FINANCES & MENTAL HEALTH

There's a great link between your money and mental health.

Considering the importance of both in your life, your mental health state affects your finances and finances affects your mental health state.

HOW FINANCES AFFECT YOUR MENTAL HEALTH

Many cases of anxiety and depression stem from money problems due to the rising stress levels. 

When making ends meet becomes close to impossible and your lifestyle starts changing due to lack of money, worries and stress gets triggered resulting to sleep problems.

Fear of isolation and feelings of loneliness may also kick in when your relationships start getting affected due to the changing lifestyle as a result of lack of money.

There are different feelings associated with money such as;

✓Feeling ashamed to ask for financial support from others.

✓ Fear of looking at your bank statements or talking to your money lenders.

✓Guilt for seeking support or spending money that you can't afford.

✓Stress due to the pressure of wanting to make ends meet and support people depending on you.

✓Feeling tired and exhausted from the constant money problems you've been facing.

Being able to identify these feelings and how they are affecting your behavior will help you gain control of your response to the money problems 

HOW MENTAL HEALTH AFFECTS YOUR MONEY

Managing your money is very essential, something that needs concentration and the right state of mind. When you're having poor mental health state, doing this will be hard if not impossible.

You find yourself making bad financial decisions in an attempt to make yourself feel better or brighten your mood. Hypomania which is an over active and excited behavior can cause spending money on things that are not important at the time.

Poor mental health also affects our normal functioning which may result to ineffective work or study. This in turn affects your sources of income which reduces the amount of money you get.

MONITORING YOUR MONEY MOODS AND PATTERNS 

Understanding how you feel about money and why is very helpful. Keeping track of how you spend your money and analysing why or what prompted you to do so will shed some light on your money habits which will help in the planning and managing your finances.

Questions to ask yourself;

✓ Are there times when you're more likely to spend money?

✓ What are the emotions or feelings you get when you think about money?

✓ How do you feel when spending money?

✓ Is there a different feeling you get when you save money?

✓ Are there times when you're likely to save money?