By Linny Kresch Jones, LPC

Money Baggage

An attachment theory for your relationship with money — why your bank balance triggers the same nervous system as your childhood ever did, and what to actually do about it.

Take the Free Assessment Work With Me
The book is currently in draft — this site shares the framework early and stays updated as it develops.
The Idea

You didn't pack this bag.

Everyone alive is dragging a bag through an airport they didn't choose. Somebody packed it for you, mostly before you were old enough to object.

You check your balance seven times before noon and call it diligence. You haven't opened a bank statement in months and call it "not that important right now." None of that is a math problem. Nearly everyone has spent years trying to solve an emotional pattern with a spreadsheet — and it was never going to work, because a spreadsheet is the correct tool for the wrong problem.

Money Baggage takes attachment theory — the framework built by John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth to explain how children learn to trust (or not trust) their caregivers — and applies it, in clinical detail, to money: the source of safety most of us were never taught to examine.

Where It Comes From

Linny is a Licensed Professional Counselor who spent fifteen years noticing that the money conversation and the family conversation in her therapy room were the same conversation wearing a different hat — and that nobody had applied attachment theory directly to money with real clinical detail.

Money Baggage is the framework that filled that gap: four attachment styles, twelve sub-styles, a free in-depth assessment, and a way back to a calmer relationship with money that doesn't start with a budgeting app.

The Model

The Four Money Attachment Styles

Two dimensions underneath every pattern: Anxiety, the fear of not having enough, and Avoidance, the fear of feeling trapped by money.

AVOIDANCEfear of feeling trapped by money
LOWHIGH

Secure

  • The Through-Checker — antidote to Anxious
  • The Bag Claimer — antidote to Avoidant
  • The Standby Volunteer — antidote to Disorganized

Anxious

  • Carousel Watcher — compulsive checking
  • Overpacker — controls others' money
  • Lost Luggage Alarmist — catastrophizes small dips

Avoidant

  • Unclaimed Bag — avoids all information
  • Vacuum Packer — decides in a vacuum
  • Carry-On Forced Check — downplays until forced

Disorganized

  • Gate Repacker — spree, then overcorrect
  • The All-or-Nothing Packer — all-in, then all-out
  • The Unrequested Porter — rescues, then drops it
LOW
HIGH
ANXIETY   —  fear of not having enough
Twelve sub-styles in all, three to a quadrant. The nine outside Secure each describe a way of carrying the baggage; each Secure sub-style is the antidote to one of the other three quadrants.

A single person can look Anxious about a joint account and Avoidant about a business's cash flow — style isn't one fixed setting across a whole financial life. Style can also shift temporarily under stress, even for people who are largely Secure. That's not a relapse; it's a sprained ankle, not a broken bone.
Chapter One · The Framework in Detail

The Twelve Sub-Styles

Three sub-styles to a quadrant, each paired with one concrete technique for working with it.

Secure

Low Anxiety · Low Avoidance

Low anxiety, low avoidance. You trust that money will mostly work out.

The Through-Checker

Antidote to Anxious

Checks in at sane intervals and trusts the system the rest of the time — a partner, an advisor, an autopilot transfer — instead of needing to watch every leg of the trip to believe the bag will actually arrive. This person has faith that it will work out okay.

The Bag Claimer

Antidote to Avoidant

Opens the mail, checks the balance, follows up on the loose end — on an ordinary Tuesday, not a crisis day — because looking was never actually the dangerous part.

The Standby Volunteer

Antidote to Disorganized

A stretch runs hot, a stretch runs cold, and both get absorbed as ordinary variation — no spree to chase it, no panicked overcorrection to follow it, because neither extreme is where this nervous system lives.

Continuous Security. A healthy, consistent relationship with money, modeled from childhood on. We all wish this was handed down to us.
Earned Security. Inherited a different style, and did the deliberate work — often as an adult — to build something steadier. This book is how you earn it.
TO PROTECT IT
Say the real number out loud, in one sentence, to the people it affects, then take the next practical step. No spiral, no secrecy, no performance of calm you don't feel.

