The Ramsey Show - App - How Much Money Should Be in Our Emergency Fund? (Hour 2)

Episode Date: August 11, 2021

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Thank you very much. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, 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. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. You jump in, we'll talk about your life and your money.

And his show, the Dr. John Deloney Show, is where we talk about, he talks about relationships. He talks about mental health, anxiety, depression, all kinds of wild stuff, and it's with regular, real people. They're not all crazy, and it's downright informative, entertaining, and a lot of times folks dealing with trauma, all kinds of things. So Monday, Wednesday, and Friday you can find it on YouTube or anywhere great podcasts are listened to. So wherever you tune in for podcasts, you can catch him there and be sure you do.

Meantime, he's right here. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Jenna is with us in St. Paul. Hi, Jenna, how are you? I'm good. How are you? Better than I deserve. How can I help?

Well, about five years ago, I took financial peace and was following the baby steps and made it through the first three baby steps and really enjoyed it. And just purchased about a year and a half ago my first home. Good for you. And yeah, it's half paid off. So it was really exciting. Wow. But yeah, it was really, really fun. But now I'm really nervous about retirement,

and I haven't thought about baby step number four. That whole investing piece makes me really nervous about, should I pay off the house first? Should I start investing? I'd rather pay off the house. So let me get this straight. You learned a financial process called the baby steps and you've used them very very successfully to get where you are and you've done very well by the way and now

you're wondering if they really work no i have come with my dad man you walked right into that one. Come on, Jenna. Wait a minute. What happens after baby step three, Jenna? Baby step four. Baby step four is put 15% of your household income into retirement. If the first three baby steps work, kiddo, the last three are going to work, and they're going to lead you right to wealth. Yeah, I think the thing that's really intimidating about baby step number four is just feeling like i don't understand the process good as much as when i had a number i was like oh i'm saving for

a down payment i feel like i'm making progress good you know but you've never bought a house before right no was closing that house not a little bit intimidating and scary it was scared me to death yeah first time i closed on one, it scared the P out of me. So I understand, okay? I get it. But that was a brand new thing, and you went and learned how to do that because it was worth learning how to do. And so the same thing is true with investing.

When you get off, you click SmartVestor at Ramsey Solutions. You sit down with one. You remember they have the heart of a teacher. Why do they need the heart of a teacher. Why do they need the heart of a teacher? Because Jenna needs to learn. Because when she learns, she's not scared anymore. Sure.

Does that make sense? It makes sense. First time you drove a car, you sucked at it. Me too. I threw gravel all over the garage door. Because I didn't know you didn't just step all the way down on the accelerator. I thought you just hit it, you know. And so you learn. Everything you do is a learning process.

And now I drive a car and don't think about it. And most people don't think at all. And it shows in the way they drive their car. But, I mean, again, investing will be the same thing. You're going to learn about it. The good news is it's not rocket science. You don't have to be a brain surgeon to do it. You just have to go sit down with somebody and begin to learn a little bit.

Oh, by the way, get the Financial Peace University materials back out, or I'll plug you back in, and you can go to Ramsey Plus and get back in it and go through the investing lesson again and kind of go back over it. Because when you went through the first time, you were just worried about debt. You really weren't concentrating on the investing stuff that we teach. And now you'll probably hear it at a different level, you think? Yeah, yeah. I think it was definitely something that I didn't think about the investing piece.

The thing that made me apprehensive was my dad. It's really good with finances. And we had a question the other day. He had really encouraged me, like, maybe you do want to pay off your house first. And that made me, like, question. So I said, I was thinking about calling Dave. Listen, if you want to follow your dad's plan, it's okay. But you called me.

Nope. That's what we decided to do. So thank you so much. So I'm going to give you my plan, not your dad's plan. Again. And so hold on, and Kelly will pick up, and we'll make sure we get you plugged in. And so I want you to go watch the mutual fund and investing lesson again in Financial Peace University. Kelly will get you set up to do that on Ramsey Plus.

