The Ramsey Show - App - Controlling Compulsive Spending While Struggling With ADHD (Hour 1)

Episode Date: April 12, 2023

Dave Ramsey & Dr. John Delony answer your questions and discuss: "How can I help my parents with their money?" Controlling compulsive spending with ADHD, "We disagree with how to pay off our debt", "Can I make my side hustle my main job?" Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 Weekdays from 2-5pm ET Want a plan for your money? Find out where to start: https://bit.ly/3cEP4n6 Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3GxiXm6 Learn more about your ad choices. https://www.megaphone.fm/adchoices Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the pods, moving, and storage studios, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Dr. John Deloney from the ever-popular Dr. John Deloney Show on the Ramsey Networks, Ramsey Personality, number one best-selling author, is my co-host today, mental health expert. And so if you want to talk about relationships and work in some questions about all of that while we talk about everything else here, that's what this show is about, you.

We're here to serve you. Talk about you right in front of you yep 888-825-5225 that's 888-825-5225 andrea is with us in houston hi andrea how are you blessed and highly favored how about you sir just? Just the same. How can I help? I have a dilemma. Well, long story short, a year and a half ago, I got good and mad and decided enough. And I am fully focused on working the baby steps. Recently, my sister had reached out to all of us in the family, brothers and sisters, that we should really get together and come up with a plan for our parents because unfortunately they've always

worked paycheck to paycheck. They have no savings. My father, 64, still working full-time. I really can't see him even retiring. We recently found out that he's removed my mom from his insurance because she refuses to provide any documentation that he would need in order to have her added, and he's not really pushing because he sees it as, well, if she's not using it, why even pay for it? You're talking about health insurance? Correct. Okay, so what's your question?

My question is, my sister's idea was to start a savings account where we all contribute roughly $100 a month for them until the unforeseeable future. There's no end in sight for that. That's very sweet. Absolutely not. I figured you'd say that yeah absolutely not no i just don't know what to do because i feel that if i kind of have the expectations of oh it'll get better something will come up why why would it get better? They're not changing anything. I know, but in the end, it'll come to us.

I can't see not helping my parents. What will come to you? You mean you've got to feed them? Medical expenses. My mom, her mental health isn't that great. She has her good days and bad days. We've tried to get her to go see a doctor, but she just gets irate, refuses to listen. We just know that eventually, since she won't go see a doctor, it's not going to be pretty when she doesn't need a doctor. What about your dad?

Have you sat down with your dad across from a table and said, I'm coming to you in love. And all of us here love you. We know that mom is struggling mightily and we know that it's very tough, but we're also looking at your 63 can't do this forever. And I want to know if you guys have a plan for what comes after this. And I'm asking this because I had this exact conversation with my mom and dad. We've had the conversation with my dad, and he's kind of putting it on us more of a, well, she's your mother. Worst case scenario, you'll deal with it. And I have that with him, and I've told him, like,

we do need to come up with a plan because in the end we'll be in more debt than what we already are you're not in debt i am you don't get there you don't get their debt no she's got her own debt i know but i'm saying you're not gonna oh you're gonna go into debt to help them no you're not absolutely not and that's what frightens no don't do it no i just wouldn't do it no absolutely not no we asked these people to help themselves we offered to help them help themselves and their answer was no absolutely you're not going into debt to help somebody poisoning your family tree in order

to help somebody who's poisoned theirs is is that's how that's how family trauma just rolls down a hill it's just going to stay the same way and your kids are going to it's just going to keep going that way somebody's got to say i'm done i'm out so there is no amount of money that is enough to take care of all of the possible things that could happen to these two people who refuse to take care of themselves and a hundred dollars a month is laughable i know that's a joke it's a joke it's like everybody wants to feel like they did something and you did nothing that's twelve hundred dollars do you know how fast that goes 30 seconds in a doctor's office it's gone that's how much it costs to open those those those those doors just to walk if you walk in the door they charge you 1200 bucks just for coming

and that's a year that's a year of you putting it in there no absolutely not and you're going to end up with an account that and brothers and sisters arguing over who's doing what who's doing what we're gonna do this thank you i will manage my money i will decide with my money and my wealth how much help i'm going to be able and willing to help with extended family members including parents you may have to decide you can't do anything you are not morally legally or ethically obligated or biblically obligated to write checks for these people that would refuse to take care of themselves. Okay. You're just not.

