The Ramsey Show - App - How To Handle Anxiety Over Money (Hour 1)

Episode Date: August 4, 2022

George Kamel & Dr. John Delony discuss: When you can afford to build a new home, Focusing on education vs. paying off debt, How to manage a multi-million dollar settlement, Still worrying about money after becoming debt-free. 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

МУЗЫКАЛЬНАЯ ЗАСТАВКА From Ramsey Network, this is The Ramsey Show, where we help you get control of your money, get ahead in your career, and get on the path to living well. I'm George Campbell, your host today, joined by Dr. John Deloney, bestselling author, two PhDs, host of The Dr. John Deloney Show, and we're excited to take your call about life, money, mental health, boundaries, relationships, whatever you're thinking about ruminating in your brain, we're here for you. The number to call is 888-825-5225. Mason kicks us off in Lubbock, Texas. John Deloney's a big fan of that place.

Mason, welcome to the show. Good afternoon. Thanks for Lubbock, Texas. John Deloney is a big fan of that place. Mason, welcome to the show. Good afternoon. Thanks for taking my call, guys. Absolutely. How can we help? So I just wanted some advice. My wife and I are potentially about to start the process of building a new home. We haven't applied for the loan or anything just yet.

I wanted to make sure that we had enough cash saved up, uh, just for that process. Okay. What's your income? So our income is, uh, about one to one 10. Cool. Where do y'all work? Um, I work with a family business. We do dirt work and trucking and then she is

actually direct sales and marketing. Why do you want to build instead of buying an existing home? So we actually have a really good friend that is a home builder. He built our last, our current home. We moved into it. It will be coming up two years in March. So we get a pretty decent deal and we hit that market pretty with good timing that we built up a good amount of equity in this current home. And so this has land and we're moving to a little bit of land as well. And this home has the floor plan and everything that we actually get to choose. So you built a home, but you didn't get to choose how it was built the first time? Correct. So he's a home builder, and he was building spec homes.

Okay. And the foundation and everything was poured, and we decided to buy that one. So we didn't really get to choose the floor plan, but we got to choose a few things. Okay. What's the current one worth if you sold it today? So we recently got our first tax appraisal, and it was valued at $550,000. What'd you pay for it? $370,000.

You may not know, the Lubbock tax appraisals, I've had many of them, are nowhere reflective of the market value, up or down. Have you talked to a real estate agent to figure out what your home would actually sell for based on comps in the area? We haven't talked to an agent yet. We know one couple that just sold for about $520,000. So I know that's possibly in the range, but that's kind of where we're trying to play it a little bit safer, not expect that much, but then make a smart decision as far as when to actually start the process.

How much is this new house you're going to build? The construction budget that our builder thinks will be about $500,000. Okay. And we're going to look to stay well below that. What's the all-in cost? You gave me a construction budget. That's all-in? That would be the all-in, yes. And what would you net? Let's say you sold the home for $520,000 today. What would you net? If we sold for $520,000, we would net about $245,000. Okay. So you'd be able to put about, are you going to put all of that as a down payment? Yes. That's going to be all rolled into the new loan.

Okay. So what's your question today? You're asking if you should start? Yes. What's holding you back? We are expecting a baby in January. Oh, congrats. That's our first one. Thank you. And that's kind of just been a little doubt that I've had on my mind. Not doubt necessarily,

but I just want to make sure that we have plenty saved up for that and then the closing costs to get the new loan started. And then I just want to do it the smart way. So what's the urgency to build this new home? Because you said you were in this current one for less than two years. Yes.

So that was kind of our original plan going into it since we got such a good deal on the first one we were just going to do that build two years sell and you know avoid the capital gains and kind of just make a little income on that um as far as build up equity in the home and that's really there's really no urgency i guess um so that's why i'm fine with waiting until you know even the spring but one other thing is we do own the lot that the next one will go on um so the down payment that will be you know put towards the down payment. So it won't be a lot of cash up front. Okay.

