When Life Changes, So Does Your Money: Navigating Transitions Without Losing Yourself with Dr. Meghaan Lurtz

Hi, welcome to Financial Behavior Thought Leaders. I'm Mary, and this podcast takes you behind the scenes with top speakers in financial services. In this season, we're focusing on the future of financial conversations, how trust, communication, and decision making are evolving, and what that means for the way we engage with money in your work and your life.

Now, whether you're in financial services, you're planning events, or you're just simply navigating your own financial decisions, you're in the right space. Be sure to subscribe so you can get more just like this. Today we're going to explore how big life transitions impact not just your finances, but also your identity. And because when life changes, and so does your money, that shift can feel disorienting in ways that go far beyond the bank account. So today, my special guest is Dr. Megan Lurts.

one of financial behavior keynote group speakers. Let's dive into her perspective, her keynote, and how this shows up in Rollways. Welcome, Meg. I'm glad to have you.

Yeah, happy to be here.

Okay, to start us off, I wanna kinda dive in to this question of what do you see changing right now in the way that people are thinking and talking about money that we really need to be paying attention to?

Yeah, I still I in in preparing for this conversation today, Mary, I was thinking to myself, how how do I want to answer that question? Cause something that that I've been thinking about a lot, whether it's people asking me, like clients of financial advisors or my friends have been talking to me, or even some of my family members have been talking to me, that people are are starting to think about, they're starting to spend money on, they're starting to consider and hire, not

Yeah.

Not just where can I get this advice from or who can I get this advice from, be it be it financial or something else, but but like do I like this person that I'm getting financial advice from? Or do I like this person that I'm getting medical advice from? Am I gonna am I really gonna ingenu genuinely enjoy talking to them? You know, are they are they just talking at me or are they asking curious questions? You know, are they really listening? Are they providing thoughtful feedback, you know, to to like the

doctor-patient scenario, you know, do they have good bedside manner? People are starting to think about this as a part of the hiring or finding, you know, who they want to work with. And this has become even more important. You know, am I gonna enjoy this experience? And so to to maybe answer your question like more directly, you know, people are thinking about and and thinking about with with with their money.

you know, the relationships that surround it and that intertwine, you know, within it, be it family, be it professional, you know, how do I talk to my parents about this money situation in my own life or in their life? You know, how do I find an advisor that is both a skilled technician but also somebody that, you know, makes me laugh and makes me feel comfortable, you know, about my financial situation, about my financial knowledge. And so it's it's no longer just about advice and who ha who gives the best advice. It's who

Who gives advice that I actually want to talk to?

Yeah. I heard a speaker say a few a few months ago actually said, you know, back in the day as financial advisors, we were giving people access. Access to the market, access to to investments, insurance, whatever the case may be. We because that's the only way they could get access. Those days are gone.

Mm-hmm.

Right. We have now democratized access and people can get access on their own. They don't need to go and work through an advisor. And so I love what you're saying there because it really reverberates with me of the fact that it's not access that you're selling anymore. And it's not access that the person is buying. It's the person. And to me, that sets us apart from AI or anything else. Of the fact of the matter is they want you.

If they're coming to you now, it's because they want you and all of you. Tell me a little more about that. How do you see that playing out?

Well, I I even think about it, you know, in my own life. You know, I I actively try to be a person, a a colleague, a teacher to my students, a a friend to my clients and my family, that that people would actually want to talk to about money, about things that are hard, oftentimes during transitions, you know, when I think a lot of us think, I don't I don't want to talk to anybody about that. I'm just gonna go

Google it on my own, you know, and sort of like think my own thoughts and then read about it in like, you know, 27 different places. You know, we're we're really I'm I wanna be a person that is open enough, that is thoughtful enough, that is a good enough listener that people think, okay, I may do a little Googling, but then, but then I'm gonna call, I'm gonna call Megan, you know, and I'm I'm gonna talk to her about what's going on and and and

Mm-hmm.

I just think that that that goes through my mind a lot. Am I am I being the person that people want to talk to not only about the difficult topic of money, but oftentimes even in a difficult transition that they are at the same time, you know, trying to navigate.