I'm not saying you shouldn't, but I'm saying the guilt trip thing that is hovering in this whole conversation is absolute bull. Okay. Like, we have to get together to figure out how we're going to take care of these people. Conversation is absolute bull. Like, we have to get together to figure out how we're going to take care of these people. No, we don't. No, we don't. Nope. Nope.

I can decide what I can do or am willing to do. You can decide what you can do or you're willing to do. But we're not going to form a little GoFundMe, 100100 a month that's a freaking joke and feel like we did something. Nope, nope, nope. I'll pass. So all you can do here is what you've done, and that is tell everybody involved kindly and gently and with compassion that you love them. And then when something comes up, you decide if you're able and willing to participate, you and your husband but you do not destroy your family unit to pay bills medical bills for someone had the opportunity to get health insurance and just didn't no yeah that's wrong it's wrong okay and so you and your husband sit down and say, all right, not if, but when this happens,

we will, mom can come stay in the garage apartment, or we're not going to be in a position to do this. And then like Dave said, you call your brothers and sisters and you say, this is what we're able to do. And I'm going to put a period by it. And remember, always choose guilt over resentment. Choose guilt over resentment. You're going to feel guilty. That's normal. You're going to feel guilty. Your brothers and sisters are going to do a great job of making you feel guilty because they learned it from their mom and dad. If you go along with this and further put yourself in debt to support somebody who is looked at as kids and said, eh, y'all carry this. I don't want to. This is y'all's problem. I can't imagine as a dad, Dave, doing that.

But that's the world you're in. Dave, that's heartbreaking to me, man. It's very hard to walk through, but you have to establish some very firm, reasonable, kind boundaries and then protect your family out of abundance and surplus. You can help them to whatever extent you want to without becoming an enabler. Probably already too late. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, you guys. Health insurance costs are only moving one way, and that way isn't down. And if higher costs aren't enough, the wait times to see your doctor are longer, and it's harder than ever to get anything approved through the bureaucracy. So if you feel like the system is working against you,

try a biblically-based alternative to health insurance, Christian Healthcare Ministries. CHM is a health cost-sharing ministry that's helped hundreds of thousands of families like yours take care of over $11 billion in medical bills since 1981. And CHM has also helped them stay true to their values and avoid miles of red tape. And CHM support goes far beyond meeting financial needs. They'll also help meet spiritual needs. Members become part of a family who will pray with them

and for them when they experience a medical event. So listen, y'all, there's no better way to take care of health care costs. CHM programs start as low as $98 a month. So learn more today and join at chministries.org slash budget. That's chministries.org. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. Wow. Phone number is 888-825-5225.

Zach's in Huntsville, Texas. Hi, Zach. How are you? I've been better. Uh-oh. How can we help? Well, Murphy kicked in my front door, asked me where's the beer, and planted his butt firmly on my couch. And on top of that, I have some major struggles with ADHD,

so I was hoping John could help me figure out ways to stop my impulse spending so that I can clean this mess up because I'm I'm completely alone in two things number one I don't have accountability partner because I'm single and number two I'm a truck driver I'm on the road all the time I don't have somebody sitting next to me to tell me hey that's stupid don't do that and I'm also a master at talking myself into making the stupid decision anyway so you, Zach, you're also a master at deflecting responsibility. Is that true too? Yes. Answer yes. I'm working on getting better at it,

but you're not wrong. You can't even say the words you're right. You can't even say it. So if you Google ADHD, my picture comes up right so i'm gonna feel like you're not that is exactly what i told you um adhd is a context not an excuse okay it is a brain processing issue i say issue it makes some things harder and it makes some things way easier than than people that you know and love.