It's, this sounds like less of a money issue. Let me, let me do this. Let me give you permission. You and your wife had a plan to, to do the two year and flip thing. And if you, if you do that every few years and when your seventh house,

whatever, it's free or whatever that thing is, y'all had that plan. And then she's like, it took you out to dinner and was like, guess what? We're having a baby. And you and you were like yay and then you remembered what building a house did to your marriage and you're like oh this sounds great what if we threw that we did that again and we added a new baby to the mix this would be a blast and so i want you to feel permission to circle back and

say hey we have a custom-built home that came to us with $150,000 plus in equity that our friend, someone we trust, built us on land in a nice community, blah, blah, all that stuff. It's okay if we sit still for a minute. It's okay. George, you're bad with the math. The math is fine. Yeah, yeah. Financially, this is a fine decision. I'm just questioning the motive behind it and the urgency.

I don't hear you want to do this. Yeah, yeah, financially, this is a fine decision. I'm just questioning the motive behind it and the urgency. I don't hear you want to do this. Usually, let me put it this way. Usually, people call me and George with this question. They're trying to do mathematical gymnastics to make this thing able to happen. You sound the opposite. You're like, I feel like you're asking us, please tell me no, please tell me no, so we can just stay put. Right. Yeah, with our last build, we actually sold our home,

and then we were kind of out of a house for about three weeks. And I think there's a little stress that's still around, and I just want to make sure that everything is smooth and maybe this is not. I have and george you may have i have not met a single person across the united states of america in the last 36 months who has built a home who has said the words it was super smooth um this date hit here all the budgets were were right on all the the material showed up on the day they were supposed to and we sold our house and moved to the next one just like we planned i haven't heard not a single person has said that. We built our town home three years ago, and it was a second full-time job.

I was staying on top of the contractors. They put the towel bar in the wrong place. The paint color's wrong. The granite's wrong. I mean, I've- Our pet's heads were falling off. It was a nightmare. And so it's not for the faint of heart.

I'm going to go ahead and wait. Let's have this baby. Let's make sure mom and baby are home safe. Then let's figure out where we're at with this new home purchase. But there's no urgency here. I'm not going to add any more stress to this when you're having your first baby. You got a lot going on. You just got into this house.

Enjoy it a little bit longer. You'll be okay. And financially, you're in great shape. So I'm not worried about that part. But hey, keep saving up. What if you could put 60, 70% down and pay off the mortgage in a year or two? That would be incredible. I'm down with that plan.

More of your calls coming up. 888-825-5225. This is The Ramsey Show. ស្រូវាប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ព welcome back to the ramsey show i'm ramsey personality george campbell host of the fine print and the entree leadership podcast joined today by John Deloney, host of the aptly named, I might say, The Dr. John Deloney Show. John, I saw you doing the show earlier today, this morning. How'd it go? I heard some laughter from the callers,

so you guys sounded like you were having a good time. There's a couple of calls that were pretty dark today. I think that meant the second one we had to laugh or the show was going to get off the rails. You do bring a beautiful levity to some really hard situations. Yeah. We get a taste of that here on the show's gonna get off the rails you do bring a beautiful um levity to some hard really hard situations yeah we get a taste of that here on the show but your show it's even darker it's pretty it can be pretty tough sometimes yeah well there's a lot always light at the end of the tunnel well thank you for going first i'm glad it's you and not me well we're here to take your

calls about money life relationships never mind i'll say it i was gonna make a George joke, and I'm not going to do that. Wow, look at that. John using his filter. James, mark that down. This is a historic day. 888-825-5225. Xavier joins us up next in Orlando. Xavier, welcome to the show.

Thank you, Ken. Thank you for taking my call. Absolutely. How can John and I help? So I'm calling today because I'm having a debate here. I'm in college. I'm going back to college after five years. I moved a quick, quick background.