So let's dive into the topic of transitions because I think you come in with such a unique lens. You're a researcher, your professor, your practitioner. You've got a really unique lens on how this really affects people and not just transitions, but how it impacts the financial transition. Because we as financial advisors talk about the financial transition part, but people don't feel it in that way. It's more the transitions. Can you talk more about what this means and what that looks like?

Yeah, I mean the we transition all all the time. You know, there's divorce, there's retirement, there's emptiness, there's having a baby, there's a job and then a new job, there's caregiving, you know, to one generation above you or one generation below you. You know, life's biggest transitions, you know, certainly they have huge impacts on our bank account, but but not only on our bank account. You know, they change they change who we are. And so, you know, depending

Depending on who at the moment, you know, is is listening to this, like let's think about just loss of a spouse. You know, this is probably the most painful, one of the largest transitions, if not the largest transition, that we go to, maybe besides becoming a parent. And, you know, a lot of times these individuals that are going through this, you know, entering widowhood, you know, they they change friend groups, they develop new hobbies, they

They start to have different likes and dislikes than maybe they had, you know, when they were a married person. And this, if if you're listening to this and you're like, yeah, I'm I'm yes, now that you're saying that, you know, I notice these things about myself. Like, so that's totally normal. You know, but I doubt I doubt that it's always easy. You know, like if you're a financial planner and like you're listening to this, you know, one of the big stats that we always talk about is that you most most widows.

you know, leave their financial advisor, 80% leave their financial advisor and go to work with a different advisor. And I I think a lot of times this gets tossed around like, advisors are awful and everybody's having these awful experiences. And so yes, they can finally break away from this horrible existence. No, I think people just they they go they enter into widowhood and come out the other side as a different person. And sometimes you want different things. You know, we don't leave our friend groups.

And change hobbies because we think, I hated those friends, and that hobby was stupid. You know, but we we evolve, we adapt, we grow. There are evolutions and revolutions, you know, that we are going through. And while this is interesting and can be insightful, it can also be deeply isolating. And so thinking very thoughtfully, thinking very

what what I write about, what I think about, what I am forever trying to learn about and ultimately teach about, you know, are are those big identity shifts that are also connected to money. You know, we sometimes talk about them first, about the money. You know, okay, somebody has divorced, we have to talk about separating assets. Okay, somebody is retiring, we need to figure out how to get this money and the portfolio in the sky, you know, into my bank account.

we've reached empty nest. Are we gonna downsize? we have a career shift. Okay, do we need to change these other priorities? We we oftentimes jump to perhaps what feels like, you know, the more tangible thing. I'm just gonna talk about the numbers. This is just addition, subtraction, you know, a little time value of money, this sort of thing. And we think, okay, no big deal. But but it it it is a big deal because it is our identity, you know, is shifting at the same time. And so

you know, financial planners, financial therapists, you know, might be some of the first people that hear about this transition that's happening. You know, that they may hear before the friends, they may hear before your colleagues at work, you know, know that you're actually gonna retire. And so the financial planner at the same time than the client, you know, can can begin to feel this like shifting underfoot. And we be can begin to talk about, you know, we can begin to talk about these as hard times, as you know, financial questions.

But we can also be open and flexible and curious, you know, about what we're learning about ourselves, about our changing identities, that we are experiencing, as you know, to use a fun buzzword that people like to use these days, this liminal, this liminal space, you know, which just means like the threshold of change, that we are no longer what we were, and you we are not yet who we are becoming. And that there is actually a set of skills, a set of stages for for understanding what.

what that what that navigation might look like and that that we don't always have to be totally lost. There are discussions and conversations that we can also have along with having the additions, traction, time value of money questions, we can also have some of these identity questions, you know, as we begin to shift and think about, you know, what we really want, you know, as an opportunity, not just as a burden.

Megan, I really like that you've you've coaxed this because on one side of it, you're seeing it as a financial advisor, which jumps straight to the dollars. Like, how does this impact the bottom line? What do we need to do? But what I also hear you saying in here is you're seeing it through the eyes of a person going through change, transition yourself, growing and changing. And what is that experience like? To me, I really want to hone in on that side of the coin. In fact, you've got a keynote called When Life Changes, So Does Money, navigating transitions without losing.

losing yourself. I want to know from this audience that is experiencing that, who may not even be thinking how money has an impact on it, how does money impact those transitions?

