Trying your best to keep your finances in check might not come easily for some persons, so they try to look for assistance. They hire financial advisors or planner or even a therapist.

But at what point in your financial journey will you be needing a financial therapist? How can a financial therapist help you keep your finances in check? Look out for the answers in this article.

• What is Financial Therapy?
• A Financial Therapists Viewpoint of Managing Finance
• How do I find a financial therapist?
• What are the 4 Types of Money Personalities?
• A financial therapist shares 3 tips to manage your money and stay sane during the pandemic

What is Financial Therapy?

Financial therapy is a relatively new field that combines financial planning services and mental health treatment.

Read Also: Expert Advice on how you can Stay on Track of your Finances

Megan McCoy, director of the Personal Financial Planning Masters Program at Kansas State University and a member of the Financial Therapy Association’s (FTA) Board of Directors, tells CNBC Make It that clients get the best of both worlds when they see a financial therapist:

They can begin to process their underlying feelings about money, while working out a plans for retirement, savings, investments and other goals.

McCoy adds that there are two primary types of financial therapists: Those who come from a counseling background and add financial competencies, and those who come from a financial planning background and add counseling competencies. Clients should pick the one that better fits their specific needs.

“Financial planners who enter into financial therapy understand that you can make the perfect plan on paper, but if you have hang ups about money, anxieties and fears about money, you’re not going to make that plan work,” McCoy says.

Though money and emotions have been tied together since the beginning of time, financial therapy as a practice is so new — McCoy says it didn’t really start developing until 2008 — that 2019 is the first year that financial therapists can get certified with the FTA. The certification ensures they are able to help clients with relationship disputes and disagreements, and depression related to finances.

Rick Kahler, a financial planner and therapist, is a pioneer in the field, and co-founder of the FTA. In the 1990s, he and a group of researchers studied the psychological and emotional aspects of money.

“What we found is 90% of financial decisions are made emotionally,” Kahler tells CNBC Make It. “The problem is that financial advisors and planners are not trained in behavioral change or communications, and therapists are not trained in money. There’s a hesitation in both camps to add competencies in the other.”

That’s all changing with financial therapy.

How does Financial Therapy work?

Money plays a large role in a person’s overall well-being, and the stresses of managing money and dealing with financial pitfalls can take a huge toll on one’s emotional health. If left uncontrolled, this emotional burden can spread into other areas of a person’s life.

Just as with any other form of therapy that addresses other aspects of a person’s life, financial therapy provides support and advice geared specifically toward the financial realm and the stresses that go along with it.

The end goal is to get a person’s finances in order and provide the necessary advice to keep them in order.

The Financial Therapy Association defines financial therapy as “a process informed by the therapeutic and financial competencies that helps people think, feel, and behave differently with money to improve overall well-being through evidence-based practices and interventions.”

Financial Therapy Reasoning

There are a range of reasons why a person would seek out or need financial therapy.

In many cases, behavioral issues cause a person to adapt unhealthy financial routines, including unhealthy spending habits (such as gambling or compulsive shopping), overworking oneself to hoard money, completely avoiding financial issues that must be dealt with, or hiding finances from a partner.

Often, bad saving, spending or working habits are a symptom of other bad habits related to mental or physical health. 

Financial Therapy vs. Other Types of Therapy

The most effective forms of financial therapy involve a collaboration between a person’s financial advisor and a licensed therapist or specialist. Both the financial advisor and the therapist have unique qualifications that the other does not possess.

Because of this, it’s hard for one to provide complete financial support, and trying to do so could potentially steer a person in the wrong direction and violate ethical codes.

However, financial advisors often find themselves providing informal therapy to clients, and therapists often deal with emotional issues related to financial stress.

Financial advisors are well-versed on their clients’ specific situations and are able to advise on the best courses of action. They’re able to share their expertise in the hopes of alleviating the financial burdens their clients face.

However, therapy is not a financial advisor’s area of expertise, and if a person requires real emotional support or needs help breaking bad habits, a licensed professional should be involved.

The financial advisor tends to be more adept at providing advice on how best to move forward with financial issues, while the licensed professional can provide support that gets to the root of a deeper problem.

