I Will Teach You To Be Rich - 245. "We make 6 figures. Why am I hiding fast food purchases?"

Episode Date: January 27, 2026

Ramit Sethi of I Will Teach You To Be Rich talks to Grace and James, a couple from Ireland, aged 38 and 37, who have been navigating immense challenges. James was diagnosed with cancer and underwent a year of treatment, while Grace managed a difficult pregnancy and maternity leave with their second child, an infant. Amidst the fear and grief, their household income took a significant hit, causing financial strain. Grace felt the burden of managing their finances, leading to guilt about James continuing to work during his illness. Despite these hardships, they’ve built a strong financial foundation with high savings and have managed to stay afloat. Ramit helps them explore their individual money psychologies, the impact of their upbringings, and how their shared experiences have shaped their financial outlook, revealing a story of resilience, unwavering teamwork, and an inspiring pursuit of a rich life. In this episode we uncover: • How Grace feels immense pressure to manage finances • The emotional toll of James's cancer diagnosis • Grace's hidden "mindless" spending under stress • The Irish perspective on "mustn't grumble" about money • James's childhood money messages and aversion to debt • The surprising freedom found in small financial wins • Grace's proactive approach to long-term financial planning • The power of internal versus external locus of control • How a shared money philosophy can emerge from conflict • The importance of planning for the worst when at your best • Their inspiring journey of overcoming adversity as a team Chapters: (00:00:00) Introduction (00:05:13) Grace's guilt over James working during cancer (00:12:32) Grace's "mindless purchases" and coping mechanisms (00:15:55) The surprising reality of their financial stability (00:30:03) Contrasting money philosophies: big spend vs. small treats (00:33:45) Reviewing their Conscious Spending Plan and uncovering hidden wealth (00:46:12) The impact of fluctuating income on their financial outlook (00:55:00) Planning for the worst when they are at their best (01:00:16) James's upbringing and the origins of his money anxiety (01:11:10) Their "ice cream cone" fight and early money revelations This episode is brought to you by: Notion | Try Notion, now with Notion Agent, at https://notion.com/ramit LMNT | Get a free 8-count Sample Pack with any LMNT order at https://drinklmnt.com/RAMIT Fabric by Gerber Life | Join the thousands of parents who trust Fabric to protect their family. Apply today in just minutes at https://meetfabric.com/ramit Facet | As of the date of this recording, Facet is waiving their $250 enrollment fee for new annual members, and for my audience, Facet is offering $300 into your brokerage account if you invest and maintain $5,000 within your first 90 days. Head to facet.com/ramit to learn more about which membership option is best for you. Offer expires March 31, 2026. #FacetAd  Shopify | Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at https://shopify.com/ramit Connect with Ramit • Get my new book, Money For Couples • Get Money Coaching with Ramit  • Download the Conscious Spending Plan • Listen to my book—now on Audible • Get my New York Times best-selling book • Get my no-numbers journal • Other episodes • Instagram • Twitter • YouTube If you and your partner have a money issue and you want my help, I occasionally select a couple to work with, free of charge. Apply for my help here: https://iwt.com/apply 

If you are in a relationship where you or your partner cover up spending to avoid big fights, or you get stressed out spending $150 on dinner, even though you can easily afford it. If you lay awake at night anxious about money, I want to talk to you. I'm currently casting couples for the next season of the Money for Couples podcast. We only do this a few times a year, and I want to hear from you. You can apply today at IWT.com slash apply. Being on the podcast is basically a three or four hour coaching session with me. Tons of past couples who have appeared on the podcast have said it is a pivotal moment for them to get on the same page.

So if you want my take on your unique financial situation, this is your chance. Apply right now at IWT.com slash apply. I hide how much food I eat out. I will drive into a drive-thru by a huge meal and eat at all. His therapist said she's shocked. that he's still working with young children and cancer treatment. I was just feeling incredibly guilty. You wrote in your application that you feel like a pressure cooker about to explode.

What if I get sick again? They said it was going to be gone the first time when it came back. Whatever I can't work for another year. This time, work won't pee for it. I actually find it so hard to stick to the budget. I spent 200 euro on Timo. On wet? Oh, I'd love to have a plan to not feel so much.

terrified. If the two of you continue on the way that you have with your money, when something comes up in life, what do you think happens the next time and the time after that and the time after that? I will just collapse. Here's the scenario. Your partner is suddenly diagnosed with cancer. They have to step back from work and your household income predictably drops. On top of the fear and grief that you are both experiencing, would you know what to do financially? This is what Grace and James have been navigating. They're 38 and 37 years old. They live in Ireland with their two children, a toddler and an infant. James has been going through cancer treatment while Grace is on maternity leave. Their income has taken a hit, and like a lot of

couples, they're trying to figure out how to make it all work. Now, I know that a lot of people would avoid talking about money until they are forced to. But Grace and James are doing it, and they've let us look inside their real numbers. I'm opening up their conscious spending plan or their CSP. It breaks down their income, expenses, savings, and exactly where their money is going. If you want my help with your own conscious spending plan, join my money coaching program at IWT.com slash money coaching. Here's what I'm seeing in their numbers. Assets, $328,000. Investments, $79,000. Savings, $42,000. Debt, $230,000. Net worth $219,000. Fixed cost are at 48%. Investments, 6%. Savings at 40%. That's quite aggressive. That 40% savings rate tells me something is going on.

Maybe they are in a rebuilding phase. Maybe they are trying to get ahead of what might be coming. it's not surprising to see a higher savings rate, given that they've been going through cancer, reduced income, and having a newborn. Now, I want to hear from you. Have you ever been through a situation where your income dropped overnight? Maybe it was a health crisis,

maybe it was a job loss. I want to hear from you in the comments. I want to know what did you cut back on? And looking back, what do you wish you hadn't cut back on? I'll check out the comments later today. For now, let's get into it. Here is my conversation with Grace, And James.

If we just have an amazing 10 out of 10 conversation, what would you walk out of here with? Why don't we start with you, Grace? I think I really want a game plan for how to build back up what we're currently rattling down on. I feel like we've had a huge, so many bumps in the road. And we've done what we can, but I'd love to, like, get that skyrocketing source. of like, okay, kind of a big release. I'd love to have a plan to look towards the future and not feel so terrified. And I would love to kind of understand how I feel maybe a little bit more and why I feel like that. Okay. James, how about you? Very similar, especially with the building

backup, but for me personally to kind of really get my head and my heart back into finances, you know, it's been very much on gracious shoulder for this past while. And, I want to be able to kind of help pick some of that burden away and get myself more financially illiterate again. Great. All right. Well, I'm looking forward to this. I have a lot of questions.

Grace, you wrote, my husband has cancer and I'm on maternity leave with a four-month-old. I feel like I'm forcing him to keep working because of our money situation. Can you tell me what you were feeling when you wrote that? Oh, just the horrible guilt for me. So in Ireland we get, I'm going off the concise now, but in Ireland we get six months paid maternity and then we get three months unpaid and then I get an extra three months. So in all and all it turns out to be a year. But I have been off SIF and I have been on reduced hours because I just had a really rough pregnancy. So we had saved money but not as much as I wanted. And I really feel. I really felt a lot of pressure to encourage James to keep working through his treatment. His therapist basically said she's shocked that he's still working with the child, young children and cancer treatment. And when he told me this, oh my God, is that like the worst wife in the world? Like I wasn't supporting him through his treatment.

I'm constantly looking at the numbers and I'm constantly like, okay, if you can keep working for another month or to, then we can put another 2000 in savings and then that will keep us going until January. And then I don't know. So, yeah, I was just feeling incredibly guilty. Do you still feel that way? Yeah, I do. Okay. James, if you're comfortable, would you mind sharing what you're dealing with from a health

perspective? I got cancer first three years ago. It was just a very simple, a mole that went funny, melanoma. and they thought they got it all. And then I found a lump in my arm of all places. And it turns out it metastasized and they hadn't called it. So thankfully they caught it early again and surgery to remove the second site and then immunotherapy for over a year.

And prognosis is looking good though, which is fantastic. I actually finished my last treatment cycle two weeks ago. Really? Yeah. Congratulations. Thank you very much. Wow. That's awesome.

How long have you been going through treatment? A year. Wow. Yeah. Okay. And how do you feel right now physically? Tired. It's going to take at least three months.

They said for it to kind of fully leave my system. And then there's a lot of side effects and everything that crop up and various stuff. So I did a bit to go. But I think the big kind of mental hurdle is out of the way. So we are in a much better place than we were when we submitted to come on the show. I'm doing great. I can't count my blessings I'm doing really well. I'm very happy to hear that.

Very happy. How about mentally? How do you feel? Mentally much better. I've had a lot more mental space to kind of get my head around it and concentrate on getting better. I've been off work now for two months. My work, work have given me till the new year, then we'll reassess. That has helped a lot.

And it's given me a lot of mental space to kind of heal. And it's also given my mental space for other things. to drop up finances for one in that. What led to the decision for you to stop working? Looking back, I don't recognize who I was. I was, I wasn't, I was a zombie. I was a tired husk. I was gray, everyone just talked about how gray I was.

I wasn't really working. That's the thing. There's so many people covering for me doing various aspects. I was doing the bare minimum. But, you know, work gave me the option to keep working. Why? Just because I thought I'd be bored. Wait a minute.

Hold on. Where's your accent from? Are you Irish? Oh. I might have weighed into it. Where's the accent from? The England. Oh, okay.

All right. The England. Am I in big trouble right now? I noticed, okay. Oh, go ahead. Sorry, everybody. Sorry. Okay, listen, the reason I'm asking is,

I would understand if some American, you know, born and raised in the U.S., all they know is work, that's our entire life, we go, what else am I going to do? Of course I'm going to work. But the UK excels at leisure. what's this? It was money.

If I take the year off, it would have to be unpaid. And we couldn't afford it. We were always planning to having a second child, but our timeline massively accelerated. When the cancer came back, it was bluntly, Grace was,

I might lose you, I want one more of you before you go. I want just a little bit more of him. I want a little bit just in case that he values. that he vanished from my life. So that was the first thought that popped into my head. If this has come back, I don't have enough of him. I don't know if that makes any sense,

but I also, we knew that he would have to have treatment and we don't know about the fertility long-term effects either. It was basically we try now and be pregnant and have a baby while you're undergoing treatment or we always. only have one child and that's it. It was really hard. But we got our beautiful second baby out of it. So she's just perfect. Congratulations. It's beautiful. Thank you. It's beautiful. And the treatment now concluding, hopefully future health, it's a beautiful end to that chapter of your life. Yeah. Beautiful. Yeah. Grace, you mentioned that you still feel guilty.

about asking James to work. Tell me more about that. Yeah, I feel I feel like it made his treatment journey so much harder than it needed to be. He ended up having to go on to steroids for low cortisol and I ended up having to call the ambulance for him and he ended up having to go into hospital a few times, probably because he was under so much pressure and he wasn't getting time to relax. And I think I was just expecting a lot of him. But I was also caring for a newborn. And, you know, when the newborn came along, I just feel like I asked a lot of him and I asked too much of him and it probably did cause him harm. Do you talk about this? Yeah. Well, what's the conversation like? I'm going to imagine Grace

says, I feel like I'm asking too much. Yeah. And then what's your response, James? You know, I've never felt that. And I always tell her that she's never felt that. Like, you know, a lot of decisions I made around work and everything was based around my recovery. Like, I wanted to keep working because it was a distraction and I thought I'd be bored.

