The Ramsey Show - App - Hard Work Is Good (Why the Antiwork Movement Is Stupid) (Hour 3)

Episode Date: July 26, 2022

Dave Ramsey & George Kamel discuss: A Christian ethic of work, The stupidity of the Antiwork movement, Helping a child with their downpayment, What to do with an insurance payout.   Want a plan for your money? Find out where to start: https://bit.ly/3nInETX Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3GxiXm6

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. We help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. George Campbell, Ramsey personality, host of The Fine Print and the Entree Leadership Podcast on Ramsey Networks, is my co-host today. Open phones here at 888-825-5225. Zach starts off this hour in Evansville, Indiana. Hi, Zach. How are you?

Hey, George and Dave. Hey, what's up? I'm a Catholic. I'm sorry, say again. That's all right. So I'm a Catholic. I've recently had a few conversations with other Catholics on the topic of work. Some of them have an almost socialist perspective on it. They think workers today in the Western world are facing poor working conditions. They argue for a four-day work week, and they say their employers don't care about them. In some ways, I can understand their concern, as Christians don't want others to be taken advantage of. However, I disagree with their position.

Dave, I was wondering what you would say to these people, as someone who is Christian, encourages hard work, long work when needed, and as someone who owns a business well um there's two sides to the equation there's the employer side and the employee side um i'm an employer um and as a person of faith that means i have a responsibility to serve and treat my team well. Okay? As a dad, I have a responsibility to nurture, serve, and take care of my children when they're minors in my home. Taking care of them also includes requiring that they brush their teeth,

that they say yes sir and no sir, that they say thank you and learn gratitude, that they learn to work. Loving them well, my children, when they were little, included teaching them to work, included teaching them things that if you were to ask them when i was requiring them to clean up their room and they were four they could say well my dad has unfair working conditions he's requiring too much of me at four years old but the truth is i could

have cleaned up their room easier than it was to talk them into doing it. But then they would have learned nothing and they would have gained no dignity. As an employer, it's different than parenting, but there are some parallels in that my goal or my job as a person of faith is to serve my team. But serving my team also sometimes includes allowing them to work somewhere else because they suck at their job we set them free in jesus name i had a young man here that was in sales many years ago and he um he was really bad at sales and we kept talking to him about it and finally one of our leaders serving him sat down

with him and said you know young man you suck at this what is it that you want to do with your life he said well i really want to be a photographer and we said okay well let me help you show you how to be a photographer we actually have a small business thing here called entre leadership and we coached him and loved him and fired him because he was awful at sales oh by the way he's now a world-class photographer some of the album covers that you see i'm from nashville artists the guy shot but he sucked as a salesman so that is you know what are unfair working conditions that mean old ramsey people fired me. Well, you sucked.

And guess what? You went on to become the best possible version of yourself, and we were loving you well when we fired you. We actually cared about you when we were firing you. We actually cared about you when your mama had cancer and we paid for your airline ticket to go visit her. We actually cared about you when we do all these things to serve you and help you and love you but we also actually require that

while you're here at work that you work and i don't really want to hear about your whining and your social activism i'll fire your little butt for that so you know we're not going to unionize it ramsey i can just promise you that it's not going to happen i'll just shut the dead gun place down so you know here's the thing you work you get paid you do the work you get loved we love each other we're all working together to pull off the same thing i don't know why a bunch of adults can't do this i don't know why a bunch of adults can't do this. I don't know why we have to juxtaposition employers against employees in order to call that some kind of spiritual movement. The goal, the truth is we're supposed to love each other.

I'm supposed to love them well, and they're supposed to love us back and do their work. And it's not me extracting from the labor market and not them um extracting from me in the name of some twisted form of fairness that they came up with and somehow put jesus on that that one's really ridiculous but you know some people can put jesus on anything put jesus on a peanut butter sandwich and call it theology it's ridiculous but it's not theology it's a peanut butter sandwich so um that's a brand new sentence for me right oh gosh but yeah i mean so yeah no i'm with you zach i mean you read your little statement i disagree with your friends it's not got anything to do with catholicism