I came from Puerto Rico in 2017. I was studying electrical engineering down there, but I stopped it when I moved. And now I'm trying to get back because I only have 44 credits to go to finish my electrical engineering degree. And I'm just having a hard time in between paying down debt or catching flow my college. What kind of debt do you have? I have $91,000 of debt. I have some student loans, $63,000 from where I was back in Puerto Rico. I have $13,000 in personal loans. I have $11,900 in credit card debt. I have a current balance in college of $1,700 and some other $390 in an old light bill that I have. Wow. Do you have a car payment? Yes. Nope. I don't have, I have two paid for cars.

Two? And that's all my debt. Yes, sir. What do you need two cars for? Uh, well, I have my, my own personal car to, uh, to, for work and my wife has a paid for car too. Oh, okay. Your wife, that makes more sense. I just thought. Yeah. Okay, cool. What's your household income? Between both of us, we make $85K a year. I'm an electrician, and she works for an insurance, health insurance company. Okay, cool. Well, as far as your question, you're wondering when, you know, should I focus on paying off the debt? I want you to cash flow college.

I don't want you to go a penny more into debt. And so whatever it takes to do that, that's the plan. If that means pausing on going back to college to finish this electrical engineering degree, I'm okay with that. Because that's going to be real stressful trying to cash flow while trying to keep up with all of these payments on this side. Okay. So you already are working in your field. You're as an electrician, but you're wanting to step step up to be an engineer. Exactly.

I work every day hand-to-hand with engineers and all that. So I say to myself, you know, I'm so close. I'm a year and a half from having my degree. I should just give a shot to this, you know, sacrifice whatever I need to sacrifice and just go for it. What's it going to cost to finish the degree at the most affordable school possible? Yeah, and the current one that I have is the cheapest one because it's the same one that I have from Puerto Rico. So it's going to get me between $18,000. To finish for that year and a half? Yes, sir. So we got $91,000 in debt and we have to cash flow another $18,000. Yes, sir. So we got $91,000 in debt and we have to cash flow another $18,000. Yes, sir.

Can you do that? Well, I'm going to give it a shot. I'm getting some more overtime. I'm getting some side works. I'm willing to do whatever, door dash, whatever it takes. So, Xavier, I'm going to say this in a meaner way than George is because he's a kinder human just in general than me. You are broke broke I know you and your wife both have jobs but you're in a precarious situation for you and your family I absolutely think it's a wise idea you're so close and electrical engineers is an it's a remarkable credential and I love the fact that you've been on the line for so long.

You're going to make a great electrical engineer. Okay. Thank you. And so I love that idea. But where my sympathy is zero is I got a second PhD with two young kids and I was working a full-time job and I was doing adjuncting on the side. And I almost lost my marriage and so I don't recommend it for long term. And I was pretty exhausted most of the time. But hey hey you figure it out and that's where you are so for the

next 24 months if you do this you have to you and your wife your wife needs to do door dash too and also mow lawns in the morning in the dark with a headlamp or I don't know whatever y'all need to do but I need to figure this out right so it's both and I think yeah I think you could be making more as an electrician and I know that because I just paid one, and I swear he looked like he was 16, and he still charged me 500 bucks. So what are you making on your own as an electrician? 28 at the moment. 20? 28 an hour. 28 an hour. Okay, I was like, that feels wildly low. But even 28 an hour as an electrician, I think you could be doing better. Is that with a company? Yeah. Yeah, I just moved to Orlando. I was working in Boca Raton, but we moved here because I have to be on campus for college. So I just moved here like two months ago, and I went

from making $23,000, they bumped me up to $28,000. And I know there's people paying more, so I'm going to look at that too. I would be, I mean, in in your neighborhood there's probably a Facebook group and if you offer up your services just in your neighborhood alone you could be making extra thousands of dollars on the weekends doing little jobs for people. But it's just you understanding and you sound like somebody

