial goals weren't realistic with a partner, and that she couldn't forge ahead with her own financial plan, that we had to work together. There was some pushing, some pulling, some compromise, and after about six months we began to get pretty proficient at budgeting.

If I had to boil it down, I'd say there were three main things that helped make us successful when it came to creating a unified vision for our finances.

1. We spent a lot of time in prayer. We asked God to unite us in our financial plan. We prayed for wisdom in knowing where to spend our money.


2. We communicated. We came up with a plan for buying things and kept weekly accountability with each other. We shared, and still share, a bank account, so there were no money secrets. And we decided that any expenses over $100 would need to be discussed before acted on.


3. We followed Dave's plan. Financial Peace University gave us a common language when it came to talking about money, and it also gave us a good starting point. Dave's baby steps were a solid "first step." Once we were telling our money where to go, we started seeing results.

Keep pinchin' :-)