The Ramsey Show - App - I’m Debt-Free, but Can I Get Gazelle Intense To Build Wealth? (Hour 2)

Episode Date: November 18, 2021

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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. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host.

Thank you for joining us, America. We are so glad you're here. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, bestselling author of the book Redefining Anxiety. He's with me. We're going to talk about your life, your money. If you've got mental health and boundary and family issues, he's here to help with that as well. We'll weave in together and make sure we get your question answered from every possible angle the phone number 888-825-5225 that's 888-825-5225

harrison is in louisville kentucky hey harrison what's up hey hey david thank you for taking my call sure how can we help hey okay so uh i am engaged to be married. Um, my fiance and I are almost done building our house. Um, so we are completely out of debt except for the house and we have our three to six months saved up and I want to start paying on the house and just knock that out. But she really likes security and she wants to continue to save and not pay as much on the house and i was just kind of seeing like what you thought about that when are you getting married when am i getting married um as soon as the house is built that's weird why'd you pick that order um well we kind of decided to do both of them at the same time.

It's like jumping out of an airplane and then trying to find where your parachute is. So you decided to both do it at the same time? Yeah, we got engaged and then started building the house. When will it be complete approximately? January, February. Okay. Because here's the answer to your question. There's not a we until you're legally married.

Because legally there's not a we. Okay. If you die today without a will, she's got nothing except what's in her name. Whose name is this house in? It's in my name. Oh. Okay.

So she doesn't have a house if you die today without a will. There's an example of what I'm talking about. Your mom and daddy got a new house if you die without a will today. So, number one, either go get married by Thanksgiving or go get a will done by Thanksgiving. Number two, there's a we after you're married. Number three, no, you don't need more than six months of expenses set aside. You have zero debt except a house, and you're attacking the house. And by the way, a paid-for house is a greater element of security than a larger emergency fund is.

Okay. So she really wants security. Security comes from the paid-for house. And so now the thing you may want to investigate, because one of the biggest things we fight about in marriage is money. You may want to investigate what the lack of where her insecurity comes from. That's so extreme that she violates that she wants an extra pile of money beyond what any financial planning expert. I mean, the three to six months of expenses is kind of a standard in the financial planning world.

I didn't come up with that. that's been out there for 50 years and hardly anybody says oh have a year just to be safe i just never see that or hear that because you should move on with other things at some point rather than just piling up cash that's making you nothing. But I would want to know, you know, what's, you know, is there the way she grew up, that family got foreclosed on three times, or they're always having to move because her mom misbehaved with money, or what is driving this need for an extra large umbrella just in case it rains? Do you know what that answer is? No, I don't know what that answer is um do you think

that's a correct question to ask uh yeah i can definitely see why you would ask that question and i guess i should try to see if i can figure that out more um i know that it's not just like money she worries about a lot of stuff she's just like that kind of person who's worried about a lot of stuff kind of like expects the worst all the time. And so, like, if, you know, our car were to blow up or something like that, that would completely drain the fun, and then we'd have to, like, start all over again. So I think that might be her reason why she wants more than that. What do you make?

I make $40 a year. She makes $30. So $70,000 a year. She makes $30,000. So $70,000 a year. So if you had $15,000, that would be approximately three months of expenses, and that would not drain your emergency fund if your car blew up. Right, because I should just probably buy like a $2,000 or $3,000 car. Well, no, I mean you can put an engine in it for six or seven thousand dollars and you still have nine thousand left over if you had 15 yeah or buy a five or ten thousand dollar car i to me the here's a the

broader question you guys as a married couple who's about to get married is a great conversation to have as you're entering into being with this person forever is asking what are the things that make you uncomfortable what are the things that scare you out out in is asking what are the things that make you uncomfortable what are the things that scare you out in the world what are the things that bring you joy you should know those things about the person as well as they can articulate them before you marry them and that's a good discussion around this whole emergency fund thing and then the other thing you do is um what i just played on you there was a dr john deloney trick um facts are your friends you described a fear that the facts were illogical oh my car blows up it blows up my whole emergency fund not that not unless you have too small an emergency fund or you need to drive a porsche right doesn't matter

