The Ramsey Show - App - HELOC for a Dungeons & Dragons Man-Cave? (Hour 2)

Episode Date: June 20, 2022

Dave Ramsey & Ken Coleman discuss: How to handle money in college, Counseling a brother-in-law who wants to borrow money to build a Dungeons & Dragons man-cave. What to do when your rent goes up. 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 really love, and create actual amazing relationships. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. You jump in, we'll talk about your life and your money. Well, Ken, one thing people are talking

about every day right now is the real estate market. Interest rates are going up. House prices have gone up dramatically in the last three years. Is the market going to crash? Is it a bubble? Is it going to correct? Should I buy a home? Should I build a home?

Should I put my home up for sale? Should I use a real estate agent? Yeah, well, let me help you with this. I've got some really distinct pieces of data, and we're going to share those with you on a free live stream on July the 14th. We're announcing it today. The Real Estate Reality Check. It is a live stream, a free live stream event.

It's going to go about an hour and a half or two hours. It's Rachel Cruz, George Campbell, and me, and we're going to be unpacking actual data about demand, about inventory, about inflation, about recession, about interest rates, and historical timelines looking back past things like 2008, and what conclusions can we logically draw from that? Because some of you are completely freaked out, and your brains have shut down, and you've lost your critical thinking skills because you're panicked and you're freaking out. You decided because Biden couldn't ride a bicycle while it's sitting still

that you think he's going to crash the economy and you're not right i mean he's not got the ability to crash the economy in and of himself he can't do it and so i'm going to walk you through what's really going on with these things we're going to talk about it we're going to answer every one of your questions but if but let me just tell you some of you this is your first economic troubled time that you've lived in as an adult if you're in your 20s you were a baby child 2008 you're wearing short pants okay seriously so this is your first one and it'll it'll melt your brain the first time you get into this. I remember being in my 20s, and I was 22 years old in 1982 when Reagan came into office, Carter went out of office, fixed rates were 17% on houses.

And everyone around me and everyone I knew, the discussion in all the coffee shops and at every water cooler was that monetary policy had destroyed America, and we were driving 55 miles an hour. So Hagar says, I can't drive 55, right? Yes. And so because we were trying to save on gas, because there's gas lines around the block because the cartels, the OPEC cartel, had shut down the supply of energy to the United States. And gas prices went through the roof and there were shortages.

These were the uncertain economic times of my 20s. Gas lines, Dave. Yeah, to get around the block. Yeah. So around the block, you'd have to sit in an hour and a half in a line to get gas. And you burn up half your gas getting gas. I mean, it's real productive. And so, but, so, you know, that was my first one, and I freaked out.

So I'm telling you, this is going to be exciting. I like these things. These turbulent times are when champions are made, and I'm going to help you be a champion in the middle of this. We teach you to build wealth in up times and in down times. We can show you how to do it. So is this the 2008 recession? Nope.

Is it the same housing market as then? Nope. And that's not based on a feeling or Dave's old and he lost his way and he doesn't have a good opinion. It's based on data, stupid, data. And we're actually going to unpack data for you on July 14th. You can sign up for this, ramsaysolutions.com slash realitycheck. It's the real estate reality check.

It's a free live stream on July the 14th with George Campbell, Rachel Cruz, and I. Spoiler alert, housing prices are not going down. So ramsaysolutions.com slash realitycheck., housing prices are not going down. So, ramseysolutions.com slash reality check. Real estate market's not going to crash. Spoiler alert. But I'm going to actually prove it to you instead of your broke friends all sitting around smoking pot and discussing this, okay? And so, let's actually go through what's really happening, what the actual data says, and not somebody living in their mother's basement writing a blog on finance okay this is what is really happening the real estate reality check

ramsey solutions.com slash reality check completely free we're not going to charge you a dime i i dave are you going to have a bicycle on stage and and kind of use it as a prop fall over don't fall off the bike just ride up there and fall over like Joe. Dave, his foot got caught in the stirrup, Dave. I know. It happened to me, but I wasn't the 80-year-old president of the United States when it happened to me. So nobody gave a crap, right? I just was a klutz and fell over. I just think the metaphor for don't fall off the bike is great for that event.

