I've come to realize that I'm a relative novice when it comes to the whole 401k retirement planning arena. I have a good friend who is younger than I am who has already banked a significantly more amount into his retirement account than I have (it helps that he works overseas for months at a time in dangerous places so the gov't helps him). I have a pretty standard 4% contribution to my 401k right now, which is just about all I can afford as I pay off other debts.
I pretty much have a handle on all other areas of my financial situation...budget etc...but I would really like to better understand 401k related items, especially investments and how best to select them in order to start to set myself up for eventual retirement which, admittedly is many, many years away.
I thought this might be a good thread for advice related to this kind of stuff.
So my first question is, how does one go about evaluating their 401k situation and how to improve it, select investments, etc...?