[kenpo1980]

I am not sure if this is an INFP thiing or a me thing but I have always had a hard time with my finances. I would say I grew up lower middle class and we never seemed to have any money so I got used to living paycheck to paycheck. But what's disturbing is that even after many years of making what is considered a decent income I never seem to have enough money.

It seems that whenever I come into a little extra or get ahead of the game I end up close to being broke again. And what's even worse is that I don't have any really bad habits. I am not a shopaholic, I don't gamble and I really don't buy a lot of crap but all my money still gets spent. I sometimes think I have a need to always be on the edge financially for some reason. Any one else have money management issues?

[Nicolathecat]

I do and trying desperately to change that. I am trying so hard to make a budget and stick to it, but everytime it seems I am doing well something pops up that I did not account for...

[Aqualung]

I learned that if I don't have money I don't have to manage it. No, seriously I got in over my head for a few years in my youth with credit cards. Rarely used them since. Same with my wife, INFJ.

[snail]

I have trouble making any money. One of the few times I didn't get an A in one of my classes, it was my "personal finance" class, because none of it seemed to mean anything important to me. I still don't know how to balance a checkbook, so it's a good thing I don't own one. It's like my mind blanks out and can't focus on anything that has to do with money. I don't have a bank account. I have never owned a credit card. I get confused trying to fill out any kind of official forms, so it is important for me never to make enough money that I will be doing something illegal by not paying taxes. I also have principles against a lot of the things that would be involved in the whole process. I don't even have a current ID card or a social security card. I just don't like the idea of it, at all. So, yeah, I guess I have financial difficulties.

Also, I have a bunch of unpaid student loans that I have no idea what to do with. I wish I hadn't just signed every paper my parents put in front of me when I was too young and naive to know better. I was still a child at that age, having never been independent from the demands of authority figures, and behaved compliantly, trusting that everything would somehow be okay because they said it would. I wasn't mature enough to know what I was getting into, regardless of what the law says about the age of adulthood. I'm just ignoring that this problem exists, for now, and hoping it doesn't cause me any trouble in the future. There's no debtor's prison, right?

[Fiel]

I've never had a problem with money per se, but I don't hold on to it for long. Money gets me the things I want and need. The more I have, the more I can get what I want and not just what I need. At the moment, I'm living with my mom, paying off a mountain of student loans. Since I don't care much about money, I just dump my whole paycheck into my loans except for what I need for gas and a few other necessities. I don't know what I'm going to do when I'm finished paying off my loans. I won't know what to do with myself OR my money!

I did get my first credit card recently, so I could start building credit (and miles). I don't have a savings account though. Right now the loans are creating a mental money block, so I feel like I can't even look into any money options until I am debt free!

My INTJ friend on the other hand is a pro at all things money related. I have a feeling he'll be able to retire and move to Cabo by the time he's 30!

[OrangeAppled]

When I had a job I managed my money pretty well. I also grew up in a lower middle class family that struggled, but my reaction was the opposite - I never wanted to live paycheck to paycheck. When I worked I was 100% financially independent and lived comfortably on a modest income with a decent savings in the bank and perfect credit. I'm not a frugal person either, so it's not like I pinched. I did try and keep my lifestyle simple; developing a taste for something outside of my income was avoided (my taste is naturally expensive as it is) . I just kept track where my money went and always had a figure in my head of what was available for me to spend. I would earmark money for bills, money to save, and the rest was mine to do whatever I wanted with. I had a loose budgeting system.

When I was in college though, I had to keep track of every penny & where it went because there was no margin for error. It did require organization and budgeting. Every night I would balance my checking account and add up every penny I had (cash & in the bank) so I knew exactly what I was working with. I kept a longterm view - I could spend this mere $5, or save it til it adds up and I can get something larger that I want/need. Then I began to see a pattern of how I could spend in a way that would maximize what I got.

You know what I've learned though? Money is not security. For years & years you can build credit, you can manage your money, work hard & save and blah blah blah, but an unfortunate turn of circumstance can ruin it all very quickly. I lost my job in a matter of a year I was totally broke, had to move in with my parents, and my credit was ruined. Not to downplay the benefits of managing money, but this idea that it defines a person in our society really annoys me now.

[infpblog]

Money is a tool like your body nothing more, nothing less. Tools are meant to be used to enhance your life.

Taking care of your body means good health habits. It's more than going to gym. Good health is about living a healthy lifestyle.

Taking care of your finances means good wealth habits. Penny-pinching is like dieting. It's not a good habit. Most INFPs never learn good wealth habits. They attach bad connotations to money. They treat money as unimportant.

I ask INFPs all the time, how many unimportant friends do you have in their life? How long did the last person that you treated poorly, thumb your noise at and considered a nuisance, stay in your life. Not very long. You treat money as important. It won't stick around....ever. I think that's why I don't know many INFPs who are well off financially. They treat money like crap and wonder why it doesn't stick around. It's like the people who treat their body like crap and wonder why they get sick all the time.

Everybody has a comfort zone when it comes to money and studies show that you never make 10% or less than your comfort zone. If you have more than comfortable, you spend it. If you have less than comfortable you work really hard to make up for it. That's why more most lottery winners lose all their winnings in 5 years or less. They never developed good wealth habits.

Health and wealth don't happen overnight. If I've eaten junk food all my life and decided to start eating vegetables tomorrow, I'm not going to become instantly healthy. However, people think that if they get that great job and make a bunch of money, this will somehow make them wealthy.

The funny thing is there just as many books and blogs about wealth as there is about health. INFPs will read ZenHabits.net but won't read the SimpleDollar.com

[murderegina]

I find it hard to manage money for a variety of reasons. I find it easy to set goals in my head about saving money, but the difficulty in following through is the clincher. I have little to no self-disapline as is, so paired up with my disorganization is a recipe for a broke mess. However, I've been working on setting limits for myself. I don't want to blame this on my INFP-ness, but I do think it plays a major role. I wish I knew the key to success with money, but I think I'd probably overlook that too.

[Blackbird]

I find it hard to manage money for a variety of reasons. I find it easy to set goals in my head about saving money, but the difficulty in following through is the clincher. I have little to no self-disapline as is, so paired up with my disorganization is a recipe for a broke mess. However, I've been working on setting limits for myself. I don't want to blame this on my INFP-ness, but I do think it plays a major role. I wish I knew the key to success with money, but I think I'd probably overlook that too.

Same. Sometimes I do pretty well, but then there are months I'm just so hungry and I don't want McDonald's or a packet of ramen noodles, I want some real food. And real food costs a lot if you don't buy it from a grocery store and make it yourself. I need some self-discipline. :S

[Aza]

Some what, the problem I have with managing money is that I don't care enough about it to hold on to it. But I also don't care about what I can buy with it either, at least not most of the time.