Saturday Case Study: Head in Sand syndrome
Oct 25th, 2008 by nancyzimmerman
From time to time I have clients who just.can’t.do it. They can’t pull their head out of the sand. Or sometimes they do, for the briefest while, and then dive right back into the comfort zone of Not Knowing.
One of my roles is to help clients reduce their anxiety about managing their money. There are myriad ostensible reasons people prefer to avoid taking a good look at their money, but the underlying reason is usually a fear of inadequacy.
The fear could be …
- inadequate income for their spending levels (I knew it! I knew it! Now what??)
- inadequate time/organizing skills to keep up with money management (I won’t be able to do it for the long haul anyway, so why bother trying now?)
- inadequate confidence to see themselves as effective money managers (I’ve never been good with money)
Resolving these tensions takes time, and sometimes a few starts, stops and re-starts, before they fade. In all cases, the most effective method to overcome the fears is by diving in and starting the practice of managing money. With rare exception, clients discover that things are not as bad as they may have feared, but even more important is the sense of dignity, that’s right, dignity, of putting themselves in the driver’s seat.
What do you suggest for people to overcome this “Head in Hand” syndrome?
It’s a serious thing, I think… sometimes I catch myself falling into this disposition because I feel like no matter what I can’t efficiently get things around the way I want to.
Hi Nancy:
I’m wondering if you’ll be at this event:
http://antigonemagazine.wordpress.com/2008/11/01/hiatus/
You’d be great as one of the speakers.
Jennifer
@Sloan What usually works for clients (and me!) is to start with what you can start with. By that I mean, it’s easy to psyche ourselves out by focussing on the real or imaginary enormity of the task, by imagining worst-case scenarios, or by imagining some idealized, perfect state, and giving up before we even begin. Instead, the question to ask is, “what is one thing I actually *could* do?” – something that doesn’t feel overwhelming or threatening. Then, do that. Acccomplishing that task usually is a confidence booster, and then it’s time to ask the question again, “what is one thing …” etc. This is a brief response; I think I’ll develop this further in a full blog post sometime soon. Thanks for asking.
@Jennifer I didn’t know about the event – thanks for the headsup! And I checked out the magazine. Fabulous!