that has no fear of hard work. It's just you and your wife sitting down. Y'all take one last one last go on one last date and just say for the next 24 months, we're going to hit the gas so that we can clear this thing up forever. Yeah. I think we got to clear this debt first before we cashflow college. And I want you to get that engineering credential and make more money. And you can do that. But right now we got to clean up this mess. Thank you so much for the call. Julio joins us up next in DC. Julio, welcome to

the show. Oh, thank you very much. I appreciate you taking my call. Sure. What's going on? So I've been listening to the Ramsey show for a little bit over a month, month and a half, and I was very hesitant about tackling my credit card debt just because, you know, I was making my payments and I had cash stockpiled. I had 20K saved in the bank and I was very hesitant to go ahead and make those payments just because, you know, you don't want to see all that cash that you worked so hard to save up. But of course, the interest is killing you, right? You're carrying the debt month to month on the card? Yes, sir.

What was the interest rate? So I had a USAA card that was at 10%, that was at 9.6, and I had a Chase card that was at 21. Yeah. Yeah. But I would have loaned you money at 21%, Julio. Dang, dude. I know, but it made you feel so safe, didn't it?

It just felt safe. 100%, Julio. Dang, dude. I know, but it made you feel so safe, didn't it? So the one card, the USAA card had $5,500 on it, and the Chase card had $3,000 on it. So the interest alone on the Chase card was like $58 a month. So I appreciate the advice. I was very headstrong about it. I was very hesitant about it, but I decided to take the cash that I had saved. And I made two payments today for the full balances for both cars. Let's go, Julio. So it's completely paid off? Completely paid off.

Both cars are ones at zero. And I guess the other payment's pending. But yeah, I made the transfers to my bank. And just, yeah, i paid both cars off today and and i just wanted to say thank you for for giving me that you know that road that path okay hold on it's your this is still fresh on you as this sunk yeah you are free my man yes yes i am you are free julio yes i am I'm debt free now. So, I mean, I have student loans out that I'm going to tackle, which aren't that much. I think it's like $3,000 in student debt that I can actually pay off with the remainder.

I have $10,000 remaining or $11,000 remaining from the original amount. So, you know, I think that's the next thing I can tackle. So that'll be gone in a month or two, right? Yes, sir. And then instead of making payments to everybody else to make them rich and buy them nice houses and them nice buildings, you can replenish that account and then some, right? Roger that.

Dude, congratulations, my brother. Dude, that's awesome, Julio. Congratulations, man. Thank you for the call. I love that, John. Because for every Julio out there, there's another 20 of them going, I'm paying off the card today. There's another 200,000 of them. I'm not safe. I got money in the bank, but I owe these

lenders at 25%. I'm not winning. Let's pay this thing off. Let's run our own race. And Julio, you're a great example of that. Appreciate the call, brother. Congratulations on this journey. You're doing it. Baby step two, the debt snowball. It works every time you work it. This is The Ramsey Show. How many times have you found yourself saying, one day, when thinking about a goal that you have, one day I'll be able to buy a house. One day, I'll be happy with my career. Or one day, I won't have to battle with anxiety anymore.

Stop waiting around. Whatever your one day is, you've got to start now. That's why we created Smart Conference. Smart Conference is the one-day event where we tackle all areas of your life. And guys, let's face it, we all could use that kind of boost right now. You're going to hear from the nation's top thought leaders on money, career, mental health, relationships, marriage, and leadership. And the event is hitting the road. We'll be going to Dallas, Texas on Saturday, October 22nd. But you got to hurry because these event passes are selling out fast. Platinum passes already sold out, but you can still get your general access

passes for just $39 for an all-day event. Best-selling authors and world-class speakers include Rachel Cruz, Dr. John Deloney, Ken Coleman, myself, Christina Ellis, Dave Ramsey. We're going to be there in full force, not to mention our friends and leadership experts from Life.Church, Craig and Amy Grishel, and a lot of surprises planned too, some great entertainment, some great music. You don't want to miss it. Go to ramseysolutions.com slash events and get your passes today. It is worth a drive. It is worth a flight.

