It’s hard to predict what the economy will look like two, five or ten years from now. It’s even harder to predict what the stock and bond markets will look like down the road. So with all that uncertainty, it’s better to focus on what you do have control over vs. what you have zero control over.

And that brings me to the “number”.  By the number, I’m referring to the amount of wealth you need to accumulate by the time you’re ready to retire and stop working for money. I believe this number is vitally important to not just your financial well being, but to your overall well being as well.

I kicked off my financial planning practice seven years ago by holding free workshops at the Integrative Medical Clinic in Santa Rosa, CA. The theme of the workshop was Financial Wellness. The sub-theme was how stress and worrying about money can and often does cause illness and how illness causes disease. These workshops were purposely held at a holistic wellness center to emphasize the point of how dangerous worrying and constantly stressing about money is to your health. With MD’s, Naturopathic Doctors and other healers in the audience, they gave testimony to this toxic link. They would describe treating patients, only to see them right back at the clinic the following month with the same symptoms. When they questioned their patients on what was causing them the most distress in their lives, inevitably worrying about money would be the number one cause.

So fast forward to today. We’re living through the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. Trillions of dollars have vaporized and it will be a while before the global economy recovers. Financial projections of what you thought your retirement would look like two years ago have most likely been turned upside down. That stinks and it’s a painful reality. But now is the time to regroup, rebuild and plan for your future without any regrets, without any shame or blame, time to move on.

I’m highly concerned that many people in our country, especially men, are internalizing this stress and worrying about money and putting their most valuable and precious asset, their health, in serious risk. If you think constant low grade stress doesn’t have the potential to cause long term damage to your health, please reconsider that assumption.

So if you think the next ten or twenty years of your life are all about playing catch-up for the money you have seen disappear from your net-worth, you’re setting yourself up for a life of striving and never arriving. Find out what your new “number” is. Maybe it means changing your lifestyle moderately or drastically. Yet overall, keep your eye on the prize, and that prize is your health. Health is wealth. If you find yourself stressing or worrying about money often, time to take action. Nothing, absolutely nothing is worth risking your health for, especially not over money.