Anxious

High Anxiety · Low Avoidance

High anxiety, low avoidance. Money is watched, counted, and worried over.

Carousel Watcher

Compulsive checking

Compulsive monitoring — checking balances and refreshing statements, scanning for danger that hasn't arrived.

TRY
Before you check again, write down the actual evidence for and against the fear. A concrete, countable answer to a threat that feels total and formless.

Overpacker

Controls others' money

Manages their own high anxiety by taking on other people's money problems as their own — projecting onto, and trying to control, other people's spending, saving, and investing habits.

TRY
Before you weigh in on someone else's money decision, ask whether they actually invited the input. The danger point is the urge to control it, not the concern underneath it.

Lost Luggage Alarmist

Catastrophizes small dips

Reads an ordinary financial event — a slow day, a market dip over a week — as proof the whole thing is collapsing, regardless of what the numbers show. Any bad data point gets catastrophized into everything: a broken hair dryer once became, by dinner, “we're going to lose the house.”

TRY
One monthly review with a standing rule: an off month is unremarkable data, not evidence requiring an emergency response.

Avoidant

Low Anxiety · High Avoidance

Low anxiety, high avoidance. Money stays unexamined, and so do the feelings underneath it.

Unclaimed Bag

Avoids all information

Avoids financial information entirely — unopened mail, unchecked balances, sometimes for years — then acts surprised when the debt collector finally calls.

TRY
20 bounded minutes, once a week, with a hard stop, and someone else aware you're doing it — so looking doesn't depend on willpower.

Vacuum Packer

Decides in a vacuum

Makes financial decisions in a vacuum and simply never mentions them — no input from another person, no outside data, just a call made alone and sealed shut, like buying too much on vacation and hoping it somehow fits in the bag.

TRY
Before it's final, bring in one outside data point or one other person's read — not to ask permission, just to break the seal before the decision locks.

Carry-On Forced Check

Downplays until forced

Willing to discuss money if asked, but consistently downplays how big or urgent a problem really is — the expanded roller bag insisting it's still a carry-on, genuinely offended when it finally gets gate-checked.

TRY
Practice naming one honest number or preference out loud, instead of the reflex to make it sound smaller.

Disorganized

High Anxiety · High Avoidance

High anxiety, high avoidance. Swings between panic and shutdown.

Gate Repacker

Spree, then overcorrect

Swings visibly between spending sprees and panicked overcorrection, with no obvious in-between.

TRY
Pre-agree on one action for either extreme, before it happens. A menu of choices is exactly what this pattern can't use once it's activated.

The All-or-Nothing Packer

All-in, then all-out

Alternates between total absorption and total disinterest in money — their own and everyone else's — with no steady in-between, and it's as confusing to the people around them as it is to the person living it. The same trip gets seven kimonos and zero socks.

TRY
Pre-agree on one fixed checklist of the boring basics, and run it every time, regardless of how much interest or disinterest you feel in the moment. The checklist catches what the swing itself can't.

The Unrequested Porter

Rescues, then drops it

Alternates between taking over someone else's finances — unasked-for loans, rescues, advice — and quietly setting the whole thing down once it gets heavy. The Overpacker's generosity, minus the anxiety and minus the follow-through.

TRY
Ask before you carry it: “Do you want help, or do you want to be heard?” Then check your own bag before anyone else's.

Free Assessment

The Money Baggage Assessment

Find your Money Attachment Style and your sub-style, see how your pattern shifts across different areas of your life, and get one technique to try this week.

FreeAbout 30 minutesYour full profile, the moment you finish

What’s in your money bag?

Nine short parts, about 30 minutes. The questions adapt to your answers, and at the end you get a full profile: your style, your sub-style, where it shows up, where it came from, and one technique to try this week. Your progress saves on your device if you need a break.

