SPEAKER_01 0:00

Research has shown that financial anxiety is actually different than general anxiety. So I think that's an important distinguishment. Stress can impact someone's decision making. It's usually more short-term.

SPEAKER_00 0:15

Welcome to Planning and Beyond, the show where financial planning meets human understanding. As an exceptional financial advisor, you know that financial planning is about more than just numbers. It's about giving clients the clarity they need to align their money with what matters most. Which is why each episode is designed with that goal in mind. You'll learn how to uncover the psychology behind client decisions and gain insights and behavioral strategies needed to create deeper, more meaningful client relationships. You'll discover techniques for navigating emotional client situations drawn from conversations with leading industry experts in behavioral finance, psychology, communication, and more. Whether it's mastering discovery meetings, handling sensitive client conversations, or understanding what is truly keeping your client stuck, you'll walk away with not only strategies that you can use in your next client meeting, but also the confidence to do so. Oh yeah, hi. I should probably introduce myself. I'm your host, Ashley Kwame, a therapist who somehow wandered into the world of financial behavior and kind of decided to stay. My mission is to help you bridge the gap between financial planning and human understanding. Because remember, finances don't have feelings, but your clients do. Let's dive in. Welcome to Planning and Beyond, the podcast where financial planning meets human understanding. I'm your host, Ashley Kwamey, and today I am so excited to welcome my friend, colleague, fellow Georgia Bulldog fan, Dr. Christy Archuletta. Christy, whoo, go dogs. Welcome. Go Dogs. I love it. I love it. Well, Christy, you and I have known each other for quite some time. And I've told this story before. I think you've heard it, that you were the first person that I talked to about financial therapy years and years ago. You were transitioning from had you just gotten to UGA?

SPEAKER_01 2:19

I feel like maybe you just gotten to UGA because I was, I just remember I was in this little bitty tiny office, which is where my office was the first year. And I remember having a conversation. You know, you can remember sometimes location where you work, yeah, but not when. But that's how I kind of time orient everything. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:37

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I I I do I remember that because it was Clayton and I asking just, you know, questions and trying to figure things out. And so I always like it, I just get like warm fuzzies, like whenever I think about you and like my own journey and you being just that first like person there from an introduction standpoint. And I'm so glad that from that first phone call, you have allowed me to stalk you and you know, I love it persistently. Now I stalk you too. And and and we've become friends. I'm glad that you've not put out a restraining order against me and a stalking. We've turned friends. So, you know, now it's le now it's legal, right? That's right. Yeah. Well, we could talk about a lot of things, which is great. And it's always actually the hard part about bringing fantastic people on uh like yourself. What I would love for us to talk about, and something that you've been doing throughout your career, but I think a little bit more here recently. We were talking before, even as of yesterday, uh, talking about financial anxiety. And, you know, I think that this is an important topic to talk about within the landscape of financial planning. Uh, because advisors, for those of you that are that are listening, you probably have clients who are really, who are really anxious. And sometimes it might just be situational, but then there might be some clients where it's more persistent and it's every situation that maybe comes up. And maybe it's a little bit more than just like, okay, I'm just nervous about buying this house and what that might do. It's it's you know, something that's bigger or larger that may get in the way for the client being able to really have like greater financial well-being, you know, lower mental stress. Uh so I want to talk to Christy to you today about financial anxiety because I regard you very much as uh one of the subject matter experts within this area. And so I thought maybe let's I don't want to assume that everyone listening knows what we mean when we say financial anxiety. So I'd love for you. Can you define it for us? How do you how do you define it? Uh let's just start there high level and then we'll we'll dive in.

SPEAKER_01 5:04

Okay. So I'm gonna walk even further back. And is that I love it when you do this.

SPEAKER_00 5:09

I love it when I love it when you do this. Yes. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 5:13