well yeah i mean but i mean if you have if you have 15 or 20 000 in your emergency fund which would be three to six months of expenses in your case you wanted six months minimum because of her insecurity so so we're really looking probably 25 or 30 000 in your emergency fund and if you have that i don't know what kind of car fire you're about to have dude but that's a pretty serious car fire so that doesn't match up you know when you say if a car blew up it would drain my no it doesn't that's the facts don't match up, you know, when you say, if a car blew up, it would drain my money. No, it doesn't. The facts don't line up. And so one of the things I've learned to do, and I didn't know I was doing it until Dr. Deloney taught me I was doing it, but that is if you lay out the actual dollars and numbers in these worry scenarios, it takes the power out of the worry. It diffuses the worry.

It diffuses the bomb. Or it highlights the one that is a real problem that we got to solve yeah and then you go oh now okay that one yeah okay we're gonna have to get another job and work for two years and well or do we buy insurance for that thing there you go you know because i'm not gonna have an emergency film won't take care of that that's right and uh so i gotta have something to alleviate worry. But most of the time when you give numbers and timelines and details to your worry, it defangs the worry. That's right. It pulls the claws out of it.

That's right. And so it takes the poison out of it. And because 80% of what we worry about never happens anyway, Dale Carnegie used to say, and the other 20%, you know, let's divide it up into the things we can do something about and the things we can't do something about. And now we've got almost nothing to worry about. Yeah. Because you can't do anything about nuclear war or Biden spending money. You can't do anything about that at all, except vote next time there's a chance. That's the only thing you can do. But so what you've got to do is get up off your butt and exist in this inflationary world

that is real. So you make the best choices choices what can i do something about what i can i not do something about so that's the problem spend all your time watching fox and cnn is you you do all you do is worry about stuff that they want you ginned up about right instead of going and living your life what a gift that would be huh wow what would happen in america people would start liking each other again. This is The Ramsey Show. You know, I heard a sad and touching story recently. Zander Insurance has set up a scholarship for children whose parents died without life insurance. Last year, they gave away over $165,000 to help kids avoid debt

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Kendra is in Dayton, Ohio. Hi, Kendra. How are you? Hello. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. What's up? Okay. Baby step six. We have a house that's worth around $400,000. We owe $250,000.

We are at a 22-year fixed. We couldn't get it down to the $15,000 at this point. We have about $140,000 worth of repairs and updates and things that we need to do to sell. We're looking to sell in three to five years and downsize. So I recently got a better job, so the shovel's a little bigger, so I'm trying to figure out do we pay down the mortgage or do the updates? What's your household income it's around 200 now good so if you do the up i mean if you if you pay down the mortgage and you don't do the updates how are you going to sell um exactly yeah so i think you do the updates

what in the world is wrong with this house? $140,000 on a $400,000 house? Falling in? Yes and no. It's just some parts are dated and was when we bought it, but it just matched what we needed for our family. Yeah, but what are you talking about doing for 140,000 freaking dollars yeah any one time someone says repairs and updates that i always want to parse those apart yeah it's both it's both because the kitchen and bathrooms need updates and this is per

realtor coming in and saying okay here are things i recommend in order to get you know the best price for the house kind of thing, and within our neighborhood. And so it's a deck where the wood is literally falling through. Somebody fell through the steps. So it's an air conditioning unit that needs replaced. It's roof, it's windows, siding. Those are more the repair side than the updates, the kitchens and the bathrooms and flooring. Wow.