versus protestant protest i can't even say it protest Protestantism. It's got to do with a clean view of Scripture which involves loving each other well. Do unto others as you have them do unto you. Treat your neighbor, love your neighbor as you love yourself. The second of the greatest commandments, Jesus said, to Catholics and to Protestants equally. And so, you know know this idea that all employers are evil and should be punished and all form here because for some of these little snowflakes work at all

is unfair it's not fair that we have to work to live Dave it's unfair that you require me to work while I'm at work and I want to work from home where i don't really work but i'm at home and i still collect a check and oh by the way i've got three of those work at home jobs now which means i'm now stealing officially from that employer uh which is a new trend in work at home by the way go ahead and get three full-time jobs while you work at home get paid by all three of them for working full-time and you're obviously aren't while you sit on your moral high horse that's called stealing okay that's a lack of integrity to say the least you're a thief so all of that to say zach this idea that socialism or capitalism is either one the answer it's not it's sanctified capitalism meaning that people are loving the other person

well in the equation i actually do love our team and i actually have done unbelievable sacrifices for them and we proved that during our downtime during covet as an example where we said the first people that aren't going to get paid if somebody doesn't get paid is leadership. It didn't result in that. We were able to keep profits up, and everybody was able to get paid. But that was how we lined it out. We said that leaders go first. Leaders go first.

Leaders eat last, according to Simon Sinek, but leaders go first on taking the pain. And so you love your team well, and in return, if you are an employer, you should work your butt off. You should do your work as unto the Lord. 323 in the Bible. Okay, here we go. So, I mean, do your work as unto the Lord.

Does that sound like do your work as unto the Lord? I want to work four days a week, and I want to not have to work, and I want to bitch and complain about my employer. Does that sound like doing your work as unto the Lord to me? Doesn't sound like it to me. Hey guys, George Camel here and I'm so excited to tell you about the newest product from Ramsey. It's called Gazelle and it's a digital banking experience that will help you spend and save the Ramsey way with banking services provided by Pathword NA. You'll get a single spending account with no monthly fees, and it's FDIC-insured through

Pathword NA. We're offering early access to our beta customers, so you can help us make it the best experience it can be. Just go to ramseysolutions.com slash gazelle to sign up for the waitlist today. george camel ramsey personality is my co-host today open phones at triple eight eight two five five two two five so george and i are talking at the break about that last uh caller and he's telling me stuff that i didn't know because i'm an old dinosaur apparently that you said there is a whole work uh anti-work rise of the anti-work movement. The group of people that think it is unfair that they should have to work. And they're frustrated with the nature of their employment.

So therefore, because I hate my employer, I should just not have to work. The nature of employment. Okay. And if the young man was asking me the Christian response to that, you know, so here's what's interesting. The Christian response is always loving, but sometimes is so bold and in your face when you read Scripture that it's offensive. So like Paul said in the Bible, he was instructing, those that won't work, don't let them eat. So that would be a Christian response to the, what's it called? The anti-work movement.

There's a movement of people that don't think they should have to work, that they should just be given stuff by society just because it's unfair, and all working conditions, therefore, are unfair. Correct? Yeah. I mean, I just pulled up, there's about a litany of Scripture that is very clear, even without the biblical context. You know, Ephesians, let the thief no longer steal.

Rather, let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need look at that or proverbs he whoever is slack and his work is a brother to him who destroys and i love there's one that i always think of when i'm grilling um and it's i can't remember the scripture because i can't quote it exactly, but it basically says an unfaithful servant is like smoke to the eyes. Oh. You know, you get the smoke in your eyes and your eyes are watering you. And so when you have an employee that is an idiot, it's like the grilling and the smoke is in your face, you know? I mean, it's like that's what you're dealing with.

And so if you've got an employer that's an idiot, it would a similar thing i'm sure but oh my gosh this is a fun one compared to the you know talking about the anti-work movement proverbs 14 23 and all toil there is profit but mere talk tends only to poverty sounds like a lot of talk out there dave well the the thing is um you kind of just have to back up and go okay if I was your dad and you were doing that and you were under my control, I mean, if you were a teenager, in other words, you weren't an adult living on your own, then you get to do what you want when you do that, I guess. But if I was someone who loved you and could influence you because I loved you and I wanted what is good for you then i've got to look at you and go kind of have a dr phil moment here i mean like how's it working for you how's that working this not working thing how's the not working thing working for you you know and um you know because you kind of do that like with communism or socialism you can go