So this has actually become one of my, I don't know, favorite topics to talk about, but I think that it's really interesting. And, you know, you would say, well, not everybody knows what you're talking about when you talk about financial anxiety. What is that? Well, let's just say researchers don't know, people studying it don't know. We're all lost. We're all lost. So I am working on me and some colleagues are working on really trying to articulate it better for lack of a better word. So I am super pumped to talk about financial anxiety today and what it looks like, but I want to walk it back first to talk about just kind of general stress and anxiety, because I think that helps lay some foundation for what financial stress and financial anxiety is. And I like to throw in what stress looks like because we often, actually all the time, conflate stress and anxiety with one another, and they're really not the same. Yeah. So yeah, let's start there. Yeah. So stress, just kind of in general. I kind of just talk about it from a very simplistic standpoint. You can add anything that you want to it. When we think of stress, kind of in a general, you're reacting in some form emotionally. There's an affective response, there's a physiological response, there's a relational response potentially to a stressor. So there's something that has happened. For example, I can't pay a bill, or and so this, or I'm not sure how I'm going to pay a bill. That would be an example of a stressor. I lost my job. That's a stressor. If you think about a non-financial example, you think about a test. We have kids, they take tests, and everybody's always like stressed about the test, right? So I have a quiz today or I have a test today. And many of you might have experienced that, like, oh gosh, I gotta do really well. And so once the test was over, though, your your worry went away. Your stress went away. You felt so much better as a response to it. And so we have these reactions. So for example, you might feel nervous about it, you might feel worried about it. Um, physiologically, your hands might be cold or clammy, your feet might feel the same way as well. And that's your just your blood going to your heart. Um, your heart might race. And so those are signs that those are just really common physiological reactions that are normal to some sort of stressor. So when we think about anxiety, we tend to think about something called generalized anxiety disorder. So, as people who were trained as therapists were trained to diagnose anxiety. And so with generalized anxiety disorder, you have to display a certain number of symptoms over a course of time. So, like over the course of six months, you need to experience this more days, these all these symptoms more days than not. And so that might mean that you are worried. So, again, that looks like stress though, right? And it can be a stress, might be worried, you might not sleep well, you might have muscle tension. So, again, those things also might look like stress. The difference there though, between stress and anxiety is that there's this persistent worry. There's this persistent weight, there's this persistent um can't sleep at night, for example, persistent muscle tension. So you're feeling these all of the time. And if, for example, if it's a test with the stress, once the test is over, you don't worry about it anymore. But if you have test anxiety, you might be constantly worried about just because the test is over, doesn't mean that you stopped worrying about it. Like what could you have done differently on it? What I could have done better. Well, you might think that anyway, if you didn't study for the test. Very true. That's a different story. But if it's anxiety, if it's true anxiety, you're worrying about what you could have done and what you could have done differently, or that you didn't do very well on it. Um, and even if you do well on it, you still are worried about it. So that's that's rising to a very different level. So it's the stressor, you can still have a stressor present and it might increase the anxiety. But when the stressor has been taken care of or is over with, you're still worried with anxiety. You still have that constant kind of focus on whatever it is that that causes you to be anxious. Would you add anything to that from a clinical standpoint?

SPEAKER_00 10:40

Um one, I would say I'm really glad that we started here and that you made that distinction because I do think that that is an important distinction when we talk about, especially in finances, like financial stress, because there are stress, as you mentioned. Even the example that at the very beginning here that I shared around buying a house, like that might just be a financial stress sir. It could just be like a one-time right thing that may not be where someone displays like financial anxiety symptoms, but it could also, right? It just absolutely depends on the person. I guess, you know, the only thing that like when I think about from, and this is more like diagnostic here, is that the from an anxiety piece, like it's it's to the level where it impacts decision making and functioning.

SPEAKER_01 11:33

Absolutely. And so it's affecting your work, the people around you, different, et cetera. Different to a different level, yes.

SPEAKER_00 11:43

Yeah. And so I I think like that would be, you know, for for you know, advisors who are listening, like just thinking about, um, and I always think about Clayton when I when I think about this stuff. And I don't mean that to be dismissive like him, but I think about how would I explain this like to Clayton and what questions like would he be having right now? Or like, how is that any different? Uh, which I guess he doesn't sound like that. I don't know why I did that voice, but he he doesn't he doesn't sound goofy like that. Um, that was not very nice of me. But I like to just kind of make that distinction around it impacts like decision making in areas, right? And and even like financially, like it could be impacting your relationship with your partner, you know, the persistence here that you were, I love that word that you were talking about. It could be impacting your own like well-being. Yeah, we've worked with a client where it probably would be helpful for them if they either took a sabbatical or looked for a lower stress job, but they are so worried from a financial standpoint around not making the same level of income, even though from a number standpoint, like they would be good to not work for six years and still be okay. Like their own just anxiety is such that it impacts the decision making around taking care of themselves from a well-being. So I think, you know, Chrissy, that would be the that's like truly the only thing that I would add is, you know, for advisors listening, like it impacts their decision making. It's not just a I'm stressed, a stress.

SPEAKER_01 13:18

I'm stressed. Now, stress can impact someone's decision making. It's usually more short-term.