You guys have let this place run down to nothing. We were doing the steps, and that was the struggle. You just now got to baby step four, five, six? Yes. Okay, cool. That's good. Only within the last six months. All right. Number one, separate the updates

and repairs do the repairs first okay the deck that's falling is not expensive number one number two is dangerous fix that the heat and air is working it's out like 20 for that twenty thousand dollars yeah and that was one of the cheaper bids it's large And so that was one of the cheaper beds. Okay. Well, just try to figure out if there's a different way to skin this cat. That sounds a little bit, you know, that still sounds out of control. The first one was 40. Okay.

They all sound out of control. One of them sounds twice as much out of control as the other one, but still. It's wood, and that is out of control right now. Okay. Well, bottom line is you just need to segment these items, make a list, and prioritize them, and begin to cash flow through them. Number one item is most dangerous. Number two is next most dangerous.

Then once you get past dangerous stuff or leaking or repairs and get over into updates maybe you do some of the updates maybe you don't maybe you just sell a house with an outdated bathroom and and that was that yeah exactly that's where we're struggling or do we refinance no you don't need to refinance it's 100 you're trying to get out of debt. We're not trying to add debt. That was not one of your questions. Correct. You make $200.

You have three to four years to do $140,000 worth. And so if you divide that by three, that's $50,000 a year. You can get it done in three years and just make your list out and just systematically begin to work down the thing. It's not all one project at one time correct and when i was talking refinance i was talking about putting money towards the principal to get it down to the 15-year fix not burning against it yeah well i don't need to pay to refinance to do that you just pay extra on the mortgage but we're not you're not able to do that

till you get this stuff done whatever you choose to do to get the house market ready, whatever you choose to do, the more you study it, the more you think about it, the more you get bids on it. And by the way, in the next six months, do as little of it as you can because let's give some of this craziness time to some of the crazy to bleed off of the construction world because the construction world's in full-on crazy mode right now yes and so let it you know let's not get in too big a hurry uh because lumber might come back down matter of fact it probably will it's you know once they start bringing the

trees out of the forest again you know that kind of stuff it's it's a supply-demand issue. And so, you know, but the way you eat an elephant is a bite at a time, and that's how I would get at this. I also want to make sure over the next three to five years, I've made this mistake a couple times, Dave. I have a goal that's three years away or five years away. I'm going to try to get through a school program or something like that. Man, I lose three years of life because I don't like where I'm at. I'm always looking at what tomorrow is going to be.

And so I want to balance that $140,000. You're not going to get all these things done and all of a sudden the sun's going to come out. The sun's going to come out anyway. So make your plan, work towards these things, and then enjoy the house while you're in it. And sell it. And sell it. At some point, just call it a day. you know i'm done i'm out of here drew's in raleigh hi drew welcome to the ramsey show

hey what's up press how you doing better than i deserve how can we help so i have a question i am 20 years old um i'm making about $41,000 a year right now. I have $20,000 in cash and $20,000 invested in a mutual and a Roth. And in the near future, probably about the next five years or so, I'll have marriage, you know, that will be coming, buying a house and stuff like that. So I had a question on is or if you would recommend being gazelle intense for a few years to build wealth. I don't have any debt.

So I was curious if you get intense for a couple years in the beginning to build the wealth, if that would be worth it, or if you would suggest you just stick with the 15% that you recommend. Well, you don't have a house payment today, and so the 15% is not what we would recommend. We'd recommend that you max out whatever retirement you can while you're meeting some of your other savings goals. See, yes, I would be intense to use your, you know, I'm not sure it's gazelle intense.

