If you have a lot of debt, are prone to emotional spending, and spend more than you earn, then you’re not just hurting your and your loved ones’ future. You’re also having a massive negative impact on your physical and mental health. Being exposed to long-term stress is similar to responding to sickness.

UCL researchers recently published a study in the Brain, Behavior, and Immunity journal about how stressful experiences and financial strain were detrimental to the healthy interaction between people’s immune, nervous, and endocrine systems.

When the communication between these systems is disrupted, our health suffers. For example, we become more prone to various illnesses like cardiovascular diseases, depression, and schizophrenia.

Odessa S. Hamilton, the lead author of the study, said that chronic stress can disrupt the biological exchange between the immune and endocrine systems, leading to disease.

“We found that financial stress was most detrimental to biological health, although more research is needed to establish this for certain. This may be because this form of stress can invade many aspects of our lives, leading to family conflict, social exclusion, and even hunger or homelessness,” Hamilton said.

The people who reported dealing with financial strain, the perception that they might not have enough money for future needs, were 59% more likely to, 4 years later, belong to the high-risk group of people who develop illnesses.

According to Davis, there are two approaches to reducing any money-related worries that you have. The first is changing how you think about money, focusing on gratitude. The second is how you actually spend your hard-earned cash, starting with more attention on savings. "They both help, especially when you combine them," the co-founder of SparkRental.com told Bored Panda in an email.

"On the mindset side, aim to put your focus and attention on gratitude for what you have rather than fixating on what you don’t have but want. That’s easier said than done—as soon as we get one thing we want, we start thinking about the next thing. Remind yourself that you have everything that you need, and then go through subtraction exercises, imagining your life without some of the things you take for granted. You’ll value them more and boost your gratitude for what you have,” Davis explained.

Meanwhile, when it comes to the spending side of things, Davis said that a higher savings rate leads to lower financial worries. "Bridge the gap between mindset and tangible spending by looking back at how you used to live five or ten years ago, how much less you lived on. You weren’t miserable then, even though you lived on less. How can you live on less once again without it feeling like ‘sacrifice?’”

Lowering your living expenses means that you increase the number of months that your savings could potentially sustain you if you were in an emergency. That, in turn, leads to less overall stress about money.

Furthermore, you have far more flexibility in your career if your expenses are lower. "You can go pursue your dream work, even if it doesn’t pay well, as you live happily on a lower budget."

Davis told Bored Panda that another important aspect to consider is comparing yourself to your peers. In short, you shouldn't do this. The reality is that we don't know all the details of a high-earner's life. "They may earn twice as much as you—and hate their jobs. You don’t know how they really feel about their high-octane job or the sacrifices they make for that high paycheck. All you see are the curated social media photos," he shed some light on this.

We were also curious to get Davis' perspective on emotional spending. Specifically, when it starts becoming a real problem. He pointed out that it's an issue when someone starts exceeding their budget for discretionary spending.

"If you budget $300 per month for discretionary spending like lattes and restaurant meals and shoes and clothes, there’s nothing wrong with you spending that money in whatever way brings you the most happiness. That includes emotional spending, such as indulging yourself at the spa or whatever floats your proverbial boat. But when you blow past that $300 because you splurged on emotional spending, you’ve blown your budget. Now you have less to spend on more essential expenses like groceries," the co-founder of SparkRental.com told us.

If you’re feeling a lot of financial pressure, your first step is to create a budget so you can sleep more soundly at night. Slow down. Sit down. And go through your expenses in painstaking detail. To oversimplify a bit, you have two main tools at your disposal to dig your way out of this hole: reducing your expenses and increasing your income.

The latter is fairly straightforward (if not so simple to do in practice): you can look for a higher-paying job, work more hours, pick up a part-time gig, monetize your hobbies, invest, etc.

In the meantime, reducing your expenses inevitably means that you will have to adjust your lifestyle. To be sure, this can be unpleasant. When you’re used to a certain standard of living, it can be painful to imagine making any serious changes. Luckily, human beings are very adaptable.

You can start by eliminating all of the things you spend money on that have literally no benefit. For instance, you might have signed up for some digital subscriptions that you don’t have the time (or desire) to use. You might have a gym subscription, but it’s been months since you went.

Or you might feel so overwhelmed in life that you try to make yourself feel better and feel like you’re in control by impulsively buying things. This can look different for everyone. Some people buy lots of shoes, bags, or clothes they don’t even have a chance to enjoy. Others might buy video games or books at a discount even though they’re too exhausted to get to them. Still, others splurge on dining out and takeaway (cough avocado toast and lattes cough)—the costs of which quickly add up.

Whatever your weakness might be, it’s important to identify it and be honest about what this is: emotional spending. It makes you feel good for a moment, but it leaves you feeling hollow later on. This does not mean that you shouldn’t enjoy the finer things in life. However, you should be realistic about how much of that enjoyment your budget allows for. Treat yourself… once in a while, not every day, unless you've budgeted for it.