A Financial Therapists Viewpoint of Managing Finance

Bari Tessler didn’t always have her finances in order. About two decades ago, faced with student loan debt after grad school, Tessler could have used someone to help her with her money issues—not just teach her how to pay off her debt, but to address the emotional baggage that came with it.

A professional like that didn’t really exist, so she became one herself.

“I got a masters in psychology, and when my student loan came due, that was when I finally realized the topic of money—practically, psychologically, spiritually, emotionally—was completely left out [of my education],” Tessler tells SELF.

She got into bookkeeping and soon married her growing personal finance knowledge with her psychotherapy practice to become one of the first financial therapists in the country.

A new and growing field, financial therapy—as defined by the eight-year-old Financial Therapy Association (which Tessler is not affiliated with)—combines finance-management techniques with attention to the cognitive and emotional challenges associated with money.

Practitioners typically come in with primary background in either psychology or finance, and learn the other specialty to help their clients address their money issues from both the practical and emotional sides of things.

Because money is never just about money, as Tessler states on her website. A financial therapist’s aim is to discover why you make the financial decisions you do.

They are not necessarily financial planners or advisors; they are there to help you put in place the steps you need to work towards your monetary goals, and help foster a healthy relationship between you and your cash.

Tessler works with clients one-on-one, and teaches a yearlong course she calls The Art of Money. Below are some points that she addressed.

What are some common emotional themes your clients come to you wanting to address?

Bari Tessler: For most people, we project a lot onto money. The whole spectrum of emotions can come up.

There are typically eight areas that people are coming to me for. The first is clarity; they don’t know their numbers at all. The second is intimacy: They really want to know their own money story, their patterns, to identify their emotions when it comes to money practices.

Three is the knowledge; they never learned the language of money, never learned how to set up a bookkeeping system. Four is ease and peace of mind. Five is success and learning to discover what their definition of it is. Six is value.

For a lot of people, value is tied up in part with money, and a lot of the things we struggle with are part of our quest to find our own self-worth. Seven is hope:

Some people that come to me are in despair and have almost completely given up. And eight is for support. We haven’t been taught to ask for help, and some of us don’t know how to accept it.

Are these negative emotions something we can ever quote-unquote fix?

Having emotions when it comes to money is totally normal. Why? Because most of us are not given a financial education from grade school up. We’re expected to just know this stuff.

But I don’t like the word negative. I want to get more specific. It’s not just this general lump of negativity. What comes up for you? Do you feel angry that you need to deal with this part of life? Do you feel anxious? Do you feel sad? Why?

It’s not like the emotions are going to go away, but they get smaller, they can diminish. The biggest thing is that you know how to deal with them.

I’ll give you an example. I had a client who decided early on she was going to be financially independent. She had invested in real estate and had made a lot of money. But every time she went to dinner with her friends, she felt a lot of guilt and anxiety.

Her approach was to just ignore her emotions and get on with it, but it wasn’t working for her. She learned to stop, check in with her emotions, and look deeper to why she was feeling this way: She felt that, because she was doing well financially, she should pay for everyone.

But by stopping, taking a moment to check her emotions, she was able to understand her reactions and accept them, and understanding them meant she could create better practices around them, and it led to less impulsive, better decision making.

What does a healthy relationship with money look like?

It’s different for everyone. Each person needs to define what a healthy relationship looks like for them. What phase of life are you in? What are your goals, what are your priorities, what are your values?

I can go back to those traditional money books and they’ll say you need x amount of money in the bank, in emergency savings, this much invested. That’s all fine and good, but we all have different priorities and values, and we’re all at different places.

I can ask those same questions six months in, a year later, two years later. We’re always going to need to adjust our definition because things happen. So I think it’s good to check in every year.

Do you find that building a healthy relationship with money is a matter of lots of little steps, or a radical shift in our daily habits?

I always say you need to do this work in baby steps because again, we’re not taught this growing up, we’re learning this as adults. One step at a time. And we need to show ourselves compassion and forgiveness, and be gentle with ourselves.

What are some baby steps we can all take, no matter where we are in our money journey?

Well number one, I want to invite everyone to do a body check-in. Ask yourself what emotions come up in different financial situations, like when you’re in line at the grocery store, or when you’re about to make a big purchase. They’re not bad, they’re not wrong, we all have them. What memories come up with that?