And then I want you to sit down with Smart Investor Pro, and I want you to take your time. There's no rush, but let's get to going 15% of your income into retirement and good growth stock mutual funds like we teach. And then it doesn't sound like you're married or got kids, so you don't need to worry about baby step five for kids college. And then anything else above 15% you can find in your budget, we'll go and get your house paid off too because we do want to do that. We just don't want to avoid something because it scares us because there's two things that scare us,

things that should scare us and things we just don't understand yet yeah right yeah absolutely false evidence appearing real yeah i i i resonate with that call less for the the information i've got a great smart investor pro more because i've convinced myself that i can't breathe underneath owing anybody anything at any time and so there's that balance of could i could i race and do and pay the house off versus do it the right way and slow down and be investing along the way too and it's less uh an information and more of a psychological issue for me well and here's the thing it's easy to understand if you know nothing about investing yeah it's scary as

crud yeah the first time you actually open a mutual fund account and put money in there. Because it's in this faraway land known as New York, right? On Wall Street, whatever that is. And everyone on the news is yelling about it. Yeah, and they're all throwing stuff down there. It's crazy. And at each other and yelling and all this. And what is this thing?

And how's all that work? And paying off debt, I understand it. I give money, and there's less debt. This is a fairly simple transaction, about as primitive as it gets. So, again, Jenna, your concern, your feeling is not invalid. It's not invalid at all. But the point is the people that win push past that and get their head around new information,

which gives them a new reality for their future and it changes the direction of your life that's what you know be not conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind get new information yeah yeah you know i i don't want to be the i don't want to be married that way. I want to be married that way. And so I need to learn what those people over there that seem to have their act together are doing. I mean, I see these people, their children are completely out of control. The inmates are running the asylum.

And then I see these people whose children are like, they're functional and stuff, and they're not running up the side of the wall and stuff and running through throwing stuff at the glass or whatever, all this kind of thing. And you go, okay, I want those. I don't want those. How did you do that? That's new information. And you gather that information and you change your life.

That's what transformation does. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, I'm Christi Wright. Do you struggle to find time to connect with God? Well, I have great news for you. Glorify is an app that makes it easy for you to have a quiet time practice that works for you. In fact, it's the number one daily worship and well-being app trusted by over 1 million Christians. And the

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finding and doing work you love. My team has packaged our new book and career assessment into the ultimate career bundle. All of this, book, assessment, everything, if you buy the bundle, is only $30. Now, if you buy the assessment, it's $30. So it doesn't make sense. Don't do that. Don't do that. The bundle will show you how to find your talents, your passions, your mission, find a job that combines all three so that you can actually do the work you love.

This assessment will even give you a list of professional career options based on your results. And it's not like the old days. This is highly dialed in stuff. Plus, you can pick between the Get Hired Bonus Pack and the Get Promoted Bonus Pack and receive for free $100 worth of other goodies. So you want to check all this out. You don't have to buy the lie that work is unfulfilling. Get the Ultimate Career Bundle. Go to the online store at RamseySolutions.com

and get the new bundle for only $30. When you do, again, you're going to get over $100 worth of goodies. Jennifer is in Houston. Hi, Jennifer. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi. Thank you so much for having me. My pleasure.

I have a quick question. We are on baby step four, six, and seven. We completed baby step three. Then my husband and I have a difference of what that looks like. So would we say three to six months worth closer to three or six? And does that, if we like, say if I lose my job today, right, I'm not going to go get my nails and hair done so like down to the bare minimum or what actual six month spending looks like

uh probably between these two at your stage uh and you can pick the three or the six month that's not the issue but then is it absolute bare bones or does it mean no uh uh no no no hair no nails all that kind of stuff so um uh uh what's your household income about 160 yeah and um how old are your two cars uh how old i just bought a car for cash of 2014 lexus and he has a uh 14 exhibition okay you got two good cars you're not you're not dying on cars so here's the thing that i discovered and the reason i'm asking these things when you're broke and you're just getting started you remember those years back in the day? Everything's a freaking emergency because you're broke.