People come from all over to see this event, and it's been a while since we've done it. So don't miss it, ramseysolutions.com slash events. Brandon joins us up next in Bowling Green, Kentucky. Brandon, welcome to the show. Let's go. Oh, there he is. Brandon, welcome to the show. Let's go to, oh, there he is. Brandon, you with us, buddy? Yes, I'm right here. Hey, how you doing? How can we help? Brandon, I'm sorry. George isn't great with the technology. I'm getting there. He is a millennial. John just got an iPhone like a week ago for the first time. That is true. He was on a Blackberry.

What's going on? I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to cut you off. So a little over a year and a half ago, I was a passenger in an injury crash, and a piece of safety equipment malfunctioned severely. I broke my neck. I was on fire, a bunch of other things. So sorry. So the reason I'm calling today is I just received my first settlement offer. We haven't, didn't accept that yet, but pretty soon I'll probably be accepting a fairly large amount of money, a multimillion dollar settlement. And I don't know what to do day one. I'm terrified that I, you know, I don't want to mess this up. I'm kind of just lost in trying to find out what I need to do

and where to begin. What have been the long-term ramifications of the accident? Are you able to work? Are you paralyzed? Are you able to get around? What's your state now? Still using a walker. Doctors, if I'm disabled, hopefully I can get beyond that.

But at this point, I'm not working. Okay. Is the settlement contingent on you not working? No, it's not. Okay. How much money are we talking currently is the first offer? It's right around $5 million. Okay, wow.

Well, I'm so sorry to hear about the accident. How long ago was it? A year and a half. Okay. And there's a lot of recurring medical issues you're still dealing with? Absolutely. Absolutely. It's been pretty devastating. Well, I'm so sorry about that piece. On the $5 million side, I'm glad you're taking your time with this and you want to do it with a lot of wisdom. And that's the right way to go about this is to move as slowly as possible don't touch this money until you really need it obviously this is going to be your income for the foreseeable future and the good news is there's plenty of it if you use it wisely it can absolutely last you the rest of your life right do you uh do you have you how you've

taken care of your rent and your bills and things like that over the last few years? Uh, I had to move in with family. We actually lost our home after this. Uh, the bills are too high and, and, uh,

my wife was taking care of me full time for quite a while. Yeah. So, uh, living with family and, you know, that, that's obviously something we don't want to do long term.

Yeah. Um, so is she a full-time caretaker or is she working outside the home she she just uh is getting ready to go back to work i'm finally getting to a place where i can kind of take care of myself you got kids two kids uh teenagers well 12 and 15 uh girls okay you guys have any debt? No. Okay. That's good. You have any money in savings? Not at this point, no.

Okay. So I would break this up into two different parts here. Number one is what do we need right now? And I would rather you and your wife have that conversation not with $5 or $10 or $15 million in your checking account. Because if you have that conversation, not with five or 10 or $15 million in your checking account. Because if you have that conversation, the van is going to be way newer and the house is going to be way bigger. Right.

We're like, Hey, we got, it's got, what's that? Uh, one of those shows, those HGTV shows.

And we're like trying to decide which house to buy and their budget. It's like Tom and Sue are both 22 and their budget is $9 million. That's what that's going to feel like. Right. So let's write down, here's like Tom and Sue are both 22 and their budget is $9 million. That's what it's going to feel like, right? So let's write down, here's what we need. We've got a home. We're going to go ahead and do the college funds. We're going to get an emergency fund. Like what's the thing here?

And then we're going to sit down directly with a smart investor pro, whether we're going to create a trust of some sort or we're going to create some sort of income structure so that this replaces your income until you find long-term work. Does that make sense? Sure. Yes. And George gave the magic word here, slow.