around the world in history and look and go where there has been communism, where there has been socialism. You just look at them and go, so how's that working for you? Like when you're driving through Israel, okay, you go into the areas that are controlled by the Jewish community. They're prosperous, safe, clean. You go into the areas controlled by the PLO. Looks like a trailer park it's awful and you just kind of want to look at them and go guys how's that working for you you know how's that working for you what's the fruit of your ideas when you put your best idea forward and you get poop back how's that working for you you know how's the thing not work thing

working for you yeah man because it's you love somebody i don't want you to you know how's that working for you you know how's the thing not work thing working for you yeah man because it's you love somebody i don't want you to you know how's the being in debt thing working for you it's not that's why you called us we're gonna get you out of debt you know so yeah and to your point you talked about parents and how you know you make your kids clean the room and it's forced labor whatever it is the thing about work thing about work is you can't choose your parents, but you can choose your employer. So imagine that. You can just choose to find a place that doesn't suck.

I don't think they pay enough. Okay, don't go to work there. If you think you're worth more, go find. I think they're a toxic work environment. That guy's a narcissist. Everybody's a narcissist now. Everybody that you don't like is now a narcissist. That's a redefinition of that term. Anybody I don't like a narcissist. Everybody's a narcissist now. Everybody that you don't like is now a narcissist. That's a redefinition of that term.

Anybody I don't like, narcissist. That's how you define it. So, yeah. And so don't work there. Don't have a choice. Don't work there. You don't. No one forced you to work there.

Half the show is just telling America that you have agency over your life. You have control. But the problem is people back themselves into a corner and decide they only have one option. It's to work for a toxic place or not work at all. And that's just not the case. No, it's not the case. There's a lot of wonderful organizations that exist in capitalism and treat their people well, including their customers, and do a great job. Are they perfect? No no they're not perfect

institutions they're run by human beings and but they're all over the place and i know a bunch of them and if you think you could do better go start you a business and run it the right way we need more of that in america go for it yeah take that take that um not working thing and go hire a bunch of people with it and see how that works out and pay them with the not money that you don't make there we go great business model love it uh so yeah in those hungry people that need to be fed um you're not gonna be feeding them because you ain't got any money your generosity level because you're a broke person by the way all communists are broke people they generally happen because there's nothing more capitalistic than a non-broke communist um they all need we

all need to read a rabbi lappin's book yeah thou shalt prosper some great gems in there and it'll give you it'll give you a real spiritual look on work the jewish community he talks he's orthodox jewish rabbi he talks about the jewish community the work the hebrew word for work and the word for worship is very similar. He said on Sunday we have worship service, and on Monday we have customer service. And they're both worship. They're both work-ship.

So when you are working and doing your work as unto the Lord, it is honoring. It's an honoring thing spiritually. You're honoring God with that. So to sit on your butt and scream about everyone else and gripe about everyone else uh there is nothing christian about that at all i think that's called gossip so anyway it's very interesting discussion it's a fun life mission i guess to be angry at work and just strike you know it's not fun because they're angry all the

time being angry all the time is not fun well that time is not fun. Well, that's why Reddit exists, Dave. That's where they all go. Twitter and Reddit. Twitter and Reddit. Well, at least you have a place to vent and someone can pretend to care. And it's free, so that's nice. They don't have to pay for it. But, you know, the whole thing of I'm going to,

that's why, you know, I've turned off Twitter. I don't look at it anymore because there's nothing on there but anger. And I quit watching the news. I don't look at it anymore because there's nothing on there but anger. And I quit watching the news. I don't turn on the news anymore. If you're not on Twitter, you don't have to block people. I know. That's the downside. You had some fun with that. That's the downside.

I had the record for most blocked. A guy reached out and DM'd me and said, hey, why did Dave block me? As if I have the reason. You're one of 40,000, dude. Get in line, man. Something you said was pretty offensive. You're not special. You're not that special. Please unblock me.