We'll talk to the live events team. We'll see if we can make that the byline. Real estate reality check. Don't fall off the bike while it's sitting still okay but yeah oh i'm sorry it's just too good james it's an underhand pitch i mean yeah it was right there for you you know if you're him okay if that's me oh i know i know as soon as i as soon as my knee hits the pavement i know from then on i'm a meme for the rest of my life the rest of your life you know yeah because i do stuff like that i get caught and doing something stupid or something something

klutzy and it yeah they turn it into a dave ramsey meme i'm famous on tiktok for stupid butt stuff i've done so you know it's okay yeah it's all right i mean you gotta be famous for something it's a horror i felt terrible it's a horrible metaphor you know just the whole thing was just unfortunate. This is the only way to describe it. Well, I'm just saying, if you're 80 years old and you're president of the United States, you probably shouldn't be running a bank. I think that's probably true.

But I do stuff that I'm not supposed to be doing at 62, so leave me alone. Shut up. You know, what happens is this. Your body gets old, but your mind, well, most of the time your mind doesn't anyway. There's no redeeming the whole situation. We're never going to get out of this. Help me, Vicki in San Francisco. How can we help you get me out of this mess?

What's up? Hi there, Mr. Ramsey. It's a pleasure to be on your show. Thank you. So I'm a college student, and I've been saving since I was a little girl. And I've been watching your show now for around a year, so I decided to open my Roth IRA, I think a year ago, yeah, when I was 18. Wow.

And I was just wondering if you have any advice for me on what I could do with the money that I save, if I should just kind of take all my money and put it into savings, or if I should put the majority of it into investing. You're in college. Yes. And you're studying what? Math.

Okay. Good for you. What are you going to do? I'd like to be a math teacher or a kindergarten teacher. Okay. So you are making an investment in Vicki. And the investment you're making is you're writing a check for college tuition and you're going to school. Right?

Right. Vicki is the best investment you can make for the next four years. You will get a greater rate of return on good education that you actually use than you will on mutual funds. And so I want to ensure that you graduate from college debt-free. So I want you to pile up as much cash as you can possibly pile up and graduate from college debt-free. And then I would worry about, and only then what I worry about beginning your investment journey, but girl,

you are on it and I'm proud of you. This is the Ramsey Show. People all over the country are discovering a faith-based and budget-friendly way of meeting health care costs through Christian Health Care Ministries. Christian Health Care Ministries, or CHM, is a non-profit organization that helps members carry one another's burdens with health care expenses. And they have successfully shared each other's medical bills for nearly 40 years. See if CHM is right for you by visiting chministries.org. CHM is a proud sponsor of Dave Ramsey Live Events. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today.

Open phones at 888-825-5225. Ryan is in Phoenix. Hey, Ryan, how are you? I'm doing good. How are you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? Well, my sister and her husband, they're having some marriage troubles,

and she's moved into our house just for a couple days because of some arguments over finance. He wants to make a Dungeons & Dragons man cave and take out a $20,000 home equity loan. That's an oxymoron. That is not a man cave. Okay, go ahead. Well played. How old is this boy? He's in his 20s, upper 20s.

Wow. Wow. Okay. He wants to take out a dungeon. He wants a dungeon in Dragon's Man Cave. And he's wanting to spend money she doesn't want to spend. Is that it? Yeah.

So she would have to sign in, sign on with the home equity loan. Oh, he wants to borrow money for it. Yes, it's to borrow money. It's to take a home equity loan for it. And how much are we going to spend on said cave? They're looking to do a $20,000 loan. That's quite a dungeon, and it must have real dragons. I think it does.

Certainly one that moves and maybe breathes some smoke for that kind of money. Wow. He's got some big visions. But the problem here is it's really driving a wedge between them and their marriage, and I need some help. So if she's living with me right now, I need some help in knowing how I can help guide them, give them some good advice in what they're doing so they can get through this. So what kind of income, what kind of household income do they have?