And, you know, it wasn't until I got to the very point where I couldn't, I wasn't, I was probably causing work more harm. That's good. That I kind of said, look, and they were, for their credit, they were great. and it actually turns out they can, they can't give me my full salary, but they are giving me three thirds of my salary

when I'm off. Two thirds. Two thirds, sorry. Wow. Yeah, which they didn't have to do. That's very generous of them. Yeah. Big shout out to all the companies out there.

You know, we usually hear only bad things about companies, but it's quite amazing what great companies can do in tough times. Yeah. It's awesome. Grace, you wrote in your application, quote, I'm constantly saving, but then I'll blow money on silly things in a life is hard moment. So what I want to know is what kind of things are you spending on in those moments?

Oh, Remy, absolutely. This morning, I spent 200 euro on Timo. On what? Just like little things. It's all just small things. It's 2 o'clock in the morning. I'm feeding the child. The child's gone back to bed.

I'm trying to go back to sleep. I'm on my phone. And then an Instagram ad comes up and I buy skincare things for 60 euros, which doesn't even work. What's going through your head in those moments where you see these ads, you go on Timu and you buy it? What's going through your head? They've got me here. I do look like crap. I am exhausted.

I don't take care of myself. This is one thing I can do to take care of myself. Look at me, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Self care. Blah, blah, blah, blah. 60 euros. Here's it. Oh, I can just double click.

oh, it's done now. What? It's interesting the way you describe it. Like, you're dismissive of it. Like, the way you describe it is it's a con, but yet you do it over and over. Why do you think? I think I got a sick joy out of falling for it. Sometimes the stuff is lovely.

So I'm like, maybe this time it'll be really nice, the same as the other times. But other times it is a totals cam. And when I look it up afterwards, I'm like, Why didn't I research into this more and find out that and like just read the comments and read the reviews and look it up on trust pilot? Did you make these sort of, as you put it, mindless purchases before you had kids? Yeah. You did?

Yeah. It really needs to stop. How do money decisions get made in your relationship? I probably make most of them. You take the lead? Definitely now, yeah. Yeah. And before?

Before James got sick? Like we would do weekly budgeting and stuff. Like every Sunday we would sit down together when the kids were asleep and we would kind of look over. We'd have kind of a set budget of what we'd normally spend and we'd go through the calendar. But then mentally I just could just take it in grace to kind of take it all. She still does now. Yeah. All that seems very reasonable, by the way, much more advanced than most to sit down and talk about money every week.

So that's great. The fact that as you got sick, James, you had to give up on participating. also seems totally normal. And the fact, Grace, that you took the load on yourself seems like great partnership. Yeah, I think we had a good system going into it because I had been doing a lot of the envelope system. And I just really liked watching the videos. And I was like, ooh, I can do that. Hold on. What videos did you like watching? Who watches envelope videos? What? It's addictive. What are these videos? That's what I want to know. What are they? It's people being like, I'm going through my budget for the week. And it's like, I just love watching other

people's money. Like, I love your show. I know why you love my show. I get that. Good. But it did help because I set up a whole thinking fund system. So I have automatic money going to, so we have basically a year's work of the big bills, always pretty much saved. And that's automatic. So we had a good system going into it. So it wasn't like too much of a big deal to take it on, James. Don't, don't be worrying about that. I'm impressed with Grace's knowledge about money. She's obviously taken the time to be curious about personal finance, and it shows when she talks about having an emergency fund, or as she puts it, a year's worth of big bills saved up.

But I'm struck by the way she describes her feelings around their financial situation. Remember, Grace said she feels guilty for, quote, forcing James to keep working because she was nervous about their financial situation. James isn't working anymore, but she still feels guilty. And now, even though she's worried about money, she'll go and mindlessly spend $200 on Timu at 2 a.m. It's all a bit contradictory. Those mixed signals tell me there's something going on here,

something deeper she has not worked through yet. And you can hear it in this one moment. She said, I might lose you. I want one more of you before you go. Can you imagine your partner saying that? Can you imagine feeling that way? There are a lot of layers to unpack here. We're not just talking about a savings rate.

We're talking about mortality and love, and we don't even know what's going to eventually happen. So listen as I gently probe Grace about this explosive line from her application. Grace, you wrote in your application that you feel like, quote, a pressure cooker about to explode. What do you mean by that? Having the sole responsibility of organizing the money and, you know, putting it where it needs to be, it feels just a huge amount of pressure. And then just the thought of not having any money coming in with the maternity leave. And then things are just a little bit complicated.

And, you know, I'm looking at all the small fine points and like hoping they all slot together. And if they don't, then, oh, I don't know. I might explode. And I tend to get quite cross. And I think that's why I was putting a lot of. of pressure on James as well to kind of keep working as well because my systems don't work if the money's not there. Right. You know, if it's money's not coming in, everything could fall apart. When you would put the pressure on them as you put it, how would you do that? I think I would gently

prompt. You were having surgery in September and you took the month leading up to it off. Oh yeah. That really, really stressed me out because I was like, you are going to need a lot more time off than this. We can't have this. Because yes, we get sick leave here in Ireland. You know, we get sick pay, but we only get a certain amount of it and you're going to need a lot of it. And then we're not going to have the money. So I remember having this discussion with you about that. Do you let James know? Yeah. You tell them, we can't do this. What about that? I try, yeah, so I try and like lay it out and say, oh, well, I'm worried about this. And then James was like, well, I need to take it off.

So he took it off. And I said, okay. But then I would like hold on to it, hold on to it. And then like it would burst out of me again a week later being like, are you sure? You can't go back to work right now and work for another week. And what did that dynamic feel like when the two of you were having this in the thick of cancer treat? I was feeling so stressed. I was feeling like there was a baby on the way.

I knew I was going to start feeling sick really, really soon. So I was trying to do all of my overtime really early on. So I could like do nights and do this before my sickness started and I had to stop working. So there was such a time limit. And I just felt like, you know, he just needed to push through like I was pushing through. And he wasn't. And James, how do you feel when Grace would

share this with you and feel anxious and stressed out? Maybe like, you know, it was I felt selfish because you know, at this time it was a toddler as well. You know, she was too. So we weren't sleeping.

You know, we were trying to, you know, raise her at the same time and it's just so much, so much pressure. Yeah, she would every now and then she would explode like that and she'd come out in a minute. it but then you know between those it was lots of little um microaggressions i guess you'd call them them that you know but for her it was very grace is very practical in every sense like you should see our cupboards they're full of jam and pickles and hand tomatoes and stuff that she would she would

find farmers you should go to the market the veg market at the end of the day wait until the very last where the farmer had whatever x amount left haggling down buy it all spend a whole day chopping and then we'd have just loads of canned stuff. So the idea was that if everyone went tits up, we'd have food. And then that was so stressful for me because I would, you know, I've come back from treatment or I would be have a bad week or something. And I would have to take the full responsibility of parenting and work and everything because Grace was in this manic mode of we have to have, you know, 17,000 tins as smart.

just in case. This is a very good example. What do you make of this example now that you are looking back? I'm really ashamed, actually. Okay. Why? I think I was just trying to do something to control the situation and try and preserve something for the future. The future was so uncertain that I just felt like I needed to at least feed my family.

Yes. Wow. Layers of perception in your answer. just now. I feel ashamed. I love the acknowledgement of how you feel that's powerful. The need for control, I totally agree. Because if you look like going and waiting and haggling with the farmers and then, and then finally, this idea of at least I'm feeding my family. I can't fix what's going on with my husband's health. Work is work. I'm trying to get as many hours as I can in before I get sick. I'm pregnant. I got a little one. But what can I do? Feed my family. Yeah. And I would spend hours and hours and hours of meal prepping and having food there. And I don't know if it actually

made any difference. He really did. It still does. We still got loads left yet. When she was towards the end of pregnancy and it was starting to get back to her and I was kind of having to, irregardless of how I felt or how I was feeling, I had to look after the toddler. I had to feed Grace. And And it just made life so much easy that I could just, you know, take a kind of a pre-made glass jar of peppers and tomato and stuff and throw it in with some rice and a bit of chicken or something, you know? Wait, was it a good decision or not? I'm trying to figure it out now. I don't know. I think that we also could have just bought it. It could have saved ourselves so much stress. Let me say this. First of all, do you know how much you have been through as a family? It's a lot. Have you grappled with that? Have you talked about that?

People say it to me all the time, and I'm like, oh, yeah. But, like, you just have to do it. There's no other option. You just have to keep going. That's exactly what my mom said. I asked her, how did you stay married for so long? And how did you raise all these kids? And her answer was, there's no other choice.

You just do it. And I love that answer. I respect that answer. And I think that maybe when we have that approach, we also don't take time to pause and grapple with the enormity of what we have done, what we have accomplished, what we've gone through. Exactly, Grace, as I just saw you take a deep breath. I think that many of us are raised to like, what do they call it, stiff upper lip, look forward, check the box. And I agree, there's power in that, but there's also power in the

softer side of saying like, hey, have we actually talked about what we went through? What did it mean to us as a family? Because trust me, two powerful things you're going to come out of that. One, you're going to gain a deeper appreciation for each other. This tomato example is actually much deeper than either of you are letting on. There's something really beautiful and something really haunting about this example to me. The idea that, Grace, you just want to feed your family. Yeah. Let them know you're going to be there. And it doesn't matter that it took hours It was irrational to spend that many hours, but you still did it. And yet there's something that perhaps is not that adaptive to your situation,

the idea that you were a very, very busy, pregnant mom, and you were spending hours. Why? If you look at it that way, it doesn't make mathematical sense. So there's something beautiful. That's the first thing you're going to get out of is an understanding of what actually happened. Most of us never pause and look back, so we just keep marching forward. The second thing it's going to do is the two of you talking about it is going to allow you to

create stories for your family. Your kids need to know this story. They need to know it. Just the same way your parents pass down their stories, your kids need to know what the two of you did. And how can they learn if the two of you have not decided what happened? You know, you have to feel for Grace and James. They have had a really tough few years. and my heart goes out to them. One thing that makes it all a little bit more bearable is where they live. In Ireland, there are systems in place

that help people when things go wrong, especially when somebody gets sick. Of course, it's not perfect, but it is a safety net that works. Like when James got cancer, they didn't have to worry about going bankrupt on top of everything else they were experiencing. Now, compare that to what we deal with here in the U.S.

In 2024, 31 million adults incurred medical debt, totaling $74 billion. And the American Journal of Public Health found that roughly two-thirds of people that filed bankruptcy say that medical bills and illness-related income loss contributed to their bankruptcy. This is why I always shake my head when people tell me in my comments, stick to personal finance, don't bring politics into it. That's like me telling you, keep ingredients out of cooking. You cannot separate the two things just as you cannot separate money from politics.

Politics is why your health care is so expensive. It's why millions of Americans couldn't even get health insurance before the ACA, also known as Obamacare. And it explains a lot of why people declare bankruptcy rather than the common belief that people bought too many luxury cars they couldn't afford. I want you to be able to know that if something horrific happens, like a car accident or a cancer diagnosis,

that you will be taken care of and you won't lose your house. That is where I stand politically, and that is what I stand for. After this break, we're going to learn more about their individual relationships with money. I absolutely love this story. One of my students, when they got married, they did something very special

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Who else has had the experience where you put off something for a week, a month, three months, it's like a pile of papers you need to organize on your desk. You finally get to it and it takes like 10 minutes. Why didn't we just get it done anyway? I find the same thing is true of water. Like a lot of us do all these crazy things to drink more water. We know we should drink more water. we buy this jumbo water ball that says keep going, drink more, you can do it.

