Rick Kahler: Laura Armstong asks what we stood for. A look at why the question still matters in your financial life

If you grew up in the U.S. in the 1960s, '70s, or '80s, chances are you remember school assemblies where we were taught about character. Words like “respect,” “responsibility,” and “kindness” weren’t controversial — they were the glue that held our communities together.

I recently came across a powerful essay by Laura Armstrong that asked a simple but piercing question: What happened to what we stood for?

It got me thinking — what happens when those values fade not just from our politics, but from our finances?

Just like “diversity,” “equity” and “inclusion” have become battlegrounds in public discourse, words like “wealth,” “success” and “security” have picked up emotional baggage. Somewhere along the line, financial values that were once simple and clear got tangled in shame, fear and polarization.

I see this every day as a financial planner and financial therapist. Clients come in carrying two sets of beliefs — one they were taught as kids, and another shaped by experience, trauma or culture. These internal belief systems often clash. One part wants to give generously, another is terrified of not having enough. One part believes in fairness and helping others, another fears being taken advantage of. Like our national conversation, their internal financial system has lost its shared language.

Armstrong recalls “Culture Week” at school — a celebration of difference, a belief that being American meant being together, not the same. That mirrors what happens in healthy financial systems too. Financial health doesn’t come from uniformity, but from integration.

Financial integration means making space for all the parts of ourselves that have something to say about money: the spender, the saver, the security-seeker, the dreamer. It means re-centering on values like empathy, fairness and courage — not as buzzwords, but as behavioral guides.

When fairness becomes “socialist,” when helping becomes “weak,” when security becomes “selfish,” we confuse our compass. Clients start making decisions from fear rather than vision. They hoard money when they want to be generous. They give recklessly when they’re afraid to say no. They stop listening — to themselves, to partners, to advisors.

And isn’t that the real loss? Not that we disagree, but that we’ve stopped listening.

So maybe the question isn’t just “What happened to what we stood for?” — but also: How do I start standing for it again? In your financial life, that might mean naming your core financial values and how they’ve changed, listening to the exiled parts of yourself that have been shut out of money decisions, rebuilding trust with yourself, your partner, or your advisor through open dialogue, remembering that equity doesn’t mean “less for me,” but “more for us,” and leading with curiosity instead of fear.

Armstrong ends her piece with a poignant line: If we forget what brought us together in the first place, we risk losing what truly makes this nation worth standing for.

The same could be said about your finances. If you forget what matters to you — what you stand for — you risk losing the very freedom, security and fulfillment that money is meant to support.

Rick Kahler, CFP, is a fee-only financial planner and financial therapist with a nationwide practice, Kahler Financial Group, based in Rapid City. His co-authored books include “Coupleship Inc.” and “The Financial Wisdom of Ebenezer Scrooge.”

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