They've got to be around $50,000 a year. Okay. All right. So as much as I want to make fun of it, I'll sidestep that for a second because it's just too easy. I can understand that the um but but let's just say that virtually anything you want to do that's legal and moral with money i'm fine with it's your money okay so if you want to build a dungeons and dragons man cave it's not probably on the list of things that'll happen in my lifetime for me but that's okay if you want to do that that's all right and me but the trick the

trick would be a couple things you would have to use, you'd have to have several basic principles that you followed, okay? So whether it's, in my case, my version of that is I own too many firearms, okay? An absurd number just because I'm a collector, okay? And so that's the same. That's just as stupid to some people as this is to other people, right? So same thing. But in that case, here's what would have to happen. A, I would need to pay cash, number one.

If I can't pay cash for my absurd hobbies, mine is guns, his is this, okay, then you don't do it. It's out of range. Okay. Number two, it needs to be, when I'm done with the whole thing, a small percentage of my net worth and income. So, in other words, if I make $30,000 a year and I have $400,000 worth of firearms, that's asinine. That makes sense. Okayine. That makes sense.

Okay. That totally makes sense. And so it needs to be a small percentage of your world because it is a hobby for fun by definition. And when your fun takes up too much of your life, it no longer is fun when you're like a grown-up and stuff. Okay. So one, we're going to pay cash. Two, it needs to be a small percentage. And three, here's the hard one here and this is where the rubber meets the road on this one even more than the other two um it can't i can't put my selfish desires in front of the needs and wants of my family. Right. And so if I, in my case, I'm using my firearms as the absurd thing.

If I am doing that and my wife doesn't have a good car, well, that's a little boy wanting to collect hunting guns or collect guns, okay? And so I'm putting my desires ahead of the good of my overall family. My children's college fund isn't funded, but I bought a new gun. That's a child, not a man. That's a child, not a woman. When she puts a $6,000 purse on the shelf and her children's college fund isn't funded, that's a child. Right.

And ain't no coach in the world worth that if your kid isn't going to school. Okay? Right. So that's where the problem is here. All three of these are violated in this case. And it has nothing to do with Dungeons & Dragons or the weirdness of all that. It has everything to do with, A, he's weirdness of all that it has everything to do with a he's borrowing money b he can't afford it and c the big deal for me is if i'm her brother if i'm you is that he is putting his little selfish wants ahead of the needs of his own wife

and i think that's how we've been seeing it too you know it's it does seem childish but well we the problem is it's i mean we have problems in the past with it and everything with those two but it's hard to get them on the same page you know it's just well because because they're they're immature right i mean she's put her foot down she's she's got him out of credit card she married him so she's immature there you go because he's immature beyond belief emotionally right he's a little baby boy that wants his little thing and he's having a little fit and that puts her in the seat of mommy instead of the seat of wife gratification yeah yeah, it is. And so what they desperately need is not financial counseling. They need marriage counseling.

Right. I'd have to agree. Yeah, and so if you want to pay for something, don't pay for Financial Peace University. It won't help them. Okay. Pay for marriage counseling. Get them in with a good pastor, a good marriage counselor

that can help these two grow up. But she married this guy she knew he was weird yeah i think i think it went pretty quick and and then it just went they got into it so yeah listen i've gotten into some things i've gotten into some things really quick too and when I was an immature little baby child I put my selfish desires in front of my wife's and we've been married 40 years and she says we've had 33 good years of marriage and it was the years where I put my selfish desires in front of her that she's laughing about they're not fun they're funny now they were funny back then hopefully someday they can heal them their marriage and both of them emotionally mature in this process and they can look back and laugh at the absurdity of we almost lost our marriage

over a dungeons and dragons man cave i mean that really 30 years later has got to be funny i'm just saying it's it's funny for it's almost funny right now honestly i mean we we've laughed and it's all happened and then you then you think a second, this is for real. Yeah, and it's causing a divorce. Oh, my gosh. I mean, she had to move out. Yeah, it got bad. You might have a problem with your hobby if dot, dot, dot, right? Yeah.