I'm not even on there anymore. Just forget it. Go on to something that's relevant to your life, and Twitter is not on the list. So, yeah, this is an interesting discussion, though. We're babbling a little bit because there's a lot of emotion around it. I just did not know there was a real thing. I mean, that's from the BBC. They did a huge piece a huge piece on it a real thing called the anti-work movement that's like the man you could have an anti-anything movement that's right that's pretty

cool but i think everyone needs to read ken's book from paycheck to purpose if they're you know in this world because what we're saying is work is not evil work is actually good for us and we just need to find the right kind of work at the right place. Let me just tell you. There is nothing. The human psyche is built to have traction. There is no psychological benefit to doing something that has no traction. Work involves traction.

That's why I like pressure washing. You get to see the stuff clean up while you're doing it That's why people like to mow grass you get to see when you're done You gotta do it again next week, but you get to see when you're done, right? It's you know when you're doing something you need to be feel the sense of accomplishment and traction incremental progress along the way it's a psychological need that the human brain has and to actually do nothing is psychologically psychological need that the human brain has and to actually do nothing is psychologically suicide because your your brain is going to rot inside your head so that that's it really doesn't work on so many levels psychologically economically spiritually and that's why your loving heavenly

father gives you instructions to work. There we go. Good word. There's your Sunday sermon. The anti-work movement is not biblical. There we go. Ding, ding. That's a headline, Dave. Be careful.

This is The Ramsey Show. Your memories are meant to be relived, not chewed up by the VCR or worn away with time. Converting your old media with Legacy Box stops fading in its tracks, so your home movies are safe forever, and you can trust Legacy Box. I've met the founders. They're right here in Tennessee, and they've helped over 1 million folks protect their memories for a limited time you can get started for just nine dollars a tape at legacybox.com slash ramsey that's legacybox.com slash ramsey George Campbell Ramsey personality is my co-host in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions. James and Ashlara are with us. Hey guys, how are you?

Hey, Mr. Ramsey. Welcome. Where do you guys live? Charleston, South Carolina. Oh, guys, how are you? Hey, Dave. Hey, Mr. Ramsey. Welcome. Where do you guys live? Charleston, South Carolina. Oh, it's a great town. Welcome to Nashville. Yes, sir. Thank you. And how much debt have you guys paid off?

$397,218.20. Boom. Wow. How long did this take? 36 months. 36 months. You were rocking that. Yes, sir.

What was your range of income during that time? $80,000 to $250,000. 250 oh there's a little jump in three years just a tiny bit so what in the world happened with your jobs to start with go ahead well I was gonna say so in the middle of it you get started and then I got laid off and so we only had his income for about three months um and then i got another job and then i got a better job and you know somewhere in the middle god shows up after you've been faithful and i got three bonuses in one year and so we just took them all and went towards that ding ding ding what do you do i'm an accountant okay and what do you do i'm a firefighter paramedic okay cool so you're stayed stable and she went to nothing and then went straight up?

Yes, sir. Okay. Wow. That's incredible. All right. So you didn't make enough, even with all of that, hardly to pay that much off. You must have sold something. Yes, sir.

We sold several things. Anything and everything we could, like you said, we sold. What did you sell? What was the biggest thing you sold? Motorcycle and a car that we got rid of. Okay. How much did they go for? The motorcycle was right at $32,000. Wow. Nice bike. It was. old uh motorcycle and a car that we got rid of okay well how much did they go for um the motorcycle

was right at 32 000 wow nice bike just it was it was great bike was that a dumb decision is what kind of no it sounds like an awesome bike what was it uh now it was an indian yeah it was an indian it was it was so fun it was a great bike but thirty two thousand dollars for the motorcycle yes sir that's a sweet bike though i bet you cried a little uh i did a little bit but looking back it was absolutely a dumb decision and then the best decision yeah it was a very mature thing but there's still the little boy inside goes okay so all right so the indian's gone and what was the car it was a chevy cruze that we got rid of yeah what did that sell for right at 22 000 okay so 54 000 of this was those two things yeah right okay wow very cool all right

what you guys obviously just did a complete about face i mean you like you changed everything yes this is very radical i can see it in the numbers. So tell me what caused this radical transformation and how you got connected to us. Well, I guess we just, like you've said, we got tired of being sick and tired of being sick and tired. And then we were just stupid on steroids, as Dave says. And you just wake up and you're tired of living like that. You're tired of living the norm. You're tired of being like everyone else. And you just make that decision that this is going to change. We did get married in 2019, and we knew going in that we were bringing debt, and we were completely honest with each other. But we also, in talking to each other, were like,