It can it can make them harder and it can make them easier. I think that that's probably one of the big things, you know, that money, money is at the end of the day, just a tool, you know, and so how well we use that tool to help us find our identity, to get on solid ground, you know, on the other side. I think that this is always the question. You know, I I think a lot about women. I am one, thankfully.

Mm-hmm.

And you know, being being a mother, being married, being a military spouse, being a daughter to aging parents, at the same time, you know, socially we have one of the largest wealth transitions, you know, that's happening that more women are going to have wealth than ever before, whether this is something that they chose, which is something that they inherited, which is something that they earned. but women being in the driver's seat when it comes to money.

is something that is different, is a transition that all of us, you know, are all women are going to experience, you know, in one way or another. And and wealth as as we become more in control or the control that we have changes, this also changes our identity. You know, now that we are the stewards, what does this mean, you know, to what we want to have happen? You know, now that we have the control, what does this mean?

Mm-hmm.

To the relationships that exist around us. Now that I have choice and freedom, what is it that I actually wish to do? You know, and is that somehow different than maybe what I was doing before, or perhaps an amplification of something that I deeply care about? You know, but I to to the fact that I wish that there, I want there to be, and therefore I do this work to have more rooms, more people, more friendly, caring people, thoughtful conversation out in the world.

About these transitions, both financially and identity motivated, because it's I I think a lot about what I do as a language. You know, I I speak a couple of languages, none of them particularly well. and but I know what that's like. You know, I know like when I want to be able to express myself and I can't, and how hard that can be. And and money is a language, you know, how we talk about that with.

people that we love, people that we're getting to know. And I think as we become more fluent in that, you know, fluent in our identity change, fluent in what that means to the changes in our finances, then it helps us to really ask for whatever it is that we need. And that I think that that, you know, truly becomes the challenge. And this is a lot about what the presentation, you know, it is about, that these changes are normal. This is some different ways to think about the space of liminality and how that relates across life.

But how that also relates across our financial decisions.

Yeah, you've just shaped that in a way that I've honestly never thought of. And that is this identity transition. I think often when you're the one running the race, or as I sometimes like to say, the hamster on the wheel, just going as fast as you possibly can, you don't get or don't take or get the opportunity or privilege of standing off and and reassessing and saying, What does this new role mean? Not just what does it look like, how do I do it? We jump to the how and the what, but like.

Who am I becoming through this experience? And how does that change me? I actually have to like jump in. What were you gonna say?

Why is that important?

And well, and just even, yeah, why is that important? And and also to realize that even though this these changes always feel different for everyone, there is there is structure to this. Or there has been some research, of course, around like the structure of this. And I I I wish I could think of the name of this particular researcher, but they have done some great work on the stages of liminality. You know, so again, liminal space being that threshold between

Yes.

what we what we were that we're not anymore, but yet we're not what we will be. And so how to think about that? And so the first part is that separation or sometimes called the ending. And so again, this could be the loss of a job. It could be a spouse. It could just be now you're the matriarch or now you're the patriarch and you're sort of the single decision maker when it comes to this financial thing. Or maybe for the first time in your life you're married and you have to make decisions together. That this also

Is a separation. Like you you weren't married, but now you are married, and now you're gonna be making decisions with two people involved, whereas before it was one. So step one, you know, ending a sort of separation. Then there's this waiting and threshold, which people people like to jump over this. You know, we like to like get I want to get as quickly to this other side of transition as possible, but that's not the best thing. And in fact, this is one of the most exciting things, and this is something that I have had to learn.

Yeah.

in my own life again and again and again and again that this this place of being actually just in the threshold, you know, but in the between, in the in-between, you know, is a place to ponder, you know, is a place to ask, like what do I really want? How do I feel? You know, what new things excite me? What new things worry me? What's important? You know, when I think about what I might want in the past or what was important in the past and what I think about what I might want in the future. You know, this

Having someone to work with or talk to during this time where I I almost envision it, which is probably a weird way to vision it, but it's how I think about it. That like it's when we have those sort of out-of-body experiences where you know you can kind of look down on yourself. You you said, you know, take a sideline, you know, to what's actually going on. There is so much to be learned in just the feeling out of what is the sort of spacelessness at this point, which

Yeah.

