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Most of us think of paying for something as a simple transaction. You hand over the money, take the receipt, and move on. But what if the act of paying itself — how, when, and even whether we pay — carries hidden meaning about our relationships with money and the people we pay?
Recently, I spoke with Vessy Tasheva, a psychoanalytic psychotherapist and financial therapist from Dublin, Ireland. In her practice, she asks clients to pay in cash at the end of each session. No cards, no apps, no automatic transfers. Just a bill, an envelope, and a moment of direct exchange.
It’s about consciousness, not convenience. “Money plays a key part in the transference and countertransference between client and therapist,” Tasheva explained. “Maybe a client forgets to pay, maybe they overpay, maybe they try to renegotiate their fee. Each of those things can have meaning.”
What happens at the point of payment isn’t just about money, it’s about what money represents. It can symbolize trust, guilt, control, resentment, or gratitude. Ignoring that moment, as Tasheva puts it, is losing “an opportunity for a friction point to have insight.”
Financial friction points are where emotion meets money: When we negotiate a raise, lend to a friend, or decide whether to spend or save. These are the moments when our money scripts come alive, often without our awareness. Someone who delays sending an invoice may not be struggling with bookkeeping. They may be wrestling with feelings of shame or fear of rejection.
Tasheva’s approach invites us to notice those moments rather than smooth them over. “If everything happens automatically through a standing order,” she said, “we lose that opportunity. There’s no space for meaning to emerge.”
There is science behind this. Researchers in neuroeconomics have found that paying with cash activates areas of the brain linked to emotion and self-control, while paying by card lights up the brain’s reward centers. Parting with physical money registers as real loss. Behavioral studies consistently find that people spend 12 to 18% more when using cards than when paying with cash. The very act of touching and releasing money seems to bring us back into our bodies, where choices carry more weight.