SPEAKER_00 13:23

Sure. Yes. So yes.

SPEAKER_01 13:25

I I I don't want us to say it, they look very similar, symptomatic-wise. It's just that anxiety is going to be persistent, it's gonna affect decision making from a longer-term standpoint that you just can't get past it.

SPEAKER_00 13:40

Really. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:41

And like you said, and I think this is a very good qualifier from a diagnostic level, it has to impact your functioning, your daily functioning in some sort of way, like at work with your relationships, etc.

SPEAKER_00 13:57

Yeah. And not that like we are encouraging advisors to go and diagnose because that's not in the scope of your your practice, but just to help understand, right? And so maybe, I don't know, Christy, I'm just thinking, like, okay, for advisors, like what if they're seeing this over the course of several meetings, like if you're like, oh, this like keeps happening. I'm trying to think of maybe on an advisor end what they might see to help them like, you know, qualify this as the difference between a stressor versus maybe potentially some anxiety. Do you have any thoughts?

SPEAKER_01 14:32

Or well, let's talk about. Well, first of all, let's walk into, I was just talking about it in general, stress and anxiety. So let's walk into financial stress and financial anxiety. It's probably somewhat self-explanatory, but financial stress, you're dealing with a reaction to a financial stressor, right? Job loss. It can be exciting, one like buying a home. It can be a new job, it could be something unfortunate like a death of a loved one, a divorce. So there's all sorts of different financial stressors that somebody can deal with that you have a reaction to. Then financial anxiety is that related to finances. So your financial situation, are you feeling worried about your financial situation for a long period of time? And one thing I want to clarify is so in why this is coming up and why it's important to distinguish is that research has shown that financial anxiety is actually different than general anxiety. So I think that's an important distinguishment. But I also have to qualify like all of the research around financial anxiety as not being great. Because we don't measure it the same. We don't necessarily sometimes we use financial stress measures and call it financial anxiety.

SPEAKER_00 16:08

Oh, that's interesting.

SPEAKER_01 16:09

Or financial anxiety measures and call it financial stress, because we might be only using like one or two items to gather information from someone. So you might ask the question, like, I feel worried about my finances. And then that is what becomes the financial anxiety. Like this person is showing increased financial anxiety because they answered yes or answered higher on a one-item measure that said, I'm worried about my finances. Yeah. So I mean, it makes it difficult. And part of it is because that's might be what the data that we have to utilize. And so we're making the best of it. But the next research paper might say that's financial stress. And they they're calling, I'm worried about my finances, financial stress.

SPEAKER_00 16:57

Man, I need you researchers, you academics, to like get it together.

SPEAKER_01 17:02

Come on. I know, I know, I know. So it's something I think we're working on as a whole, and just trying to delineate those two concepts from one another. So we do have better research, which means we have better tools and better um better research to show what is working, what doesn't work, and what to do with clients who are experiencing this. So it's they're they're multidimensional in terms of symptoms and how we um how we assess for them. But it is again financial anxiety. If we're really going to measure financial anxiety, um, and I, you know, I built one of the financial anxiety measures that is commonly used, um, it that one needs work too. So I'm putting that out there that it needs work because uh what it doesn't do is that it doesn't have any cutoff numbers to show up, show if someone is anxious or not about their finances. It just says that you have elevated financial anxiety, which is very useful to know. And I don't know that it's meant to be a quote unquote diagnostic tool. Um, that's not what it was originally built for, but it was originally built to kind of mimic and look at symptomology that was rooted in generalized anxiety disorder and relate that to a financial situation. So that was kind of just the original purpose of it. But it doesn't do a good job in looking at necessarily persistence or duration. And I would like to add that to it. So hopefully 26 goals. I got goals. 2026 goals in 2026.

SPEAKER_00 18:52

Well, on the practitioner end, it would be really nice, selfishly. Um yeah, I don't know who. I mean, do you need a an assistant, like a research assistant?

SPEAKER_01 19:02

We are working on some um, we are working on some some papers.