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pro sports teams. Get a free eight-count sample pack of elements most popular drink-mixed flavors with any purchase at drinklmnt.com slash remit. That's drinklmnt.com slash remit. Find your favorite element flavor or share it with a friend. Try it totally risk-free because if you don't like it, they'll give you your money back, no questions asked. Now, are the two of you similar in the way you think about money or do you think about it differently? Wow. Okay, I already know the answer based on James's smile. James, go ahead. In some senses, I think we are quite, I think kind of big picture stuff, I think we're quite very similar. Just tell me the differences because neither of you believe you're similar. I can tell by your faces. Tell me, James.

If she has fun money, whatever, she'll spend it on little things. I'm more of if I buy something, I'll probably buy something big, maybe once a year. What's an example of a big thing once per year? My watch broke a year and a half ago and I finally replaced it. How much did it cost? 400 per year. Okay, all right. And Grace, how would you describe your relationship with money?

So I save first. I always put the max amount that I can think to save. I earn a little bit more than James. So I always have a little bit extra. so I think, oh well, I can spend the rest of it now. And when the stress goes up, whether through James's illness or having kids, does anything change in your relationship with money? I think I spend more and I wouldn't really tell James too much about it.

What do you mean? I suppose I do hide a little bit from him. Like what's an example of something you have hidden from him? I think I hide how much food I eat out of. when I'm out and about. I'll often get absolutely ravenous when I'm out doing jobs or I'm like taking the girls to events or whatever. I'll be so hungry and they'll both be asleep in the car and I will drive into a drive-through and buy a huge meal and eat it all on the way home. But I don't know, I think I got a bit of a weird thrill out of height. Little small things. Do you take the bag and throw it

outside before you go inside? Yeah, I do. How old are your kids? eldest is three and our youngest, well, we only have two, but she's six months. Six months. Okay. All right. All right. All right. What would you say the primary thing that changed, financially speaking, was when you had kids? Well, she did childcare costs, which are not under absolutely a theory of astronomical now. Well, they're nowhere near what it is in America, James. It's... Wait, wait, just say the number so everybody in the U.S. can get ready.

Sorry, yeah. Go ahead. Oh, don't get angry at us. I'm sorry. It's going to happen. What is it? $3505 per month. Okay, Americans. Go ahead. Roast them.

A little bit of socialism for you. The government pay 25% of it. God, this country is so sometimes. I'm sorry, parents. I just want everybody to understand because I don't think people actually know how policy

affects their actual finances. things like child care. The government can assist with those. They can subsidize them. Maternity and paternity leave. Taxes, yes, many other countries charge equivalent or higher taxes. But imagine getting subsidized child care, paternity and maternity leave, the ability to get health care and not have to worry about a $78,000 bill, and on and on, on. Of course, there are tradeoffs. Of course there are tradeoffs. But I just want everybody. to understand when we're sitting here looking at these numbers, these numbers are not just picked out of thin air. They are the result of who we voted for, the result of our political systems,

the result of what our culture will put up with. So anyway, I appreciate you all coming here. In fact, now that we're talking about it, why don't we take a look at the actual numbers? Yeah. All right. What was it like to do this conscious spending plan together? Oh, I loved us. Oh, I love us. All right. I know that. James, what about for you? James got a weird look on his face like. Oh, God. It was surprising how off I was. Like, I was off.

And normally I'd be able to tell you off bat what we make, what we spend, everything. But I was quite a bit off. And I literally, a year, less than a year away from it. And the numbers have changed. And I was, didn't know what. Wow. Now, can I ask you, were you off because you forgot?

And or were you off because the numbers have changed so dramatically in the last 12 months? A bit of both. wage-wise, I got that right. I thought we were making a lot less than we were. And then the savings, I didn't realize how much we were actually putting in. I didn't realize we had so much. Ah, okay. Wow. Great. Well, let's take a look. I think this is a great lesson for all of us, is that knowing your numbers is a skill. And if you stop looking at your numbers, which in your case, it makes perfect sense why you did, somebody gets sick, they have cancer, they're going through treatment. Of course, they're not going to be sitting there looking at their CSP every week.

but it just simply shows us this is a skill and the more remove we get, the more we lose touch with it, but we can also get back in touch. All right, let's take a look. Okay, let's see. James, can you read the word in bold and then the number in full next to it for this entire box, please?

Yeah, so assets 328,000, investments, 79,000, savings, 42,000, and debt, 230,000. the total net worth of 219,000. Great. What do you think about those numbers? Great. In my head, if I took three months off, we wouldn't be able to pay the mortgage, and we would be at money, and we'd be on the street. And obviously that has not come true.

Hmm. What do you make of that now in retrospect? I think a lot of it was psychological for what I was going through. You know, the idea is that whole kind of provider thing, even though I make a little bit less than that. there's still that kind of holdover of being the man of the house type thing you know. And we've always talked about how

because Grace's wages kind of set she's hit her max really because the HSE in Ireland is a set wage band so she can't really go any higher without moving jobs or being promoted. Whereas obviously I being in the private sector I have a much more higher threshold that I can reach. And we always talks about before

while I was starting out, Grace was kind of up here already that eventually I would catch up. which is kind of where I am now, and eventually I would overtake her. So she would be able to kind of drop down to maybe part-time or just nights and on call and everything, and I'd be able to pick up the difference. And that's always kind of been in my mind a little bit.

And I know in the grand scheme of things, like it's a year, less than a year, that I'd be off, you know, I'm going to work until for another 30-odd years, whatever. But it still felt like it's a massive setback. It's quite perceptive. The idea that, well, first of all, congratulations for talking about. that is very rare. The fact that two people would look as objectively as possible at their careers and say,

okay, here's where you are, here's where I am. Based on our trajectory, there'll be a certain point where we're going to intersect and then I'm probably going to make more. That's very forward-looking. I wish everybody had those type of conversations. So well done. And then this is the hard part. You make a plan and then life gets in the way.

and something goes around. Family happens, illness happens, layoffs happen, whatever. And I know because when I make a plan, I want that plan to happen. Like if I tell you I'm going to be somewhere at six, I'm going to be somewhere at six. And if somebody goes,

oh, let's actually switch it to 645, I'm like, ah, it's annoying. And I've had to train myself like, it's not the end of the world, but given my own, planfulness, I just want to follow the plan. And I see a bit of that in you, James. Even though when you look at the numbers, you realize it certainly did not put you on the street, not even close. Okay. I think this is such a valuable lesson. I'm really thankful that you're sharing with all of us, the idea that if I don't get this

plan exactly right, I'm a failure. But what I can actually see from the two of you, the two of you working as a And in any given time on a team, someone is stronger, someone is less. Someone may be injured, someone is picking up the slack, and it rotates. And that's a team. And teams also are not only rated on how much money they make. And a lot of men look at themselves like that. It's not just that we absorb the lesson that we need to be providers. We actively encourage it.

It's like, if I'm not making money, who am I? there are lots of ways to contribute to a relationship beyond making the incremental dollar. Grace, what did you think about those numbers? When we first got pregnant, we had to stop. I was putting, well, we were both putting 500 euro into like a long-term savings, or like a long-term investment fund. And we had to stop that. So we haven't done that in like three years.

And it's actually killing me not to be doing that. but we just can't really afford it now. And I'm really glad we didn't because we didn't have to take it out then to cover this situation. But I would love for those to be higher. It's making me a little anxious. But I am really delighted. I didn't expect it to be that big either. Take a look.

Investments are 79,000. Oh, gosh. Actually, that's including our pensions. So, yeah, and then our savings is separate. Just say that word again for all the Americans who have never heard it again. Just say it wasn't? Pensions. Pensions.

All the boomers on the call. By the way, they're like, what are these guys talking about? I have a pension. My pension pays me 130% of my income. What are you talking about? Everybody has a pension. All right. Let's continue on.

Grace, will you read off your combined gross monthly income? What's that number? 9,000. Okay, 9,000 bucks or 9,000 euros. I'll just call it dollars for easy. Yeah. 9,000 bucks, which means that combined the two of you make $108,000 per year.

By a show of hands, who knew that number? Okay, only Grace has her hand up. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you for continuing my statistic. 50% of people do not know their own household income. And James, you thought it was lower? Yep.

Okay, let me... Just for kicks. How much did you think it was? 85,000. 85,000. It's actually 108,000. So now that you're making like tens of thousands more than you thought, Do you feel any differently?

No, because it doesn't feel like enough. You know what? Let's change the name of this show. Forget money for couples. Let's just call it. Ramith was right. That's it. That's what this entire show ends up becoming. Nobody knows their income.

At least 50% don't. Then they go, if I made more money, I'd feel better. Then they make more money. Then they don't feel better. And on and on and on. I'm going to tell my producer right now. We're going to switch to the name of this show. All right.

108,000. What do you think about that household income? To be honest, for me, it's more because I didn't include any of my overtime, which is normally an extra 10 to 15K. Wow. Which is where all the savings comes from. That's great. Okay, so let's put a pin in that. So it's even more than that.

And how do you feel about that overall household income? To be honest, really good. It's not a very common wage to get in Ireland at all. You make more than the average? The average is about 60,000, find. Okay, wow. Great. And James, it sounds like you feel good about the income as well.

Yeah, 100%. And then you get the whole, oh, you feel so guilty because you look at it and you think, God, you know, we're doing so much, we're doing really well compared to so many people. And so you feel like you can't feel bad. You can't feel guilt about, you can't feel that I need X amount or Y amount, you know, because you should be, you should count your blessings of what you have, you know. Well, I will say that's one of the reasons that I really love speaking to guests on this show, that until now, all of this has. felt like it has to be shrouded behind closed doors. There are people making considerable incomes, and they're just like, why do we feel behind?

Why can't we actually save as much as we thought we would making six figures? And until now, you couldn't really talk to anyone about it because it's like boo-hoo, wealthy people shut up. But I actually think that there are some legitimate questions. Sometimes people don't realize that their child care costs are temporarily very high, or they have not actually been automatically investing, and that's why they have no investments. So I'm grateful that we get a chance to talk about them.

I do have a question about the incomes. James, I believe your income was reduced. Is that reflected on the CSP? No, that's if I was in full wage. So can we update it to reflect what you currently make? Mine's the 35. So mine be an... Probably 2.10, something like that.

2100? Yeah. 2100 instead of 3,500 for gross. And then what would that take your net down to? Ballpark. 1-5, probably, 1-6. All right, let's say that. Okay, wow, so quite a considerable difference.

What just happened was your fixed cost jumped from 48% to 58%. So just for some context, your fixed costs originally were 48%, which is, at least for the U.S. quite low, and it jumped to 58% because of the reduction in net income. Still, not bad, not bad at all. Why don't we continue on and go down the rest of the numbers here? We are going to... Can I add something actually?

As of this month, I am making 280 euros a month. So I have gone from full maternity pay, which was my 550 to zero. So I have three months unpaid currently, and then we get a child allowance of 280 euros a month. So we are currently on zero money coming in from me for the next three months. And then what? And then it goes back up to 550, and then I go back to work. Just so everybody knows, when she says 550, the way we say it is 5,500. That's totally fine.

All right, you have a temporary reduction to essentially. essentially zero for three months. Yeah. Okay. I'm not going to reflect that on the CSP, but I'm going to put a pin in that. And I'm also going to put a pit in the fact that you make approximately $10,000 to $15,000 more in overtime, which they sort of equal out.

Yeah. Yeah. Right? That's why I'm just going to, they're a wash and it will just confuse things. So we just put them to the side. That's fair. Can you confirm that you will be going back and making the same wages after three months? When I go back to work in April, I'll be working four days a week and then doing one or two overtime shifts, which will get me back up to that level.