Slow. Because you know as well as I do the data on lottery winners, and you're not winning a lottery or anything, but it's really easy to find money just to, people will come out of the woods and they hear you got $10 million and blah, blah. That money can go away so fast. So you and your wife making up a set of boundaries and rules. We are not going to give this away right out of the gate. We're not going to do this right out of the gate. We're going to send this to, sit down with our smart investor pro and get a good

retirement. I mean, get a good fund set up for this thing. That's what we're going to do with it, but we're going to be very intentional and very slow. So the only homework for you, Brandon, right now is to start assembling your team because that's what you need right now. You need like a board of trustees in a situation like this. So I want you to find, and you can find this all at ramsaysolutions.com, click on Trusted Pros, but you need a really great tax pro. You need a great smart investor pro on the investing side, not only for your own personal investing, but for the kids and the 529s and getting them to college. You need a real estate pro who knows what they're doing, and you need an insurance pro. And you can connect with all those people at ramseysolutions.com. And along the way, of course, you can

call us back as this becomes more tactical. But I think your long-term plan is let's buy a reasonable house with cash. Let's get college fully funded for the kids. Let's get a reasonable car to get around with. And the rest, we're going to park in investments long-term and we're not going to touch it. And like John said, a trust may be the best option for you with a state of this size, but that's where a smart investor pro can help. Maybe a real estate attorney, a tax attorney, you name it. And we're also going to be about healing. There's going to just continue to be psychological, physical healing. You know that.

And as your family redesigns what life is going to look like, what normal is going to look like moving forward, we're going to continue to spend energy doing that. But good for you. We're glad you're turning the corner, man. And give us a call and we'll walk alongside you any way we can. Man, that's a tough situation, John.

Now, in situations like this where there's a deep level of trauma and there's a pile of money on this side, that can be a very stressful place to be where you're just going like, I'm trying to grieve from this thing, but I have to deal with this giant pile of money

and what this means for my life now. I mean, it changes your life in a lot of ways. Obviously it's better than having no money and having the situation happen, but it's, it's feel similar to, I lost a loved one and now there's life insurance payout that I get. The money obviously is never going to equate to what happened with this situation. but how does someone grieve that process while navigating you said it best it well the grief is one thing that's something you you walk through with counseling and therapy yeah community and your friends and your church if you've got one and a professional if you need one right so there's that what happens often in a situation like this is he has it feels tremendous guilt for being disruptive,

for having to move in with his family, for his kids having to go through X, Y, and Z. And then suddenly you got $5 million in an account. Or that's a rare example that's so far outside the bell curve. Let's say you get $100,000. The temptation to buy your kids a super nice car as a way of paying them back. Because you feel guilty. Right. Or to make sure they've got this much money in college fund,

or we're going to get them this nice of a house in this neighborhood because we finally can. It's not looking at the money like you won the lottery. It's looking at this money like this is going to keep us plugging and moving down the street, right? And these settlements are to make you whole. This is going to bring us back to where we were. And so we're going to make sure we're stable,

and then we're going to create us back to where we were. And so I'm going to make sure we're stable. And then we're going to create a very intentional, intentional budget. And then we're going to let this money just stay over here. A lot of wisdom in that. It's tough. Thanks for the call, Brandon. We're wishing the best for you healing-wise and for your financial future and for your family. This is The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. I'm George Campbell, joined today by Dr. John Deloney.

This is The Ramsey Show. The number to call is 888-825-5225. We'll talk about your life, your money, your relationships, your mental health, all of it. It happens right here on The Ramsey Show. John joins us up next in St. Louis. John, welcome to the show. Hi, guys. Thank you so much.

