The Ramsey Show - App - How Do I Prepare for an Upcoming Settlement?

Episode Date: June 6, 2022

Dave Ramsey & Dr. John Delony discuss: Preparing for an upcoming settlement check, When changing jobs won't really help your situation. 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. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. We help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Open phones this hour as we talk about your life and your money. The phone number is 888-825-5225. My co-host today, Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, number one best-selling book, and we're number one best-selling book and land uh we're number one best-selling author of the number one

best-selling book i'd get that spit out correctly here in a second you talk and you call in talk we'll help you the phone number is 888-825-5225 alan is in louisville kentucky hi alan how are you hi dave and john i'm doing better every day what an honor to talk to both of you. You too, sir. How can we help? Well, I'll be quick. I'm not here to waste anybody's time. I'll give you the context and then the question. I'm 24, married, got one child, make $60,000 a year in union construction.

Right now, however, I'm on total temporary disability. Roughly three months ago, I was buried in a building collapse and was buried totally alive due to the work of the co-workers and firefighters that got me out within two hours and saved my legs within five minutes. So I'm back home. I'm out of the wheelchair. I'm in therapy. I still got probably another four weeks until I start doing some light duty stuff. Broke leg and shoulder and had a small brain bleed, was on a ventilator for a little bit, some other stuff. But the questions I've got for you, I've retained lawyers for other stuff,

but it kind of revolves around if there's anything ruled negligent, which is kind of what you're thinking, I'm sure. As far as the settlement-wise, you know, how long do I wait? I'm renting right now. You know, I don't have fancy cars. I got what I need. I was in Baby Step 2.

Right now I've got about $5,000 in savings, and I've got $2,500 in past medical debt. Obviously, everything's being taken care of as far as I'm on disability and then everything's being covered by workers' comp. Just those main two questions is just, you know, how long do I wait? If there's a settlement, then do I pay off that $2,500 that I've gotten past medical debt? I was in the baby step, too. I've been through APU. I've used your ELPs for everything from my taxes to my insurance.

I've got disability insurance. I felt like, you know, I'm done. You've been through hell. You've been through hell. It's been interesting. That was an amazing adventure that you've been on, man. Right. How long ago was the accident?

It was the end of February, so it's been just over three months. Wow. I've been walking for about two weeks. So you're up walking now. Yes, yep, up walking. I've got surgery coming up here in two or three days. They're going to take a screw out of my knee that's kind of messing with my walking. That should get a little better, but that should be the end of that.

You're a tough motor scooter. How are you managing the pain? Well, we're off of Percococet so we're just on tylenol now so we're never going back right that's that's the plan yeah no no no we're never going back we're never going back right correct correct there you go percocet makes buildings fly yeah yeah yeah the percocet before that ketamine's a little hard on you and dilaudid and all that yes yes yes yes, yes, yes. Yeah, you got messed up, dude.

Sorry, man. I'm glad you're lucky, man. I'm glad your little girl's got her daddy with her. Right. So, yeah, it's just I couldn't find anybody on YouTube that had the scenario that I did outside of maybe inheritance questions, but I'm just looking for some counsel. It's early to have this discussion because right now I'm just happy you're up walking around. I'm out of breath listening to you. Yeah, true.

But, you know, a year from today, two years from today, five years from today, what are you, have you thought that far out on what you're going to be doing for a living? Well, I continued. As far as the relationship with the employers, you know, it's still been great. You know, they're grateful for everything. You know, it's still under investigation to exactly what happened. Was it their building that fell in? We're a general contractor, and I'm a union carpenter,

and we're working on a project that's about 30-some buildings, a big campus, about $800 million. The company itself runs about 500 guys in the field. That you work for. So if there is negligence, it's the company you work for. At this point, the lawyers, it's third party. You can't sue your own employer. So it's kind of looking like excavators.

I work in heavy concrete as far as foundation-wise. And what seems to have happened is we came in the same day. They dug out dirt to do some foundation work, and then the foundation blew out and buried me. So that's as far as that stands. So you think long-term with your injury you'll recover enough to go back to doing your job? I do. The doctor already said, you know, I tore three rotator cuffs in the bicep, so overhead stuff's probably not really going to be in there.