Gazelle intense is you have absolutely no life until you get yourself out of debt and i i don't i don't think i'm going to prescribe that for you but i think you would be very intentional versus intense and say okay i'm gonna have this segment of my money that i enjoy and all the rest of it i'm going to use to pile up and build wealth during this short period of time i'm going to be really intentional and i may have a little smaller enjoyment budget than some of my buddies who blow their entire freaking paycheck because i'm grown up beyond my years i've already matured beyond my 20 years here which you have just by asking this question you're pretty impressive young man um and so yeah i think that's intentional but when we're talking about gazelle intensity we're talking about you have no life at all yeah until you get your dadgum debt paid off

and that's that's the best way to get out of debt that's not necessary for you to have a really sweet situation five years from today and i think you got to look at what are you not doing meaning if you have a traditional eight to five job and you go home and you've got to look at what are you not doing? Meaning if you have a traditional 8-5 job and you go home and you're going to spend from 5 o'clock till 9 o'clock playing video games in your 21, get another job. Start work and grind. If you've got

friend opportunities to hang out with your buddies and create community, of course do that stuff. But I'm a huge fan of people in their 20s really busting it and getting after it. But like Dave said, man, you've got to breathe, too. You've got to breathe. Yeah, intentionality just means that we're not going to go from Friday night to Sunday night

and spend everything we made in the previous five days, which is what most people do, particularly at 20 years old. Then they spend the next three weeks trying to pay it back. Yeah, and trying to figure out how we're going to eat eat because now we don't have any money to eat next week. And so that happens all the time. So, you know, we're just moving way to the other side of that coin. But this idea that you sit at home and do absolutely nothing and you cheap out on every single thing and you don't buy a bed and you sleep on the floor or something. You know, no, we're not saying do that go on a date yeah yeah enjoy and have some money set aside for enjoyment We'll be right back. Dr. John Deloney Ramsey personality is my co-host today.

Open phones at 888-825-5225 i can't see the screen james thank you okay so in the lobby of ramsey solutions on the debt-free stage tyler and jessica are with us hey guys how are you hey y'all how's's it going? Great, man. So, how much debt have you guys paid off? It was about a little over $68,000. Very good. How long did that take? 25 months. Good for you. And your range of income during that time? It started about $59,000-ish all the way up to now it's right at $70,000. Very good. Good for you guys. Awesome.

So, y'all are getting after it. Yeah. So, where do you guys live uh sparta tennessee sparta awesomeness very good not far just over the road over the hill just over the hill a couple hours huh yeah not too bad what kind of debt was the 68 000 man we were pretty normal i listen to the show every day and i hear all these screams and how they're normal and i was just the same we were just the same pretty normal it was a car loan credit cards personal loans just anything

you can think of except student loans yeah wow good for you guys so uh excellent job so tell me about it when did you start on this journey? You started 25 months ago, but what started you on this Ramsey journey? Well, in April of 2019, we decided that we wanted to have another baby, and we wanted to provide the best life possible for both of our kids because we'd seen our debt that we were in. We actually, what kind of encouraged us to start the Dave Ramsey plan was because we sat down one day before we bought our house and we looked at how much we were eating out each month. And it was ridiculous. We were spending like five to six hundred dollars a month eating out.

Whoa. In food. Wow. And so it's kind of crazy. You're keeping Sparta open. Yeah, we had no control over our money. We didn't have any control over our money. If we had it, we spent it.

And we just, we didn't care at the time. And so we decided that we wanted to have another baby. And so we just started trying to attack our debt. And then we got pregnant sooner than we thought. And so we started stockpiling up everything. And that was probably one of the best things that we could ever do was really follow that to a tee because whenever our son was born he had to be in vanderbilt for three weeks and he came home on a feeding tube for

three months and so because we had the stockpile of cash we didn't have to worry about anything because we knew that we were taken care of regardless and even through it was a very very challenging time it really rocked our faith you know we had to be we really had to be strong in our faith with god through all of that but because of that we could focus on what god was doing for us because we didn't have to worry about any money at all yeah so so he come early or just had some issues or what well he came three weeks early but he had a birthing injury. So whenever he was born, they had to resuscitate him and send him back.

He had to be rushed to Vanderbilt. They didn't think that he was going to not be able to walk. He wasn't going to have much of a life at all. They thought he was going to stay on the feeding tube for the rest of his life. You even mentioned he may even develop cerebral palsy at one point yeah none of that happened none of that happened he's running around here like crazy oh i saw him out there he's screaming at the top of his lungs i love it very cool yeah i love it i especially like it now that's great good for for you. Good news.