When they get on the same page as a married couple, then the finances can get on the same page. But Dave is absolutely right. This is a full alarm marriage issue. It's got to be dealt with. Then the money can take the next priority piece. But right now, there's bigger issues going on. So here's a way to meet him.

Okay. I don't have, you know, I would tell her to tell him this. I don't have a problem with you building a man cave. I do have a problem with your putting your needs or your selfish self in front of the good of our family and our marriage. I do have a problem with borrowing money to do it. And I do have a problem with spending money that is an excessive amount considering our current financial state and uh but if we can get all of those things straightened out and you want to build a man cave someday that with cash and that is a small percentage of our world even if i don't understand the the whole thing we can do that all right and uh but in other words it's not no it's not now

i'm not using these principles right but and i think you're right it does come down to just change in and uh that's through christ so exactly we'll keep them in ours exactly yeah and you know if you can get them in with a good pastor this may be the thing that creates a whole spiritual movement in their marriage that facilitates the emotional maturity that helps cause it to grow up because one thing about a powerful spiritual walk is one of the things that'll always teach you is to not be so dadgum selfish and self-centered and um it's the main problem with every marriage, by the way, including Ken's. Hey, let's go to commercial, shall we? And mine.

This is The Ramsey personality is my co-host today. Jacob and Megan are with us in Cheyenne, Wyoming, and it says on my screen you guys are debt-free. Congratulations. Thank you, yes. Yes, thank you. Well done. How much have you paid off?

Paid off $67,011. All right. And your range of income during that time? Just during that time, it was $60,000. Okay, cool. What do you all do for a living? I am a contractor. And I'm a records clerk at my local courthouse.

Cool. What kind of debt was the $67,000? It was our house. Way to go! All right, so where'd you get the money because you didn't even make that much during that time well if you want to hear the whole story you know we it was truly 130,000 over eight years um 20,000 was about consumer debt and so we uh just followed the baby steps that whole time. So this last 11 months, $29,000 came out of savings, $29,000 was cash flow, and $9,000 was from the government stimulus checks.

Ah, okay. All right. Cool. And so we had a big emergency fund. Too big. It was too big. So you didn't clean it out. You just reduced it. No, no. We just reduced it.

But the reason we went that had such a big one is I had started a business, and frankly, I was just nervous. Didn't know if I could make it happen. So we stocked it up a little bit and then 11 months ago we got a note from our lender saying they're calling the note oh wow and yeah that lit a fire under us like you would not believe we looked at our banker and said we'll be back in under a year you wait and see we're paying this off yeah and we'll never be back in here again and we will close all our accounts with you, you twerp.

Why'd they call your note? So the bank got bought out. You know, we had it under a local bank, and they got bought out. When we went in and saw the banker, he said, oh, no, you don't need to worry about it. We just wanted to make sure you guys are still in a good spot. And we were just done with it. Yeah, yeah. Good luck with that.

I don't think so. We just wanted to panic you and make sure you were okay, which reminds you why you don't want these twerps in your life, right? Exactly. Man, that pisses me off just hearing it. It went into my house. It's like a headband. Wow.

Way to go, guys. Good for y'all. So, yeah, you just roll up your sleeves and say, done with this, knocking it out. Boom. What's the house worth? Probably right around $180, $200, somewhere in there. Cool. What kind of business did you open?

Construction. Oh, yeah. Good, good. Good for you guys. kind of business did you open? Construction. Oh, yeah. Good, good. Good for you guys. So you're 100% debt-free. You're weirdos. Yes, yes. Successfully cash-flowed that business for four years.

I'm super proud of my husband and where we are as a family. Yeah, you ought to be. You're in a really strong position. I mean, you're going up and to the right this time, baby. You're ready to go, right? Oh, exactly. Yep. Yeah yeah way to go all right what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is you know it's uh it's just being intentional you know megan and i we've reflected a lot on our journey the last eight and a half years and we uh cleaned out that first $20,000 in debt pretty quick, and then we started working through all the other steps and building things up.