What I want to reflect for everybody listening and watching is when we are living this, we get caught in the weeds necessarily. It's like, this thing is happening, but in June it's going to be this and then it changes after two weeks. It's very, very detailed. That's how we have to live our lives. What the CSP allows us to do is to zoom up and focus on the key levers. Like in the grand scheme of things, having a three-month reduction in wages for one person, even though it seems extreme, actually doesn't even need to be reflected on here

because we have the overtime. So you can basically say it's a wash. We can get a little bit more precise, but in general it's a wash. And that allows us to focus on the big picture. For so many of us, we immerse ourselves in the weeds and we get paralyzed.

And it is imperative that we zoom up and look at the big picture. You can just focus on the key levers, get 85% of the way there, and in most cases, move on with your life. So, we're going to keep it as is. We're going to continue moving down that CSP. We got 58% on fixed costs. What's the percentage on investments? Can you read that number?

7%. 7%. And that is in addition to a pension. Yes. Okay. 7% or $380 a month. Savings, whoa, what's that number? 49%.

49% you American freaks complaining you can't save 4%. 49%. I'm coming back to that category. Oh, wait, wait, wait. Hold on. Before I get too excited, what's this number under guilt-free spending? Oh, yeah, minus 14%. Negative 14%. All right. So obviously the shit is all f***. No, it's messed up.

In general, I can see what your priorities are. And I love that. A CSP is the fingerprints of your life. If you looked at my CSP, you'd be like, this guy likes to travel. Like, it's very clear. Okay. But what I can see here is you like to save money. It's very obvious.

Even if the math isn't quite right, we'll fix that. I can see what is important to you. When you look at the CSP, what do you notice? Grace first, then James. I think that it's off because I basically put all of my overtime into savings. and it's normally about $2,000 a month extra. Why do you do that? Just out of curiosity.

Because I want to, we're saving for a lot of things. We're saving for a renovation on the house, but I'm also really, really keen on saving for owning a house. There's always stuff that comes up. So I'm trying to make sure that we're saving into high-yield savings and also an emergency fund. Sometimes people save money purely out of fear. It's what they were taught. They're afraid. All they know is frugality, which in their mind is seen as I got to save and essentially hoard. And you can tell because when you ask them, why are you doing that? They just go like, well, you never know what could happen. And it just traces back to something their dad said when they were five. What you have told me is, look, I have plans. Forward looking, we're saving for the house. We're saving for the house. We're saving for this, we're saving for that. That's actually very important because what we do is determined by

why we do it. And if your reason is, hey, I have key things that we are saving for as I can see in your CSP, then it becomes more constructive. It's not simply done reflexively out of fear. Under your savings category, you have vacations, 100 bucks a month, gifts 50, house renovation fund a thousand a month, long-term emergency fund $1,000 a month, and sinking funds $5.58 per month for a total of $2,708. Now, it's quite interesting because you have 13 months of savings already. Were you aware of that? Wow. Look at Grace's proud laugh. Tell us, Grace, how do you feel right now? I feel great. Did you know that?

Yeah. You did. And I've actually stopped putting it into the long-term. emergency fund and I'm putting it into sinking funds now instead. Now that we've got to got that year of savings, I want to start putting it into the investment again. James, what do you think when you see this conscious spending plan? I honestly don't know. I could believe it. I don't trust investments. I don't trust banks. I don't trust stocks. But at the same time, I was like, it's like I should feel good. And then like I get so annoyed

at myself, I'm like, why am I not happy about this? This is incredible. You know, why am I still so nervous about this? This is, you know, the fact that I can go down two thirds wage and Gracie can have no wage and we're going to be absolutely fine.

I mean, that's incredible. How many people can say that, honestly? Like, and yet it still doesn't register really with me. How connected do you feel to these numbers when you see them? My whole wage goes straight into the joint account. bar what I need to cover my bills and that pays for the kids' school mortgage bills.

Wait, wait, wait. I'm not asking about how the money flows. I'm asking how connected do you feel to these numbers? It doesn't feel like it's my money. That's what I thought. What do you think was behind your answer where you started to give me all the money flows just now? Because literally I get my paycheck. I move over X amount to my joint account and then that's it.

It disappears. And then we have savings and we have sinking funds and we have roof over our head. It's just like mechanized. It's like asking like, how do I feel about the way that a car turns on? I don't know. I just get in there and turn the thing and it turns on. I don't feel any way. It just works.

It's a machine. Just to give you a point of comparison, when I see our numbers, I feel extremely connected to them. Not that I love looking at numbers. It's not that. It's that when many people see a spreadsheet or an investment portfolio, they see some zeros. And sometimes they see their own failure. They will see things like I should have started early, et cetera. When I see it, I see the ability to take a trip, the ability to not have to look at prices if we eat out once in a while. I see the ability that if somebody in our family needs help, we can help them. It's much deeper than the numbers. It's about the kind of rich life that we want to create for ourselves. So if I can ask you just for a second, James, to put on those lenses of not the logistics and the money flow, I get that, but rather what the money has allowed you to do, what do you see? If I look at them honestly, we are and we are creating a life for our kids that I never had.

I remember I filled the car up about paying attention. I just paid it. Didn't have to look at the price which had a full tank gas and I paid it because I did I could afford it. And I got back in the car and I was just like, it kind of just struck me like, you know,

that's, you know, you don't, I didn't look at how much that diesel was for that particular gas station. I just brought in because I needed it. I didn't go down to the cheapest one, which is a bit further down the road, you know, just showed up to it stopped, and I paid it, and I drove off. What did it feel like?

Freedom. Freedom. What a beautiful example. Freedom is in the simplest of things. It's in filling up gas. It's in going to the grocery store and buying something because you can. It's rarely about the fanciest vacations and flying on first class. It's literally about being able to go to the restaurant and get a lemonade.

because your kid asks you for one. It's a beautiful example. James, this is part of what I want us to be able to do is, yeah, of course we're going to analyze the numbers a little bit more, but actually to go way deeper beyond the math and to say, like, what does it mean? Grace, I see you reflecting on what you just heard, James. What's going through your head right now?

I'm just really proud of us. I'm just so glad that all the work that we've been doing and all the work that I've been doing to kind of automate and make sure that our family's safe and happy that it's working and you feel great. That's so nice. I love this. And big kudos to you, Grace,

for picking up the load when James had to focus on his own health and for you continuing. And I have to say on a personal level, one thing that really impresses me is that you made tradeoffs. That's not easy. you said we're going to stop contributing to our investments,

even though as you put it, it kills you. That's what a leader does. You said, look, I have to take over this decision making right now. My husband is sick. We did it. So I think the two of you should be commended. That's true teamwork. It's awesome.

You know, what's interesting is maybe today is a chance for the two of you to really take a second, celebrate how far you've come and then to reflect on the next chapter. Yeah. Yeah. We can't stop bad things from happening. That's life. But what we can do is make a few smart decisions when things are going well so that when something unexpected happens, we can lean on our planning. In other words, we can plan for the worst when we are at our best. I have a friend just the other night she got to note that her mom is sick. Her mom lives

in a different country. She had to get on an international flight last minute. She booked the first ticket she could get her hands on. She didn't check 20 different prices to get the best deal. She just said, I have to go now. And that is the level of focus I want you to be able to have in a crisis to be able to say, I don't care about anything else right now. My field of vision is narrowed to the one thing that matters getting on the next flight. Money is not my primary concern. I actually love this idea of money not being the primary determinant. I love it so much that I extended it to a personal money rule that I use for myself, not just for bad things, but also for good things. So my personal money rule is that for the big, important things in my life, I'm going to plan

ahead so much that money is not going to be the first concern, the second concern, even the 10th concern. And that includes our wedding, our honeymoon, housing, and our health. Is this rule practical for most people? No. Is it right for me? Yes, that is the point of a rich life, which fits you like a bespoke coat. It is meant for you to live your rich life. And the more you turn that dial, the more your rich life is increasingly confusing, even bewildering to other people. Now, the simplest way to start applying this concept of freedom when something bad happens is to start aggressively building your emergency fund. So when something bad happens, and it will happen at some point in your life, you will be ready. And money will not be your first concern. Now, for James and Grace,

they made a series of money decisions during their journey. These decisions were not arbitrary. They were shaped by what they saw growing up. And we're going to get into that right after this break. Okay, I got a question for everybody. Why in America do we ignore all the infrastructure, all the invisible systems that make success possible? Like I have shoes with shoelaces, of course.

I know those shoelaces are going to become dirty one day. You think I'm going to wait until I see some dirty-ass shoe laces, before I walk outside. Oh, look at my dirty shoelaces. Hello. No, I have extra shoelaces. And not just one. I have two.

That's called logistics. Think about all the other invisible things in our life, our Wi-Fi, the pipes in our house that make our daily lives possible. We've got to be able to pay attention to those things as well. And that also applies to your money, especially if you have children or dependents,

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Prices subject to underwriting and health questions. All right, I have these money rules that I developed. You may have heard me talk about them, like save 10%, invest 20%, or I give myself unlimited spending on certain areas of life that I love. But a lot of people don't realize that these rules change over time. Like the same rules I had in my 20s are not relevant for me. This is why I am so big on doing a rich life review. Now, part of this is looking at your numbers and figuring out your options,

which is something that our friends at Facet can help with. Facet charges a flat membership fee for financial planning, never a percentage of your portfolio. You get access to a team of CFP professionals, always a CFP, always a fiduciary, who help you create a personalized financial plan for your rich life goals. And they handle important things like investments, retirement planning, starting a family, becoming empty nesters, estate planning, all of it. Your financial plan needs to adapt as your life changes. Facet makes getting professional financial advice more accessible without charging hidden exorbitant fees. As of the date of this recording, Fassett is waving their two.

$250 enrollment fee for new annual members. And for my audience, FASID is offering $300 into your brokerage account if you invest and maintain $5,000 within your first 90 days. You can head to Facet.com slash Ramit to learn more about which membership option is best for you. Facet is an SEC registered investment advisor. I'm not a member of Fassett and I have an incentive to endorse FACET as I have an ongoing fee-based contract for cash compensation based on this endorsement. All opinions are my own. And now, not a guarantee of a similar outcome. I do want to know a little bit about how you grew up with money.

James, I'm very interested. Just from what you told me about your gas, I have my suspicions about how you grew up. But what do you remember your family saying about money when you were young? I've never really talked about at all. We always had enough, as long as we had enough, we shouldn't grumble. You know, we had food. Mustn't grumble.

That's very English. Is that right? Must and grumble. Oh, yeah. Must and grumble. Stip up her lip, you know, muscle crumble. And would you say, how would you describe socioeconomically? Were you middle class?

How do you describe that? In England, it doesn't matter how poor you are. You always say, well, we're just about middle class. We're always just going to be a bit, you know, you're not. We never went hungry. We never, you know, we had Christmases and stuff. We didn't have holidays. We didn't have anything, any new cars or anything like that.

But it was always enough. Okay. that's all interesting, but that doesn't answer my question. Trust me, we do the same thing in the U.S. Everybody lies about being middle-cical. I talk to people who have $5 million. They're like, well, we're just getting by. We're comfortable.