But I love the industry. I love working with people. You know, it's not in my plans to move away from this type of industry, if that kind of answers the question. And so you'll be back to making an income similar to you used to make. Yeah. And workers' comp and disability will cover you until then. Yeah, workers' comp, they're getting to me within $100 of my paycheck where I was.

Okay, so mathematically, if I'm understanding now, and here's what I'm trying to get my head around. Mathematically, if I'm understanding, you go from disability workers comp to back to working again over some period of time, and you're going to have the same income as you had before the accident. Everything is going to be running right along. So any settlement that you get would be to cover any more surgeries that you have to do or any other injuries that anything you have to do regarding the injury or um it's just gravy you don't really need the money your life is going to go on like it was before the accident and the money that you get mathematically speaking will be just to uh uh will just cause you to have a gravy on biscuit, to have a little extra, right? Right.

So my point is, how long do you wait for money that you didn't need anyway? As long as you need to wait to get the maximum amount. And so your attorneys that are advising you on this negligence lawsuit can tell you what the timeline looks like and if it's four years it really doesn't matter because you're going to have the same income anyway and you're going to be moving right along am i missing something right i was just kind of thinking you know if it's something crazy like a million dollars you know is there a timeline that you wait no let that kind of soak in no or it doesn't really matter it's already that timeline's already been used up by then no you you're you're gonna you're gonna have a long timeline they don't give up a million dollars

easy years they don't give up a million dollars easy it's gonna take a while and remember this and you don't have to have it to eat yeah and the idea of a settlement yeah the idea of a settlement is to make you whole. It's not a scratch-off ticket. You didn't hit a lottery ticket. Right, and so you might get a million dollars, but you just said it in passing. This is going to shave some of your life off, right? This is going to affect you 20 years from now with a hip replacement or 30 years with a knee replacement, right?

So you want to bank some of that stuff and be smart about it. Don't think, oh, cool, we can buy Ferraris now, right? Or now we can buy a house with it. Yeah. Not even. So I would continue your life as if you weren't getting a settlement. And then if you get one, it's just extra money. That's my point. And then the timeline doesn't matter as much.

You're not waiting to buy a house on this settlement. You're not waiting to do something on this settlement because you're not waiting on the settlement. You're moving on with your life. Man, I'm sorry for what you've been through. Yeah, I'm sorry, Tim. I'm glad you're safe. Terrible.

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That's RamseySolutions.com. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Thank you for joining us. Michael is with us. Michael's in L.A. Hey, Michael, welcome to The Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave and John, how's it going? Good, man.

How can we help? Yeah, so I'm 24 years old. I make $170,000 a year. I mean, you know, the company I work for is great. You know, culture is great. Everything about it is great. I work remote. You're 24 and you make $170 a year?

What do you do? So I work in fulfillment and logistics. What do you fulfill? No, he logistics. Oh. So, yeah. Supply chain, right? Yes, exactly, exactly.

So a lot of, like, e-commerce. Yeah. Basically, like, QVC is a type of our company. You are aware that you are a unicorn, right? I guess so, sir. 24-year-olds that make $170,000 a year do not grow on trees, dude. That's very impressive, very impressive. You must be very, very good at what you do. That's incredible.

Thank you. Thank you so much. It's an honor coming from you guys. So, yeah, let me come up with the problem. So, you know, all my life I feel like I'm still searching, like, for more and more. I'm great at my job, but I feel like I can do more. I don't know what culture these days, company culture at least, you know. I'm afraid of, like, leaving my company. you know, I'm afraid of like leaving my company.

You know, I've only been here for eight months. But before this, this role, I was doing the same exact level, same. I'm a director level currently right now. And I feel like I could become a VP level, you know, in the next, you know, six months. And I just wanted some guidance. You know, am I being too confident? Am I being too hasty? You know, I feel like I want more. I feel like I want a larger scope. I feel like I want to do, um, you know, be even better than I am right now. Um, am I wrong for, for feeling that way or looking to leave my company within like six months?