Begin the Assessment

Short on time? Take the five-minute quick quiz for a first read.

Your answers go to Linny and Tandemly only, and are never sold or shared. This is a starting compass, not a diagnosis, and not clinical or financial advice.

Short on Time?

The Five-Minute Quick Quiz

Sixteen statements, five honest minutes. A first read on your style — the full assessment above goes much deeper.

Part One · The Anxiety Scale
Part Two · The Avoidance Scale
0 of 16 answered

Anxiety Score: /40
Avoidance Score: /40

Inside the Book

What Each Chapter Covers

Money Baggage is written in draft — these are the chapters as they currently stand.

Introduction

The Bag You Have Been Carrying

The core metaphor, and why a spreadsheet has never once fixed an emotional pattern.

Chapter One

Everyone Has Baggage

The full framework: four styles, twelve sub-styles, the quiz to find your own, and a first technique for each.

Chapter Two

Generational Trauma

Building your money genogram — tracing the scripts and silences across generations.

Chapter Three

Financial Shame

The feeling doing more damage in this territory than any other single emotion.

Chapter Four

Identifying Your Triggers

Catching your pattern in real time, instead of only recognizing it in hindsight.

Chapter Five

Net Worth Is Not Self-Worth

What happens when a number quietly becomes a verdict on who you are.

Chapter Six

Money Fights Are Never About Money

What's really happening when two Money Attachment Styles collide — partners, co-founders, family.

Chapter Seven

Rewiring Your Spending Habits

Naming, regulating, reframing, and rehearsing — the four stages of actual change.

Chapter Eight

Boundary-Based Systems

The external structures that keep a private breakthrough from getting eaten alive at Thanksgiving.

Conclusion

Passing Down a Lighter Bag

What you're already transmitting to whoever's younger than you — and how to change it on purpose.

Appendix A

A Checklist to Return To

The checklist, scripts you can borrow mid-conversation, and the twelve sub-styles at a glance.

Appendix B

Go Deeper with Your Baggage Blueprint

An optional second layer: your Enneagram type as it shows up around money — the why behind your style.

Linny Kresch Jones, LPC
About the Author

Linny Kresch Jones, LPC

Linny is a Licensed Professional Counselor specializing in the intersection of attachment, family systems, and money. Drawing on fifteen years of clinical practice, her certification in the Integrative Enneagram Questionnaire, and considerable personal experience unpacking her own baggage, she developed the Money Attachment Styles framework at the center of Money Baggage.

She works with individuals, couples, and business partners navigating the emotional architecture underneath their financial lives. She is also Co-Founder of Tandemly, a leadership coaching and business consulting practice that helps executives and teams level up through coaching, management consulting, and Enneagram-based work. Money Baggage is her first book as a solo author; before it, she co-wrote Please Do Disturb (Barett Kohler).

  • Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC)
  • 15 years of clinical practice in attachment & family systems
  • Co-Founder, Tandemly — leadership coaching & business consulting
  • Certified, Integrative Enneagram Questionnaire
  • Co-author, Please Do Disturb (Barett Kohler)
  • Creator, the Money Attachment Styles framework
Stay In The Loop

Get Money Baggage Updates

New chapters, quiz results by the numbers, and early access as the book develops — straight to your inbox.

Powered by Zoho CRM. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Let's Work Together

Testing Ideas, Taking Clients, Open to Conversation

Money Baggage is still being written — which means this is the right moment to talk, collaborate, or bring the framework into your own work.

Client Sessions

Individual, couples, and business-partner work using the Money Attachment Styles framework.

Inquire

Media & Social

Podcasts, interviews, and collaborations — happy to talk through the framework or a specific chapter.

Get in Touch

Follow the Book

The manuscript is in draft. Use the sign-up above to be notified as chapters and the release develop.

Sign Up