SPEAKER_00 19:07

So I was gonna volunteer myself, but I don't I don't think that I can like volunteer as a research assistant. Um yes. Well, maybe just an assist. Maybe, maybe, maybe I could do that. Let me let me add one more thing to all the things. No, that sounds like you'll be helping. Great. I'm here for you, Christy. I'm here for you. So, okay, I I'm glad that we've kind of clarified a little bit, taken that elevator down a little bit more and you know, kind of named like financial anxiety and like here's what it is, and even just some of the research limitations and how that can be difficult just on the practitioner side for, you know, okay, like really, like what kind of what is this? But, you know, for maybe for advisors who have clients and they're like, well, maybe, but maybe not, like, how does how what does this look like in I say in real life? Like what like a client, can we walk through maybe like a client example here? Um, where they it's not just financial stress. It is someone who maybe does exhibit, you know, from a symptomology standpoint, like true financial anxiety. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:20

Yeah. I think where it shows up the most is what you said earlier. It it's rooted in maybe not being able to make decisions or always regretting decisions that they do make. So, like around purchases, like spending. So I I love the example of buying a house. So that is a that really is actually probably a stressful situation for everyone just because of the process that you have to walk through and all of the things that have to be done to make sure that you're purchasing a house, right? You just can't be like, I'm gonna purchase a house and all of a sudden it's all done for you. You never had to go look at any houses, it just came to you and it was all of a sudden yours. So that in of itself is a stressor. And you can be stressed about that, like, oh, and then we have move-in day, and you can be stressed about that. But once that's all done, that's that's taken care of. Anxiety would show up in the fact that you would never or you would have a lot of difficulty in terms of making that decision in terms of what house to buy, you it would look like you're putting things off. I don't know which house to get. I don't know which mortgage lender to go with. I don't know if I should if I have all cash to buy it, if I should use all cash, should I get a loan? Should I? Even if you as an advisor are saying these are the things that you need to do that make. The most sense financially and are in your best interest. They're going to keep weighing those and going back and forth and almost maybe even looking ambivalent around it. Yeah. Effort not to make a decision.

SPEAKER_00 22:15

Or even saying, maybe we don't move at all.

SPEAKER_01 22:18

Or maybe we don't move at all. Exactly. This is looking pretty good. I like where we are. Maybe we just renovate.

SPEAKER_00 22:24

Maybe we just renovate where we are right now. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 22:26

Yes. Yeah. And then you never renovate. Right. We just don't do, we don't do any. We don't, we don't do anything. We just stay where we are because where we are is comfortable. We know what that looks like. It seems safe. Yeah. Even though if you made the purchase, if you got the house, maybe you would be in a different position in some way. It's maybe it's less house because you need less house now. It's less to take care of. It's not so stressful. Um, in those sorts of ways. And it actually, you know, reduces anxiety or it reduces stress, but you got to get over the hurdle. So that's how, in some ways, how that anxiety is going to show up is that there's just blockades everywhere. And there might be conflict that arises. If you're working with a couple and there's conflict arising, like he he won't make a decision, or she won't make a decision about this, or they say they're going to do this, but then they then they say, No, I'm not going to do that, or I don't want to do that, or now I'm not sure about that. Then it's causing conflict within the relationship because of the anxiety that's happening.

SPEAKER_00 23:40

Yeah. Before we continue, I'm going to pause for just a second to tell you about something I'm so excited about. And yes, I know that this is a classic podcast move, right? But just stay with me here because if what we've been talking about today resonates with you, this is going to feel really relevant. If you're a firm owner, if you're an advisor who knows that there's more to financial planning than the numbers, but maybe you're not quite sure how to systematically bring the human side into your practice. I want to tell you about our foundations offering. This is a three-tiered offering that Meg Lurts and I created to help advisory firms integrate financial psychology into every area of support, from client support, advisor support, even including firm support. We have done for you quarterly trainings, bi-monthly case consultations, on-call one-on-one client coaching sessions, white label newsletters, client-facing tools, even strategic support that builds your team's confidence over time. If you're ready to transform how you show up for your clients, visit beyondthefp.com to reach out to us and start the conversation. All right, let's get back to the show. There's something that's been coming up more recently, and not that it is new, it's I've just been seeing a lot more of it, is clients where, you know, I'm trying to suss out, is it stress versus anxiety? But this thought around enough, like will I haven't will I have enough? I don't know if I can stop working, even if my advisor says, hey, you're good to retire at 65 or 60, whatever it is. There's just this like worry around, like in the and the word enough just kind of has come up a lot. Uh what are your thoughts, I guess, around that in terms of maybe the connection to you know financial anxiety? Do you guys see or hear that a lot?