It's such a pleasure to speak with you guys. Absolutely. How can we help? Yeah, so Dr. John, this question Thank you so much. It's such a pleasure to speak with you guys. Absolutely. How can we help? Yes. So, yes. So, Dr. John, you know, this question is primarily for you. I just want to thank you first off. You know, I read your book. I think you're absolutely fantastic. I find myself in a little bit of a situation here. I'm trying to find financial peace even after following the baby steps. So really quickly, I'm 32 years old, all debts paid off, including my home. However, I recently decided transmission go out in my car and that same kind of panic and that same fear that I had came right back. And the fact that I had to take that on my fully funded emergency fund. So I was just kind of looking to kind of see what your guys' guidance would be on how to kind of help tackle that kind of that fear and that anxiety, even after following baby steps. That's a great question, man. Tell me about how money worked when you were a kid.

There was no discussion on money. I lived in a very, very, very poor household. There was no doubt about it. And so there was no discussion of money. I started off out of college, very, very rough student loans, you name it. I was just guided in the wrong direction. And I got out of that. Cool. And then are you married? I am married. I have two kids. You got two kids. Okay. What was your wife's situation like? Pretty much the same. Well, she has a loving family, absolutely fantastic. She only had a little bit of college debt and just a little bit of credit card debt, but that's been paying off.

So she has a completely different upbringing than mine was. So I'm going to oversimplify this because we're just having a few minutes on the radio. Is that cool? Yeah, that's fine. All right. So let's take your situation. And you grew up in a house where we don't talk about money. It's a dark cloud over the house.

There's never enough of it. And there's a lot of stress that even as a young kid, you know, we don't have fill in the blank. Right? Right. Your body put a GPS pin in that. Right? It put a pin in it and said, this is not safe. And so you discovered this when it,

let's say, let's say you're 25. Um, you discover the baby steps. Suddenly you get a path out of this, of this. I'm not safe. I'm not safe. I'm not safe. I'm not safe. I don't have any control in my life. And you get a path out out your brain still understands that a money issue is not only a money issue it's a relationship issue it's catastrophic and it is just scanning its environment 24 7 365 looking for the next thing that might get you and it remembers that money stuff gets you and so now you are free and you ever been on a boat all day on a boat? Nope, never been on a boat. Okay. If you're on a boat and you're going fishing or skiing,

what you don't realize is the water is kind of rocking all day. And when you get off that boat, you stand on the shore, and it feels weird for a little bit because your body has to get used to the world's not moving underneath you anymore and so the word i want to give you is practice you are safe and you know the math problem the your frontal lobe right the front part of your brain knows that you're safe the part that doesn't is the part that's been trying to keep you safe and keep you alive since you're a little kid and what we're going to do is we're going to practice.

Every time that alarm system sounds, oh no, it's all coming down, you can stop and take a big deep breath and hold it for a second and exhale and say, we got emergency fund, we're good. And we're just going to practice it. And we're going to practice it. We're going to practice it. Here's what you have. You have an identity that says I'm poor. I have an identity that says I'm not safe. And what you have to do

is lean into and learn a new identity. And we say all the time, like, or if you just scroll Instagram, it'll tell you, just decide, man, you can just decide, but you got to practice it, right? Like I'm going to be a great basketball player. It doesn't mean I'm gonna wake up tomorrow and be a great basketball player. I'm going to be a great basketball player. It doesn't mean I'm going to wake up tomorrow and be a great basketball player. I'm going to lose 100 pounds. Cool, it's going to take you nine months, right? So you are going to have to practice leaning into this new identity, and it's going to be consciously aware of those thoughts when they take off on you. Write them down if you want to up the ante.

If you want to super up the ante, commit to your wife. Hey, when both, because she's going to feel the same things. When either one of us has a money thing set off our alarm system, let's commit to telling the other person. Because the other person can then hold our hands and say, good thing we have an emergency fund. Good thing we're safe. Good thing now we are just paying ourselves for whatever we want

because we have no payments. See what I'm saying? Right. Right. Absolutely. I want you to hear me very clearly. You're not broken. You're not dysfunctional. You're not malfunctioning. Okay. Your brain is just trying to keep you safe. And what it needs to learn is I am safe now. Is that cool? Yes, sir.