I, you're conflating a lot of things into a single stream, right? Why do you want to be a vice president? Larger scope. Okay, why do you want to have larger scope? I feel like I want to do more. I want to make more changes. Why? Like what will you get?

You want to make more changes. What does that mean? Like I want – like I guess the question would – why would anyone want a better paying job or why would anyone want more work to do? I want to learn more. That's a great question. Okay.

Yes, and learning more. That's a great question. Yes, and learning more. That's why you conflated a lot. You're 24, so here's a powerful life lesson. If you can learn this at 24, I didn't get it until I was probably 37 or 38, and it was a humbling smack in my face. Whatever job you get, whatever person you get to marry you, whatever car you buy, whatever kid you have, the second kid, third kid, eighth kid, you go with you.

And so that stirring you have, that feeling, that sense of I'm just not, I'm just not complete. I'm just not. That's going to go to your next job and you you're going to get vice president, and you're going to be within six months, you'll be thinking, okay, where can I be CEO? And then I want to be a CEO. You're going to keep running and running and running until you decide you're all right where you are, and I'm going to learn this stuff. Now, here's the other side to that. We need really, really ambitious people in our culture right now. We've got a lot of big problems that we need fixed. You, by the way, fix the supply chain. What are you doing? They're paying you 170 grand. And there's a lot of big problems. So I want people

to be ambitious. I want people to start businesses and work really hard and grow big businesses to help a lot of the challenges in the country. I just want the leaders in those companies to know that those big paychecks and that vice presidency, it's not going to fix you. It's not going to make you feel less restless. And you sound a lot like me, who the moment I got a job, I was applying for the other job. And then as soon as I got that job,

I was thinking about where am I going to go next? And it wasn't until I landed and said, I got to fix my relationships with myself with my past with my family with my friends and then i had this state of peace and here's what's beautiful about it then i could go do anything and then i ended up in the job of a lifetime and after that i got the job of another lifetime after that right you see what see what I'm saying? Right. That makes total sense. What you're chasing is peace, and you will not get that in a job title or dollar amount. Yeah, sure.

Paul, going back to your first – wait, do you want to talk, Dave? Sorry. You're fine. Go ahead. Okay, going back to your first thing, like, is it wrong? Like, for example, I won't find peace, and'll make it to vp and then co one day but is that wrong to like like is it wrong to realize that i need peace at a co level like oh like i you're right i need peace but oh i'm the co making 250 or like like is that wrong to like go through that

you're attaching a moral construct to uh to a linear condition all What I mean is that. Ambition is not wrong. Growth is not wrong. Changing jobs is not wrong. Doing it to try to become complete because you weren't complete at the last place is bad medicine. It's not going to work. in other words john john has a talk he does says the title of the talk is winning doesn't make you well right so you sound very smart and very legitimately not illegitimately ambitious but the fact that you're struggling with the part of you that's struggling with,

is this wrong, as if it's a moral construct that it's bad to be ambitious or it's bad to have growth or it's bad to make a big income or it's bad to move up the ladder or it's bad to change jobs. None of those things are bad. None of them are good. They're ambivalent to the moral construct. But ambition for ambition's sake, None of them are good. They're ambivalent to the moral construct. But ambition for ambition's sake, ambition so that I feel good about the guy in the mirror,

you won't ever catch him. He keeps moving. He's a bully in the schoolyard. He takes another step back, draws another line in the sand, says, when you step across this line, then you'll be happy. And then when you step across this line, then you'll be happy. And then when you step across this line, then you'll be happy. And happiness is not a across right and so it's not bad nothing you have done physically morally is in a moral construct that is bad it's all good why you're doing some of it

maybe i'm gonna guess john is listening to you Michael, my estimate would be that 20% of why you're doing this is brokenness. 80% is all good reasons. Right. But you're piling them all in together, and the brokenness part is making you question the whole idea. So let me tell you a shape-shifter in my career. I got a job way over my head at a real young age, very much like you. I was pretty good at what I did, and they took care of me.