SPEAKER_01 25:42

Oh, yeah. So definitely hear about it a lot in terms of just basically how you described. I also wonder, we don't have research to back this up or really data. I think it's more clinical observation, but um is it worry? Is it anxiety? Is it grief in terms of someone's stage in life that now I'm tired it's time to wrap up this chapter of my life? And maybe it's not necessarily about do I have enough? That's the excuse, but it's more about hanging on to what's been and what's and how I've created who I am and my purpose in life.

SPEAKER_00 26:26

Oh, that's like, yeah. Oh, I had not, I mean, yes, there is a great, I don't know if I've tied that enough piece to a potential or perceived loss. So uh my brain is gonna just go crazy with that this weekend. Uh, I love that connection there. And you're right, like it can be, it can be hard, I think, sometimes to suss out. So, you know, look, I know that for me at least, sometimes financially anxious clients can be, they can be challenging.

SPEAKER_01 27:03

Absolutely can be challenging because they have clients that look like they got their act together a lot of times because they're anxious. And so they're doing all of the things a lot of times that they need to do to be in a good financial position. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:19

But then when it comes to actually doing something different, ah something that might be aligned with like what they say they value or what they want.

SPEAKER_01 27:28

Exactly, or what they've planned to do. Like this is the plan. This is the plan you made 20 years ago. You've said that you want to keep working at this. Here we are. It's time to execute on that goal that you had and what you've been working towards. And you look like you're going in reverse.

SPEAKER_00 27:49

Yeah. The way that uh you kind of explained it um a second ago, like I like to, I guess, validate for clients, like your anxiety makes sense. And the difficult part is that in probably many areas of your life it has served you well.

SPEAKER_02 28:06

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 28:06

Right. And so I just think like from a brain standpoint, what's hard about working with clients with anxiety, albeit general or financial anxiety, is that that anxiety has served them well. Absolutely. Um, especially like finance, right? Especially if there's they're like super savers and they're vigilant, like around that, like that anxiety has served them well. And so then it's so challenging as a like as an advisor, like as a practitioner, to then help them when we when they get to those like stuck points, those stuck moments. Let's maybe if you're okay, like let's kind of go there. Like we maybe we've kind of determined and said, like, okay, like this is a little more than just a financial stressor. Um, this is a recurring like pattern. Like, how how can advisors work with clients? What's the starting point or what questions? Like, uh let's help them out here. Uh, let's not keep them waiting. Uh let's help them out.

SPEAKER_01 29:10

Yeah, let's do. Let's help them out. So I think one of the most valuable things, a lot of times what I'm teaching is, you know, let's look at some numbers. Assuming that you've shared the numbers, the client's been an active participant in that. They know this is this is it. Um the next piece is what are they willing to try to do and taking extremely small, tiny steps towards whatever that goal is. So they're like, oh, okay, well, and I don't know if this is going to be a very good example because I haven't articulated this yet in my mind. So it's going to be articulated as it goes. Let's go. We'll go with we'll roll with it. Let's go with it. Um, because I'm going with the one where where you were talking about like maybe afraid to uh re afraid to retire. You have you know you have the funds to be able to retire to live comfortably, but you're not doing it. Your spouse is potentially getting very frustrated with you because you're not you're not taking those steps. So, what are the things that you can do that are tiny steps that seem really doable? What might be taking vacation? You might not, you probably have a lot of vacation or the client, sorry, the client has a lot of vacation saved and stored up because they might not have just thought I'm ever gonna take vacation. So let's utilize some of that time, maybe even just in a couple of days. Let's try a day of vacation, let's try two days of vacation. And you're gonna you're gonna try that out. And what does that look like? And what does that feel like? And so you're not quitting your job, you're not retiring from your job, you're not taking this huge, scary moment, but you're utilizing resources that you have available to you and using them in a way that can help you experiment. It's almost like um exposure therapy, a little bit, you know. You're afraid of snakes. Please don't ever do this to me. I don't want exposure to um my fear of snakes.

SPEAKER_00 31:30

No, you and me both snakes and cockroaches are my two like bugaboos.

SPEAKER_01 31:34

I had a cockroach, I can handle snake. No, no way. I will not be doing exposure therapy. Thank you. With snakes. But if you're wanting to do exposure therapy with a snake, then the idea is like you get a little closer to a snake, but in a safe distance from it, right? So I don't know why I'm bringing up snakes, probably because that's my biggest fear of all time. So that in heights. Um, but anyhow, you're able to do that. And then getting that that client to talk about what that experience was like. And you're not gonna go from one day to a retired, but maybe it's one day to two days. Maybe we're doing two days, and then we have the weekend, so it's really a four-day weekend, and you're actually not going to work at all. You're not allowed to open your phone, you're not allowed to open your computer. You're going to live like you would if you might be retired. You don't have these other obligations. So setting some boundaries around what that looks like. So it's really figuring out what is the tiniest step that a client is willing to take themselves. And having that client come up with those possible solutions with your help is going to be the most helpful. You can help them brainstorm ideas, and I recommend coming up up with more than one idea. Um, but then, you know, asking the clients, really the client's decision in terms of what is it that you're willing to try? And when when are you going to do this? And let's make make a date for that, for when this is going to happen, what this is going to look like.