we're not living like this anymore. I'm sure we had heard through, I do believe a church is where we had originally heard you from, kind of played around with it when we first met. But then when we got married, we made the commitment that we were going to do this. How did you get to our materials at that point? What did you do? Did you go through FPU or read the book or what? We read the book and then we just watched thousands and thousands of hours, seriously, of YouTube videos and everything we could. And that's kind of what brought us here today. It was hearing everyone else's debt scream that we wanted to do that. And we got to this point, even during those difficult

months when I, and I say difficult when all you're doing is eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. That sounds crazy, but we wouldn't go to the grocery store because we had peanut butter and jelly and bread. That's how serious we were about doing it and then we would just sit and watch videos together of of you guys on tv people other people talking other people sharing their experiences um and that's what got us through yeah there's several thousand debt-free screams on youtube oh yeah on our youtube channel several thousand we've now had we've now had a billion downloads on youtube it's crazy yeah well you were our cheerleader like we didn't have a cheerleader so you were the encouragement

we would listen to debt-free screams all those people like you yes exactly because you see yourself in every one of those calls a little bit 100 but your whole thing was you really had a beautiful thing because you get married so you got a fresh start on life yes and you're like okay while we're at it we're going to clean out the garage 100 so while we're at it the end in and the cruise is gone right exactly and behavior that we had prior going into just living like everyone else was going to end and i say in the middle of that we had just gotten married and there were those difficult times where all we were talking about was this and i it was just that's when we had to go back to the youtube videos because it got very discouraging that we almost lost each other during this we were so determined doing the finance part

of it but now coming out on forgot to have a honeymoon we forgot to do us yeah and we forgot but because we were so focused and so intent on doing this and wanted to change because we had between us, we have eight kids, we have four a piece. So not only this, we now have eight kids that they're excited that we're here. They're following these steps. We have, we have 21 year olds that are both bought houses. Both have a 401k. Both.

Yeah. So it's not. We showed them how to win yeah and we just yeah thank you so much effect of what you guys have done i mean it will be felt for generations and that was the biggest thing we were wanted to make a generational change starting right now wow yeah so did i miss it what kind of debt was the 397 oh i didn't ask besides stupid besides the car and the motorcycle go ahead so. So we had medical debt. We had IRS debt.

We had state taxes debt. We had attorney fees from before we got married. Credit card debt, student loan debt. Yeah, we had 13 credit cards. I was still paying on my student loans from 10 years ago. How did you even keep up with all these payments? You feel like you lost 300 pounds. That's the thing.

It's a full-time job. We would pay something, and somebody would come out of the woodwork and say, oh, by the way, you owe us two, so you just tack it on to the end. Yeah, it's great to see that number, but then when you get there, you're like, oh, my God, how was I living? You're excited about the number being gone, but then you're like, oh, my God, I did that. It's great that it's gone. It's a tremendous, you talk about this all the time,

Mr. Ramsey, it's a tremendous feeling that is off your shoulders right now. Yeah. You breathe differently at night. You absolutely do. And in reverse of that, or the other side of that, we almost lost each other, but now we've grown so much closer together doing this. Now it's totally changed our very young marriage just in the past couple of years. really changed our marriage going forward you guys are amazing you created margin in your money but also in your time and in your life and in your marriage so you can actually focus instead of being stressed and distracted amen that's exactly right you guys are heroes i mean you got you gained back many hours a month just not having to pay these bills yeah there's a lot of them oh my god everybody on the list oh my gosh the irs the attorneys the credit cards it was all there get in line it was and it was you know many

nights of working double shifts her work and doing taxes for other people it was yeah we we spent a lot of time away from each other working because we were absolutely going to do this and then was it worth it absolutely yes sir yes, sir. Yeah. Because you still have life in the middle of that. We still lost her mom. We still had another death in the family. You still have kids graduating, kids going into Marines,

kids, just everything. So yeah. Yeah. We were determined, Mr. Ramsey, we were going to push this and get here. You guys are warriors. 400 grand paid off. Yes, sir.