Hey, you have changed an entire legacy. You know that, right? Right. You're going to watch your kids as they have a different experience in their home, a different one than you, and it will heal you over time in a pretty profound and beautiful way. So congratulations for changing everything. Now you've got to walk on the ground understanding that it's not shaking underneath you anymore. Way to go, man. Beautifully said, John. Yeah, those kids, when dad's going, hey, kids, here's how money works. We just had this thing happen with the car

and we had the money to pay for it. We don't have to stress and wonder where that money's going to come from. The kids then learn, oh, that's okay to talk about money. And the way to avoid having stress with money is having it in the bank and not having to rely on other people's money. So the lessons that can be learned from this are awesome. And I would encourage John, he sounds like he's a saver because he's very worried that it's not going to be enough. So I'd encourage him to spend it on purpose. Like you said, practice, practice spending money. Even though it's leaving your bank account, you have plenty of it and practice giving because it'll give you joy with money instead of money's the thing I have

to hold on to because what if, what if, what if? Instead, you're practicing all three, give, save, spend. That's what we talk about on the show and it's a healthy practice. George, I see people a lot, whether it's leadership, whether it's parenting. I talked to somebody on my show earlier today that was saying, hey, I think I lost my mother, Jean, now because my youngster is three and she wants to sleep with me, but I need a night's sleep. We constantly think that if we run up against something we don't understand, that we're somehow got character issues. We're a failure. We're a loser.

We suck. It's often I just don't have that skill set. I just don't know to do that. I've never been in a position to do this. And so if you've never taken a free throw with 15,000 people cheering you on, you don't know what that pressure is like. You know what I mean? So be really gracious with yourself.

I have never been in a situation where I have a transmission flat on my car and it's annoying, not catastrophic, not I might get hit by a dad who's had too many drinks, not by fill in the blank, right? So let's give ourselves some grace and start practicing living into these new identities, man. It's going to be great. Yeah. I was just meeting with our research team yesterday and they were unpacking some of the

data from our latest personal finance study. And it was fascinating to see the direct quotes of how people are feeling around money. And it was an interesting connection. So it was about 48% said, I can't get ahead with my finances. That's how they were feeling. 45% said, I feel ashamed of the way I handled money in the past. And another chunk, about a third, said, I wish I was taught how to handle money well. And there's an interesting connection there. I feel like I'll never get ahead because I feel shameful about how I've spent in the past because I wasn't taught how to handle money. Just never told me how to, yeah.

And so you just need to relearn and practice. It doesn't have to stay this way yeah but it starts with a decision going i'm not going to be like my parents sometimes it's the anti-mentor right i don't want to be how my parents were stressed out the first time i i said yeah i'll uh i'll change my son's diaper i did not know how diapers worked that's me being vulnerable america i didn't know how they worked And I tried to put one on and I think... On yourself? Nope, on my son.

Okay, thank you for that clarification. It was not, I did not do a good job. It would not have been an effective use of that diaper. And now you're an expert. I'm pretty good at it, but my wife came in and said, oh, that's not going to work. And so I had to practice. I had to learn how to do it, right?

It wasn't because I'm the worst ever and I'm a loser. No, I just got to practice, man. And so many of those things, we just got to practice. We just got to get ahead. I got to change that mindset. I'm somebody who's going to win with money. I'm somebody who's going to get ahead with money. So I got to practice those things that are going to make that happen.

Yeah, and James Clear talks about this in Atomic Habits of, you know, values, identity-based goals where you go, I'm the kind of person who blank. That's right. And it changes the way you look at money when you do that. Yeah. Like one of the first callers, I am a kind of person who never borrows money,

so I'm not going to go into debt for school or whatever the thing is. Yeah, that's huge. Good hour, John. Appreciate all the folks in the booth keeping the show afloat. And you, America, thank you so much for listening. We'll be back with you before you know it.

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