Your Emotional 401K (pt. 1)

This blog was first posted by Nathan Hansen, LPC at http://nathanhansenlpc.com/investing-in-healthy-relationships/ and is used here with permission of the author.This is the first of a series of posts on managing and investing your emotional currency so you can have healthy relationships. When you are done reading these posts, I hope you have an idea of how you could reap the rewards of a fully vested emotional relationship portfolio just as you would enjoy a strong financial portfolio in the later years of your life. You will be familiar with how you spend, save, and invest your emotional currency in relationships much like you would with investing your personal finances.Most of us have money. Most live in a constant struggle living pay check to paycheck.  Some are one step away from financial ruin or are currently picking up the pieces feeling hopeless.  Perhaps you’ve been taught how to manage your money well.  Maybe your family did everything it could to survive and you weren’t taught how to manage your money.  Others have not made wise decisions with however much or little they have. Most of us are somewhere in between.  We all have an expectation of what our retirement will be like. We look forward to being less busy, relaxed and spending time doing what we always wanted to do.However, there’s another investment and it is one we do not talk about enough.  It is your Emotional 401k.  This investment will provide you with healthy, strong, lasting relationships.  It will only work if you have an intentional and planned emotional investment strategy.Without an investing strategy we may become emotionally bankrupt. Do you struggle with being depressed, being anxious, or being frustrated? Have you done everything and nothing is working?  Maybe you just can’t seem to be on the same page with your teen?  Have you been struggling with the fallout of a friendship? Do you want to be in a romantic relationship but it never works out? Is your marital relationship good? Are the relationships with your kids full of frustration? Maybe your co-workers or supervisor drive you crazy!Questions like these can be addressed and can possibly change as you learn how to manage your Emotional 401k.   The next post in the series will define our emotional currency spending habits.