The Lifeworks Group, Inc.

By Laura Hull, LMFT Coping Coach Are you sick of worrying about money?  Is the stress of keeping up with the Joneses or maybe just making the minimum payments sucking the joy out of your life?  The economy has been tough for a few years now.  This is not news.  Many people are struggling in many ways these days.  Again, this is not news.  Those who find themselves reading this article are likely either struggling with financial problems or love someone who is.  This is a reality of the world we live in.  Financial problems can cause a tremendous amount of stress in our families and in our marriages.  Money problems are some of the most identified problems in couples work.  We can’t control the world economy, but there are things we can do to minimize the stressors that debt and problems with managing money can bring into our lives.   Tired of being under the weight of debt?  Here are the first steps on the r...

By Chris Hammond, MS, IMH He was the responsible one, the one everyone depended on because they knew he would come through.   He was determined, focused, ambitious, reliable, detail-oriented and motivated yet here he sits having to make one of the hardest decisions in his life, one that would forever tarnish his reputation.   It is the decision to file for bankruptcy.   There is a part of him that intellectually knows it must be done as the numbers don’t allow for any other alternative yet there is another part of him that is not willing to admit failure.   And that is exactly how he sees it, as failure and a blemish to his name which will never be forgotten.   No amount of mutual bankruptcy filers including various famous or successful people seem to calm his anxiety or set him further at ease.   No amount of verbal encouragement from a variety of friends and family seem to lift his spirits.   And no amount of logical detailed analysis se...

By Dwight Bain A recent USA Today poll asked this question, “Which best fits your holiday emotional state?” • Relaxed - 18% • Joyful - 31% • Stressed - 27% • Depressed -24% Why do people feel so overloaded with additional problems during the holidays? I believe the majority of the pressure they feel is from trying to live up to unrealistic expectations of creating a ‘perfect’ Christmas. Remember Clark W. Griswald from the movie ‘Christmas Vacation?’ He is the laughable, but best illustration of a guy who tries to do everything right, only to have literally everything go wrong. Dysfunctional relatives, one blown bulb derailing all of the decorations, the Christmas tree goes up in flames, the turkey is dry, the check for the swimming pool is going to bounce, add in a crazy cousin kidnapping the hateful boss, while the dog destroys the house chasing a rabid squirrel and a senile senior citizen sings the national anthem and you have the wh...

It seems that our culture encourages the concept that after you say “I do” at your wedding, you also say “I do” to a house payment, car payments, new furniture, nice honeymoon, and each other’s debt. Here is a new thought: the ball and chain in your marriage is not each other, but rather the debt you both carry around. Think about it. The debt becomes like an additional partner in your marriage as you can no longer separate without bringing the debt with you no matter who in the marriage contributed to the debt. The debt controls what you can and cannot do, where you can and cannot go, and how you can and cannot spend. The debt becomes part of your every conversation, the cause of great anxiety and increases your stress as each of you takes a stand against the other in the blame game. That is why there is no quicker way to destroy your marriage than to go into debt. How did we get here? In the movie, “The Company Men” there is a scene in which Ben Affleck depicts the faça...