But we know where we want to go. We know where we want our life to be, how we want to live in retirement. And so we were just very intentional on how we got there. And we involved our kids. I think a big part of it is making sure your four walls are good. And when your kids see you working towards a goal and you're grocery shopping together and sticking with a budget, you know, it's very, very important.

We want to raise successful little people to grow up to be successful and smart adults. So you've just got to be intentional, and you've got to be really close with the members of your family. I love that. What was one of the sacrifices maybe that maybe the kids were a part of or that you all were a part of in this journey where it hurt at the time, but you knew it was good, and they got to see that real sacrifice, some real pain there for something that was much bigger?

So I'll let Megan answer this one because it was what she did the last 11 months while we were getting out of it because we put everything towards the house and she decided to take a second job so we could have a little fun money too. Yep so we we stuck with our budget I was working as just an office clerk for a John Deere dealership, so working 30 hours a week. And we were pushing all of that on top of the construction money to pay off the loan. And I started working at a gas station, you know, picking up ships here and there and working on the weekends. And, oh, Mom, we want to spend time with you.

And I'm like, well, I can either keep this job and you guys continue, you know, to have your golf lessons and swimming and all of that, or I can stay home and we just have to sacrifice, you know, different extras that we have. And so they understood and they did cut back some things over the summer, but they also realized we were working towards a goal. So after begging for three years, once we paid the house off, my husband surprised them with a Nintendo Switch. Yeah, they had to wait three years for it, but by golly, they were deserving, too. They sacrificed a lot with us, so it was truly a family effort. I'm really proud of our kids.

Yeah, very good. Good job, you guys. Great job. Well done. How does it feel to be 100% free? Amazing. Like the example. I mean, I have people coming up to me, I heard what you guys did,

congratulations, and we're hoping to be able to start teaching financial peace, because it's really made an impact, I think, in people that we know from our community, so. Well, thank you. We hope you do. You could be a great coordinator for this, without a doubt. And have you been able to resist the urge to go dance on that banker's desk? You know, what was funny is we brought him personally the last check. And I think Megan sent some pictures in, and he was the one who took a picture of us. Holding our deed. And he told us when we left, he's like, all all right well next time you you guys want to borrow some money against the house or something just come see me and we'll get you hooked up and

hooked up is right like a bass oh my gosh hooked up like a fish unbelievable well you guys are awesome that's funny that's great they don't they never learn do they they're just something that yeah yeah all right hey we got a copy of baby steps millionaires for you without a awesome that's funny that's great they don't they never learn do they they're just something that yeah yeah all right hey we got a copy of baby steps millionaires for you without a doubt that's the direction you're going how ordinary people built extraordinary wealth how you can too another copy of total money makeover you can give it away to somebody and a one-year subscription to financial peace university and ramsey plus and uh again you probably give that to somebody when you start teaching the class there in your area. So thank you guys so much.

I'm so proud of you. You're heroes. Well done. Thank you. Thank you. Jacob and Megan in Wyoming, $67,000 paid off in 11 months, making $60,000. That's cleaning out savings, cleaning out everything, making this happen, get rid of the old banker with a note call

count it down let's hear a debt-free scream three two one i love it. Now, Ken, that's how this whole Ramsey thing was born, was a banker calling a note on me. And started a crash, only it was a little bit bigger note, me and two. But, yeah. And I hadn't lost a dime. I hadn't been laid a lick.

But same exact thing. Bank got sold to another bank out of town, and some duber in another city looks down and says, this guy, even though he's never been late, even though he's never lost money on a deal, we need to limit this relationship. And so they sent me one of those exact same things in the mail, and the only difference is I wasn't able to pay it all off within that period of time, and it started to crash, and I spent two and a half years of my life losing everything we owned and ended up in bankruptcy because of that exact scenario. But it taught me beautifully I'll never be there again.

And you know what? That banker trying to loan them money is funny because they'll never go back in there. Yeah, a friend of mine in the music business got a big royalty check, went in and paid his thing off at Farm Bureau, and they said,'ll see you and he said uh-uh yeah i ain't coming back in here this is the ramsey show Thank you. We'll be right back. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Lou is in Phoenix.

