Relationships & Spending

Happy Friday, folks! 

Last week, Misti shared her thoughts on social capital & how it affects our lives and finances.

Now that I’ve recently moved into a new community with my partner, it made me wonder how I can use social capital to benefit me & the others living here. 

Taking it a step further, it made me think about the relationships I have with other people.

I’ve moved six times in the past few years (oof) and many of those moves were across state lines where I’ve had to start from scratch making new friends.

But how do our relationships relate back to our finances?

And how do our connections in the community & with our given family affect our financial decisions?

First, we need to break it down.

💞 Defining Our Relationships 💞

We all engage in various definitions of relationships, each one with its own benefits and drawbacks.

But it’s important to recognize that no one group or person will fulfill ALL of our needs.

We do need a combination of some of the relationships listed below.

As we go through these categories, think about your own life and where your relationships fall within this spectrum.

Most importantly, think about how these relationships influence your spending & how individual relationships bring you fulfillment.

🤍 Chosen/Given: The friends & partner you choose for yourself and the given family that chose you. These are your closest circle of friends & family and can have an intentional (or unintentional) impact on your finances. 

💖 Old/New: These are the friendships & relationships that go back as far as we can remember, and those we are just now meeting & beginning to develop. This is especially impactful to me right now! 

❤️‍🩹 Life-giving/Life-depleting: The people in our lives that fill our cup & have a reciprocate relationship with versus those that take without giving and drain our social battery. This is not a call to “cut off” life-depleting people, but it is a chance to explore our life-giving relationships and see how we can add more “life-giving moments” to our lives.

💰 The Impact on Our Finances 💰

Defining a few categories of our relationships are helpful when examining our finances because each different connection we have can impact us in different ways.

You may have old friends from college that want to go out to eat all the time or new co-workers who all want to contribute money for birthdays or themed office days.

Whatever the scenario is, there are ways our relationships can deplete us financially, and ways they can support us.

It’s up to us to recognize:

• When to say yes. 👍 Because it’s aligned with my values AND my spending plan.

• When to offer alternatives. 💸 Like “let’s do a packed lunch at the park instead”, or “I’ll pick up the flowers and write the card, but I can’t contribute money this time.”

• When to say no. 🙅‍♀️ Because no is a full sentence.

Enjoy your weekend,
Kim

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