SPEAKER_00 33:21

I like that idea of uh one, just taking or doing experiments. Jake Northrop, one of the advisors and firms that I work closely with, like he and I talk, he was doing this before I even came out, like, hey, can we experiment like with this? And I love that idea of experimenting, particularly with clients who are very anxious, because I think it does put those like guardrails kind of in place of it's an experiment. Like, yeah, so we're not diving like all in. Like we can we can pull back, like if we if we need to, if it gets really scary or if we try it, you know, and we we really like don't like it. Um, so I like the idea of taking experiments. And in addition to that, you know, as you said, like taking like micro steps, like what's the smallest like possible action that we can take? And really the game changer here is you know, being collaborative, like collaboratively coming up with solutions. But you know, I guess you know, seeing first like what is the client instead of giving them the answer. It's like with your kids, right? Like sometimes we don't want to give them the answer, like we want them to you want to give them the answer because we want to make the right decision because it's gonna be the right answer. Because it's gonna be the right answer, yeah. It's going to be the right answer, and then I can move on to doing whatever else is that I need to do for the day. Like exactly, exactly. And then they should just do it, and then they should just do it. There's a lot of parallels between like parenting and advising, like absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 34:52

Well, I always equate people like just in general, adults, we're all a bunch of walking teenagers. Oh, yeah. We really just want to do things our way and how it's gonna fit best with us.

SPEAKER_00 35:05

But occasionally we want people to tell us what to do.

SPEAKER_01 35:08

Because we want their permission a lot of times. We want someone else's permission, or we want them to say that's a good idea to validate what we think is a good idea. Yeah. Yes, yes. Or we might not have any ideas. And so that's where we help brainstorm. But yeah, it's collaboratively, but it really needs to be the client's the trick is to make it make you make the client think that it's their idea.

SPEAKER_00 35:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:35

That's what we do with our teenagers. We make them think it's their idea.

SPEAKER_00 35:39

Yeah, yeah. And there's some questions I think too that you know, advisors, you know, can can maybe lead with. Some of like what I'll say is, hey, like, what would you tell a friend to do in this situation? Absolutely. That they're having a hard time if they do like the, well, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. I might say, like, hey, well, in this situation, like, what would you tell, or what would you tell your adult kids? What would you tell like a friend? And see if that can just be a jumping off point. Um there. Uh you got any other ways that advisors can kind of ask and like lead into that from a collaborative place of drawing out solutions?

SPEAKER_01 36:16

Yeah. So I think one way to do that is what do you hope that a day in retirement might look like? And how are you gonna know a good day in retirement might look like? And how are you gonna know that that's been realized? Like, what are you going to be doing for that day to be successful? And then if you're if we're just taking like a day and we end up doing the day, like, how can you make this day look like what you're hoping it to be like?

SPEAKER_00 36:46

Yeah, yeah. And I think like more broadly, like a framework that I will use in general. This is not just to clients who might be, you know, anxious, financially anxious, um, but more general. And and I guess, especially if they're stuck, is hey, what's the what's the vision? I call it vision reality plan. Like, what's the vision? Like kind of like what you said, what's the hope? Like, what do you want it to look like? What would, you know, working through this particular stuck point look like? What does it look like on the other side? Okay, where are we right now? What's the reality? Like, like how far away are we? What's that's the gap there? And then maybe what is our plan for getting there? What's like step one? Or maybe it's step 0.25. Yep, we need to define. Maybe step one is like a little too big. Yeah. Um exactly. Exactly. There. So, you know, sometimes like if our goal is to go work out at the gym like more consistently, sometimes like the first step is just pulling in the parking lot. Yeah. And you don't even have to go into the gym. You just, you know, maybe maybe the next time it's you walk to the front door to the gym. Yeah. And then maybe the time after that, it's like you actually like go in and you just do a lap and like walk around to like look, I don't know. But my point is that it can we can it's baby steps of getting there.