So I want to move that over to the side. I want to focus on the behaviors, the actions that you're not doing and that you are choosing to blame all this stuff on. And this is what I'm trying to do is empower you and unchain you from this. You think this ADHD is dragging you around the world making you do all these things it's not it's not it's not true it's contributing to the chaos in your life 100 it's not making you do things you're not out of control um the eight and the adhd is not in control that's what john's saying um unless you choose to hand over the keys to the car and let it drive. And that's a choice.

But you're not out of control. Yes. As I'm trying to be intentional about things, the very concept of ADHD makes intentionality difficult. Oh, yeah, man. My wife calls. I've got magical time she calls it um it's a very unintentional tuning out like and this happened this morning i went downstairs to grab something out of the uh small fridge we have in the garage and on the way back up i thought

literally i haven't practiced this guitar solo in a while and i went back downstairs and went into the basement the other part of the basement and got my guitar and plugged it in. This is at 615 this morning. And then my kids are upstairs. I get what you're talking about. And that was all of those steps along the way were choices I made. See what I'm saying? Yeah, I see what you're saying. Like, like I'm working really hard on the impulse control because I recognize that is a choice I'm making, and I'm getting better at stopping. The only other facet of it that has caused me the most difficulty is forgetting things that need to be paid on certain times. I do have a few roommates who help me keep track of the bills, but they'll call me and be like,

oh, hey, remember, this bill needs paid on Friday, and I'm driving, so I can't write it down or nothing like that. Hold on, hold on, hold on. You're trying to white-knuckle your way through this. There was a season, and I'm not proud of this, but this was me taking ownership. I gave my debit card to my wife for a season years ago. I put as many roadblocks as possible between my impulse issues and the world I wanted to create. I also have, I'm bad about firing off emails. So I made a rule. I don't email for 24 hours. Like I'm putting these barriers in front of me. And over time, my body learns that this is a

better way to live. Yeah. So in other words, another way of saying that Zach is to say, we've got to put some processes in place that remind you about the bills, whether it's a calendar system you're using, whether it's the EveryDollar app, and you put a reminder in about a bill and it dings when you wake up in the morning. You put systems and processes in place that do two things. They spur you towards proper actions at the proper times, and you can even put some processes and systems in place that give some boundaries to your purchase. And it can just be a self-rule.

A rule is, I don't use Amazon Prime because I can't control it. A rule could be, that could be, that may not be. A rule could be, I'll give you a rule that I give everyone that goes through Financial Peace University. If you're going to spend over $500 on an item, wait overnight. Because the body chemistry changes overnight. And so large purchases, anyone, regardless of ADHD, should wait overnight because your adrenaline drops, the proteins, endorphins have been released. You get excited, and the chemistry of excitement occurs when you're making a purchase. There's all kinds of – you can map it on a graph.

And so, you know, if you feel that rising up inside of you, you go, wait, I have to wait overnight. That's one of my rules. And in my case, I'm married. You're not, you said. But I also have to talk to my spouse. I don't spend $500 without talking to her. She doesn't spend $500 without talking to me. It's not because I'm henpecked and my wife controls my life or I'm an overbearing husband and she can't do anything.

She's not got any rights. It's because we respect a process that keeps us from overspending. I want you to get upstream of this too. What does that mean? You've got to exercise. Even if it's going for walks before you hit the truck in the morning, you've got to be conscious of what you're eating. You've got to get sleep.

You've got to do these things way upstream that give your brain a fighting chance. You can't sleep four and a half hours a night, drive 90 miles an hour for 12 straight hours, crash in some dimly lit hotel room, eat something from the continental breakfast

and hit the road again. It's like putting water and sand in your gas tank. The thing's not going to run very well. You there? You there? Yeah, yeah, and ironically, because of this call, I was going to ask a question I completely forgot. Oh, yeah, like any tips for trying to stop these small ones?