I go, shut the fuck. Tell me what you're rich. So now, looking back, how would you characterize your family socioeconomically? When I got my first proper job, I was making more money than my mom and dad combined. Wow. That explains a lot. That explains the feeling of freedom from filling up your tank in the car. That explains a lot. When you got your first job and you made that much,

did you ever talk about money with your parents then? We talk about it more now. Now that they're retired. And my dad was in the armed forces, so his pension's actually pretty good. What do they say to you now? What do you talk about? I worry that they don't have enough. I worry that they spend too much on our kids. I worry that, you know, they shouldn't be buying stuff for our kids. We can do that. I worry when my mom asks me, what do I want for Christmas when I know she's going to put it on a credit card and I'm like, I don't need anything from you've had enough. And can they afford it? They must be able to. They haven't lost a house. Like, wait, that's, that's a bit dramatic. I suppose they must be able to buy toys. They're not homeless. I honestly don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. Like, I know, like, mom, mom worked odd jobs part time and everything and her pension is very small. Do you ever feel good about money? I don't know how I've answered that. I think that's the answer. I like that. I look at my account and I know it won't be the negative. I like that I can take up a hobby if I wanted. I think my biggest worries, I think if I liked money, I'd spend it all.

Like, I think if I got, I think I have quite, I'd have quite a bad habit if I was to kind of really unleash myself of why I really wanted to do all the time. Let me translate. Tell me if I got this right. Okay. I don't feel great about money, and that's actually a protective mechanism, because if I let myself uncaged feel good about money, I would just spend it all. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That's a very common feeling that people who are ultra frugal have. They'll use certain phrases like, I don't need to

eat at a fancy restaurant. Like, I'm perfectly fine with Taco Bell. Nothing wrong with Taco Bell. but what's really said beneath that phrase is I'm worried that if I go to this nice restaurant or nice hotel that I might like it and then I might find myself actually needing to eat there every single day for the rest of my life. It's obviously absurd. To me, what it shows is a lack of self-trust.

I can eat at a nice restaurant a couple times a year. I can enjoy it. And then I can come home and say, that was nice and I don't need to go back there for another six months. I trust myself to make the right decisions and to indulge occasionally, knowing that I can afford it.

But this idea of like, let me keep myself cage because I'm a wild animal and I'm wild. We can work on that. Yeah. What do you say? Grace, am I getting this right?

Yeah, 100%. 100%. But then like, you know, when we say we're looking up a whole deal or something, I always look at more expensive things than you do. Yeah, it's true. Why is that? I think you're a bit of a dreamer.

I think you, you're constantly thinking, oh, well, when we have a million euro, when we win the lotto, we're going to do this. And when we do this and I think you love the idea of thinking about, you know, having this money and what you would do. And then when I, like, so you look up the expensive holiday and I, I'll come back with the actual price because I'll do a little bit of research. And then he'd be like, well, obviously, we're just going to Wexford for the week. Oh, wait a minute.

That was my question. So he looks up the expensive things and then where do you actually stay? Oh, we don't go. Oh, wow. Okay. What the hell kind of story was that? I look up the expensive things and then we don't go. What is that?

Yeah. All right. Sorry. No, that's actually extremely insightful. And I think the characterization of potentially dreaming a bit, I don't mind dreams. Like I like them. I like saying like, oh, wouldn't it be nice?

I love that. But I like to go one step further, which is, hey, do you actually want to stay there? Because if you do, we could. We might not be able to do it this year, but we could put some money aside. And we know exactly mathematically how long it's going to be. It might take two and a half years. And then we could go there. We'll literally put it on the calendar right now.

Do you want? This is what I say to him. This is what I'd say. And then he's like, no, no, no, no. it's crazy, we can't spend that. And do you know why? Do you know why he says that? No.

Ask him. Why do you say that? Why do you... Because it's a dream. We can't afford it, really. But we can't. Look at our savings. What if I get sick again?

You know, they said it was going to be gone the first time when it came back. Yeah. Or if it comes back again. Whatever I can't work for another year and this time work won't pay for it. Then you do the child care and I work and it's all fine. I wouldn't mind that too much. Yeah. what I'm hearing is we're having fun I love talking to the two of you but I really love peeling the layers and going deeper

and beneath the jokes about the gas and the hotels there's actually pain the idea that look at what we've been through together it has been hard and what if we have to go through it again what are we going to do. We did it once. I don't know if we can do it again. Let's acknowledge that. We don't have to fix it this very minute. But what I can tell is money is deeply emotional. We try to nibble around the edges. We try to ignore it. We use logistical answers. But actually, like, the logistics are fine. We can fix some things here and there. That's not what you're coming to me for. It's because there's something much deeper here, much deeper. Grace, can you Tell me what you remember growing up.

What did your family say about money when you were young? Both my parents come from really big families. And they would have been middle class in the 50s in Ireland, which was very, very still quite poor compared to the rest of the world. My mom was a nurse and she was what they called the laying hen. So she would be the one with consistent money coming in and my dad started his own business. And it's and it worked super hard all his life. But we were, to be honest, probably upper middle class. They did a huge amount of work.

They invested in properties. They were very smart with their money. But one of the things that always sticks out in my mind is my dad, he had a business at one time where he made automatic gates. And we had an automatic gate installed in our house. and that was seen to be like really rich. And then my mom pulled me aside, and I think I was in primary school or something, she said, no, don't tell anyone we've got automatic gates

because they think we're rich and we're not. Wow. When you remember this story from, you know, decades ago. Yeah. Why do you remember this story in particular? I think she was a bit frightened about money. I remember coming home from Irish College one day and they had a hot tub in the house.

They had a hot tub in the... And I was like, where the hell did this come? And they were like, well, instead of buying a new car, we got a hot tub instead. And I was like, what? They're doing really, really well. But I always had the feeling that it was like a secret that we couldn't tell anyone. In what ways do they downplay their success publicly? They would never show off.

We'd never buy expensive cars or anything like that. It was all very practical normal. What if I met them and I asked them, what do you do? What would they say? It's a very American question by it. the way. Yeah. They would say, oh, sure, we're retired and enjoying it and we're traveling around the world now and having a great time. Okay. What are they going to do with the money when they pass? They're very generous with it, and I think it'll go to, it'll go to us. There's three of us in the

family and they're going to split everything equally. And we had conversations about it and kind of for like, kind of, they don't want us fighting over anything. And I'm like, that's fine. Like, we're all quite successful, which is really brilliant. You know, it's kind of a striking example for everyone listening and watching that you can see parents who learn about money and talk about money between themselves. They tell their kids about money. Yeah. They have set you grace up with a very good financial education and they'll talk and they'll say things. Hey, don't tell everyone at school. We're not rich. Well, you may have been rich. or certainly upper middle class.

But I can understand parents not wanting their kids to go and blab. You know, I understand. But it's not a surprise to me that siblings often turn out similarly with money. Not always, but they grew up with the same money messages. And to me, the big takeaway from this is you better get good with money and you better talk to your kids about money. Because it's not an accident. If you want your kids to grow up equipped.

To deal with the world, you talk to them from the time they are three, four, five. Otherwise, some shit-selling whole-life insurance is going to be taking over that role. And you really don't want that. So let me ask the two of you. The two of you grew up quite differently with money. When was the first time you substantively talked about money in your relationship? Australia. Yeah.

It was actually kind of a bit of a kind of our first kind of really big fight because Greece went to Australia. actually when I had met her, when I first met her, she'd already planned to move to Australia. And I was, I didn't really have, I was kind of working part-time, wasn't really making any money, living at home still. And then she left and then after a few months, I was like, I can't let her go. So I quit everything and moved across follower. And to me, this is the first time that I had traveled, really, ever. And it was the other side of the world. Hold on.

It's very romantic. What that is good story? I'm like, yo, this is a good story. Sorry, go on. We bought a camper van. We traveled down the West Coast of Australia for six months. And then Grace got a very drug for a job. And I was doing odds-and-end. We had a small flat, which was dirt cheap because it was right next to the airport in the flight path. So, you know, the best alarm clock in the world is a Bowen landing over your head in six in the morning. So I was making money so I could enjoy Australia, whereas she was. taking care to make money so she could save and then

her plan was to maybe go back or stay. There was an ice cream shop around the corner that I really liked and if Grace was having a bad day I'd get her some and she would just get so mad that I was spending money on ice cream. And I think that was the first time we kind of really talked about it and we hadn't talked about it. We hadn't talked about what our kind of idea and goals were

when we were out there. And it was kind of a really eye-opening for me because I remember when Grace was talking, she wasn't talking about what she wanted. the money she was making, it was what about the money's going to do for us? It was we. And I hadn't been thinking like that at all. Honestly, I'm very impressed. Actually, shocked, in a pleasantly shock, because that story tells me so much. And I really appreciate you sharing it with me. The idea that, James, you had never really traveled before. You get on a plane,

you go across the world to chase a girl. The two of you, living a very frugal life, living under flight path, just like, we got to make it work. But what really strikes me is the way that you looked at money differently. I can just imagine, James, the way you grew up, like not thinking much further ahead. Most people, at least the ones I talk to in the U.S., they are literally thinking about that month, maybe next month, and that's it. And I'm begging people to think further ahead. Six months, a year, ultimately 20 years. Because when you look that far ahead, you can actually achieve amazing things. You can take the trips you want. You can buy the car you want. It's awesome. What's amazing is Grace was already doing that. Grace has been thinking about money,

talking about money in her family since she was a kid. The fact that the two of you got in a fight about freaking ice cream cones is hilarious. This is a great example where sometimes the most substantive conversations can come from what seems like the most trivial purchase. Ice cream. And look at what happened. You built a life together as a team. Starting way back with a freaking ice cream purchase. Now, I want to ask you to,

there's a reputation for people in Ireland, let's just say the UK for feeling guilty about money. Oh, yeah. Is that true? Oh, 100%. Oh, 100%. Like, you feel guilty about making it,

spending it, all of it. Talking about it. Yeah. So how are you two so open? How come you're so comfortable talking about it right now? I think it's because it clicked with me. I was in work one day and I had a meeting with one of these pension guys. And we have a system in Ireland, I didn't know about it really, called additional voluntary

contribution. It's a pension. It's kind of the only way you can save money with benefiting with time. tax. But I didn't really know anything about it, but I made a meet, I had a meeting with this guy and I said, listen, I know nothing. Tell me about this. And he walked through, if I did nothing, how much money I would have when I was 65, 70. I think on my contract, it says I have to work until I'm 70 before I get a pension. But it was something like 8,000 euros a year. And that number stuck with me and I was like, that cannot happen. A, I'm not working.

until I'm 70 because I can't be hauling patients around when I'm 70. So I need to retire earlier than that or do something different. And be like, I can do something now. And he was like, right, if you start saving now, you can have this much or whatever. I think it was like a million. And I was like, lull, okay, let's try. And so I started learning all about it. And what I really started being annoyed about was no one else was talking about this. Everyone in work was like, what are you doing talking about pensions, you know, because I was like, no, you need to go and learn about this because you'll only be getting $8,000 in a year. And everyone was like, oh, I'll deal with that when I'm 50. So it was really frustrating me that people just weren't talking about money and especially women.

Yes, we get a fabulous maternity leave, but it also affects our pension and all the sort of stuff. And as women, for me, I feel like you have to have your own something to fall back on because we are in a more vulnerable position at certain times in our lives if we're having children and all that sort of stuff. So I started being sort of militant about it. You looked ahead, decades ahead. And you said, that's not going to be the future for me. I'm going to make changes right now.

And you did. I love that. And it's reflected, by the way, in your CSP. I can see it with a 49% savings rate. It's obviously very clear. When you both think back to the messages that you grew up with around money, which of those messages do you think you bring to this relationship today? Yeah, I think. And credit cards and anything that isn't like is literally the B or an end or you should never ever, ever, ever own. Like we don't, we have Like our car, we just, we saved up, we bought it outright.