Right. And you're driving junk cars, and you haven't done all the maintenance on the house, so even more stuff's breaking. And so it's like the fact that you're broke is inviting more strain on the emergency fund. And later on, when you've got more money and the air conditioner's getting serviced regularly on the emergency fund later on when you've got more money and the air conditioner is getting serviced regularly on the house and as soon as there's one little thing on the roof you

fix it immediately it doesn't leak and create a bigger mess and it's and you're driving decent cars so they're not breaking down and you don't wait until there's a flat tire you happen to notice when they're going getting a little bare and you go change them out early where when you're broke you have to drive them until they blow you know and so what happens is you get more margin in all these areas of your life so the weird thing is is the more money you get the less need of an emergency fund you have because there's fewer emergencies is that logical yeah absolutely and we have a two 15 year olds-olds and a four-year-old. And then the only other factor would be that I'm wondering if we should pile it up a little more. I hate my job. I've been looking at Ken Coleman's stuff.

And my performance has not been where it should be just because I'm just making myself get up and go to work every day. Should we add a little more to it for that? No, that's not an emergency. Okay. That's a transition. If you want to set some money to the side for job transition, you can do that. Feel free. Okay.

Feel free. Set you $10,000 or $15,000, $20,000 over there for job transition, but let's not confuse that with the emergency fund. The emergency fund's for emergencies. This is not an emergency. This is a problem we need to fix. Right. Christmas is not an emergency.

It's always in december it's predictable it's predictable that two years from today you're not going to be working at that place god i hope not and jennifer listen can i can i you didn't even ask this can i push on you for a second please do please don't sacrifice your dignity and your respectability and your work ethic and say things like my job performance is slipping just because i don't feel like going anymore if you're still employed there and still taking their money show up and give a thousand percent and then when you're looking for jobs give a thousand percent on your job transition but you will it will keep you from

walking six inches lower right with your head held you will walk with your head held high your chin held up you will clean out your desk when you get that new job with a smile on your face yeah don't you're not a person that mails it in no that's not who you are yeah so but yeah go ahead and make the transition and set some money aside for that and if you want to um what's happening is is that transition is scaring you and that's what's making you want to put the emergency fund on up and so put 25 000 over there right quick in the next few months to make this transition that's not that's a transition fund it's not an emergency fund and then you then you won't be worried about your emergency fund anymore

because your emergency fund is probably just fine. I love that idea, Dave. A transition, a new baby coming, you need to get a new car. None of those are emergencies. Those are just we need to have a sinking fund that we create and save up for that. Yeah. You know what the problem is? And it's not her situation, but it's just all of us in America.

We were just taught to have a savings account. That's it. That's exactly right. And you know what a savings account is? It's a put-and-take account. You put money in there, you take it out. Put money in there, you take it out and buy a bass boat. Put money in there, fix air conditioner.

Put money in there, put stitches in the kid's head. Put money in there, it's a put-and-take take put and take and so it's all this stuff is combined in this one general account that that you always watch it and it just never seems to do what it's supposed to do because no one knows what it's really supposed to do it's never enough or look at all that money i got right yeah and when you separate out your savings and you say every savings dollar has to have a job a mission an assignment okay this is this one's job is transition this one's job is christmas this one's job is car replacement and this one's job is emergencies and don't confuse them i love buying a bass boat is not an emergency there is no situation ever on planet earth in which you can describe a

bass boat purchase as an emergency it's not on the list i i can emotionally get there but intellectually we're all laughing right now right and so you know that that's i was forced to buy a new car no you aren't they didn't have a gun you chose to buy a new car and so these are the things but that's the reason is it and it helped me a ton uh because my nature is not a say i'm not naturally a saver it helped me a ton to say these things have a goal because i am goal oriented and once i have something with a goal then ding ding ding ding i can do it i love i'm writing that down every savings dollar has a job too different than your light bill or your food or what every every dollar you are dollar has a job, too, different than your light bill or your food or what.

Every dollar you are saving has a job as well. It's a little bit of the frustration of when you're investing just in general. And what do we do? We call it we're saving for retirement. Yeah. What does that even mean? What does retirement even mean? And, you know, we started saying a few years ago around here, you know, retirement's not a number.