Because I've never done anything over $100 or $500 or anything like that. Put a process in place that stops it. Where are you buying it? How are you buying it? Usually it's like I'm groggy and running a little late in the morning, so I go grab McDonald's for breakfast, or I have had a really long, really hard day. I don't have the energy to want to cook anything, so I just walk inside and order something from Carl's Jr. it's usually stuff like that. So meal

prep go to the store and buy yourself a box of protein bars put something ahead of it and you're going to have to be a grown-up and say no to yourself and that's hard that's hard. Here's the thing what you're describing is not an ADHD thing. It's an everybody thing. Everyone, when we get fatigued and time stressed, always default to the point of least resistance on food, on purchases, on everything. And so there's a great saying by Patton. He said, fatigue makes cowards of us all

the you don't have much courage to fight against yourself when you're tired and so um you know i discovered that you know little thing and i've laughed about it here on the air i gained a whole bunch of weight during covid because i ate every donut in a 50 mile radius so i discovered that the stress of running this place and keeping it open and making payroll and keeping a thousand people jobs in place the stress of fighting against entire segments of revenue evaporating and coming in here and trying to replace it with our leadership team and working and working and working and working and working i that i gave myself permission to eat everything in sight, particularly donuts.

And so once I got in about halfway through that process, I realized I'm going to die. I have to stop this. I'm going to be as big as a freaking house. Fat boy needs to stop eating donuts. I just quit cold turkey. I just quit because I recognize that, okay, when I'm tired, when I'm working, when I'm putting in a 16-hour day, that's when i'm tired when i'm working when i'm putting in a 16 hour day that's when i'm vulnerable when i'm traveling right that's when i'm vulnerable because fatigue is always with travel so i recognize your points of vulnerability pre-prepare

like john said pre-prepare meals but also just say okay this is a time i screw up oh i'm not gonna do that it's about changing identity. And pick up Gabor Mate, M-A-T-E, his book called Scattered, which is the ADHD masterpiece. You can check that out as well. Listen to it while you're driving. Scattered. Wow.

This is The Ramsey Show. It's going to be an exciting weekend here at Ramsey. All the Ramsey personalities, including Dr. John Deloney, me, Rachel Cruz, George Camel, Jade Warshaw, Ken Coleman, will all be doing the Smart Conference this weekend in our brand-new Ramsey Event Center, our first public event there. We are really excited about it. And folks call us all over the place for advice

about their money now the smart conference this weekend is a friday night all day saturday event it is completely sold out sorry i'll just help you get some fomo we'll be announcing soon uh another one coming up in the fall but it won't be here uh so you missed this one but maybe you didn't because you could at least watch the early morning or the first few talks of the morning. Rachel Cruz, George Campbell's talk about how to get your income up, control your spending, change your mindset, learn about money. The first couple of talks on Saturday morning, we are going to live stream them free. The event is sold out. We can't put anybody else in the building so we can't help

any more people unless we do it this way so don't keep living how you're living jump on this live stream it's free sign up at ramsey solutions.com slash live and we'll pipe it to you this coming sunday morning and rachel cruz and george camel are both world-class communicators actually all of our ramsey personalities are i'm very proud of them and I'm more regional class more regional I'm regional class I'm local well I mean when you get into self-deprecating you're the king but other than that regional class yeah I don't know what regional class means, but anyway. I don't either. So anyway, we're all going to be there, and we're all going to be excellent in spite of John. But if you want to watch the first couple talks, ramsaysolutions.com slash live for Saturday morning's Smart Conference. Rachel Cruz, George Camel, you want some help with your money, you want to be inspired, you want some information, some inspiration that you haven't had.

Maybe you know someone that does. Have them sign up and watch this live stream. It is completely free for the first couple of lessons on Saturday morning. So budget about an hour and a half or so, two hours, and you'll be able to catch the Saturday morning startup of the Smart Conference. So thanks for hanging out with us. Bianca is in San Diego. Hi, Bianca. How are you?