Hi, Lou. How are you? I'm good. How are you? Better than I deserve. How can we help? Okay. Well, I'm calling because I just, I'm in. How are you? Better than I deserve. How can we help? Okay. Well, I'm calling because I'm at a kind of a crossroads, and I want to be really strategic

because I have, like, I'm older. I'm 56, and I don't have a lot of time left for, you know, my working career. And I'm divorced, and unfortunately, I don't have a huge 401k. I'm renting, and I just got noticed my rent's going up $300. And so I've been hearing, I mean, I know what you're going to say, but, you know, I have like $7,900 left in debt. It should be paid off by March 2023. What do you make?

$60,000. But I just don't know what to do. I have people, my friends and everything i'm sorry why does it take 12 months to pay off seven thousand dollars when you make 60 well um well i have to take i have my um i take three percent from my 401k and then i'm sorry say what i put three percent away from my 401k, you know, of my income. And then also I have my HSA that I've been putting in like $125 per pay period. It's every two weeks.

Stop both of those. Stop both of those. Stop both of those, okay. Here's what's happening with you, okay? And it happens with most people you're trying to do a little bit of everything that's smart and nothing's moving okay you're trying a hundred dollar into one thing three hundred dollar into another thing and you're nickel and diming and you got no focus at all to the math it's all spread out and when you went light dispersed simply lights the

room light focused is a laser you can do surgery with okay and you're dispersing all of your financial energies across a whole bunch of things and not moving the needle on any of them okay does that make any sense oh yeah and that's why that's why we teach the baby steps do you have any money in savings that's not retirement? Well, I have that $1,000. Actually, I have $1,200 for my emergency fund because I'm trying to follow the steps. But like I said, my rent's going up $300, and it's just dumb. Okay.

Yeah. So here's what I would tell you to do. What do you do for a living? I work in – I do loans, legal documents for commercial banking. Okay. All right. Cool. Okay.

I would tell you two or three things if you were my little sister, and you'd be about the age of my little sister, okay? I would tell you let's do the baby steps exactly like you were a Pharisee about them. Okay. And that means $1,000, not $1,200. It means you stop putting money in HSA. You stop putting money in retirement and you get on a really tight beans and

rice, rice and beans budget. And we knock out this debt in six months or four months, not in 12. Okay. And then we get the emergency fund up to three to six months of expenses, and then we start saving aggressively to buy a house. And I think if you do all of that plus one more thing,

I'm going to tell you that you're probably buying a house by Christmas of 23, 18 months. Okay. But, I mean, I'm going to put you on beans and rice, girl. You're spending money right now. You don't have a lot of money i'm not saying you're crazy and out of control or something but you're gonna find money when you make this pretend like you had a health problem and if you didn't save up fifteen thousand dollars to pay for the medical bill you were gonna die okay that kind of thing i mean like that kind of intensity that like i ain't doing nothing

okay you don't need to see the inside of a restaurant unless you're working there and don't you talk to me about a vacation we're trying to get a house exactly you know i totally hear you i have yeah you sell so much stuff the kids think they're next put the cat on ebay and the dog on greg's list i'm kidding not really but maybe not about the cat but and then the other thing i'm going to tell you is with ken coleman's gonna help you this other thing i'm gonna tell you is i want you to start thinking about what you can do to make more money not only in the short term take an extra job and work your butt off but also in the long term what career moves can ken coleman help you make to go make 80 000

or 90 000 and change your whole life you like you said you got a decade or so left to work let's go make some money and put it away so we can retire with dignity ken yeah i want you to do a little exercise and i want you to after you do this exercise i want you to run it by three or four people that you really know well and that you respect their opinion. Here's the exercise. I want you to write down your working life. I want you to write down all of the experience that you have that is really relevant to just about any industry. And what I mean by that is you're very detail-oriented, process-oriented in the type of work you do now. True or false? Yeah, true. Very true.