And our old car is, God, it's 13 years old. Your lesson is you bring an aversion to debt to this relationship. Is that right? Yeah, I think so. Okay. What else? Yeah. Gifts, physical things as showing love.

Ooh. That would explain the ice cream. Yep. That you could not afford, actually. Yeah. And I think if there's one thing I actually spend my money on, it's toys for the kids. Because I remember the Thunderbirds, there was a big toy island that every kid had to have and I couldn't have it. And instead, Mom made me one out of plasticine and out of toilet roll and stuff and painted it and everything.

And I all, I have one. That's kind of adorable and like sad at the same time. I kind of love it. Yeah. That's really beautiful. Do you have a bunch of toys in the house? Yeah. They're everywhere.

No credit card debt? No. I have a sinking fund for kids' toys. Every week there's about 80 years that goes into the sinking fund for like stuff they might need. 80 a week? I know. I'm not in touch with kids' toys, but that seems like a lot. No, no, no.

It's not just for toys. It's for like swimming lessons and trips away and things like that. Sorry. All right. Can you say no to your kids? No. Okay, great. You both admit it.

All right. Grace, what messages do you bring from your childhood that you bring to this relationship with money? I think communication. I always saw my mom and dad have conversations about money and mom always did the books for dad's business. So they'd always just have the books out and mom would be talking about taxes and returns. And it would just be like in the air, like the conversations. And they never fought about money. It was always just a discussion or, you know, and I think that's what. I've almost forced you into James because it was one of the things is essential to me in a relationship is to be honest and open about money

and then I'm the one that's hiding stuff, I don't know. Well, let me say that I really appreciate what you just said about your parents and I hope that the children of every guest that I speak to on here say the same decades from now that they will say my parents didn't fight about money

but they talked about it. always a discussion, it was always in the air. That's actually what I want. I don't want money to be hidden. I don't want it to be a source of tension, although sometimes it will be, and that's okay. I want it to be an important part of the family. Just like food, just like respecting your elders, just like studying and having fun, money is one of those core parts of a family. It has to be in the air. And when we shine a light on it, instead of hiding it, then we can build a healthy relationship with it. I love that Grace didn't sit back and hope things would improve. She learned how pensions work, and then she made a decision that is going to have a huge impact on her future. That is what's known

as having an internal locus of control. An internal locus of control is the belief that you can control your future. Compare that to someone with an external locus of control who believes simply that life happens to them. So which one are you? Do you have an internal locus of control or an external locus of control. To answer that question, take a look at your own behavior with fitness, food, your relationships, your career, and money. External or internal? It's quite an interesting question to think about. This has actually been one of the biggest questions that I have come back to throughout my career. We all know intuitively that if we eat better, we will be healthier. We know that if we save and invest, we will be more secure.

So why don't we do it? This is the question I've been thinking about since the year 2000. One reason, and it's a big one, is that a lot of people don't actually believe that they can control anything around them. A lot of them have tried before, or they've been told it's out of their hands, or they have tried and it failed over and over.

And so they simply stop trying. That can lead to an external locus of control. and I think this is one of the most overlooked reasons that people stay stuck. These beliefs are shaped by a lifetime of experiences, even multi-generational. A lot of you watching this right now had some great-grandfather who something bad happened to, and that story, that myth or legend was almost passed down your family tree. And today, you think you cannot affect the way the world works because of what a great grandfather, or somebody you never met experienced 100 plus years ago.

If you're listening to this and you're starting to realize, oh my gosh, I want to have an internal locus of control. I want to take control of my money and make rapid changes. Then I can help. Inside my money coaching program, I'm going to walk you through the exact systems that I use to take control of your money and start seeing real results. You can join the program at IWT.com slash money coaching.

Now, Grace believed she could make a difference in her own life. She saw the lever, she pulled it, and she got results. Up next, we'll take a closer look at the other changes Grace and James are considering as they build their rich life. My best tip for new business owners, nobody cares what font you're using or the alignment on your website. None of that matters if you don't have customers. If you are starting a business this year, focus on making sales instead of all the ancillary stuff like sales. Like sales. setting up the perfect font on your website. And that is why I recommend you start with Shopify. Shopify is the best converting checkout on the planet. It's used by 10% of all e-commerce in the

U.S., including big brands like Mattel and Jim Shark. Make shopping easier for your customers. Plus, they've already got easy templates for things like websites and landing pages with AI tools that help with everyday tasks like generating discount codes and enhancing images. If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Turn your big business idea into with Shopify on your side. Sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today at Shopify.com slash Ramith. Go to Shopify.com slash remit.

Shopify.com slash Ramit. If the two of you continue on the way that you have with your money, When something comes up in life, what do you think happens after the next time and the time after that and the time after that? What do you think will happen? I will just collapse. I'd worry for us as a couple. Yeah. You know?

Well, it just becomes too much. What if we can't support the other one anymore? It just sounds crazy, but I don't think that would ever happen. It does sound crazy. I mean, you have such a beautiful teamwork here. Yeah. There's no doubt about it. It's so obvious.

but I also think the two of you are very good at putting your blinders on and moving forward. And what a shame to live that way when you actually have all the ingredients for a true rich life. What I see in you versus what I see when I talk to other people who perhaps were not raised to save money, who did not have a healthy education about money, right? They didn't have those role models. And so I'm having a different conversation with them. I'm actually trying to show them why it's important to save money at all. The two of you have the ingredients for greatness.

And in many ways, we can see it on the CSP. It's reflected. Wow, what a savings rate? It's incredible. Maybe the way that you talk about money and behave with money could be tweaked a bit. I just want to reflect, the two of you went through an incredibly stressful situation. I don't think anybody can give. you feedback on how you did, who the hell knows what it's like to have one kid on the way,

a young kid, husband who's going through cancer treatments, morning sickness, like nobody. So what we can say is, I think you handled it the best you could. I think you've done a pretty phenomenal job. And I think that life is going to be stressful in other ways. And what I want to do I want to equip you so that you can continue to get closer together, not let these stressful situations tear you apart. Right? How does that sound? Yeah, that sounds great. Wonderful. Okay, awesome. Have the two of you talked about what your rich life vision is? Retiring early. Okay, retiring early. Great. Any idea what age? 50. 50. Okay. All right. So that's like about 12 or so years away. What else? Grace, what's in your rich life? I would love to be able to go on two or three

holidays a year, one back to the UK. And I would love to be able to bring your parents, James, on holidays somewhere, because they really haven't been on many. And I would love to be able to help my kids the way that I was helped, you know, financially going into college and stuff. Oh, I really want to do the renovation on the house. That'll be so incredible. Oh, my gosh. I want to have my own craft room upstairs with the light. I would love to probably go down to maybe two days, two or three days a week working. And then the other two or three days work on my own businesses. I loved creating community and hosting events. Cool. All right. So here's what I'm, what I'm hearing from both of you is you want to live a very rich life.

Like these aren't, oh, I don't know, like when we're 70, maybe we want to take a trip to the Grand Canyon. No, it's like we want to retire early. We want to renovate the house. We want to travel three times a year. This is a lot. I love it. Right now, how do you feel about money? Just nervous about if something like this is going to happen again.

Are we going to be okay? Are we going to be able to manage it? Because we actually, we had a serious illness cover in addition to life insurance. How much did they pay you? 30,000. Wow. That's great. It was really, really amazing.

So that really saved our, and it helped us. That's where a lot of the savings have come from. So when I think about your rich life, I'm thinking, first, can we set things up so that you are safe and resilient. First, we can get to the home renovations and the travel. Second, safety first. How do you both feel about that? Yes, 100%. Okay. I want to know that if James gets sick again, or grace for that matter, that the family is financially safe. And wouldn't that feel good to know that you have the math, that you both understand it. And most importantly, you are both connected to it.

It's like wipe away these blurry lenses. In fact, throw them away. We know that we're safe. And now we have earned the right to talk about the next part of our rich land. Okay? Yeah. I'm going to put the CSP up on screen. And I would like to get your help to try to figure out what needs to happen in order for you both to be safe.

Quick recap here. Your assets 328K, investment, $7.7.000. savings 42k and debt 230k. That's a total net worth of 219K. Income is 91,200. That will go up when you go back to work, James. James, when is that happening? January, January 1st. January or February, I'd say. All right. Let's leave it for now, but we can change it. Fixed cost we're at 58%. Again, things are a little bit different where you're living because of pensions and et cetera. I just do want to reflect on some of the numbers in this fixed cost because they're quite amazing. So you're, you're mortgage is $997. What the

$997? There's not even four digits in your... It's incredible, right? It's incredible. This is insane. This is another one. I just want to say it again, just so people get even more pissed. Child care is $355. Again, there's only three digits in that number. This is insane. That's for 45 hours a week. And they feed her and they include, yeah, it's, it's Unbelievable. I love it. I want easy child care for all parents.

Like, how can you expect parents to have kids and to work if it's freaking thousands of dollars? Okay, let's go on. I'm getting mad right now. All right. Car payment, $200. Debt payments, $200. What's that for? Oh, it's my student loan.

Oh, okay. Wait, how much is your student loan? $20,000. All right, fine. Groceries are $600 a month. Oh, my God. I feel like I'm living in like 1985.

What the phone is $30? What? Yes, for both of us. How is this possible? I call every year and I'm like, I want to move down to Tesco Mobile, which is like the super, super budget.

And they're like, oh, we can do that for blah, blah, blah. So I'm currently paying 15 euros a month. I see so many CSPs. The thing about the CSP, I feel like some formula got messed up and every number has one zero dropped off of it. Like literally every number is missing a zero. This is crazy. 30 for phone should be 300 in the U.S. All right. So your investments, again, just to sum it up, you are doing 960, let's call it $1,000 a month plus $380. So roughly

$1,300 a month for your investments on a salary of about $91,000 gross. 49% on savings and negative 14% on guilt-free spending. Obviously, that doesn't work. And you mentioned that you feel stressed out about money. Yeah. You see why? Yeah. If you don't have any money to eat out or to do anything, but yet you are still buying all these toys. I know. Actually, it's the worst of both worlds. Yeah. Might as well just be honest about it. And maybe Scott buying so many toys. I don't know. That's up to you. So what do we need to do in order to change these numbers because they actually need to be rationalized. We need to pick appropriate numbers. You can choose based on what you want for your rich life, but then you actually got to stick to them.

If you want to change them later, you could change them six months from now. But one of the most important things is, hey, let's pick numbers together that match up with our vision, and then let's both agree to stick to them. And after six months, we can reevaluate. How would you change these numbers based on what you said your rich life vision was. I think we're saving too much. Okay. Definitely. I would like to save a thousand per month.

Okay. You're doing that right now into your emergency fund. Keep in mind you already have 13 months of emergency funds. Yeah. So I'll stop the emergency fund and we'll just keep for the house maybe. Yeah. Okay. So let's drop, you're saying drop the long-term emergency fund off.

Yeah. Okay. Watch what happens. Okay, your savings drop down to 31% and your guilt-free spending is now at 4% or $216 per month. I spend more than that. But it's a good directional change. So it's interesting because you do have 13 months of savings,

which I think is great. When, James, you got sick, I'm guessing you burned through your savings pretty quickly. Sorry for this question, but what's the likelihood of this happening again? In theory, it should... Okay. Because you've gone for treatment, pad surgery, scans are good. Okay.

But there is no, obviously, exact. Are you concerned? Financially speaking. Health-wise, obviously, but financially speaking, are you concerned? We're not going to get that extra, we're not going to get that insurance payout again. No. Because he's uninsurable now. Yeah.