Hi, I'm great. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So my husband and I have about 200K in debt, not including our mortgages. We have two homes, one we live in and one that we use as a rental. We both are on board paying off debt. We're tired of paying in debt, but we have different paths that we think we can get there faster. So the home that's our rental, he had that previously before he met me. Basically, he took over it from his grandfather that was going to go into foreclosure. So that's how he had that home. I would personally want to sell that home and use the equity in that to pay off our debt. And he's more thinking he wants to keep that other house and just be really intentional and work more hours and pay it off just like gazelle intent. So I kind of wanted to give you that advice.

You have $200,000 in debt that is not mortgages. Yes. On what? Well, it's one of your favorite words, $100 on HELOC which was a bad idea um we have 80k in student loans and about 20 on solar nothing on cars no car payments no okay what was the HELOC for paying off old bills when we purchased the home we basically purchased this home that we're in now my daughter has special needs and we needed to get her we basically purchased this home that we're in now. My daughter has special needs, and we needed to get her into a better school district,

and we basically bought, like, the ugliest house on the nicest street, if that makes sense. So it needed, like, a full—there was, like, cracks everywhere in the concrete. We had to do a lot of upgrades to it to just get it livable. So this was for repairs? repairs yes how much is your first mortgage so the one we live in yeah the one with the heloc yeah it's 600 000 what's the house worth um i just looked at zillow today it's. Okay, cool. And the other house that was his grandpa's has how much owed on it? $350,000. And what is it worth? When I looked today, it was worth $620,000. Okay. And how long have y'all been married? We've been married five years. Okay.

What's their household income? Right now, it about 115 to 130 um i was working but my mother recently got really ill with cancer so i'm taking care of her right now and we have a special needs daughter so it's just his income okay the house he got from his grandpa that was in foreclosure was that a a family property um by that i mean does it have history with the family or was this just a place grandpa lived um it's kind of a long story like kind of messy but basically um he lived there and then he was going to lose it because he made some bad financial investments you told us it was in

foreclosure. Does it have family history or not? Yeah, all of his, his mom grew up there, his aunts, everybody grew up in that house. So really that's his reasoning for not selling it, not some kind of financial decision. Yeah, I think there is an attachment i think sometimes also he thinks like oh you know we don't know how our daughter our daughter is going to develop and he thinks like the more property and more stuff like income we can generate for her yeah until you took out a hundred thousand dollars he locked a fixer cracked sidewalk

yeah yeah you kind of kind of screwed that plan up like i want to do something good for my special needs daughter so we're going to go deeply in debt no that that those two things are counteract or counterproductive he's got a really expensive bucket bailing water on a ship with a hole in it he needs to stop and plug the hole in the ship yeah you guys got to sell this house you gotta sell the house. I'm sorry. I hate it because it does have memories, and it is going to break a part of his heart, and that's why he doesn't want to sell it. But your needs, your daughter's needs, the future of your house is much more important

than the past of that other house. Okay. And another way to think of it is instead of trying to prop up this idea of legacy in these four walls of this house, be able to sit back and say, my granddad bought this house, raised families here, and set us up in a position

that we could change our family tree when it comes to our money. And what's your daughter's name? Her name's Natalia. Natalia, okay. Would you do me a favor? Don't you ever blame your stupid butt financial decisions on your daughter again. Okay.

That's so wrong. My special needs daughter gave me permission to do stupid stuff. No. You have an extra responsibility to not do stupid stuff in the name of having a special needs daughter. Not, I have a special needs daughter, so we had to do this. If you keep using her as a cloak for your stupid stuff, you're going to keep doing stupid stuff, because it gives you permission to do anything if you call on the nobility of taking care of special needs. And that is not a fact.

So quit doing that. You've got to stop that. And you guys have to get your, if you're going to sell this house and pay off everything, you've also got to get on a budget. You've got to get under control. You've got to make every dollar behave because you'll go back into this mess if you blame Natalia for your next stupid thing again, like this house you bought that was all to pieces, and then you went in debt further after buying the house,

but used it all as a rationalization to make that move. And you just can't do that. You know, next time you get ready to buy a car while I have a special needs daughter, I don't care. I don't care. You still can't buy a car if you can a special needs daughter, I don't care. I don't care. You still can't buy a car if you can't own the money to buy it. You've got to stop this. You've got to stop this. And so you guys have got to get yourselves under control.