True. Okay, good. So I want you to just think of all of that valuable experience and just get it out of your head and write it down could be a list of five things could be 15 could be 50 and then I want you to focus on what you do really really well where you're talented these could be people skills could be some technical skills as well I want you to get that out on paper so experience on one column and talent on the other and that's going to show you what you have the offer what you have to offer to this marketplace. And you're in a job economy right now, certainly where you are, where you have a lot to offer. And I want you to be able to see yourself a little bit differently.

Run that list by some people and go, hey, based on this list of experience that I bring to the table and talent I bring to the table, what ideas do you have? Let other people who aren't kind of in their own, in your world, they're in their world, they see it objectively, let them give you some ideas. This is a brainstorming exercise is what I've just given you, okay? Now you're going to see opportunities that you haven't seen before, okay? And then I want you to, we're going to give you, when we put you on hold, we're going to give you my Get Clear Career Assessment. It'll take you about 20 minutes, and I want you to take we put you on hold, we're going to give you my get clear career assessment. Take you about 20 minutes.

And I want you to take that after you do that first homework assignment. And you're going to begin to see yourself and see some real purpose and some opportunities that you've never seen before. Go put yourself out there. Side hustle for sure. But can you transition? Can you pivot? Find something you think you could get and go interview that makes 80. Right now. And let's get a big bump bump and let's just see what we can make can we make 80 or 90 000 what would it take to get to six figures you got a decade to where you can really stack up some money

and get out of this debt-free journey pretty quickly just on where you are but let's juice it with some more income yeah you can ask yourself what Henry Cloud talks about, your desired future. Okay, this is my desired future. And then you ask yourself, okay, what has to be true for me to be there that's not true today? That may mean I need to take a class. That may mean I need to put myself out there and go interview. It may mean you can walk right in there and get it, but you just hadn't bothered. Because what happens is sometimes we get out of a fear of rejection or, you know, because if somebody doesn't hire you, that's very personal.

That's right. Out of a fear of rejection, we can kind of get stuck and go, well, I'm just going to ride this thing out. I'm just going to ride this horse on out. He'll take me home, but he's not very fast but he'll get me home tell you something else that happens and it may be happening in lou's case but what we focus on is what we see so neuroscience did all this study in decades ago and found that we have this thing in our brain called the reticular activating system very fancy word here's what it means for all of you that ever bought a car you remember seeing that car

everywhere for the like four or five days after you bought it it's remarkable you know it's like for all of you that ever bought a car, you remember seeing that car everywhere for like four or five days after you bought it? It's remarkable. It's like, oh, there's our car. There's our car. And did the gods of cars just drop that car into your world? No. What happens is they've proven that what we focus on

is what we see everywhere. So if you have victim-type thinking, you start feeling attacked everywhere you go. And she doesn't sound like a victim. No, no, no. But the idea is what we focus on is what we see. So if you focus on... If you focus on opportunity. Right, but if you go and she does she doesn't sound like a victim no no no but the idea is what we focus on is what we see so if we look if you focus on opportunity right but if you go grades yeah if you go i only got a decade left there's not a lot of opportunity out there for me then we see that everywhere so if we switch it we wait a second i've got a decade a decade and a

half a day you know of of real worth and work that i can do then we begin to see opportunities that were sitting in front of us the entire time. That's the idea. What we focus on, our brain goes out and takes pictures of it and gives us evidence of it. So when we change what we focus on and what we think, we begin to see things we've never seen before. And that's what this exercise that I gave her, that'll help her to begin to see herself differently than maybe she's ever seen herself before.

What's the old, yeah, it's Earl old Earl Nightingale from the 60s. Classic. You know, what you can conceive and believe. Conceive it. You can see it in your mind. You can conceive it. Yeah. And believe it can be true.

You can achieve. Great words. Hopefully you're not delusional. Yes. And so hopefully what you're conceiving is actual. Yeah. And, you know, what you can conceive and believe you can achieve. And we're not talking about the American Idol dropouts here.

Okay. You actually know how to sing and you can conceive and believe it. This is The Ramsey Show. Dave here. You can find all of our shows with the Ramsey Network app on your smartphone. It's the only place to listen to the entire back catalog of episodes. Download the Ramsey Network app in your favorite app store today.