Can I say this? If I were in your situation, here's how I would approach this. I would say, look, I think we've done an amazing job, especially Grace, done an amazing job of shepherding all this stuff while I had to focus on my health. We have 13 months of savings. That's incredible. But I'm in a high-risk situation. Yeah. If I get sick again, we do not have the same benefits that we had last time. I think that we should save what to others might seem like an irrationally high amount of money, but for our high-risk situation, it makes sense.

what number should that be? I don't know. Let's talk about it. Okay, let's settle on 18 months of safety. Yeah, yeah. I think that sounds good. And once you have that, it's locked away, and you know that that's your break in case of emergency, but 18 months gives you time. You can adapt. You can cut your spending. You can extend it. You're not going to count on all these subsidies and things like that payouts, but it gives you time. What do you think about that? I like that. The point is we need to pick a number that's reasonable and and will serve the needs financially speaking in case one of you get sick.

Yeah. I don't think I've recommended to anyone 18 months of savings. Like my own personal thing, I like to have a year, and that's quite aggressive already. But 18 months in your situation, considering all the things we've talked about could make sense. Yeah. Okay?

So if that is the case, then can we go back to the CSP and let's just take a look? We actually just took that emergency fund down to zero. What do you think? I would say we'll pause the renovation fund and move the long-term saving fund into that. Wow. Okay, so now we're back up to 31%

for an emergency fund. We're putting $1,000 a month away. You have zero towards the renovation fund. Anything else? Vacations. It's only a hundred euro really would make a difference to cut that. I don't really want to stop going on holiday.

At $100 a month. Yeah, it's not really going to make a difference. And you both told me you like vacations. Yeah. And like you've gone through a lot. I don't mind it. I think if you wanted to save $100 a month there are other places you could do it from.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Now that we have rationalized this a bit, you have 31% going to save it. which actually seems, I mean, it's a little high, but it's appropriate. You don't have enough in guilt-free spending. No, I don't.

I understand that for the next three months, reduced income, but it's going to go back up. I'd like to just plan for real life. So tell me the numbers, and I will adjust them here. So, mind we back to $3.5. Sorry, how do you say it, America? $3,500. And your net income will be what?

$2673. $2,673. Okay, wow, let's see what just happened. Fixed costs are down to 48%. Amazing. A total reflection of your core values right here, which is like, we don't need a big old fancy house. We don't need a big old fancy cars.

It's all quite modest, which I like. I really like that. Next up, investments are at 6%. Oh my God. Savings are at 26%. But all the way down to Guilfrey spending, look at Grace's face. Look at that big old smile.

She goes, yes. Yeah, okay, and James is smiling too. Guys, I love this. Yeah. So you're at 21% or $1,389. Now, what do you think about that number? Like we always overspend on guilt-free stuff. And then in our heads, we said, well, we can only spend X amount

and then we beat ourselves up because we spent over it. But now, looking at that, actually what we have been spending has been reasonable for the amount of money we do make. And we shouldn't be beating ourselves up because, I mean, we go out to dinner maybe once every other month and we have takeaway probably every once or three months or so. I love the lies already.

Oh, everybody notice the f***ing lies. Just rewind five seconds and look at Grace's face. Yes. This is the favorite time of Ramit Satie's life. Oh, God. Okay, why don't we just discuss

where you all have been spending guilt-free spending money? Yeah, let's do that. Go ahead, Grace. This September, I have it on my little spreadsheet. We spent 250 euros on dining out. Wait, can you just put this on screen? I'd love to look at it myself.

Oh, great. Okay, hold on. Let me just describe what I see right now. So this is a nice looking spreadsheet, and it's got some different categories. Scroll up a little bit, if you don't mind. So we have cash flow, overview, bills, expenses. I can see at the bottom tabs we have August, September, October, November, 25 and on and on and on.

Okay, very good. Let's go down a little bit. What's nice, so I see the day it's due, the budget amount, for example, the mortgage 996 and then the actual, which is 996. That's great. And then the expenses in the orange is the, like every day, day to day. Read out the kids one then. Oh, God. The kids one. The budget was 100, and we actually spent a thousand one hundred and 33. What the on what? Now, let me see. Let me see. Oh, my God.

Amazing. Stop right here. Stop right here. Okay. Everybody remember what James said about 45 seconds ago. He goes, oh, we eat out once every three months or some BS. Okay, look at this September 3rd, dining out, off the bone lunch. I don't know what that is, but it sounds expensive.

Next day, McDonald's, 525. That's quite modest. Moving along, kids, what are these, I don't even know what any of these words are. Knit, comb, and doties. What does that mean? So it's just pacifiers and stuff. There was headlice in the crash, so I just wanted to be prepared. Okay, more words I don't know. I thought I spoke fluent English. All right, moving along. We got Starbucks. This is all on the fourth. Dining out the next day, $20.90. for coffee. Next day, dining out, $20 at McDonald's. Okay, and on, no, no, no, okay, you can take this off screen for a second. Wait, I, hold on, just look at this, look at row number 95. T-moo. Like, this is the only, this is the only one I've seen where people put what they

spent, but then they go in there and add comments that are like, oh, we're like, who does this? Everyone should do it. It's great, crack. All right, take this off screen, please. Okay. First of all, how the f*** are you going to tell me you only eat out once every three weeks or three months or whatever? James? None of that is me. It's true. It's me. It's all me. Oh. Yeah. So we're a team except when it comes to eating out. Yeah. All right. Do you have a, because you have this sort of well-constructed budget, you know, it has all the stuff in it. But when we go to the, the actual discretionary stuff, you're behind on many of the things. Yeah. What do you think about that?

I actually find it so hard to stick to the budget. Bills are fine. I can argue down bills. I can argue down everything. But when it comes to, like, sticking to the budget that was set, it's more of, like, a tracking expenses rather than, like, sticking to the actual budget. I don't know how to explain this. I'm not doing it very well.

It's easy to track. It makes us feel like we are doing something. But the one thing you are not doing when it comes to changing your behavior is changing your behavior. It's a distraction for us. We track it, we go through it, we tell ourselves we're looking for patterns.

You know the pattern. It's very obvious from looking at it for five seconds. The real energy should be spent on saying, What is the overall vision of our rich life, which we've done some element of today? How much do we want a portion to different four key buckets? Okay, we've done that. Now, we know those numbers. We know what the finished puzzle looks like.

How are we going to get there? That's where the energy should go. Tracking is irrelevant. Yeah, you should track a couple of discretionary things. Like eating out, one of you should own that number, and you can track it through your credit card, debit card, whatever. But the level of tracking here is actually not getting you what you want. It's getting you a distraction. How does it feel to hear that? I know this. I know this in my soul. Yeah. Yeah. Good. Okay, great. I personally think that you are destined for something bigger than

tracking 100 rows of expenses on a spreadsheet. I just do. There's got the stuff that the two of you have been through, the way that you have done it together, you've tackled really hard stuff. And it would be a shame to focus your energy in this small of a way. I think it's the same thing that I was doing with the tomatoes. You know, it's the control. If I can just get it down on paper, then I can make sense of it. But actually, I know what's wrong. Yeah. What do you think might be a different, alternative to that approach that you've taken with the tomatoes and with the budgeting? Zooming out a little bit more and seeing a little bit more about the importance of it, really.

I enjoy process. I always have. I enjoy knitting. I enjoy spinning. I enjoy, you know, the meticulous details. I really like that. And I find that I can't do my knitting, spinning, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, because I'm minding to children. So instead, I will focus it on things that are for the family, like meticulously tracking the budget or making food for my family. But I don't need to be doing it in this way, putting in so much effort. I'd probably need to just relax a little bit. Wow. Do you think? One of the most profound things I've heard on this podcast, your level of self-perception is really high. And you just mentioned something offhandedly. I probably don't need to, I think you said something like work as hard or put the amount of time in.

Yeah. Can you say it a different way? Would you be comfortable putting less work into this? I don't know why that's hard because I love like. But yeah, I think I need to like put less work in to do. to do swash them. Isn't that the key question that so many of us ask? If I stop doing this, if I delegate this,

then what will I do? And on a deeper level, who am I? Yeah. Who am I if I'm not canning tomatoes for the family and tracking this detailed report that's available for the last three years of expenses? Who am I? can you answer it for me grace who would you be i'd just be probably just mom and wife yeah you know moms

are not loved because they have the most extensive spreadsheet in the world wives are not loved because they track every single expense that's not why they're loved none of us are yeah part of getting to the next level of where you want to get is having a still clear vision of where you want to go. And both of you, as a team, working to get there. You already did the easy stuff. Then you got stronger. You had to because you had to go through tougher stuff.

You went through illness. Very difficult. Most of us cannot understand what that's like. You did it. And now to get to the next level, the level where you are safe as a family with 18 months of saving setup, where you are showing your children a healthy relationship with money. that probably requires not doing some of the same things you used to.

And actually saying, I choose not to. Because in order to get where we're going, that's not my future anymore. James, what's coming up for you as you hear this? What you've been talking about is just there, it's just been in the background for so long, and we haven't been able to kind of express it. You know, sometimes I feel like she's so focused on the saving money, the canning tomatoes, but

we never get to eat the tomatoes. We never get to spend the money. We never get to, it's a process. And then once it's done, it's put on a shelf, it's put into savings. And then we're on to the next one. And so to be, who she'll be if she doesn't do that,

you know, should still be, you know, the best mom. She'll still be my perfect wife. You know, that's not going to change. We'll just maybe have a bit more time together. You enjoy our witch life, as you say.

And so I hope a big part of her not been held to take on all this is that I would be able to come back on board and that we can start being a team again

now that I'm hopefully out of the end of this that I can start taking on some of that burden and she can maybe relax a little bit let the steamer off that pressure cooker

and then. You know James, you were always a team. Didn't stop because you got sick. Yeah. Not once have I heard either of you insult the other. Haven't heard it.

If anything, bending over backwards to support each other. And you were a team always. I think the way that the two of you talk about money reveals so much. The idea, James, that you, maybe deep down, think that you've let down your partner, but of course you have not. You got sick. now you're better. You put in a lot of work to make that happen.

And now you can come back and you can participate in the numbers more than you were able to. Perfect. Amazing. Grace, the idea that you have to control everything that you may not be a good mom or wife if you're not tracking numbers

reveals so much. What I love, what I'm seeing, the two of you get is, hey, we've made this work. We've made it work. We're actually very grateful at what we've been able to go through. But now perhaps there's a new way to look at our money together. Maybe it's not about going way down into the weeds. Maybe it's about coming up with a few key levers, those four key numbers,

and actually creating a vision for ourselves that lets us appreciate living. Let's go out. let's actually go out as a family and go eat out once a week. Fine. We'll find a way to do it within our numbers. But that's important to us. And trust me, when you go out to eat on Saturday with the whole family, you are going to really appreciate it.

That's actually the best part of the whole thing. How do you feel? Do you feel confident that you could change the way you relate to money together? I think we can change the way we're going at it. I think we were going at it from a survival point of view. And now that we are at this place, even though we're at a very sort of precarious place, but we both have jobs that we can go back to. We both can build a backup in no time, really. Once I'm back doing overtime, that can go into fun stuff, you know, and go into the extra savings and you get bonuses as well.

So that's extra money that we can do. So we're actually fine. And I think I just need to sit in it and enjoy the fact that we've sort of almost made it. Yes. No, you have made it. You have made it. You made it out of a cancer diagnosis. You made it.

You still have money and savings in investing. If anything, when I look at it, I feel gratitude. I feel gratitude towards your employers. I feel gratitude towards the government. Universal health. Exactly. I feel gratitude towards that insurance payout. Yeah.