And it wasn't until I got around people that were one step ahead of me, the vice presidents. And then I realized, oh, they know this stuff really well. They had something I didn't have. We all had knowledge. They had wisdom. I'd love to see you stay put for a year, for two years, and learn the business. And not just how logistics work, but how people work and how the cycle is going to work through a recession. And get some of that wisdom, some of those scars and strength, and then you will be an incredible

vice president. You go into that stuff with confidence and wisdom and peace you are you're an incredible young guy yeah don't look for healing in movement it's not there this is the ramsey show Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, number one best-selling author, is my co-host in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions. You can drop by and see us anytime if you'd like. We do the show from 1 to 4 Central Time every day, Monday through Friday. And we'd love to have you. There's usually 50 to 200 folks sitting out here. It's completely free.

That's how much we charge, and that's how much it's worth. So thanks for coming. And also, we've got a great visitor center. The cookies alone are worth the price of free, and so is the free coffee. It's worth the price of free. Also in the lobby is our debt-free stage. On that stage is Jordan and Sarah. Hey, guys, welcome to the Ramsey Show.

Congratulations on being debt-free. Thanks, Dave. Thank you. Where do you guys live? Just a little bit east of Greensboro, North Carolina. Cool. Welcome to Nashville. And how much debt have you paid off?

Just over $169,000. Love it. I'm going with $170,000 then. Okay. So how long did this take? 15 months. Wow. And your range of income during that time? We started at $126,000 and went up to $185,000. Good. Good for you guys. What do y'all do a living? Well, she's a teacher, and I own a photography and videography real estate company. Oh, very good. Very good. What do you teach? Special education, high school. Oh, wow.

That's a brave soul right there. I'm proud of you. We need you bad. Hers is the harder job, obviously. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. What did you do today? I took a picture of a building.

What about you? Wrangled 20 kids. Dealt with parents all day. Oh, the kids. That's the blessing. It's the parents. Oh, wow. Way to go, guys.

What kind of debt was the 170? It was our mortgage. You paid off your house. All right. Look at the weird people. Congratulations, weirdos. Thank you. Way to go, you guys.

Loving being weird. Yep. How old are you two? I'm almost 39, and she's 37. All right. Not even 40 years old. What's the house worth? It's in the range of $400, $420, somewhere around there.

Good for you. Way to go, guys. Very, very cool. Well done. How much is in your retirement accounts? Just about $100 right now. Good for you. So you're on your way to baby steps

millionaire yeah yeah good for y'all way to go guys yeah what got all this started 15 months ago because you guys got fired up here well it was during the pandemic yeah i had i've always had this little fear of always losing my house apparently that's the thing that i just wanted to make sure i provide for her and our kids. So, you know, kind of when the pandemic hit, that kind of sprung it in a little bit. And I was like, this would be awesome if our house was paid for just in case something happened. Did you ever have that experience when you were a kid or something or what? No, I just always had a little bit of fear of providing.

Like I want to make sure I provide. Good for you. It's an act of honor. Well done. I mean, I'm very chivalrous, I guess. She is snickering. She just shook her head. She just snickered.

I love it. But, yeah, that's really what started it. The pandemic didn't really hit us too hard. My company actually did pretty well over the pandemic. Yeah. And real estate with taking pictures of it because nobody wanted to go actually look at it with humans is a big deal. I mean, 360 view, virtual views, all that stuff went nuts. All that stuff picked up.

We had a lot of people buying houses in this area sight unseen, only with the drone pics and the 360s. Yeah, exactly. Good. Yeah, as soon as that happened, I was like, we probably need to start sending as much money as we can to the mortgage and get it all taken care of. Might as well get rid of that one less fear, one less thing to be afraid of. Exactly.

And the house is paid for. So now that you did it, how does it feel? Was there that release you were looking for? Yeah. I mean, it's already kind of sank in a little bit, but the last payment of clicking, well, we weren't really clicking a button. It was calling the bank and saying we need them to pay off the last $30,000. That was a very cool moment, and we really enjoyed that.

Yeah, that's fun. And it's fun telling people our house has paid off. We don't go around wearing T-shirts saying our house has paid off. But when that conversation comes up, it's cool to say. Or just get T-shirts that say weirdos. That's what happens. Dave's weirdos. That's it.