That's good news. What's his name? His name's Aiden. Aiden? Yeah. And how old is he now? He's 19 months. All right, cool.

We have another one out here. Her name is Emery, and she's six. And she's sitting here just like a little princess. Yeah. She is a princess, and she knows it. I love it. Very good. Okay.

So Aiden and what? Emery. Emery. And so y'all got scared, and you got a dose of hard, hard life. And then what got you on the journey? Well, just we wanted to provide a better life for our kids than we had. Our parents did the best they could with what they had, but we both grew up really, really poor. Gotcha.

So I didn't want my kids to have to go through that. The house that I lived in growing up was falling apart, you know, but we just, we made do with it, you know, really humbles you down in life. So I didn't want my kids to ever have to go through something like that. I think what we originally hearing, heard about Dave Ramsey from high school, but didn't think nothing about it. Sure. And then we got married, and she actually mentioned, hey, why don't we, don't you remember Dave Ramsey? I said, yeah.

And that was pretty much the end of it. Of course, that was in 2017. That's how we are around here, Tyler. It's just Dave. It's just Dave. Yeah. Then, you know, we started our marriage with, didn't have much debt, but took responsibility. And, well, it was more of a negative impact on a life because I was the one that got us into the debt.

I kind of got this car fever, wanted the new stuff. And, hey, why don't we go get a credit card card if we can get it on zero percent it must be okay that kind of thing but then reality started setting in because as she mentioned we were wanting to have another baby and so we started looking further into this dave ramsey stuff you see it with different eyes when you need it yeah you really do that's good i understand well well done you guys i'm proud of you yeah we're so excited what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is you paid off 68,025 months well um yeah so i tell people that the key of getting out of debt is for one you got to be content with what you have if you're not ever

happy with where you're at now you won't ever appreciate where you go out in the future um so i tell them that and that they have to get on a budget budgeting and knowing where you're knowing where every dollar is going to is the biggest thing so and i think the key for me would be patience i learned a lot of patient to have patience during this process to have patience not only with myself but with the actual process. If you're not going to go get another job, then find something to sell. If you don't have anything to sell, then just find other ways to make money and just be patient with the process. We literally sold everything in our house.

We did. We sat on lawn chairs for a few days. That's okay. We sat on lawn chairs for a few days. We even sold one of our vehicles, which was a big majority of our debt. Good for you guys. Way to go, you guys. Incredible. Well, if you live like no one else later, you can live and give like no one else. That's right.

Set yourself up to take care of these two babies. Very well done. Now you can buy that beautiful wife of yours a couch, my friend. You already got them. You already got them. You already got them. That's a good thing. I love it. All right.

Are we going to get Emory or Aiden, either one, in the debt-free screen, or are they just going to watch? I think they'll just watch. Okay. That works for me. All right. Tyler and Jessica from Sparta, Tennessee. We've got a copy of The Legacy Journey for you.

That's the next chapter in your story for you to go on and be Baby Steps millionaires. We've also got a copy of the Total Money Makeover for you, for you to give away to one of those friends that have been making fun of you while you were doing all this stuff. Oh, yeah. Maybe get one of them activated. Yeah, they told us we were crazy. Yeah.

Well, you are. You're crazy like a fox. So there you go. Well done. Very, very well done. Tyler and Jessica, Aiden and Emery. $68,000 paid off in 25 months, making $59,000 to $70,000 from Sparta, Tennessee. Count it down.

Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! There is something about having an emergency, and there's nothing quite like a brand-new baby who's got some medical challenges to take your breath away, put your stomach in your throat, and make it stay there for a while.