For some people, it can feel horrifying, and for some people can feel relief. and for others, you know, it can just feel kind of, I don't know, like jello-y or something. And so it's it's trying to figure that out, but giving yourself the time and space to do that. So we we talk about that particular stage. Then there's rising and like sometimes called the transition, you know, where okay, we've thought about a lot of different things. We've thought about how we think about them and we've thought about how we feel about them.

Now, now we're gonna kind of experiment. We're gonna experiment our way forward, which I love experimental thinking. It's almost kind of like magical thinking, and that it doesn't have to be forever. We can learn something from it. It's totally okay if it gets messed up because you still learn something from that. It frees you of a lot of stress, but you really get a play with this new this new identity and you know what he or she or they or them might like. And I think that that.

Is such a fun period and it can last, you know, for a long time. It can also be done in pieces and parcel, you know. But this idea of experimenting in order to help us really figure out, you know, what feels right for this next identity that we're going to be taking on. Then there's okay, we we figure out something, you know, I love this, you know, about my new role. I love this about this particular aspect of my transition. And so I'm gonna integrate this, you know, I'm gonna commit.

Mm-hmm.

To some sort of choice, you know, in my life as it relates to that. May you know you've tried some new things. We're gonna move forward with what works. And this is now gonna be a part of our new self. And then there's the last step, which is the reveling, which is more of like the celebratory stage. And this can honestly happen at a lot of different times.

but it's it's celebrating the discovery, this new thing that you have established about yourself that you've become more aware of. And in many ways, that now you want to share and acknowledge this, you know, as part of the transition of who you are. And so I love that this has a practical aspect to it. I love that it has stages and steps and like different ways to think about this. What is oftentimes what feels like a very amorphous, very

liquid, you know, sensation, but but it has it does have a process. You know, if we can step back and like look at the river from above, you know, not just experiencing being in the river, you know, we can see that yes, it has twists and turns, but there is a beginning and an end. And we can get, you know, from one side to the other. And so I I particularly like this model. There's lots of models of change, but I really like this one, you know, for thinking about identity transition,

Yeah.

And and the support, you know, this this is the other thing, you know. So we we have these steps, we now have the language for how to talk about it. And in the presentation, there's lots of questions, lots of different things that you can try and do as you a figure out where you're at, B, sort of start to experiment with that a little bit, and then C learn how to talk to people about it. You know, I have I have said for a long time about the trans theoretical model of change was another nerdy example of change that I wish that we taught that in school to children over trigonometry.

Okay.

Because nobody uses trigonometry and everybody could benefit from understanding, you know, how people change and how to be with people as they change. And so now that you now that you have this information, you understand where you're at in the process, you can ask for what you want. And I I lean very much on the Super Communicators book recently by Charles Duhig. It was a great book. But in there, in there he uses help hug herd.

Like those are like the three things that people ask for. And so it's like if you realize, you know, in this space, okay, I'm in the waiting, I'm in the threshold space, I need to ponder. Okay, I need somebody to hear me. You know, maybe, maybe you're in the reveling phase and you're like, I need to celebrate and I need a hug. You know, maybe, maybe you are in the transition phase and you think, I need to talk to a financial advisor because I need help. I want to understand like how to fund this thing.

yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But this gives us the words and gives us the structure, you know, to be able to communicate what is oftentimes, again, something that we try to treat like a math equation, but it is also a big shift in our identity. And if we have the words for that, we can we can do a lot better job, you know, communicating what it is that we want and need.

Meg, this is where I love the researcher, the practitioner, the person all coming together to see this process because you bring a framework that is unique and applying it directly. And that's what I feel this takeaway is. Now, let me ask you one question here, because you just gave us a lot to chew on. What is one small shift that makes a really big difference for people?

self-help is for suckers. self-help is an industry. Self-help is meant to keep you alone and needing help. the antidote to this is find a good listener. Find a helper, you know, find someone who wants to give you a high five on a great day and a hug on a difficult day, or maybe a high five and a hug, you know, on a good day.

Mm-hmm.