That's an incredible accomplishment. It is. In three years. It's just beautiful. Yeah. Yeah, we've gone from baby step one, $400,000 paid off. Yes, sir. That's an incredible accomplishment. It is. In three years. It's just beautiful. Yeah, we've gone from Baby Step 1, everybody listening, Baby Step 1 to right now standing there, we're making double payments on the house now. So everybody hopefully will know that. Yeah, we are at that point right now in 40 months.

Ready to work four, five, six now. Yeah. Yeah. Or are working. We are doing it. Yes, sir. Way to go very well done we got a copy of baby steps millionaires for you that is the next chapter in your story for

sure how ordinary people build extraordinary wealth and how you can too that's where you're going proud of y'all thank you y'all are neat people thank you fun to talk to you yes and we got a copy or we got financial peace university which you should have gone through anyway but now we're going to give it to you free and you can go through it. So there you go. Keep you motivated along the journey. Got the new joy. Yeah, well it'll take you on to the baby steps. Take you on to the baby steps millionaire status. And George and Dr. John

Deloney and George Campbell and Rachel Cruz are in the new videos along with me and also a Total Money Makeover book for you to get going and give away to somebody who's trying to get going. You guys are very, very impressive. James and ashlara from charleston south carolina 397 000 paid off in 36 months 80 to 250 income count it down let's hear a debt-free scream three two. We're debt free! Yeah! Oh, the newlyweds.

Wow. That's incredible. That's one way to start off your marriage. Let's pay off 400 grand. First thing out of the gate. First 40 months. Yeah. This is The Ramsey Show. our scripture of the day galatians 6 9 and let us not grow weary of doing good for in due season we will reap if we do not give up pablo picasso said only put off until tomorrow what you're willing to die having left

undone oh pretty strong on a little bit of dark from pablo there pablo stepping up with a positive thinking moment but yeah oh my gosh hey right now if you're hearing a lot of the talking heads of the news stirring up fear about the real estate market be careful don't believe them it's not going to crash um it's going to slow down the economy has slowed has slowed down but uh don't make decisions based on fear bank them based on facts and uh prices aren't going down values aren't going down some of the prices are going down because they were unrealistically high but the values are not dropping so we're just going to grow and we're going to grow at a slower rate. It's going to take a little harder, a little longer to sell a house than 48 hours and probably more like 70 or 120 days, right? You need an experienced real estate agent when you're selling

houses in a market like this. You need an experienced real estate agent when you're buying houses in a market like this. If you want to find who we trust that's a high-octane, high-protein real estate agent, Ramsey Trusted, go to ramseysolutions.com slash agent. Check out our endorsed local providers. Lee's in Phoenix. Hi, Lee. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Thank you very much.

What's up? How can we help? Well, I've received an insurance settlement check of $174,000, and I know I'm going to make a donation to my church, but after that I need some advice on how to spend the rest of it or save it or whatever I need to do. Okay, cool. So, well, we teach the shortest distance between where you are and wealthy

is a process that we call the baby steps yes so do you have any debt currently um i have a fifteen thousand dollar loan on my car but i don't have any credit card debt and i do owe 1366,000 on my mortgage. Okay. And what's your income? $60,000 a year. Okay. What was the settlement from?

It was from an accident. Are you okay? That I had back in 2020. Thank the good Lord, yes. There's no ongoing medical issues or health bills you're dealing with? Well, I'm still waiting on a pending $25,000 that they're holding, but I don't think I'm going to owe anything else on this accident. I think they've taken care of everything so far.

Okay. And I do have, you know, I'm not doing therapy now but i am fine but i am 84 years old so i'm not a young chicken how much you don't sound like it you that surprised me when you said that wow well most people don't think i'm that age what do you do you have do you have money in other money in savings i have uh about 55 000 in a 401k in some money market prior to the accident and since the accident before you received this check how are you living i was living an excellent life traveling and doing all kinds of things um what are you using for income down i have uh pensions two pensions and a Social Security, and that's what I live on.