Start to gather information and data about your stories, patterns, and money beliefs. Understanding your emotional response and the way you think about money is the first step to changing your habits

For example, one of my clients had a lot of medical bills because his wife had cancer. They were an older couple, and she survived and they had more time together, but he was calling this expense “that damn debt.”

So he decided to rename this category of expense for his wife, to honor her. I can’t remember what he called it, but it was just like, “I get to spend more time with her,” or “She made it through, she survived!”

He said every time he goes to pay it, he gets to appreciate the fact that his wife is alive and they have more time together. Such a small thing, and it had a profound change on the way he responded emotionally to paying it down.

Number two is to learn how to use a bookkeeping system, learn how to track your numbers. Half the people that come to me or more don’t know what their numbers are, they don’t have a bookkeeping system.

That’s a biggie. Just learning how to track your income and expenses to start to get in touch with your patterns. What are your usual expenses?

There’s always going to be some expected and unexpected expenses, but eventually those surprises—doctors visits or house repairs—they’re not unexpected, you know. Within a year, they’re going to happen. Then we can start to understand income and expenses better and cash flow.

I tell people it can take three to six months to learn a bookkeeping system, and then 6 to 12 months to really feel comfortable in it.

I have people create their income and expense categories, and instead of naming them rent or mortgage, I ask them to rename them so it’s more meaningful or based on values.

Try renaming your debts so it’s not “that damn debt!” It’s such a little thing, you know, but it’s an easy way to make it more meaningful or fun or creative.

How do I find a financial therapist?

While certified financial planners help you develop and implement concrete financial strategies, and mental health professionals help you recognize and change thought patterns that aren’t serving you, financial therapists straddle both worlds.

They focus on your relationship with money and how it affects your behavior so you can realize your financial goals.

If you struggle with saving, budgeting, paying off debt, severe frugality or other money issues, financial therapy could help. Here’s how to assess whether it makes sense for you, and how to evaluate any professionals you may work with.

When to go to a financial therapist

Financial therapy can help you understand why you’re stuck in the same patterns, such as overspending, even if you’ve tried to change. It also can help you explore the feelings that bubble up when you think about money.

Gresham and Derek Lawson, a doctoral student in personal financial planning with a focus on financial therapy at Kansas State University, say financial therapy might be the right call if:

1) Your finances make you feel depressed or anxious

2) You’re consistently spending more than you earn or aren’t saving any money

3) You’ve tried to change those behaviors, with no luck

4)  You want to understand the root of your money troubles

In some cases, other experts could better suit you. Try traditional financial planning if you want straight money advice you’re fairly certain you can implement on your own.

If you’re dealing with a mountain of debt and urgently need an action plan, try credit counseling. Gresham says she refers her clients to these financial pros when necessary.

What financial therapy looks like

At your first few sessions, a financial therapist might ask you, “What are your best hopes for your financial future?” and “How would you know if these hopes were realized?”

“I might have a couple of meetings with clients before I analyze their financials,” says Lawson, who is also a financial planner at Priority Financial Partners in Durango, Colorado.

Lawson says he’ll ask clients who have trouble saving to focus on a time in the past when they did save and how they felt. That positive emotional memory may encourage clients to integrate saving into their lives more frequently.

How to find a financial therapist

Because there are few formal places to study financial therapy, practitioners today typically have either a mental health background and an understanding of financial issues, or a financial planning background and further training in mental health counseling.

(Kansas State University and the University of Georgia offer financial therapy studies, and the Financial Therapy Association plans to develop a certification in three to five years, says president-elect Sarah Asebedo, who is also assistant professor of personal financial planning at Texas Tech University.)

You can use the Financial Therapy Association’s member directory or do a general online search to find financial therapists or financial psychologists near you. The XY Planning Network lists financial planners who work with clients in their 20s and 30s.

It’s best to work with fee-only financial planners, who charge flat or hourly fees and won’t earn commissions on insurance or investment products, like mutual funds, that they might recommend you buy.

This type of planner may be more affordable than one who charges based on a percentage of your assets he or she is managing.

