When you think of money or financial wellness, what are the kind of things that come to mind? In my conversations with women, there’s two words that always pop up. Time and time again, no matter what woman I’m speaking with, when we dig into it, there are two key pieces that they are most concerned about. Watch my short blog to discover what these are.
So those two words, what are they?
The first one is about safety and safety means different things to people, but pretty much every conversation I have with women, they talk about the money giving them that feeling of safety. That’s something that there are many layers to. For most women, the feeling of safety usually looks like knowing that you’ve got a home for you and your kids. It’s about knowing that you’ve got the ability to feed them, to clothe them, to make sure that you can provide for their needs and if there are any health challenges that you can keep them safe on those fronts.
The second word is around security, and when women talk to that, it means different things for different people. But the common threads that come out of it are it’s about securing the future. So knowing that you are going to be okay regardless of what’s coming. You will be able to provide for your children’s futures, futures of any loved ones in your lives and your own future, your retirement with the things that you’d like to do.
For most of us, they’re not big things. They are pretty simple needs and sure It would be nice to have all the add ons, but when we boil it down and maybe when our backs are to the wall and we’re made to choose as to what are the kind of things that are important to us, they’re often very simple, like I mentioned under the safety, having a home to rest in, having food, having our health, being happy with those around us.
Knowing that regardless of what’s in our future, that we will be okay is hugely invaluable. When women have those feelings and they feel safe and secure by perhaps having eggs in different baskets. Perhaps they’ve got good diversification in their assets, their income, their expenditure, etc. Then that starts to nurture those feelings of safety and security.
In my opinion, these are really quite primal feelings and I think the roots can go very deep and there can be more to this. These two words arise regularly because sometimes they words that some of us can struggle to come up with, myself included, to name what it is and what the involve to give us those feelings of safety and security.
Initially we might think it’s the holidays and the bags and the clothes and the extras. But actually when times are tough or things are challenging and we boil it down, we start to see what’s really important and for most of us it’s those things. So I just wanted to put those out there today for those of you who may be struggling to put words to what it is financial wellness will actually look like for you.
Some find it very hard to have a clear vision of what financial wellness looks like to us and as to what that would even look like. Often you feel that you’ve just no idea. You haven’t taken the time to think about it. So I’ll leave that with you as for some food for thought.
To Your Financial Wellness,
Caitriona