How much does all of that total up to a month? $5,000. Excellent. Okay. All right. If you were my mom, here's what I would tell you to do. I'm 62, so that's a mathematical possibility, okay? So here's what I would tell you to do. I would tell you to pay off'm 62 so that's a that's a mathematical possibility okay um so here's what i would tell you to do i would tell you to pay off your house in your car okay now if you did that

if you did that the five thousand dollars goes a lot further every month doesn't it oh sure okay absolutely now if you have zero debt in the whole world i want you to breathe that in and feel that how's that feel wonderful thank you okay and that's kind of why i'm having you do it i mean there's not a big financial thing at 84 if you said i'm going to take all this money and blow it and pay my mortgage out of my uh deal it doesn't ruin your life you're living your life well already okay and and we're not really doing this for the next 25 years because that's probably statistically not likely right well my grandmother lived to be 105 so i'm you might have 20 you might have 20 but not 25 that's why i said 25 i know okay but the uh the

but the challenge me dave i'll do it you're fun you're gonna push it all the way out to the edge on my mouth here but the point being that what gives you the best quality of life is what ran through my head if i'm in your shoes for the next decade and you've enjoyed really living life well on five thousand dollars worth of pensions to social security a month if we take your payments out of that and the weight that those payments have on your shoulders on your back and on your neck if you if you don't have there's there's literally a physical transaction that occurs when you're no longer in debt right you really do feel like you're breathing cool mountain air yes well that's what my thought was because i know

that i don't need the money that's in my 401k and if i have money every month that i'm not putting out in other things i can save that or i can travel or I can do different things that I would enjoy. You've got options. I want to do that as long as I can do that. I love it. I hope I'm like Lee when I grow up. 136 and 15 is 151 out of 174.

Correct. And you're debt free. And you can still make that donation to the church. How cool is that? And you can still book a couple more trips. Yeah. Well, as I said, too, there is another $25,000 pending, which the attorneys assured me that I probably will get. And there's also a possibility of some other that they're working on. But I'm not banking on any of that.

I'm banking on just what I have. Was it a car accident? Sounds like a plan. Actually, I was a pedestrian walking when I was hit. Oh, wow. By the grace of God, I'm still here. Well, you're resilient. That's impressive.

Yeah. Well, I figured the Lord wasn't done with me yet. Apparently. Apparently. Yeah, he gets to decide that after all, huh? So how long ago was the accident? October of 2020. Oh, my goodness. In the middle of all that garbage.

I mean, how did you get hit by a car and nobody was driving? No cars out there. Golly. Wow. Wow, you're amazingly. That's what I would do. The sense of peace, the sense of well-being, the weight that has been set down is what I would want for you. It's what I'd want for me if I were in your shoes.

Well, and when anyone retires, I mean, going into retirement with no payments in the world, it changes how you make decisions in retirement. It changes what you can do. It changes if you can take the grandkids to Disney that year. Now, she's figured out a way to do all that on the $5,000, really. Yeah. But the thing is, there's something almost in the air. It's just intangible. It is spiritual. It is psychological at this stage. It's not financial. It's not even mathematical at this stage, it's not financial, it's not even mathematical at this stage, because of the number of years we're dealing with in the equation. You know, the math starts not being relevant in this situation. But there is something precious about the feeling that when you get up in the morning and you're sitting on your porch and you're 84 and it's yours.

That just is golden, man. I can't really quantify it. and it's yours that just is golden man i i and i want that i you know i want that i had that when i was in my you know my 30s because i quit borrowing money and paid off everything right but a lot of people don't you had that you know in your 30s yeah but i you know and with all she's been through too yeah she needs to enjoy that and she's an through, too. Yeah. She needs to enjoy that. And she's an upbeat, optimistic, incredible lady, you know, but having gone through that horrible accident, obviously. Yeah. And she doesn't need the money to put food on the table.

So that's kind of what we were trying to get at is how much does she need this settlement money to live, and she doesn't. If she had no pension and was trying to live on Social Security, I might change that. But she's got everything set up. This is like extra money in a sense it's not like she's overdone like she's got a ton of money but it's just um so really what we're getting here is a quality of life issue kind of thing so i don't know if you can

quantify it but will she live longer without a mortgage payment i don't know i think there's a case to be made for that i doubt you could probably back it up with empirical research that's ever been done because i've never seen that but um yeah you know stress is um the big one of the hypertension kills people you know so she doesn't sound too stressed to me that puts us out of the ramsey show in the books we'll be back with you before you know it in the meantime remember there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus. Do you love a good day, Brandt?

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