It's not a number. It's not a destination. It's not a thing. So all we're really saying is we want to build some wealth. But when you don't even have that, it's just very vague. It's like, I just want a big pile of money. It's not motivating. Nope.

But if you say, you know, I want to build a hospital for children, and that's going to cost $40 million. I need $40 million. Now you've got something you're aiming at, right? Now we can go get it. Yeah, then you can go get it. You've got a reason for doing this. It changes everything.

Very cool stuff. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, my co-host today. This is The Ramsey Show. Picture your life one year from today with no debt payments. If you're living paycheck to paycheck, worried about money and chipping away at debt, I know how hard it is. Right now, debt is stealing from you. But when it's gone, you free up your money for what

matters to you. You get the security and options you've always wanted, and you get there faster than you think with Financial Peace University. It's our step-by-step plan that teaches you how to save and spend wisely and pay off all your debt. And how do you put this plan into practice?

With EveryDollar, our premium budgeting tool. Look, with focus, hard work, and the right plan and tools, you can and will be completely debt-free. Get access to everything you need only with a Ramsey Plus membership. To start your free trial of Ramsey Plus, text TRIAL to 33-789. Text TRIAL to 33-789. dr john deloney ramsey personality is my co-host today in the lobby of ramsey solutions on the dead free stage jared and and Katie are with us. Hey, guys.

How are you? Hi. Hello. Welcome, welcome. Good to have you guys. So here to do a debt-free scream, how much did you pay off? We paid off $110,000 in nine months. Good for you.

Nine months? Yeah. And your range of income during that time? $200,000 to $250,000. What do you guys do for a living? I'm a digital marketing analyst. And I am in marketing and sales for a large media company. Awesome.

Very cool. Good for you guys. Great careers, obviously. Great income. What kind of debt was the $110,000? Mostly credit card debt. So a small portion was car payment, but it wasn't very much. It was about $6,000 for the car.

That's a lot of credit card debt. How long have you guys been married? 19 years. 19 years? 19 years. You get married when you were four? Yes, I was two. Wow.

Yeah, I was about to say three or four years. Y'all look so young. Wow. 19 years. Yes. Okay, so is Wow. 19 years. Yes. Okay, so is this like 19 years of slightly overspending every year, and you looked up and it was 90 or 100 grand? Or was it like you had two or three little events and you just went nuts?

I'd say we never really had a budget. We didn't really know how to do it and didn't really think about it. And then we had a house, and flooded and we had moved to tennessee and we were going to rent it out it was in virginia and we just um that was a big portion of it paying a paying two mortgages essentially so okay um that escalated it to the hundred thousand range okay so half of it was just steady stupidity and then half of it was big problems right exactly which is always how it goes right so a year or so ago right covid time something the phone rang and there was a wake-up call you had an oh crap moment or something what happened tell me about it

yeah we were um finally able to sell the other house So it was hit by a storm and it took them four years to rebuild it. And we finally sold it and got it off the market. But we didn't make any money off of it. Yeah, we didn't make any money off of it. And we looked at where we were and we're like, well, this is horrible. We can't continue to do this. We make too much money to be this broke. Yeah.

And we were just juggling our debt. Well, I was just juggling our debt well i was just juggling our debt and then i was keeping some of it from her so she wouldn't realize how how bad we were so what oh how is that conversation that's hard i didn't know as much as i should have and i just was assuming it was going to get better and you know we'll figure out college for the kids and you and when we had that conversation it took a little bit of counseling, a little bit of talking and we talked about the

book and we decided to gung-ho, go all in. Yeah, I knew we had to do something. I reached out to my friend Carolyn who works here and just said, hey, I really have some debt that I need to take care of.

I know you work with Dave. Is all that stuff real or not? Yeah. Does that work? And the next day, literally the next day, I had your book in my mailbox. She was almost like she hand-delivered it to me. And I read it

and then Katie read it and said, if we're going to do this, we're going to do this, and it's been the best thing. So the total money makeover baby steps just go all in. All in. All in. It's all or nothing. We got the kids on board.