And then you had the vision to choose to get that. A lot of gratitude. And what you said was so beautiful, going from survival to the next chapter. What's the theme of the next chapter of your life as it relates to money? James, what would you say? Enjoyment. I love that. And what about you, Grace?

I'd love to thrive. Thrive. Yeah. These are very positive, forward-looking words. Yeah. Like nobody, look at my body language. Nobody thrives like this. I'm worried about how much.

Nobody thrives like that, right? They thrive, standing up straight, sitting up straight, leaning forward and saying, what is it we're going to do in this chapter of our life? We are so grateful we're here. Yeah. We're going to thrive. And I really want to enjoy, enjoy our kids and see them. grow and gosh, they're just incredible.

You know, I can say when the two of you were talking right now, I can almost see the family stories being created. I can see them like a spider web. They're almost unraveling in front of me. It's the story when we first started talking today of dad was sick and it was hard and he got better and we're happy. It's nice. It's a nice story.

But this story is so much more detail. it's the difficulty we had to go through. It's the fact that we didn't know what was going to happen. We had to stop working. Dad kept trying to work because he thought he would get bored, but actually, maybe he was scared of just coming home. Who will I be if I'm not working? Mom over here, going to the farmer's market, canning tomatoes,

because she was afraid, afraid of who she would be if she couldn't feed her family. And we were so grateful we had the help of our employers and our friends and our family. And once we got that final check from the doctors, we celebrated. How did we do it? We sat at home. We watched TV. We cried.

We hug. We did it all. Went to Lego land. There you go. Amazing. Yeah. Exactly. These are the stories that your kids remember.

but secretly they're actually not for your kids. They're for you. Grace, before we wrap up, you mentioned that it'll be 2 a.m., 3 a.m., and you find yourself purchasing something off of Instagram. Yeah. Can you tell me what you might do to change that? Not out of judgment.

I'm not judging you for it, But now it seems to me you have a powerful vision that is perhaps more powerful than whatever item is offered on Instagram. What tools could you use to change the way that you relate to spending? I think I need to take my cards out of the back of my phone. Great. I love that. Very simple, but very powerful. but very powerful.

And disconnect the Apple pay from my phone as well. You want to do it right now? I do. I do. I do. I do. I want to do that right now. I'll leave there. So she took the credit cards out of the back of her phone. And I just have my driving license in there now. Okay, okay, great. That's gone. How does it feel to remove them?

I feel like it's going to be hard to do the normal things that I'm doing. But maybe that needs to happen. That's good. Important things are always hard. Yeah. Goodbye. James, what's it like for you watching this? I thought this happens. They're gone. They're gone. All the cards are gone. I see that. She held it up to the screen. Well done. Let's do a round of applause because that's very impressive. Well done. Grace. Many of us find it silly to have to do something like this. You know, like, oh, I have to remove cards from myself. Like, I'm a grown adult. I should be able to control myself.

but actually once we accept that human nature is very responsive to even the smallest of barriers, then we learn how to deploy those barriers on purpose. As an example in the U.S., in California, a few years ago, they started charging like five cents for bags, for, you know, grocery bags. The amount of grocery bag consumption went down dramatically, like huge, just for a nickel. Using these barriers in our own life is incredibly powerful to, for example, make it a little harder to spend

on things that you do not want to actually spend on. Very effective. And how about for the two of you? One thing that I heard is this feeling of guilt, this feeling of being behind with your money. What's a way that the two of you can change that relationship with money? I think having our meetings again. Yeah, definitely.

not hiding anything. If you come home and there's a McDonald's Cup and the thing you'd be like, yeah, kids were tough if I needed something on the way home. Fine. I love that.

Honesty, always. I love that. There's nothing wrong with getting McDonald's once in a while. There's nothing wrong with it. It's totally fine. There's no need for shame. In fact, you can actually build it into your plan. Yeah.

That's the way to do it. Hey, once a month, maybe twice a month. I'm going to set some money aside from McDonald's, fine. You can certainly afford it. I want you to live a full, rich life.

And that involves eating out once in a while, yes. Getting something for the kids, yes. And building up a sizable savings just in case also yes.

You can actually do all of those things with planning. Yeah. What surprised you about today's conversation? I think that control aspect

that surprised me that I thought I was going to be just a really mean woman making my sick husband's work. How dare I? But actually, it was really emotional. I just, I really appreciate that you saw me. You saw what was going on and I didn't. You know, Grace, I saw a different story than you saw. In your application, there were multiple references to making your husband work. Fifteen minutes into talking, I didn't see any evidence of that. If anything, James himself said, what else would I have done about work? And so sometimes the way we see ourselves is not the way that others see us.

And it is so rare that we get the chance to see ourselves reflected through somebody else and maybe for someone to give us honest feedback. Yeah. And I think you were very open to it. I say all this because it really shows you the power of how you can craft your own story. Your story was that I'm a bad wife forcing my husband to work while he has cancer. That's not the story I heard. Meaning you have the power to shape your own story.

Okay. Yeah. James, what about you? I'm surprised how easy it is to talk about it. My expectations for this is that, you know, it would be. that we would beat around the bush and not be honest about it or we would hide things. But then once we kind of got into it, the idea of hiding and not being honest about it was just ridiculous. Like how are we ever going to get better if we don't talk about it?

If we're not honest about it, honest with ourselves. And I think maybe that's something that we have been kind of holding back on. And it's purely because we just don't want to hurt the other one or don't want to burden the other person. but in some ways we've actually come making it worse because we haven't been in talking about it so openly. And so I'm just surprised how good it feels and how easy it is to actually talk about money so openly and even the stuff around money and how it affects us all. Amazing. I appreciate you for for really showing up and being so open, being so honest. I feel hopeful. Great. Grace.

I feel a huge sense of relief. Amazing. And I really commend you for what you've been through, but how you have done it especially. Tough things like this, illness can really cause fractures in relationships. Not only did I not see any of that, I actually see the way that the two of you showed up for each other. It's very, very impressive. And what an example you set for the many people that will watch this. Well, we're very lucky. We're so lucky that we have so much supports. Like, you know, the financial cost of a cancer to diagnosis in the States is a totally different story. Yeah. What are the stories that you tell yourself? We all do it.

We tell ourselves stories. In fact, we tell them so often that they start to feel like facts. I'm just not good with money. I need a big house to be successful. People like me don't wear things like that. You know, I once remember I was reading a financial forum and people were talking about when you have X million dollars, what are you going to do with the money? And there were hundreds of posts in this thread, and I read them all. And I have to tell you, after reading them, the feeling that

I got was disappointment. Almost every single respondent in that thread said the same thing. I would get a house. I would renovate my house. I might get a car. I was thinking, these are people from all over the country, all over the world. We're not talking about having $10,000 or $25,000. We're talking about millions of dollars. And everyone's answer, like something like 85% of the answers are all exactly the same.

You independently decided that you just want a house. That's it. And I thought to myself, where is the creativity? Not one person said, you know what? I've always wanted to learn how to dance. I'm going to hire a dance instructor to come to my house and teach me how to dance. Not one person said,

I've always wanted to learn how to act. I'm going to go to an acting class, and I'm going to get really good at acting. Not one person talked about hiring a chef to come and teach them how to cook. It was just a house. It was literally inanimate objects that they wanted. I don't find this cool. I think that each of us is different. I think that each of us has something that we would love to do,

but a lot of times we don't think people like us do it. I think that we think that's for rich people. I think that we tell ourselves all kinds of stories. And I've told myself stories too, that I'm just a skinny Indian guy, that I can't express my emotions, that experiences are better than things. And for a long time, I believe them. I never even thought to question them. Most of us never stopped to ask, wait a second, is this even true? Like, some of you believe you don't even like to eat lamb, but you never had Indian chema. You believe you don't like opera, but you've never seen an opera that you understood or one that connected with you.

So that's what I want you to think about today. What is your story? What is your story, the story you've been telling yourself, about health, about money, about relationships, about where you live, about anything? Take a second. Think about those stories, write them down, and interrogate them. Why do I believe this? Is it true? Who told me that?

Keep going. Ask why. Ask again. Sometimes you'll get to the end of that chain and realize, I don't even believe this. I just picked it up somewhere and I never put it down. And on that note, let's now hear follow up. from Grace and James. Hi,

roommate, just a little update. It's been about two, three weeks. And we've just got back from an amazing holiday in the forest up in Longford. And it was so much fun. We had a budget and we hadn't spent it all by the last day. So we just kind of went wild on the last day. It was lovely, actually, to like just have that guilt-free spending

and just be like, no, no, no, this is the money. aside for it. So that was really nice. We are also, James is taking the lead on the money meetings, which I'm really enjoying because it doesn't just fault me, which is nice. And also it allows me a little bit more space in my brain, which is lovely. We haven't really started the big savings. well, nothing's coming in, but we are kind of reducing down the silly spends. I'm finding it hard. So I need to realign now after the holiday and have a little plan in mind for what I actually want to spend my money on.

But yeah, I think we have a meeting tomorrow now and we're just going to kind of lay out whatever is ahead of us. We're already planning next year's holiday, which is really exciting because we haven't on any sort of holiday in about three years. Well, apart from, you know, we've just, that's been our first one. So, yeah, it's all looking positive. And I can't tell you how much better I'm feeling. So I hope James is feeling better as well.

Thank you. He's tired after the holiday. So, yeah, thanks so much. Positive changes. Very positive. changes, I feel, from it. A big thing of the getting back involved with the finances again. So after the show, after the interview, we did a, we did have a kind of catch up. Grace showed me here, went through, went through the spreadsheets that we kind of been looking at.

We set out some kind of big goals, main one being to get our, we've figured out how much of our savings we'd have to use over the next three months. we're both on no pay and low pay and then we kind of tried to figure out how much we would need to where our savings would go next year to kind of build that backup that emergency fun backup so we've got our first kind of catch up tomorrow and then we'll meet once a week briefly just to

because we'll map out the month before and then we'll meet a week and see if something crops up another party we'll go to or we've got to go somewhere extra that might meet a bit more fuel, whatever it is. I found being involved in the money more, the ability to just kind of cool grace up on some of her spending. I'm loving that she's being a lot more open

with me now about it. Because she knows some of it is ridiculous. Like she even says, she comes at me with how ridiculous it is. You know, and I have to, because I think before I'd be like, you know, she was in charge of the money if she thought was a good idea, then great to go for it, you know?

And that has kind of, I think that's helped a lot. And being more involved than money has helped me a lot as well. I feel a lot more secure in us as a family and as our finances. I'm a lot less worried. I feel I'm getting a lot less worried about money. It's still there, obviously. But kind of seeing it all, being more involved in it again, is helping a lot with the kind of anxiety that I was feeling.

about it, you know? We probably won't go completely bankrupt if I get sick again, you know? Small things like that. And, you know, I'm trying to, similar to grace, I'm getting more, trying to be more involved with,

stop worrying about it and be more involved with the family. Like trying to not spend money on things for the kids, put more in stuff together as a family, not just toys that they can play with and that'll end up throwing away or giving away or something. Try to create more memories and more, more things together as a family. You know, we've been through a lot, a lot, a lot. And, you know, we're coming out the other side of it. It's time to enjoy it a little bit.

So, yeah, so that's where I'm at. You know, it's early days yet. but if we can stick with it I think we'll be on a much better course moving forward so and thank you again for sometimes you just need someone else to kind of listen in and because I think deep down we knew a lot of it sometimes you just need someone else to kind of point it out

someone from the outside just to be like yeah you know you're not crazy you know so thanks again We'll see each other again soon.