SPEAKER_01 38:09

You don't actually have to go into the gym the first day.

SPEAKER_00 38:13

No, you no, you can just actually get out of bed and get dressed right to go to the gym. Exactly. Uh, and start there. But I think for you know, for advisors like helping particularly clients who are and struggle with financial anxiety, like those really small steps, um, at least from what I've seen, I'd be curious your thoughts, Christy, is is it can help reduce some of the overwhelm and anxiety.

SPEAKER_01 38:37

Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think sometimes advisors get, and I don't know if you see this or not, but I think sometimes advisors get caught up in like, oh, well, I I'm gonna be doing therapy. Like those kinds of questions are like therapy questions. And I I'm actually taking a a line from Meg Lurts who says, Well, I'm not worried that, and maybe she took that from me. I don't know, but I'm not worried that you're um that you're gonna be a mental health therapist. You haven't been trained to do any of those things that you would do as a mental health, well, that like diagnostic level. You're not gonna be going in and treating someone's depression, but what you are doing is facilitating behavior around a financial plan. And when you're facilitating behavior around a financial plan, you're gonna have to ask some behavioral related questions. And so you're calling it a visual realization plan. I call it solution focused therapy because you're looking at it. Let's let's look at what the ultimate vision really is, to put it in your words. What are those best hopes? What is your vision? And what the more concrete and clear someone can make that look. That's why vision boards were so popular. They might still be popular. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 40:04

I heard somebody recently like they're doing something, they might still be in.

SPEAKER_01 40:08

They might still be in. My daughter went to a little party, slumber party, like this is a little high school party, and they made vision boards for the with magazines, or did they do it digital? Well, actually, I think they um printed off pictures of different things. So yeah, yeah, but I think some of it might have come from magazines or online uh it was digital, probably. Sure, of course. I don't think they had a stack of magazines around them.

SPEAKER_00 40:35

Well, they're doing it wrong then. They're doing it wrong.

SPEAKER_01 40:37

Wow, I know they didn't flip through all of those magazines, but that's why vision boards were so successful, is because you could really you had pictures of what things look like, and research has told us that the clearer you can paint that picture, the more likely someone is they're gonna work towards it because they can visualize it, they are committed to that process, and when they start making little tiny steps towards it, they actually become more confident in their pathway towards their goal because they see themselves making progress or oh, well, this isn't so bad. Oh, well, this is what a day of retirement looks like. I can totally do this. I could do this for a couple of days. Oh, I can do this for a week. I think I might try it for two weeks now. Yeah, and so then you start making plans and it starts being more comfortable, and then that visualization or that best hope becomes reality.

SPEAKER_00 41:38

Yeah, yeah. I'll share just a quick story. I was working with a client who financially numbers-wise, um the numbers said that they could afford to buy first class tickets for their annual, like big vacation that they like to take. Um, but they were not in their minds, quote unquote, first class people. Uh, that is not how they accumulated their wealth is by being, and they were very anxious just in in from a f like the the female partner is very financially like anxious, um, which made a lot of sense. Made a lot of sense. And so the work around talking about experimenting and like trying things out is uh, you know, they did, they tried it out, they got the first class, you know, tickets. Um, and they came back and decided they're not first class people. And even though it wasn't about it wasn't the money, yeah, it was more the like this doesn't feel congruent with who I am as a person. And that is okay. That is okay. And that is okay. But I think sometimes with experiments, what's my point in sharing that story, I guess, is that just because a client does an experiment doesn't mean that it's always going to result in them saying yes. Especially if there is, you know, a high level of financial anxiety, or if it's tied to something else, something deeper, maybe like identity. Um, you know, and that's how that is okay. But what it's it's not as important, the outcome is not as important as it is walking through and just trying it and going through the process and being willing to try something out. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:27

Yeah. And experiments, it's not all or nothing. You might find a different alternative in the process. Right. So maybe it's not retirement full-time, maybe it's part-time.

SPEAKER_00 43:37

Maybe it's delta comfort.

SPEAKER_01 43:39

Maybe it's delta comfort. That's right. We lip in Georgia. So everything is Delta.

SPEAKER_00 43:44

Everything is Delta. Delta and dogs. Yep. And 2Ds. Yes. Yes. Um, all right, Chrissy, I do want to ask just quickly before we jump off here. So, you know, let's just say if an advisor is working with a client and their financial anxiety really is impacting. Decision making and progress with the plan and their overall financial well-being. Um what can an advisor do if it's kind of getting, you know, maybe a little bit outside of their work, outside of their scope? Like, what would you recommend for them to do?

