Helping Clients Break Free from Financial Shame
A Deeper Role for Financial Advisors
Shame around money can be pervasive, deeply personal, and incredibly isolating. Many of your clients may be dealing with shame related to their finances—whether it’s feeling embarrassed about debt, guilty for not saving enough, or burdened by the pressure to maintain wealth. Yet, for many clients, this shame is a quiet struggle they carry alone, often never voicing it aloud.
This article addresses how financial advisors can recognize and help clients navigate these deeper emotional barriers, providing not just financial expertise but emotional support. In doing so, you can help clients develop a healthier relationship with their money and, ultimately, with themselves.
Understanding Financial Shame
Money, in many ways, is (incorrectly) tied to our identity and sense of security. For many, it’s about more than just numbers on a spreadsheet—it’s about how we see ourselves, how we believe others see us, and how we measure our success or failure.
When financial decisions don’t align with personal or societal expectations, feelings of inadequacy, guilt, and fear can quickly follow. And it’s in this emotional space that shame takes root.
For many clients, this shame might not be a public disaster—it’s more of a private, persistent feeling of self-disappointment or fear of judgment.
Young professionals might carry the weight of debt as personal failure, fearing that financial missteps define them. A couple in their late 40s or 50s, having spent decades raising children, may quietly fear they’ve failed to save enough for retirement. Or a business owner, outwardly successful, may feel isolated by the burden of maintaining a certain lifestyle, all the while worrying about having done enough to deserve such wealth.
As advisors, it’s critical to recognize that financial shame doesn’t always present itself explicitly. Many clients may come to you for financial advice without realizing that their deeper struggle is not just about numbers, but about their identity and self-worth.
Shame Within Marriages and Families
Financial shame also impacts relationships, particularly marriages. Money is one of the most common sources of tension between spouses because it’s tied to a sense of personal adequacy. One may feel ashamed of his or her spending habits, while the other may be anxious about saving for the future. Often, these unspoken insecurities drive a wedge in the relationship.
For example, a husband might feel inadequate because he hasn’t been able to provide the life he wants for his family. This shame can manifest as guilt for not saving enough, leading to silence and a reluctance to have financial conversations with his wife. Meanwhile, she may carry her own shame, perhaps about spending habits or past financial decisions.
These emotions, left unspoken, create tension and erode trust, making it harder for couples to make financial decisions together.
As an advisor, your role goes beyond facilitating financial plans. It also involves helping clients navigate these deeper emotional and relational dynamics. By addressing financial shame head-on, you can help clients not only improve their financial outcomes but also strengthen their relationships.
Moving Beyond Traditional Financial Tools
While most advisors are trained in traditional financial planning tools—developing retirement strategies, creating investment portfolios, and setting goals for the future—these tools often don’t address the emotional and relational aspects of money. Many clients struggle with feelings of shame or insecurity around their finances, and without addressing these underlying issues, the best financial plan can still leave clients feeling stuck.
Advisors may feel unprepared to wade into these kinds of conversations, worried that they lack the skills or resources to address the emotional side of money. Some may even be dealing with their own financial shame, which can make these conversations even more daunting. But you don’t have to be a therapist to help your clients with their financial shame. The key is to create a space where clients feel comfortable opening up about their financial fears and mistakes, and to offer understanding and support without judgment.
For advisors seeking a framework to navigate these conversations, the Life Impact® Stewardship Journey from EverSource is a holistic life planning tool designed to foster authentic client-advisor communication. Through meaningful conversations and structured exercises, this resource helps advisors guide clients on a personalized path to impactful living, addressing both the financial and emotional aspects of their journey. It’s a powerful way to move beyond traditional financial planning tools and into a more comprehensive and relational approach to advising.
For those advisors who are unsure where to start, it’s helpful to see this role as one of empathy and listening. Financial steps like budgeting and investment planning are still essential, but when combined with an open dialogue about emotions, they become even more powerful. You are in a position to help clients see that financial shame is common and doesn’t define them—and that there’s a path forward.
For advisors who may be struggling with their own sense of financial shame, it’s important to remember that your value as an advisor comes from the guidance and empathy you bring to the table, not from having a perfect financial history yourself. In fact, your own experiences can often make you more relatable and effective in helping your clients work through their own challenges.
A Call to Compassionate Advising
The role of a financial advisor is more than just a job; it’s a vocation—a calling to serve others and help them live out their values through sound financial decisions. Financial shame can be one of the biggest barriers standing between people and financial freedom, and freeing clients from that shame is a high calling in itself.
As an advisor, you have the privilege of guiding clients not only toward financial security but also toward emotional peace. By recognizing the deep emotional layers that can underlie financial decisions, you’re offering your clients a path to true freedom—a freedom that transcends just accumulating wealth and helps them live a life aligned with their values and goals.
This kind of work isn’t easy, and it requires a level of compassion and intentionality. But it’s also deeply rewarding. When you help a client break free from financial shame, you’re doing more than offering financial advice—you’re helping them reclaim their sense of worth and confidence.
Incorporating this deeper level of compassion into your practice doesn’t mean abandoning traditional financial planning—it means enhancing it. By creating a space for clients to discuss their financial shame and vulnerabilities, you enable them to confront the emotional barriers that hold them back.
Here are a few practical ways you can start creating that space:
Ask Open-Ended Questions: Go beyond the numbers. Ask clients how they feel about their financial situation, what their biggest fears and dreams are, and how they define success.
Listen Deeply: Instead of immediately offering solutions, take the time to understand your clients’ stories. Let them know they are heard before you move into planning.
Normalize Mistakes: Many clients carry shame because they believe their financial blunders define them. Help them reframe these mistakes as learning opportunities, not reflections of their worth or competence.
Foster Vulnerability: Create an environment where clients feel safe sharing their fears without judgment. Be vulnerable yourself when appropriate, letting clients know that everyone—yes, even financial advisors—faces challenges when it comes to money.
Finding True Financial Freedom for Your Clients
As Christian advisors, we're not called just to be portfolio managers, but rather ambassadors for Christ in this industry. Our vocation is a higher calling than just managing assets.
At its core, true financial freedom is about more than hitting goals or building wealth. It’s about helping clients break free from the shame and guilt that so often plague their financial lives. It’s about creating a sense of peace, confidence, and dignity in their relationship with money.
Let’s commit to being the kind of advisors who don’t just help clients accumulate wealth but who help them develop a healthy, shame-free relationship with their money—and with themselves.
Shaun Morgan is Business Development Director for EverSource Wealth Advisors. In developing strategic initiatives to expand the company’s market presence, he enjoys fostering relationships with advisors and contemplating vital matters in today's financial marketplace. Follow Shaun on LinkedIn.