How to Stop Financial Anxiety from Ruining Your Life

People experience a lot of stress when they face financial problems. The fear of not having enough money to cover daily expenses can ruin your life. That’s why it is important that you know how to stop financial anxiety from ruining your life.

How to Stop Financial Anxiety from Ruining Your Life

What is Financial Anxiety?

Financial anxiety is a type of stress that you feel about your finances. According to a study, around 65 percent of Americans suffer from stress regarding their money according to nbc news. Most of them feel the stress every day. You are not alone when it comes to feeling anxious about your finances.

There are many causes of the problem. For some people, it dates back to the time they were young. They grew with not enough money. While some parents don’t really address the problem to their kids, their attitude towards money trickles down to their children. As a result, kids grow up knowing that money is limited, and they have a difficult time differentiating between comfort and struggle.

More likely than not, you have, or know someone who has a student loan that you are still paying years after graduating from college. Or a number of bad debts not payday that they are struggling to pay off and leading them to take bad credit loans or bad credit score. The debt adds to your anxiety. Even if you manage to become free from your financial burdens, you still feel some kind of financial uneasiness. Every decision you make still comes with a hint of fear, even if you are already financially stable.

Financial anxiety makes you feel hopeless and helpless at the same time. The worst thing you can do when you are suffering from it is to ignore it. When you pretend that you don’t have any problem, it would only get bigger and you will have a harder time dealing with it in the future.

How Financial Anxiety Affects Your Lifestyle

When you are suffering from the mental discomfort financial anxiety brings, you will try your best not to waste money. These tips will help you get to know the ways of wasting money that no one thinks off. You don’t go out to eat, and you buy clothes from second-hand shops. You don’t own a car and instead, ride a bike or walk to work.

While those solutions mentioned are good ways to save money, you do those things because of the fear that you are spending more than what is needed. You fear that you will lose money and go broke.

Anxiety is harmful to your personal and financial growth. You would also have a hard time finding happiness. When you allow stress to control you, you would not find any reason to become happy.

Stressing about money can also damage your health. Individuals living in constant stress and anxiety have higher blood glucose and blood pressure levels. Those are indicators of bad heart health.

Any type of stress can be bad for your health, but financial stress can be very toxic. The body releases hormones to respond to stress, especially when the brain senses immediate physical danger.

However, the hormones would still be released, even without any physical danger. They can damage the balance in your system and become problematic over time. That is what happens when you worry about money all the time.

People with more debt have high levels of stress and it’s bad for economy as well that suggested in a 2012 study. Financial insecurity is also another cause of anxiety. The more stress they have, the more they increase using over-the-counter painkillers to numb the pain they feel.

How to Prevent Financial Anxiety

Change Your Mindset About Money

One way to win against financial anxiety is to change your mindset about money. You should know the art of not to be stress about finance condition. For instance, you should get rid of the notion that there will never be enough money especially when you are already living a comfortable life.   

Become More Involved In Your Finances

You should also become more involved with your finances. Look consistently at monthly bills and bank statements. It removes the fear of the unknown because you become more aware of your financial status.

Rework Your Budget

If you constantly worry about not having enough money for an emergency, college fund, or for retirement, you should find ways to rework your budget and learn how to live within your means. You should also set up direct deposits to ease some of the anxiety.

Develop Good Money Habits

If you still feel anxious after creating a good budget, then it means you have a deeper issue concerning money. Some people have to develop good money habits, instead of trying always thinking about money all the time.

Talk To Your Supervisor

Job security is also one of the top worries that lead to financial anxiety. If you were laid off in the past or any of your parents had trouble keeping their jobs, then you might develop the fear of losing your own job.

To have some peace of mind, you can ask your immediate supervisor about the state of the company. Ask for some feedback about your performance. However, this might have the opposite effect if you are performing badly at work. Then you should consider improving your performance.

Talk To An Advisor / Professional

Having debt can add to the anxiety, especially if you don’t have a financial plan in place. You can talk with an advisor to find out how you can reduce your overhead costs so that you can put more money into repaying your debts.  

Look at your debts and find out if you can repay them or not. You have full control of the payments and can easily adjust them according to your current financial status. Don’t overthink your decisions. If you need help, consult a professional.