IDENTIFY YOUR MONEY PHOBIAS

However high we jump to clear the hurdles and move into male domains, women are still tripped by up internalized messages from media, from bosses, from childhood and from family members: Women aren’t supposed to concern themselves with money.

As a result, we often hand over the power that money confers to others, usually men, whether lovers, husbands or professional advisers. That way, we can feel cared for, safe and feminine.

Investigating this phenomenon requires deeper thinking than the girly psychobabble continuously hurled at us, the glib calls for “empowerment,” the sly hand wringing about “math phobias.” You must look at how you experienced money in your family and, more critically, how society deals with women of means.

That evaluation often releases women from their past constraints, leading us to take ownership of our own money and influence. That control, in turn, typically moves us to support the causes we believe in.

In “The Money Mirror,” a book that explores why women are so afraid of finances, New York psychologist Annette Lieberman suggests that “the traditional male values money implies—independence, power and financial reward—are the final frontier.”

We’ve heard this before, you say. Well, sure. But old habits are dying very hard. Think about it. When you pick up the check for guys, how do you feel? What happens when you meet men who earn considerably less than you do? “Men are tied into work for a sense of identity. ‘What do you do?’ and ‘What do you make?’ are vitally important to them,” says Joan DiFuria, a Bay Area wealth adviser and cofounder of the Money, Meaning, and Choices Institute. “Successful women do not ask what you do. They ask about children and relationships.”

Money, of course, still carries a serious gender bias. Women have only lately begun to earn significant dollars, reach the top of professional ladders and control the fortunes that men have traditionally managed. Around the country, the larger society continues to be tough on women of wealth and power. And as more women become wealthy — often very suddenly from selling a business or receiving an inheritance or a divorce settlement — many of us must come to terms with the meaning of financial success.

“We can’t handle money responsibly until we understand what money means psychologically,” says Lieberman. “Financial security does not equal emotional security.”

In her book, Lieberman outlines several types of women who exhibit “deadly symptoms of money phobia,” among them money-blind women, who close their eyes and think of money as vague or unreal; money-squeamish women, who find the desire for money greedy or vulgar; money deniers, who wait for someone or something to rescue them; money-folly victims, who solve emotional conflicts with excessive spending; and money-paranoid women, who use their money as a fortress to keep them protected and insulated.

Hit any nerves for you?

The solution is to do the personal work of defining your relationship toward money and its role in your life. “Women particularly need compassion for the inner critic who says they’re not worthy enough or not successful enough,” says DiFuria. It helps to acknowledge the effect of the changes in gender roles that we encounter every day.

Denying money’s influence, hiding from its power or pretending that money doesn’t make a difference won’t get you where you want to go. When you remove cash from the equations of approval and love, status or achievement, you can harness your dollars in ways only you see fit.

And that can result in exhilarating choices in life — and in giving.