I love it. Good for you guys, man. I'm so proud of you. Thank you. So proud of you. What's the first big thing you're going to do now that the house is paid for? Well, we've started putting money towards going on a 10-year anniversary wedding trip. Where are you going to go?

Montego Bay. Yeah, Montego Bay. Yeah, nice. That's going to be in August. It's not really a thing of, oh, gosh, we've got to pay for this when we get back or anything. It's just all cash, ready to go. Write a check and enjoy it. It's a beautiful area. You'll love it. Looking forward to it.

Excellent. Excellent. Good for you guys! Yeah! How'd you get connected up to Ramsey stuff? Sorry, John. Well, I don't know if this is a really funny story, but when me and her were dating, I guess I forced her to listen to one of your

podcasts while we were in the car um and that not only is he chivalrous but he's romantic his car his rules yeah yeah nothing says i love you like hey let's listen to this guy on the way to our date no smooth jazz no old pop songs let's get a hillbilly on the radio she was pretty cool but i wanted to make sure she was going to be debt free at some point man your chivalry is shining through my friend but but i had more debt than she did so it was yes um but yeah i mean we i kind of knew about you for a while and i guess when she heard one of the podcasts she kind of picked it up and started reading the book and and it just kind of r slaughterslaughtered from there. All right. Very cool.

Good for you guys. What was the – who sat down with who and had the hard conversation about let's suck it up for a year or two and pay this thing off? I think it was more me. I had just gone back to work after staying at home with my youngest for a few months, and I was like, well, you know, I'm back at work. I'm back at making a paycheck. Let's just do this. Let's start sending in the extra money at first. I think that was back in the spring, right when COVID hit. And he said, well, let's wait until the fall starts when you, you know, cause in the summertime, I don't get a paycheck. He said, let's wait until the fall,

you know, get the money coming in and then let's start throwing it at the house. When you added it up, did you think it was going to take 15 months or longer? No, our first estimate was it was going to be 18 months. But there's obviously a couple good months in there. And, you know, when 2020 hit, when the government started sending money just because the pandemic, all we did was just take that money and just put it towards the mortgage. And that helped a little bit. John, you and I paid off their house. Thanksica we didn't ask for it but they sent it so

taxpayer dollars at work that was nice of us dave that was nice of us you guys are fun way to go y'all amazing i'm so proud of you very very done. All right. What do you tell people the secret to getting out of debt is? Definitely budgeting, having a plan, and having the same goals. Yeah. The budget is definitely the thing. She's all of that. She's that budget person. So her making sure we stay on that, that's the main thing for me.

Very good. Good stuff. I'm so proud of you all. It's awesome. Great work. All right, we've got a copy of Baby Steps Millionaires for you. That's the next chapter in your story for sure. You're on your way.

Probably 45-year-old millionaires. Let's hope. That's what it looks like right now, or less. Good for you all. Also, I'm going to give you a Ramsey Plus Financial Peace University one-year certificate to get you guys in for a year subscribed. If you haven't been through the class, you can go through it. If you have, then give it to somebody. The same with the Total Money Makeover book.

We're going to give you one of those. We're going to load you up on goodies to give away and to enjoy both. And so well done. We're very, very, very proud of you. All right, let's bring the kiddos in. What are their names and ages? Go ahead. We have Cooper, who is almost seven, and then Remington, who is three.

All right, Cooper and Remington, who is three. All right. Cooper and Remington. Good stuff. Good Americans there. I like them. Patriotic. We need to salute while we're doing this. Good stuff.

All right. Jordan and Sarah, Cooper and Remington, Greensboro, North Carolina, $170,000 paid off in 15 years and not even 40, and their house is paid for. Making $126,000 to $185,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. All right. Not even 40 in their houses paid for. Making 126 to 185. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. All right. Three, two, one.

We're debt-free! Yeah! Woo! Way to go, you guys! Woo-hoo! And those two little munchkins will never know A house with a mortgage Can you imagine?