They were super psyched. How old are your kids? We have twins that are 14, and one is 12. Ah, okay. So, Jared, most of the time when I hear she didn't know about all of the debt, there's a percentage of the time it's you're just being deceitful and you're doing all this crap on the side you didn't want to know about. But most of the time that's not what it is. Most of the time it's like this is my job and I feel ashamed that I have failed

and let this get this bad and I don't want to admit it out loud. Yeah. Is that kind of what it was? It was holding back? Because it wasn't like you were setting out to deceive her. No, it was my responsibility to take care of her. I mean, I felt that. Obviously, that's not true, but I felt.

That's the tapes that play. Yeah. Yeah. It's my responsibility. I'm head of household. I'm going to fix this eventually. Let me just keep it in the air until I can deal with it. It was rough.

That was hard on our marriage, too. What was the moment you said, we need to talk? It was after that. When the house sold. Yeah, when the house sold. That was kind of the kicker. It was like, okay, what does this do for us? We're still in the same spot.

We want to buy a house. We've been renting here for six years and we love franklin tennessee it's amazing wanted to buy a house and um it was now like well how are we going to do that i still have and i didn't even know we had a hundred thousand dollars you know it it was so unattainable to be debt-free that i just didn't even care at that point. Why even look at it? I'm just juggling. So, Katie, not to put you guys on the spot, but this is a great story of redemption, really. And it's good for other people to hear.

Yeah. Because what you guys have gone through is like almost everybody goes through this exact same thing. So he comes in and says uh i gotta talk this is he's kind of like laying down his pride and saying this is screwed up it's on me but it's worse than you ever dreamed what did you hear when he said that yeah it was very hard to hear that that was the reality um and i actually did feel like i had some responsibility too it's my job to also know it is i'm saying i mean but was it like fear that you heard yes or was it there was a mad at him for for not telling the truth or what yes

she's too nice to admit it. She was angry. There was a lot of anger. And it took me a while to understand why. You know, it's like, well, this is, you know, it's my job. But part of it's angry because you're in the whole situation. Right. And part of it is because he didn't tell you. Yeah, of course.

We're never going to get through it. We're never going to get out of it. Why did I not know? Why didn't you tell me? And we've somewhat dealt with this earlier in our marriage and it was just a big pile of it and we you know we wanted to finally like get to a good point well the reason i bring it up is you're a great example of a healthy way of handling this because most people don't handle it healthy that's right it explodes right and then there's shrapnel everywhere and especially on those three beautiful little kids, right?

Yeah. Yeah, and we couldn't let that happen. And that was the beautiful thing about this, is the kids got to see us actually do this, and we get to explain to them, this is why we're not doing everything we used to do, and this is why I'm saying no to this. We're going to do it right. And we're doing it together. And they smell the air change in your marriage.

Yes. The cleanliness and the connectivity. You can't keep that. That stuff's in the air. That's right. Yeah. And this is a whole other show, but you alluded to it a little bit. A conversation like, hey, we're $100,000 in credit card debt and I haven't told you.

There's other stuff y'all needed to talk about too. And the oxygen filtering your home is lighter now, right? in credit card debt and I haven't told you. There's other stuff y'all needed to talk about too and the whole, the oxygen filtering your home is lighter now, right? Everybody in your home is different now because y'all

had the courage to put on the table to forgive one another to say I'm sorry and to say let's build something new. Were you there? No.

That's exactly what it was. It's made our marriage 100% better. Well, congratulations. You changed an entire legacy of those three little boys. You've changed your legacy, and there's millions of people who are stuck just like you. Thanks for letting us drag all that out. Because it's not for you.

It's for all the 22 million people listening. Because everybody, if you can go, hey, everybody messes up, but there's hope the other side of the mess up. So congratulations. Good for you guys. What do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? Gazelle focus. Okay. Communication is the key to everything, right?