Or bad, whatever. Sometimes people just need all ho hugs and high fives all the time. But I don't do this alone. This is we are not meant to do these things alone. I I like these frameworks and I like these conversational tools because I think it brings us back to what is the most important thing. And in even what began our conversation today, that maybe in the rise of information and the rise of knowledge everywhere, you know, as as maybe scary and

strange and and weird and not great as some of those things are, if it drives us back to really loving to talk to each other, then you know, then then I'm all for it because I I I just think it's important, you know, to to to say it, you know, again and and again that, you know, can when you're trying to convince others, when you're trying to convince yourself, you know, when you're

Talking to someone, well, now I talk to you, Mary. And I'm like, yeah, here's this thing that I'm thinking about. And you're like, well, did you also think about, you know, this and this and this? But hey, I really liked it, you know, when you said this and this. You know, it it matters, you know, to be in communication with other people. This LLMs and Twitter, you know, jury is still out on Twitter. I pretty much sure it's not good for you. So, but like L LLMs, you know, that

People have only been using these for a very short period of time. They are just tools. But the tool that humans need, that we have always needed, that we have always relied on, you know, is that we would talk to another person and they would help us, you know, with cognition. They would help us with empathy. They would help us with connection and decision making and question, you know, our our identity and our growth and our heartbreak and our joy and and our money.

You know, and at the end of the day, you know, we still get so much more from calling our best friend, from talking to our mom, you know, from talking to a partner or a teacher, you know, and in times of transition, reach for connection. Do not just reach for consumption. If you really want an answer and you want to be supported along the way, you know, what you need is a friend and someone to talk to. And

Listening to a presentation like mine can help you, not necessarily on the friend part, you know, that's kinda up to you, but I can definitely I can definitely help you to know what to talk about and how to ask.

Yeah.

Well, and taking friends at the end of that presentation. That's what I heard, right? If you want to learn more about Megan and bring this keynote to your audience, visit Financial Behavior Keynote forward slash speakers to find everything you need. Now, Meg.

Yeah, take friends to the presentation. Good idea. Yeah, all friends welcome.

I need to ask you a final question because this whole time I've been thinking a lot about your blog. You have a blog called Less Lonely Money. And it really is meant, I feel like what you've just shared with us today is it's meant to bring people together. It's to help them find out. Tell us more why you started this and what it is, what it is for the world.

I started it because I remember living in Spain during COVID. And I remember when the general surgeon came out and said that loneliness was killing people, to the tune of, you know, loneliness is as bad for you as fifteen cigarettes a day. And I thought to myself in my little apartment in Spain at the time, you know, living through COVID and how loneliness, you know, was affecting me, that I I I obviously can't change.

loneliness for the world. But in in my little corner of the world, my little dorky, money-filled corner of the world, you know, that this is often a very dark corner for very many people for very good reasons. but it is it is a place that I could make less lonely. I could teach people, I could talk about, I could give people structure and scripts and ideas and blogs that they could read and think to themselves.

Who can who can I talk to about this? You know, there are often lots of lists of questions about things you might want to ask yourself, things you might want to ask your financial advisor, things you could ask your partner. So it's it's trying to, in the small corner that I can affect, trying to get rid of loneliness. And money tends to be, again, a very lonely topic for very many people. And if I can help make talking about money less lonely.

maybe this will have, you know, a downstream third order effect on just helping people to feel like coming back into communication, even when the communication is hard, even when the communication is about a hard thing, that that this will actually bring us together.

Yeah. Well, my response is thank you. Thank you for having the courage to put it out there. If you haven't subscribed, I highly encourage you to subscribe to her her newsletter. And it just brings up topics that no one else is willing to touch right now in a deeper way. You know, it really resonates with me because quite frankly, that's why I started Financial Behavior Keynote is I have a tiny little segment of the world and I knew that joining together.

your segment with my segment with more segments, like all of us together really open up that blue ocean mentality and just have that viability to reach someone in the far-off reaches of the world. And so if you're listening to this podcast today and this spoke to you.

We want you to hear more of this. Please subscribe to this podcast, share it with a friend or a a partner that needs to hear it right now. And please continue to come back and ask these good questions, ask these hard questions and receive that from one another. We're so grateful that you're here. And please subscribe to our show, Financial Behavior Thought Leaders, and we'll see you next time. Thanks for joining us.