They live in a debt free house And he's not even as tall as your knee It's awesome man He's going to think all parents are just kind to one another Man Amazing All parents don't have money fights And live on a budget together and have shared goals

It happens in our house so it must be everywhere Changing society Amazing. All parents don't have money fights and live on a budget together and have shared goals. It happens in our house, so it must be everywhere. Wow. Changing society, one debt-free house at a time. This is The Ramsey Show. We'll see you next time. Our Scripture of the Day, Deuteronomy 28, 12. The Lord will open to you His good treasure, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season, and to bless all the work of your hand.

You shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. Stephen Covey said, Our most important financial asset is our own capacity to earn. That's true, because your most powerful wealth-building tool is your income. Thank you for joining us, America. So, John, what do you think is happening in the culture when we were going through the pandemic and people were quarantined and lost their jobs and others were in the plexiglass business and having the best year of their whole freaking lives, you know, some businesses were just booming and others were just gone, just went to nothing.

And that happened inside the building here. I mean, we had the entire live events team had to sit down. There was no live events. We didn't lay them off. They're still here, and we're doing events again now. But then we had other areas that just boomed, and we made more money than we thought we'd ever make in some of these other areas. And so in our case, inside Ramsey, we had a really good year in 2020,

much better than we thought we were going to when the world was coming to an end in March, and much more than it was originally budgeted. We had a better-than-budget year, but not – I mean, it didn't just – I mean, we didn't just – the skies didn't open. But other places, the skies opened, and they had – whoa, like that guy with his drone business and real estate pictures, his business went crazy. And he didn't do anything but good things he wasn't doing anything wrong but there was a sense of like you can't talk about it if you're doing good because times are bad we have a culture that is addicted to bad news and we we even have this day with our close friends um we don't call our friend when something great happens to us maybe one or two of them hey this thing happened that was really great kid got the play like my wife and i our marriage is great we just don't have a cultural ethos towards that and if you happen to

be doing well when things are you better just keep that to yourself and then it just got magnified and what's what's strange is most of the people who did really well during the pandemic were helping their community they happened to have a business that was in service of other people like uh door dash or delivery or whatever right and man i i i like to beat that drum dave that we've got to be able to share the tough stuff together but we've got to be able to share the good stuff too man well I mean that it feels like you always talk about um I kind of want to put it in the same bucket with um okay I you know so and so went through this horrible calamity with cancer treatments and everything else uh and I broke my leg yeah no i didn't but i mean you know but and you always say don't compare your thing to their thing your thing you broke your leg man still hurt it's awful you're still your leg hurt you know now i understand it's

not it's not cancer it's not 14 months of chemo it's not gonna lose my hair but minimizing minimizing your thing isn't gonna help that's the. And minimizing the fact that you're successful doesn't make that you're making more money than you ever made in your life in the middle of a bad time when you're not doing anything wrong. On the contrary, you're serving. Hiding that as an act of shame doesn't make the people that are financially hurting get any better. Right. That's the bucket I wanted to put in. There you go. Yeah, yeah.

And in fact, you can become a lighthouse to your community. Yeah, showing that it can be done. That's right. Or a, here's what this could look like, or here's an idea, or fill in the blank, right? Yeah, I mean, you know, we talk to these travel nurses. Oh, man. We've had several of them on the show. And they made like a half a million dollars.

They cleaned up, man. They did all right. Half a million dollars one of them on the show and they made like a half a million dollars cleaned up man they did all right half a million dollars one i made in one year and another one another one didn't even travel but she worked two jobs were you on with me that girl had 90 hours she was working 90 hours yeah and she made like 380 000 bucks and she was working two 40 hour jobs yeah yeah she's cleaning up man we saw teachers who were teaching and then they'd get right off of work and go immediately into driving and then the next morning they were up driving uber and they just people worked really hard and all of a sudden they looked up and they made an extra

hundred thousand dollars and that message during the time that some other folks were legitimately suffering financially absolutely but it doesn't minimize their suffering for you to hide your success under a bushel. Right. Right. Hide your light under a bushel. That's right. It doesn't. It doesn't.

