Healthy Financial Habits
Financial wellness includes your earning, spending, and saving. When you engage in proactive and responsible financial practices and feel secure in your financial situation, you feel a boost in your financial wellness. Financial wellness extends beyond your bank account. Your financial habits affect how you feel about unexpected expenses, long-term goals, and day-to-day enjoyable activities. It's not surprising, then, that financial wellness often brings with it feelings of calm, security, and freedom.
Tips for Building Financial Wellness
Studies have found that relying on external benchmarks of financial wellness can cause stress, especially if those benchmarks feel too far out of reach. Rather than focusing on external guidelines, begin your financial wellness journey by naming your personal financial goals. For instance, do you want to put aside a certain amount each month for savings? Enjoy a special treat once in a while? Pay off a credit card? Take the time to write out concrete goals and why they matter to you. You can use this list to determine your financial priorities and break down your goals into smaller, shorter-term steps.
Explore these articles and resources as you set your own financial wellness goals:
Creating and sticking with a budget can help you spend and save sustainably while working toward your personal and financial goals. With a budget in place, you become more mindful of your spending habits-both those you want to keep and those you want to break.
Explore these articles and resources on budgeting for your financial wellness:
An emergency fund is money set aside for unexpected emergencies in life. It's meant to be used only for emergencies. Having emergency money set aside can give you a greater sense of security as well as make emergencies a little less stressful.
Explore these resources for starting your emergency fund:
How and why you spend are a big part of financial wellness. As you make your budget and start your emergency fund, pay attention to what you're spending your money on and why. Where you can, prioritize your expenses. Take note of unnecessary expenses that can be cut and expenses you'd like to put more into, like a savings account, paying down debt, or saving up for something big.
Explore these resources for prioritizing your expenses: