Love. Communication. Money. Three of life’s essential ingredients. On this Valentine’s Day, consider connecting with your significant other in a meaningful way on these topics.

Here’s what I like to do.

Whether we go out to dinner or stay home for Valentine’s Day, I make a point of telling my husband what I love about him. We all like to hear why we are loved and communicating that with each other is important. Oftentimes, financial conversations can cause stress in a relationship. I have learned starting from a place of mutual love and respect can go a long way toward a successful conversation.

Plan for Your Future

I find conversations about the future together can be a motivating way to start talking about money; we get to dream and share our intentions. So, during this month of celebrating love, connect with your partner to discuss your life together and the small financial steps you can take to reach your aspirations.

As I highlighted in a previous blog, money talk can also boost relationship satisfaction. So, make a date this month to discuss your finances! I like to remind myself that my husband and I won’t chart our financial future with just one date or conversation; it’s about ongoing communication. As we all know, life throws us curve balls – like that hot water heater that just went out on us made us redirect some cash flow to replenish our emergency fund — so it’s important to keep the communication channels open as life happens.

Set Financial Goals Together

Our next step is setting our goals! What do your goals look like? Getting debt under control? Boosting your savings with money-saving tips? If you have children, maybe you’re focused on saving for college. Or perhaps your family will be transitioning out of the military in a few years, and you are planning the next chapter. This year, our goals are focused on boosting retirement savings while balancing expenses of a daughter in college and planning for a milestone birthday celebration mid-year. No matter what the goals are, be sure to set SMART goals. Having a conversation and dreaming of the future is a great start but writing down your goals and how you plan to reach them is critically important. It helps you track progress and gives you something to work from when you check in together.

Need more inspiration? See how other MilSpouses like Janelle and May and their partners connect around talking about money and making their future dreams a reality. And find even more helpful tips from others in our MilSpouse community about how they are saving for their financial goals.

Enjoy Some Flirty Fun With Money Talk

Here’s something fun to do before a date or conversation about money: Take the What is Your Money Personality quiz. You’ll learn about your money strengths and opportunities which helps break the ice. Nobody is perfect and we all have things to learn. I consider this a good way to get you and your partner in the mood to be open about money issues and your approaches to what can sometimes be a stressful topic.

Because communication is key between couples, MilSpouse Money Mission provides several downloadable handouts to use as financial discussion tools with your spouse. I find these tools handy — designed to help discover our personal financial values, rate our ability as a money manager, set budgets and spending plans, and more — to navigate some of the financial planning considerations that come with being a couple.

There are many ways to approach money discussions. Do you and your partner have a special tip or idea to share and help others in the community? Please share your thoughts in our comments below.

Enjoy!

Mandi Moynihan is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ professional who has been with MilSpouse Money Mission since its inception. She also served in the Army and is the spouse of a retired service member.

MilSpouse Money Mission® is a Department of Defense resource that offers FREE personal financial education specifically geared toward military spouses. There is a Money Ready guide for various stages of financial life, a MilLife Milestones section to help you through the big moments in your military journey, a blog, spouse videos, quizzes, calculators and more!