How your spending changes according to your ‘love language’

We all have a relationship with money – and, as with any relationship, a little bit of love goes a long way. Here’s how you can make the most of yours using the five love languages, writes money coach Talia Loderick

How would you describe your relationship with money? This is something I ask my coaching clients when we start working together and the range of responses is so varied and interesting, including:

“Fraught, disconnected, full of negative emotion. But with glimmers of hope!”

“All a bit at sea. I’m mad at it – mad at myself, really. I have savings goals but I struggle to prioritise my money. I’m easily distracted and impulsive with my spending and then get mad that I don’t have the money to do what I’d really like to do.”

“Thoughtful and intentional. I’m careful with how I earn money and how it’s channelled for current and future use.”

The five love languages

I’m a money coach – of course I’m taking Valentine’s Day (and Galentine’s Day!) and applying it to money.

Enter the five love languages. Have you heard of them? They’re as follows: words of affirmation, quality time, giving and receiving gifts, acts of service, and physical touch.

The Five Love Languages is a 1992 non-fiction book by Gary Chapman which details five ways that romantic partners express and experience love. There’s an online quiz you can take to find out yours.

Here’s how you can apply the five love languages to your finances – whether your relationship status is coupled-up, single and ready (or not) to mingle or “it’s complicated”.

‘If you could beat yourself up into being better with money, you’d probably be stress-free and sitting on a fortune by now. So, let’s bin that approach’ (Getty)

Words of affirmation

What you say to yourself matters. If you repeatedly tell yourself you’re bad, useless or hopeless with money, it’s no surprise if this shows in your actions. And how’s the negative talk working out for you?

If you could beat yourself up into being better with money, you’d probably be stress-free and sitting on a fortune by now. So, let’s bin that approach – it’s not about lying to yourself but there’s a difference between blame and taking responsibility for your situation.

This can look like shifting from thinking, “I’m bad with money” to “I am learning how to be good with money” and taking action to reinforce these words of affirmation with your behaviour, whether that’s starting a savings habit or putting an hour aside each week to work on your finances and get clear on your numbers. Which brings me to…

Quality time

Getting on top of your finances doesn’t have to take ages, but it does need time devoted to it. My top tip here is to schedule time to work on your finances and set an agenda so you know exactly what you’re working on.

One of my clients set aside one morning a week to review her finances. “Finance Friday” is now her ongoing weekly quality time with her money.

Another client put an afternoon aside to do a subscription sweep and saved herself £1,500 in the process – not a bad result for two hours of quality time.

Yet another client scheduled a money date with her husband so they could pin down the family summer holiday – where they were going and how they were going to fund it.

“If it’s in the diary, it’ll happen,’ she said. And it did. She put time in their shared online calendar, the money date happened, and their holiday is now booked and will be paid for with no last-minute money stress.

Receiving gifts

It’s tempting to slash and burn all your non-essential expenses when trying to budget and improve your financial situation. But it’s a false economy to cut back on all the things that make life worth living.

Similar to dieting, what happens then is that people eventually crack and splurge, then beat themselves up for being bad at budgeting and stop – and perhaps end up worse off than where they started.

Instead, whether giving or receiving gifts, budget for joy. Keep a line in your budget for the things that matter to you and your loved ones.

Think savvy instead of splurge, thought over cost. Giving and receiving gifts can be no cost or low-cost. Swapping those overpriced Valentine’s roses for a more affordable bunch of daffodils, for example. Get creative and come up with options for how you can achieve a similar outcome for less, if that’s what your relationship with money needs at this time.

Acts of service

Like a partner who shows their love by fixing things around the home rather than saying “I love you,” this love language is about intentional actions that make your life easier or more enjoyable.

Think about your future self. What can you do now to make your life easier for them?

Short-term, this may look like writing down what’s still to come out of your bank account this month so you’re not quaking every time you get a Monzo notification on your phone.

Longer-term, it might be sorting your pension out so you have enough money to live the life you want in retirement.

Be proactive instead of reactive with your money. Your future self will thank you for it.

Physical touch

While I, like many, tap away on my card for the majority of my transactions, I try to take out cash every week as purse money.

It helps me not overspend on, erm, Haribo sweets, to make up the £3 minimum card transaction at my local shop (a win for my health). It also helps my wealth as handing over cash creates greater awareness of my spending as I see and feel the money go down.

Cash offers a helpful pause that allows people to consider if they want something enough to part with their cold, hard cash for it. Reintroducing this pause through the use of cash is what one of my clients opted for last year to improve her relationship with money.

Plus, the recent banking outages provided a timely reminder that having a bit of cash to hand is always helpful.

Talia Loderick is a Money Coach. Talia helps people understand and take control of their behaviour with money so they can stop stressing about money and have enough to live well – now and in future. Visit: talialoderick.co.uk.