And there's something about being in that situation with money versus without money. Money doesn't make it all better. Money doesn't make it go away, but it lowers the level of trauma. It gives you an option. Yeah. It gives you the ability to concentrate on what matters, not what matters and what doesn't matter. Yeah. And this couple didn't have a model of what this looks like growing up,

and so they had to just lean all the way in on these baby steps, and they followed them all the way through. How cool is that? Very cool. Good stuff. Good folks. Well done, y'all. Well done.

This is The Ramsey Show. guitar solo Thank you. I kind of think it's too soon to start talking about Christmas, but it's not too soon to start thinking about being ready for Christmas. Thanksgiving is a couple weeks away. Here's the deal. Me and the rest of the Ramsey Solutions team, we're already in Christmas mode because that's what we do. We just love Christmas around here. So that's the deal.

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Shop the $10 sale at RamseySolutions.com. Sign up for the free money. Hey, our question of the day comes from Blinds.com. Find out for yourself why Blinds.com is the number one online retailer of custom window coverings, free samples, free shipping, new promos all the time. You save even more. Use the promo code RAMSY to get the best deal. All right, today's question comes from Caitlin in Colorado.

Caitlin says, my husband and I are on baby steps four and six. Our children's college funding is already covered through my husband's GI bill. We paid off $175,000 in 27 months while working six jobs between the two of us. Wow. While that feels great, the problem is I'm exhausted. Well, no kidding. Yeah. I'm tired of working 70 hours a week, and I don't want to miss out on this time with my kids.

I see in the EveryDollar app what the extra income can do for family vacations, buying the things we put on hold in Baby Step 2 and paying off the house, so I feel like I have to keep up this crazy pace. How do I change my mindset from the hustle and grind to get the debt done to this is a crock pot and a rhythm of life so I can finally enjoy what we're working for for so long? Man, that's a question about identity

that we get a lot, Dave. How do I turn the gazelle off? How do I let the gazelle just rest and start grazing again? When you finish your baby step three and you've got your emergency fund in place, we tell you to change from gazelle intensity just to intentionality, just doing things on purpose. So here's what's new. What will never be the same, because you've changed the shape of your brain permanently what will never be the same is is that you will never again look at the every dollar budgeting

app and not think oh i could do this i can do that i can do this you're always going to have that thought because you've retrained your brain to actually pay attention instead of letting this happening to you you're happening to it and so that's great news and and you've identified what the problem is you're tired and so you know you look at the every dollar app and you go well i'm not gonna be working as much and so we won't be able to do this and this and this and this but now you're doing it on purpose yeah and that's fine yeah i i like to there's a there's a three-pronged decision making matrix here you go practice curious and facts

I want you to practice working fewer hours and then I want you to feel how uncomfortable that is and be curious with yourself why does it feel so uncomfortable right now that I want to hang out with my kids instead of going to deliver pizzas tonight and then I want you to sit down with the data

your body's going to be telling you, we got to keep rustling. We got to keep running. What are the facts? The facts are you paid your debt off. You're okay. And you're going to slowly practice retraining your body

that you're not in danger anymore. And now it's about how much fun can you have. And like Dave said, be intentional about your life. And some folks, Dave, I've just come to understand some folks, and you may be like this, you just hit a light switch. You're just off. I'm good.

I saved up my money, and I'm going to do this thing. I found my wife's that way. We got the money. We're good. And I keep thinking, all right, but what about this? What about this? And so I got to practice. I just lean into it and practice, and then I get better and better at it,

and then I quit thinking about it after a while. So here's what happens. Your nervous system resets right and so you're driving 30 miles an hour for a year and then you step on the gas and your heart rate changes your stomach comes up in your throat adrenaline is released and you're doing 90 and then you set the cruise on 90 and you ride along about two hours on 90 then you reset the cruise down to 55 and you feel like a turtle it's like you're walking you feel like a turtle you're like what happened yes i like i thought you know but at first 90 blows your mind right but then you reset and you drop back down to 55 after you've got your nervous system reset at 90.