Communication is the key to marriage. For sure in this story. It's just focus and keep going. You made plenty of money, so as soon as you just decided and both of you were game on and everything's on the table, you just went after it. Oh, yeah. Most of that was going to credit card interest.

Boom. Just have a plastic surgery party and go to town. Yeah. Yeah. It was just focus. We've got a copy of the Legacy Journey for you and the Total Money Makeover. Another one. So you can give that one away to somebody because you probably know somebody like your friend Carol that works here knew somebody.

So there you go. Congratulations. I'm very proud of you. You're a very cool couple. I love you. Very neat. $110,000 paid off in nine months, making $200,000 to $250,000. It's Jared and Katie from Nashville.

Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! We're debt-free! I love it so cool yes yes

your show and this show will always be intertwined always this is the Ramsey Chef. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Brianna is with us in Cincinnati.

Hi, Brianna. How are you? Hi, I'm blessed. How are y'all? Better than I deserve. What's up? I just had a question. So I'm 23. I have two kids under five. And I want to go back to school. I've been taking some online classes towards like an associate's degree, but I'm ready to actually put it in full gear and get a degree in economics so I can better our life. It's just scary to leave my job that I have now and pursue that.

So I just wanted to ask. You're single? Yeah. Well, I'm married, but we're separated. So that's a whole nother talk, I guess. Okay. And what is the goal career-wise with an economics degree? Well, I think it's just like I want to go to law school. So I was looking at degrees that could give me other opportunities if I ended up not wanting to go to law school, but I've always wanted to. So I looked at data analysis. I worked at a law school. They'll take you. I mean, we had students with literature degrees and psychology degrees and math degrees and

analyst degree. Economics by itself doesn't sound like a degree that's going to be easy to roll out of law school with. Data analyst? Yeah, absolutely. Yes. Business? Yes. that's going to be easy to roll out of law school with data analyst yeah absolutely yes business yes um economics i i don't know a lot about that but i don't think that's as viable as an option as you think it might be okay so here what john john is a phd in higher education he's worked in universities his whole life okay uh until until just a couple years ago when he came here. And so what we're looking for is if you don't go to law school,

which degree that could have gotten you into law school also gets you into a great job if you choose not to go to law school. That's what he's talking about. And so right now, any job will get you in. I mean, any degree will get you into law school also gets you into a great job if you choose not to go to law school. That's what he's talking about. And so right now, any job will get you, I mean, any degree will get you into law school. So let's put that on the back burner and go with what Dave's about to talk about. Let's get a degree that gets you into a position to make money, because that's what you're looking at is how to better your life. Now, how in the world are you paying for all of this, including feeding these two kids while you do all of this? Yeah, so I make $10.22 an hour right now, and I'm barely at work because

I'm the only caretaker, so I'm barely even making any money, but I'm on food stamps, of course. I live in public housing, so I'm blessed to that aspect, but I really just want to get out of it. You know what I'm saying? Get out of poverty. My whole family's got the history. I just want to get out. So, yeah. Yes.

Agreed. And how are you paying for it? College financial aid is covering it. Okay, so you're going to go pell grant straight up yeah but student loans are tempting you know because of my situation so they'll guarantee that you stay in poverty is what they'll do exactly yeah they don't go away they don't leave they stick around forever until you pay them. They're a problem.

So Pell Grants will cover your tuition, correct? Yeah, they'll cover a bachelor. Law school is another story. Law school you can probably get scholarship to as a single mother living on public assistance. You're probably going to find a law school that wants you and wants to pay for it for you. That would be a doable thing. Absolutely. The goal here, what I don't want you to do is put the cart before the horse.

Your job is to, you've got a journey ahead of you. And what you really want to do now that you've made this decision to get out of poverty, you want to do it tomorrow. And that's not going to be your journey. Your journey is going to be going to school, fighting every temptation to take out a loan that you're going to have to turn on and pay back. And you're going to get through it debt free. And you're going to work and you're going to be exhausted. And you're going to have to call on friends and family. And you're going to have to meet people and you're going to have to ask for help.

