One of the biggest struggles in planning for your future is ensuring that there’s enough money. Obviously, the major concern is the future, but planning for retirement shouldn’t put a strain on your current day-to-day life.

In order to ensure that you’ll be able to live the life you want now and in retirement, you first need to determine what that lifestyle is. In other words, determining the amount of cash flow that, if you had it coming in right now and for the rest of your life, inflation adjusted, would allow you to live the lifestyle you want to now and would make you financially independent. Once that number is discovered, you’ll be able to know the amount of wealth you need to accumulate or to preserve and manage, but that’s all dependent on the right guidance.

Making the wrong choices can ensure that you work longer in life, leave you with less wealth and cash flow, or increase the risk in your investment portfolio. Yet, few people utilize their resources and seek advice from experts. A number of very bright people who come into my office with the advanced medical degrees, law degrees, accounting degrees, or financial degrees. These CEOs and high performers, because they’re experts in their respective arenas, assume that they can ‘visit’ the investment management area or other areas of finance and know all there is to know about it. But that would be like playing tennis one day a year and thinking you could beat Serena Williams. It doesn’t not show any weakness or incompetence on your end if you are not a master of all things financial: that’s why there are people who do that kind of work all day, every day, and are masters at it, whether it’s in insurance, banking, accounting, estate work, or investment portfolio management. You cannot become an expert in all these areas, but you can surround yourself with experts who are equipped to help you make better financial choices.

By surrounding yourself with experts who can help, you’ll be able to learn how to avoid some of those mistakes. And while they still may need some help, they’re going to be in better financial shape in ten, twenty, or thirty years. Just like practicing tennis one day per year won’t make you an expert, your financial well-being is not something you can visit once in a while or learn to do simply by reading a book or by taking a course. It comes from building a strong and lasting relationship with a financial expert who can help create a clearly detailed, specific, and outlined plan to ensure you’re living the life you want now and in the future.

This relationship can help reduce stress and anxiety and provide you with concrete figures to know how much to save now. By following the markets, understanding investment options, and knowing the ins and outs of the tax system, an expert can help you find money that you’d otherwise be throwing away.

For more information on picking the right financial planner so you can live the life you want now and in the future, visit tswealth.com.