Check each professional’s background and training: Ideally, they’ll have both the certified financial planner designation and licensure as a mental health counselor, marriage and family therapist, social worker or psychologist.

What are the 4 Types of Money Personalities?

Like almost everything else in life, your response to money is largely dictated by your personality. But have you given much thought to how you behave in regard to your finances and how that behavior affects your bottom line?

Understanding your money personality is the first step and will help you shape your approach to spending, saving, and investing.

The Five Money Personality Types

Character traits regarding money can be classified into specific groups. This subject has been analyzed in a variety of ways, and many people can identify with parts of several of these money personality profiles.

The key is to find the type that most closely matches your behavior. The major profiles are big spenders, savers, shoppers, debtors, and investors.

Big Spenders

Big spenders love nice cars, new gadgets, and brand-name clothing. People with a “spending” personality type aren’t typically bargain shoppers; they are fashionable and always looking to make a statement.

This often means a desire to have the latest and greatest mobile phone, the biggest 4K television, and a beautiful home.

When it comes to keeping up with the Joneses, big spenders are the Joneses. They are comfortable spending money, don’t fear debt, and often take big risks when investing.

Savers

Savers are the exact opposite of big spenders. They turn off the lights when leaving the room, close the refrigerator door quickly to keep in the cold, shop only when necessary, and rarely make purchases with credit cards. They generally have no debts and may be viewed as cheapskates.

Savers are not concerned about following the latest trends, and they derive more satisfaction from reading the interest on a bank statement than from acquiring something new. Savers are conservative by nature and don’t take big risks with their investments.

Shoppers

Shoppers often develop great emotional satisfaction from spending money. They can’t resist spending, even if it’s to buy items they don’t need. They are usually aware of their addiction and are even concerned about the debt that it creates. They look for bargains and are happy when they find them.

Shoppers are varied in terms of investing. Some invest regularly through 401(k) plans and may even invest a portion of any sudden windfalls, while others see investing as something they will get to eventually.

Debtors

Debtors aren’t trying to make a statement with their expenditures, and they don’t shop to entertain or cheer themselves up. They simply don’t spend much time thinking about their money and therefore don’t keep tabs on what they spend and where they spend it.

Debtors generally spend more than they earn and are deeply in debt while not putting much thought into investing. Similarly, they often miss taking advantage of the company match in their 401(k) plans.

Investors

Investors are consciously aware of money. They understand their financial situations and try to put their money to work.

Regardless of their current financial standing, investors tend to seek a day when passive investments will provide sufficient income to cover all of their bills. Their actions are driven by careful decision-making, and their investments reflect the need to take a certain amount of risk in pursuit of their goals.

Once you determine which of these personality types describes you the most and have put some thought into how you approach money, it’s time to see what you can do to make the most of what you have. Making small changes can often yield big results.

Spenders: Shop a Little Less, Save a Little More

If you love to spend, it’s likely that you are going to keep doing it, but you should seek long-term value and not just short-term satisfaction.

Before you splurge on something expensive or trendy, ask yourself how much that purchase is going to mean to you in a year. If the answer is “not much,” skip it. In this way, you can try to limit your spending to things you’ll actually use.

When you channel your energy into saving, you have another opportunity to think long term. Look for slow and steady gains as opposed to high-risk, quick-win scenarios. If you really want to challenge yourself, consider the merits of scaling back.

Savers: Use Moderation

Ben Franklin once recommended “moderation in all things.” For a saver, this is particularly good advice. Don’t let all of the fun parts of life pass you by just to save a few pennies.

Tune-up your savings efforts, too. Pinching pennies is not enough. While minimizing risk is any investor’s prime goal, minimizing risk while maximizing return is the key to investing success.

Shoppers: Don’t Spend Money That You Don’t Have

A critical step for shoppers is to take control of their credit cards. Unchecked credit card interest can wreak havoc on your finances, so think before you spend – particularly if you need a credit card to make the purchase.

Try to focus your efforts on saving the money you have. Learn the philosophy behind successful savings plans and try to incorporate some of those philosophies into your own.

If spending is something you do to compensate for other areas of your life that you feel are lacking, think about what these might be and work on changing them.