And you're going to grind and grind and grind. And then you're going to end up with a bachelor's degree that is free and clear that nobody can ever take away from you that you don't have a dime on none it's yours now we're in a position to if you do this in a way that is um you know the way we're talking about it and if you select a degree that lands you in a type of career that not only prospers you, but that you enjoy. Yeah, that's my main concern, too. So what I want you to do is jump on KenColeman.com and go through a bunch of his materials. I'll tell you what, I'm going to give you the Get Clear assessment and the Ken Coleman's new book coming out, From Paycheck to Purpose.

I'm going to give you that whole bundle free. Kelly will pick up and get that all set up for you. Now, the book won't come until later because it doesn't come out until November, but we'll send you the assessment now. I want you to take the assessment tonight. Okay. And I want you to use that to help guide you into what you want to study so that you're studying something that fits your talents,

your passions, your mission, and you're looking at it and going, okay, if I was one of those, I could make $80,000 a year, and now I'm done with this poverty crap. Yeah. And that's if I don't go to law school. So let's plan this out that you're not going to law school. Okay. And then if you go to law school, it's gravy on the biscuit.

That's right. Yeah, that's true. And, Brianna, to law school, it's gravy on the biscuit. That's right. Yeah, that's true. And Brianna, you are changing a family system, so you know what you're going to need in your life? You're going to need strong, brilliant women who you can have coffee with, who will be honest with you, but who have managed businesses before, who have graduated college, who've walked the road you're about to walk because you're heading off into the woods by yourself because your family, the models, the pictures you have don't include this. And their pictures of you don't include it.

And so they're not going to they don't mean to be mean, but there's something about a family system that will drag you back down to their level every time unless you've got a real breakthrough group around you. Okay. So when you go to class, I want you to get involved. breakthrough group around you. Okay. So when you go to class, I want you to get involved. And I know it's hard. You've got two little kids. And you feel weird like you're the old woman at 23. You will provide so much wisdom and value for them and vice versa. And this will become your community.

I'm so, so proud of you. Yeah, this is amazing. Thank you. You're incredible. You're amazing. Your kids are going to be blessed to have walked this journey with you okay but find some people find some people that walk look and talk and are like you want to be in five years and hang out with them they will lift you up to there people who are not there will hold you down to where they are. Okay. You become who you hang around with.

And those kids' dad needs to put some money on the table, too. Yeah, well, that's part of this little separation here. Yeah, but good luck with that. Yeah. Should, should. That's the... Whew! That's a whole other call.

That gets my blood pressure boiling. Yeah, I noticed that. I saw that little thing happen on your forehead there, the little bump, bump, bump, bump. Yeah. So, yeah, that's. But here's the thing. You're a hero, kiddo. Hang on.

Kelly will pick up. We'll get you in there. Get clear assessment. Take that tonight. I'm going to furnish it to you free, along with all of Ken's goodies and bundle on his new book and everything. Because that's what you're exactly where you need to be. Because sometimes, folks, if no one in your family or your friend group has ever taken this journey, then you can take the journey wrong because you don't have a good guide.

Right. And the biggest mistakes in the student loan debacles that are out there in terms of how much debt they go into and studying stupid unusable degrees come from first generation college students no one in their family ever went to college before and everybody in the family wants them to go to college but nobody knows how to do it wisely that's exactly right and that that's how you end up 260 000 in debt with a degree in left-handed puppetry because all education is good horse crap right no it's not all education is valuable no it's not not all education has a market value that is worth what you pay for it. Definitely not.

Right. Some more valuable than others. But, you know, so you've got to get a bit utilitarian about this and go, what is the actual application in the marketplace? Big deal. But that first decision is big, and she's there. Amen. She's got to do it right. Amen.

Bust through, girl. Good for her. You call us any time you need some help. We're here. We're not going anywhere. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, guys. This is James, senior producer for The Ramsey Show.

Did you know over 18 million people listen to The Ramsey Show every week? And a lot of those people listen on one of our 600 plus radio stations across the country. To find a station near you, head to theramseyshow.com.