Now, if you're an arrogant idiot about it, then yes. Like, look at me. Look at, you know, you're running poor people down or something. That's not the point. There's idiots everywhere. But if you have a light. There is a thing in these uh one group of these trolls that um that like anytime you say that hey listen like i said on fox news during

that time they gave them like they came out with a fourth round of money or something and there's they're they're acting like the whole world has changed because biden's sending out 1300 and i said if 1300 changes your life you don't have a life oh you're struggling you're struggling more than you know what i got i got 16 days of trolling dave ramsey hates poor people uh yeah you don't understand you're you're too cool you think 1300 isn't any money dude mathematically if 1300 changes your life you do not have a life. Mathematically. That's not a poor people rundown thing. That's an arithmetic thing. But, man, I got hammered. I got destroyed. Entire Reddit threads going after Ramsey and people playing the clip over and over and over.

And some of these wealth inequalities morons retweeting the thing and all this stuff. As if I hate poor people. I've spent my entire life helping people that were broke. Right. But, I mean, so that's why people couldn't do it they can't say i'm winning financially because you're shaming poor people so the flip side of that is this i have to here's a great example um and you and i've talked about this i the day that i got the call that my first book made the bestseller list i thought my boss jeremy

breland i thought he was pranking me i thought thought he was messing with me, right? Why? We knew it was going to be number one. No, not this one, the old one. Oh, the old one. I thought he was messing with me. Okay. And so he calls. Yeah, I did too.

That same day, yeah. That same, so I thought he was messing with me. I hung up and I thought, whoa. Well, shortly after, one of my closest friends in the world, the most stable friend I have, said that the bank he worked for got sold. And I said, so are you rich? And he goes, no, I think I'm out of a job. And I told him, you can't be out of a job. You're the most stable

guy I know. And so we talked through it. But in that phone call, he told me the hardest news. I think I'm unemployed. And I said, well, while we're on the phone, I just made the bestseller list. And I was able to sit with him in his grief. And he's like, dude, you've been working for this for so long. I'm so proud of you. I've known you for a long time behind closed doors, and I'm going to get choked up here. He celebrated my win, and I sat with him in the crap. All in the same phone call.

That's what friendships do. And so what he didn't hear is my win as somehow taking from him. And he was able to go, I'm glad that there's a light out here. Because he's not a freaking victim. That's right. And so if I lost my job and you had your best year ever, you having your best year ever doesn't take from me. In fact, I could allow it to inspire me to take another step out there, right? Yeah, that's it.

That's the way it should be. And it flips, right? There's something in this entitlement stuff or in this cancel. I have to take from you in order for me to be whole. If you say anything about get up off your butt, leave the cave, kill something, and drag it home, then you're shaming poor people, which is quite the opposite. I'm teaching people how to not be poor people. You're giving them a set of skills and strategies, right?

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I've been broke, but I've never been poor. giving them a set of skills and strategies right yeah yeah i mean i've been broke but i've never been poor poor is a state of mind you know and i've never been poor i've been completely dead dog broke yeah where i mean we got a bucket sitting on the dadgum kitchen table and what water's dripping off them the light fixture i've been broke and i'll flip that around looks like i've i've and i've also sat there where the fixture over the light table was more than i made in those other years but i've been i've been poor i've had that mindset of this is the way this is always going to be right and it's taken being around

other people who have been successful and who have worked really hard and who have open businesses and fill in the blank to go i can be different i can do this different but these guys are doing these debt-free screams, they changed their family tree because they believed. That's right. They had hope. They had a picture of it. That if I change these transactions, regardless of what my old neighborhood said, regardless

of what the tapes my uncle said, the college professor said, you're never going to amount to anything. I did it anyway. And my college professor in my senior year dropped his glasses down on his nose and said, Ramsey, you've got a firm grasp on the obvious. And so I went and made millions of dollars proving him to be right.

I sell the obvious for a living. I sell common sense for a living. And I'm good at it. So there you go. I help people all the time. Celebrate people's victories, man. We need a culture that shines lights. Celebrate their victories.

Sit with them in their grief and celebrate their victories. That puts us out of the Ramsey Show and the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, we'll be back. 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. Hey, it's John Deloney, co-host of the Ramsey Show. Did you know over 18 million people listen to the Ramsey Show every week?

A lot of those people listen on one of our 600 plus radio stations across the country. To find a station near you, go to ramseysolutions.com slash show.