Debtors: Plan Your Finances and Start Investing

If you are a debtor, you need to get your finances in order and set up a plan to start investing. You may not be able to do it alone, so getting some help is probably a good idea. Deciding on who will guide your investments is an important choice, so choose any investment professional carefully.

Investors: Keep Up the Good Work

Congratulations! Financially speaking, you are doing great! Keep doing what you are doing, and continue to educate yourself.

While you may not be able to change your money personality, you can acknowledge it and address the financial challenges that it presents. Managing your money involves self-awareness; knowing where you stand will allow you to modify your behavior to better achieve your financial and life goals.

A financial therapist shares 3 tips to manage your money and stay sane during the pandemic

Nicole Iacovoni, a Pennsylvania-based financial therapist, tells CNBC Select. “Everything is so unpredictable; we no longer have that job security and guaranteed, stable income. It’s certainly making people question, ‘How can I be prepared to weather a financial storm?'”

Lacovoni offered her advice on how people can stay on track of their finances while also having peace of mind. Here are her three tips.

1. Press “pause” on your debt payoff plan

If you’re among the millions of Americans who have lost their job or expect a loss of income in the near future, stick with just making the minimum payment on your lower priority debts for now.

These are bills that, if go unpaid, won’t have an immediate and severe consequence to you or your family. Examples of these low priority debts, as defined by the National Consumer Law Center (NCLC), include medical bills, credit card debt and student loans.

But remember to at least pay the monthly minimum on your bills. You’ll remain current on your accounts that way, and your credit score will stay mostly on track — therefore minimizing any possible feelings of guilt, Iacovoni says.

Of course, making only minimum payments on credit card debt will cost you more in interest and prolong the amount of time you ultimately carry a balance.

Even the best low interest credit cards come with double-digit APR rates: the DCU Visa® Platinum Secured Credit Card has a regular variable APR of 11.50% and the Capital One® VentureOne® Rewards Credit Card goes up to 15.49% to 25.49% variable APR after its introductory 12-month no-interest period on new purchases.

Make sure you know the interest you’ll be charged beforehand and decide whether or not pausing your debt payoff is worth it.

2. Find comfort in new routines

While the stress of a global pandemic could send you running towards material comforts, Iacovoni suggests keeping your money in your pocket instead of spending it on new belongings.

“In times of stress, we all seek comfort,” she says, noting that we often crave the feeling of spending and the dopamine rush that comes with it.

“We spend just because it feels good,” she says. “We use it as a comfort and sort of like comfort food and eating when we’re not hungry, we spend when we don’t need to.”

Instead, try little habits that can bring routine and a sense of stability back in your life — and that come at no additional financial expense.

Some have reported that making the bed each morning is now a comforting ritual, along with dressing as if you were going into the office or making a to-do list for every day. Find new ways to feel fulfilled and relaxed at home, such as exercising, doing artwork or chatting with a friend.

And as you look ahead to possible new windfalls of cash, such as a stimulus check, plan on using them to save, invest or pay off debt, knowing that long-term security is perhaps the ultimate comfort.

3. See the pandemic as an opportunity to get better with money 

Pre-pandemic, you might have made entirely different choices than the ones you’ll be making now. And Iacovoni says this is perfectly normal.

She’s heard from multiple clients who regret making a big but unnecessary purchase before the coronavirus pandemic hit, or that they wished they had saved up an emergency fund or paid off their debt so they wouldn’t be worried about those payments now.

Read Also: How to Accelerate the Achievement of Your Financial and Professional Goals

But you’re not alone if you are financially unprepared during these times. Try to channel that feeling of guilt or shameabout what you didn’t do to prepare for this financial storm into something productive for your future.

“See it as an opportunity to take a more active role in your financial life and make better decisions moving forward, so you’ll never be in a state of financial panic again,” Iacovoni says.

Start by creating a budget for your “new normal.” Once you have a handle on your monthly expenses, pull your credit report to see where your credit stands. The three major credit bureaus — Experian, Equifax and TransUnion — offer free credit reports to all Americans on a weekly basis via AnnualCreditReport.com.

And if you’re looking for a community of people in the same financial boat, know that there are free online personal finance groups, such as the Financial Common Cents Facebook group, that offer advice on how to get better with money.