The danger of selling the house is you guys don't change your decision-making processes and your habits, and you're going to go back in debt. But truthfully, mathematically, you need to sell the house. You're right. And get rid of all this debt and get it off of you but only if you both raise your right hand and pinky swear and spit shake to never make decisions that involve debt again ever and live on a written budget where you live on less than you make and um listen stuff comes at all of us. Relatives get cancer. People pass away. Children have struggles. Stuff comes at all of us.

You've got to have a process that involves you to live your life without sacrificing the quality of your life on the altar of the bad things that come at you. This is The Ramsey Show. Thank you for joining us, America. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality, is my co-host. Thank you for being with us. If you're brand new to the show, and based on our rankings and ratings, we know a bunch of you are. Lots of new folks coming around. Thank you for that.

And those of you telling people to come, thank you for that. But if you're brand new and you're trying to learn all this lingo and what this Ramsey stuff means and all that, well, go to the Ramsey site. Go to RamseySolutions.com. RamseySolutions.com. Click on the Get Started button, and we'll help you figure out the next best step for where you are and start to kind of graft you in. This is where you are, and here's the next thing you are and start to kind of graft you in this is where you are and here's the next thing you can do and here's how we teach this and it's all free the whole thing's free so not a problem at all check it out all right uh jonathan's with us in

houston texas hey jonathan how are you i'm doing good mr ramsey i heard you've been doing finance for a while so i thought maybe you'd be the guy to go to for some advice since the dinosaurs roam the earth brother what's up well um i am currently working three jobs um one full-time job one side gig and uh also serving the reserves. My side gig at this point is making a lot more than my full-time income, and so I am just hoping to get some advice on when to pull the trigger and make that my full-time gig. What is it? So the side gig is I make music. It started on social media and has grown in some other platforms.

The problem, the hang-up I have is I've only been doing it about six months. So I'm just kind of worried about the stability. I have a wife and son and just trying to make it all happen at once. All right. I'm a little confused. How are you making music make money on social media? You're just wildly popular um it has kind of blown up uh but most of my income is coming from the music streaming platform spotify apple all of that the social media is mainly just the way i get it out there how much are you making like give us real dollar

amounts not pretend musician dollars yes sir um i made about fifty thousand dollars between august and december this last year so i'm projecting maybe between 100 and 125 this year but was that on a particular track that blew up or is that a steady stream that's slowly increasing over time you see i'm saying like that i have a post that gets 300,000 likes on it. And then my next one gets six. My next one gets two, two, two, two. So I had, I had one really cool thing happen and then it just settles back in. Yes, sir. Uh, so I thought that that's what was going to happen to me. Um, but each thing that I've posted since then, I've got about 25 songs out now and they have all been performing well.

I'm getting good engagement, so I expect it to continue to grow. I've had one or two that's maybe bigger than the others, but it's been very consistent all in all. So all of your revenue is coming from letting people sample the song on social, and then they're going to iTunes and buying it, and for a buck you're making 50 grand? Yes, sir. I would say the streams are probably close to 70% of that income.

The rest comes from just ad share on the social media site, selling CDs and that sort of thing thing how many followers have you got uh between all i'm approaching a million i think i'm about 900 000 you're not getting much rev share then okay uh a little but you know you're the main thing is you're just monetizing your music career beautifully. Congratulations. Highly unusual and wonderful. Okay. Here's the thing.

Here's what we're poking around on, and you're asking. So is this replicatable and sustainable? Can I repeat the process? Can I use this recipe to keep making cakes? Because the cake I made is sold. But can I use this recipe to keep making enough cakes to feed my family? That's what we're trying to figure out. Is it sustainable and scalable?