Then it just feels like this is a crawl. But you're still not at 30. Well, you're double. You're almost 2X what you were. And here's the demon here. Your body gets addicted to the cortisol and adrenaline that gets released at 90. It begins to beg you, go back to 90. We feel we get that drug released at 90. It begins to beg you, go back to 90. We feel, we get that drug hit at 90.

And you've got to retrain your brain that, you know what? And what's worse than that is 90 won't deliver it anymore. You've got to go 110. Because once you get satiated with that, you've got to go on up again. And so you just have to force yourself to go, oh, my God. Because when those white lines are coming at you like, and then they're coming at you like, ding, ding. It feels like you're dying.

It feels like the world's passing you by. Are we crawling here? Are we ever going to get there? But your nervous system resets. And it does it in any area of your life. Once you've handled. Here's another example. I talk to people.

They made $60,000 their whole life. And then they start making $100,000. And they make $100,000 for 10 years, and they lose their job. And they get a new job making $60,000. I say, well, you're not going to keep making $60,000 because your brain is reset. Your nervous system is set at $100,000 now. The gravitational pull is going to pull you back to the $100,000. But you've never been there before.

The first time up that hill is a steep climb. Yeah. But it's like rolling down the hill to get there the second time because everything about you, the way your mind works is set on 100,000 now. Yeah. It just changes everything. Yeah. And you can't go back. Once you've stretched, you can't go back so you're going to experience when you turn this down the feeling of you've gone from 90 to 55 but or 60 but that's

still twice as fast as you used to be going so you're fine and what most people go wrong is they feel that downshift and then they try to hide from it they try to they numb it they they get into all kind of crazy addictions because they feel like they're going too slow they're going too fast and that's why i want someone be curious about it go oh yeah we're going 60 and then what's the data the data is we're going 2x what we used to be the other speed wasn't sustainable it was just for a season we had to get out of that you're gonna get arrested yeah or you're gonna crash your car or your engine's gonna melt down right and now let's be curious about it and we're gonna practice and then is going to be a great cruising speed for the rest of your life yeah yeah we'll be just

fine you have some more seasons of 90 and some of 40 but it's life you can spike up if you want to spike up again if you need to but you know it's not sustainable you're exhausted yeah you're exhausted yeah and you need your your brain is telling you your emotions your body your fatigue level is talking to you. And so listen. Yeah. Listen. And there's nothing wrong with that. Everything you're doing is right.

Everything you're doing is normal. The beautiful thing, though, is you now know what 90 feels like. Yeah. And so it's no longer a theory for you. And there will come a moment when you have to go 90 again and you'll settle right back in. And it's like, I can do it. Yeah. I've had to do it. Absolutely.

You know, I've had to do that after COVID. You know, I've had to kick my hours and the work productivity that is, you know, I had slowed back, but I'm right back up where I was. Because there's some, you know, stuff happened at Ramsey, and I've got to be back in the saddle. And here I am. So here we go, baby. You know, and I'm back on the stage. I'm back in the media. I'm back in writing books.

What do we got to do to get, you know, because this is what it takes to go back in the media i'm back in writing books what what do we got to do to get you know because this is what it takes to go right now but it's not for everything it's not for everything it really wasn't hard to get back there either yeah i know it's part and that's the thing it's part of me like just give me an excuse to go 90 i just want to go and hey uh i want caitlin i want you and your husband you you don't go celebrate. You have a marker. You pay $175,000. $175,000 in 27 months? Go have a party. Mark the moment.

And then say what's next. Don't just continue in the same river. Go on a trip and drive 60. Yeah. Man. Pretty stinking incredible. I love it. Dr. John Deloney, good hour.

James Childs is our producer. Laura Johnson filling in for Kelly Daniels today on the phone as an associate producer role. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, and we'll be back. Hey, it's Kelly, associate producer and phone screener for The Ramsey Show. If you would like to do your debt-free scream live on the show, make sure you visit theramseyshow.com and register. We would love for you to come to Nashville and tell Dave your story.