If you fear everything about money, you might have chrometophobia

Chrometophobia is a situation where one experiences an intense fear about any aspect of money and finances. This includes fear of spending money, avoiding big money moves, keeping away from necessary money conversations and much more.

Now, why do we experience Chrometophobia?

Though most of us strive to make more money with every passing day, we are also afraid to lose it to some extent. We all have mixed emotions about money and we often feel like if we don't have enough, something is wrong with us. One of our biggest fears is of losing our connections and relationships and being abandoned if we don't have money. We could also be afraid of the consequences of losing money: like losing respect in society, and being looked down upon while we are left with empty pockets.

What does Chrometophobia look like? 

1. You fear spending all your savings: When we keep our money aside in our savings for some financial goals, it could be annoying, disappointing and even confusing if we aren't able to use it for our desired goals (or if we spend it impulsively on something else). And if someone has experienced that disappointment once or multiple times, they could be paranoid about spending their saved money. Even when it is necessary. 

2. You avoid money conversations: If you have never been in healthy conversations around money or have witnessed your primary caregivers avoiding money conversations, chances are you might avoid it too. This means that you would neither be willing to acknowledge any unhealthy patterns that you have nor be able to deal with them. You might also feel like avoiding money conversations since you don't want to come across as a show-off or be seen as 'poor'.  But that might be a disadvantage because when people actually have necessary financial conversations, it might trigger you or you may feel offended.  

3. Being overwhelmed with debt repayment: Say someone you know took a loan because of some situation and maybe it was way more difficult for them to repay it back than they thought it would be. That difficult period could have really sent things for a toss and put them in a negative zone about money for a long time which may have made them feel negative about borrowing money again. The problem is that being stuck in a situation with negative thoughts makes you stuck in that cycle and it is difficult to come out of it.   

4. You fear you are a burden on your family: Most of us don't like being dependent on anyone for our monetary needs because we don't want to feel like we are a burden on anyone. Also, we have mixed beliefs about depending on others for money and spoiling our relationships with them which often makes us break our backs as much as we can to make our own money. Though there is a healthy way of looking at this, it may make us more attached to our source of income, especially if there is only one source of income. 

5. Fear of making a big money move: If you are afraid of switching your job or afraid of switching industry or work profile because you fear that you won't be able to make as much money as you should, you are stopping your own growth because you fear money. Also, if you are afraid of negotiating a pay raise or feel financially lost, you could be letting fear get the best of you.

Why healing your fear is important? 

Only when we know the root cause of a problem, can we really do something about it. Knowledge of a problem gives us the power to act on a problem, heal it from the root, and heal the symptoms that come from the root. Symptoms include feeling mixed emotions about money, feeling jealous, blaming our circumstances, and feeling powerless and dependent. 

What can you do about your fear? Here are some things you can do to get over your fear: 

1. You have to know and believe that turning around your fear starts when you believe in yourself
2. You can always make more money and you don't have to do it alone. There are money experts who can always help you out.
3. You can start with protecting the money you have and then finding ways to grow them 
4. Educate yourself and don't be afraid or hard on yourself for 'wasting your money'
5. Celebrate your successes and have an attitude of appreciation for what you have.