SPEAKER_01 44:18

Yeah. So, first of all, try some of the questions that we have have talked about here. Um, next up is reach out to somebody. If it's like this is beyond me, I don't feel comfortable doing this. I always say, like, if you're not sure if you should be doing this or not, maybe you shouldn't be doing this. Yeah. Um, because maybe you're you haven't been trained or you're not competent in in that area. Um, reach out to someone that can't. So I Ashley did not ask me to say this at all, but reach out to someone like Ashley. Uh uh Planning Beyond, or be sorry, beyond planning. I'm writing your sign back there. You and Meg. You and you and Meg can't ever top to bottom. So beyond the plan. So reach out to somebody like beyond the plan, reach out to a financial therapist, reach out to a mental health therapist that you have um maybe created a relationship with in your own local network and collaborate with them and figure out kind of what's the next, what's the best way to move forward with this. Um, have those people act as consultants or collaborators on a case, just like you would do with an estate attorney, a tax accountant, um, and whoever else you might have on your, we don't do Rolodexes anymore, but in your digital Rolodex, in your referral resources, have someone who can work with the psychological aspects, the relational aspects of your clients. Um, have them on speed dial because that's really where the crux of a lot of planning happens. Numbers don't show up on a paper because they were, they just showed up. They showed up because how someone thinks, feels, and does and relates to one another. Um, that's how those numbers showed up.

SPEAKER_00 46:27

I love that. Thank you for sharing all of that. And, you know, no, I did not ask you to say that, but I'm always very grateful uh and appreciate just your endorsement uh there. And, you know, Christy, yes, we is right. We at Beyond the Plan, we do, you know, offer, you know, one-on-one direct uh, you know, client services there, helping and walking clients and you as the advisor through situations like that. But more importantly, you know, whether it's reaching out and working with us at Beyond the Plan or yes, connect with mental health clinicians like in your local area, please, please, please do that. Uh, I guess what I would want those that are listening to, you know, take away from this is that you don't have to do it alone. Uh, this isn't this isn't a scenario or situation where you have to be alone and navigating it, that there are other professionals out there that can be helpful in that way. So I appreciate you wrapping us up by sharing that. Chrissy, where can people find you? Where can they hang out with you if they want more Christy?

SPEAKER_01 47:32

Well, you can find me in a couple of different places. So, of course, the University of Georgia and a professor there. And so you can always find me there or on LinkedIn, or you can find me at Behavioral Keynote Group.

SPEAKER_00 47:49

Yes. Yes. Bring Christy to your group. Bring her to your next event. She is fantastic. Or even better, if you're listening to this, you could apply to be a part of the graduate program at UGA.

SPEAKER_01 48:04

That's right. We have a fabulous behavioral financial planning and financial therapy graduate certificate, um, and also track in our master's program. So our graduate certificate is fully online. So if you want to be more competent and proficient and gather the skills and actually apply the skills, that's what's cool about our program is that we have an experiential component where you take what you learn and you put them into practice in a pro bono setting. Um it, we would love to have you.

SPEAKER_00 48:35

Yes, yes, all of the things. Well, Christy, thank you so much for coming on and sharing all of your wisdom uh here uh today. I selfishly I enjoy just any opportunity to be able to chat with you. And thank you to all of you who are tuning in today, who have allowed Christy and I into your mind, into your ears. If this conversation resonated with you, I would love to keep the connection going. You can find me on LinkedIn, which is where I primarily hang out at Ashley Kwame. I share weekly insights on the human side of planning. And just in case, if you want even more, Ashley, even more beyond the plan, you can subscribe to our monthly newsletter at www.beyondthefp.com. Make sure to follow the show so that you never miss future conversations like this one. And as always, my friends, remember finances don't have feelings, but your clients do. Until next time, keep planning, keep growing, and keep going beyond. Thanks for joining me on this episode of Planning and Beyond. I hope you found today's insights valuable and inspiring for both your practice and your personal growth. If you enjoyed the show, please subscribe and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform. Your feedback helps us reach more advisors like you who are dedicated to making a difference. For more resources, tips, and to continue the conversation, visit our website at beyondthefp.com. You'll find articles, tools, and information about upcoming episodes designed to support your journey and practice. Stay connected with us on social media and never miss an update. Follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn. And remember, the best way to grow is to keep learning and sharing. Until next time, keep planning, keep growing, and keep going beyond.