And, you know, can you get bigger and bigger and bigger? So certainly you've done an amazing job so far. Congratulations. That's fabulous oh i would not quit my day job and except to the extent that you can prove to yourself logically and you and your spouse are you married yes sir yeah you and your spouse are sitting there looking at this going okay is this a recipe that if i keep using this recipe i'm going to keep getting quality chocolate cake. In other words, I'm going to keep making money doing music. And that's what we were poking out trying to, is this a one-hit wonder? Okay, you've established it's not. I'm buying that. Okay,

that's good. And then at what point can we level in and go, okay, this is music business is my career because there's a whole lot of wannabes in that space and not many people actually make a living yeah and the space is littered with a great first record or i finally got i finally got a feature film so i quit my day job and went and i i did a good job i got a good in i got a good role in this film and then there's no more films what do you do what do you do during the day? I'm in construction. I do estimating for a general contractor.

Okay. And how much debt do you have? Make about $70 over there. And the thing is, I really like that job. How much debt do you have? I'm just running myself dry. Oh, just my house. I own a house. own a house okay does your wife work outside the home uh no sir she started staying home this year okay all right so you're bringing you're bringing about 120 we're talking about cutting

that to 50 but you'd have more hours so maybe you could get the 50 up to 70 if the recipe is duplicatable if you had more hours to 70 if the recipe is duplicatable. If you had more hours to work on the music because you didn't have a construction job, could you get it up to 70 or even 90? But you're still taking a pay cut net-net because you're giving up the day job, right? Net, I will take a pay cut. However, I am making more on a monthly basis doing the music. I'm grossing about $10,000 to $12,000 per month probably on average.

Okay. Yeah, but gross is not – I mean, you mean gross of taxes or gross of expenses? Gross, I'm bringing in about $10,000 on the music. I may have $1,000 or $2,000 in expenses. Yeah. Mixing. Gross doesn't matter. Net matters.

Plus 30% that you're going to have to put aside for taxes. Yeah. And then insurance, if your GC pays you your health insurance or something, you're going to have to budget that into. Yeah. So to the extent that you can see this is replicatable, sustainable, and can be grown, is when I'm comfortable with that, I'm going to quit and do what you're doing.

Yes, sir. Okay? That's what I would do. Yes, sir. So that's, but you're really in a position to ascertain that better than, and be sure that you don't talk your wife into this. Be sure that she says, honey, you've got to do this. This is the right thing. Here's what you really want to hear from her.

I have peace about this. If your wife says that, you're probably on track. Yes, sir. But if she's like, I i'm scared don't do it and it's not because she's a scaredy cat because here's the thing proverbs 31 says who can find a virtuous wife for her worth is far above rubies the heart of her husband safely trusts her and he will have no lack of gain when i stopped making decisions that went against the peace in my wife's spirit, my income went up substantially.

Our asset base went up substantially. The number of stupid butt things that we did went down substantially. Now, is she without error? No, of course she's not without error, and she will tell you that because she's a virtuous woman. She will tell you sometimes she makes an error. I not sure if this is the holy spirit honey it could be last night's pizza but i don't feel good about this she's not saying and thus saith the lord or thus saith the wife she's not confused she's not confused her own voice with the voice of the holy spirit

and some people do that. So, yeah, you've got to have that peace. If she's got that peace, she's looking at the systems. Let me tell you, Jonathan, my wife says she has a feeling from East Tennessee, a feeling. It's a seven-syllable word. If she's got a bad feeling, we're about to lose 10 grand minimum. I fought my wife on this for the first half of our marriage, and she is even sophisticated enough now to say,

I don't like this, but it's right. Go for it. I feel it in my spirit. I trust it 100%. I don't quite understand it, but it feels right. That's right. That's a deal right there. This is The Ramsey Show.

Hey, it's Dr. John Deloney. If you love the show and want a deeper dive on your money journey, we have a weekly newsletter that gives you trending and helpful articles and tips on following the Ramsey way. Just go to RamseySolutions.com today to sign up for our newsletter. Again, that's RamseySolutions.com to sign up for our weekly newsletter.