The Ramsey Show - App - Should I Take a Pay Cut To Reduce Stress? (Hour 3)

Episode Date: January 22, 2021

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studio, this is the Dave Ramsey Show. It's where America hangs out to have a conversation about your life and your money. I'm Ken Coleman, host of the Ken Coleman Show on the Ramsey Solutions Network, joined by my colleague, Dr. John Deloney, host of the Dr. John Deloney Show on the Ramsey Solutions Network as well. And we're here together today. We're taking your calls as we always do, but we're going to add in our specialties.

John is obviously working with folks on mental and emotional health and relationships and just being whole as a person on The Dr. John Deloney Show. And then I'm going to help you with answering that age-old question, why am I here, what should I do with my life? And we're going to look at the work context. You were created to fill a unique role. You were needed. You must do it.

And if you're sick and tired of being miserable on Monday mornings, life is too short to live for the weekends, we're going to take those questions as well. And John and I both love to take on all of these things together. There's such a collaboration between us when we do shows together. And so we've taken calls about toxicity at work. Politics and the family. Politics and the family.

Unhealthy leaders above us. What do we do there? As well as our specialty as well. And we'll take your money questions, too. So come on, let's go. We're having a blast. 888-825-5225. I've got to tell the YouTube audience, because they're out there watching and looking at us,

the producers and the engineers were making fun of us during the last break, saying they were going to have a picnic on us after the show today because of the flannel. We did not plan this. This was not... Ken, it's time to be honest. Ken texted me this morning and said, Hey, brother, wear your checkered flannel. We did not plan this. Ken, it's time to be honest. Ken texted me this morning and said, hey, brother, wear your checkered flannel. Let's do it together. Let's wear flannel today, John.

Let's look like we're wearing a blanket. Never happened. That is fake news. Hashtag fake news. 888-825-5255. How very conservative of you, Ken. Oh, stop it. Stop it. Alright, let's see here. Oh, boy. Now, I'm hooked on phonics, Doc, but I'm going to take a shot at this one.

Sean is joining us in Mississauga, Ontario. Let's see if I'm right. Sean, how can we help? Hey, how are you guys doing? Good. Did I say that correctly? Well, yeah, that's my nickname. My real name is a lot longer, so I just said, yeah, go ahead and use my nickname.

Oh, okay. We'll go with that. I don't know what any of that means. How can we help? So let me tell you guys, I'm 16 years old. I've been an entrepreneur since I've been 12. I run two successful e-commerce companies. Wow.

And I also do stock trading kind of on the side. And to get my social skills before I am 18, I also work at McDonald's. So a lot to take in, but, uh, I really have a good question for you guys. Okay. Go for it. So, um, my parents have kind of, you know, done a path for me to go to university right after I graduate, whether I'm a millionaire or a billionaire or worth nothing. So what do you guys recommend in this sense? I feel like not going to get a post-secondary education and continuing the path that I'm continuing and doing what I love. Yeah, I want to know.

Play that out, and you're a young man who has got a lot on the ball, but dream with me a little bit. As a 16-year-old today, what's that dream? Take me 25, 30 years down the road. What's that look like? I'm going to tell you. Me and our family used to live in Fresno, California, and we used to do house flipping there. It was pretty successful until our immigration status changed and we had to move to Canada. So I think based on what I've seen from my dad doing and

the business skills and the business strategies he's used, I think real estate would be good for me in that pathway if I've saved up enough money. Okay. So let me answer your question by giving you a framework to take to your mom and dad because your mom and dad have saved up for you to go to university and it sounds like they would really like you to do that.

Is that correct? Not really. Not really. I saved up for myself. Oh, good. So mom and dad aren't like super, what's their opinion on a scale of 1 to 10? 1, they don't care. 10, they'd really love for you to go to university.

Where are they at? Oh, no. It's more like 12 because I've been to 11 countries because my dad, what's it called, used to work at an oil company. And it's all been about education. I'm from Yemen, so my background is not that good. Oh, okay. There you go. You could tell. All right. So, Sean, and I'm from Yemen, so my background is not that good. Oh, okay. There you go.

You could tell. All right, so, Sean, and I'm going to let John jump in here in a second and give you some thoughts on the relational component about how you share this, but I want to give you at least a framework to share with your mom and dad so that they at least know you've thought through this. I know you don't want to go to university, but you can just say, I talked to Ken Coleman on the Dave Ramsey Show, and here's his criteria,

by which he gives advice on whether or not you should go to university or not. Two simple questions. Is it the only way for you to get qualified to do what it is you want to do? Is it the only way? The second question is, is it the best way? So is it

the only way or the best way? For you to be a successful real estate professional and work your way up, so let's say you got into just selling homes right out of high school and you started crushing it the way you've crushed everything else you do and you start making money and you're cash flowing, you're saving like crazy and you save up for your first flip and you buy a house, I'm making this up for round numbers, for $120,000, fix it up and flip it for $180,000, and you keep doing that while you're successful. You don't need to ever darken the door of a college campus to be qualified or to be a successful real estate professional.

College isn't going to teach you that. So if you were my son, I'd go, is this what you want to do? Why do you want to do it? And I'd walk you through it, and you'd give me all the answers, and if I felt good about it, I'd go, well, here's the path.

And the path for you is, even now at 16, to see if you can find a local real estate agent who will mentor you and let you do cleaning up their houses that they're getting ready to sell. And then they teach you, and you learn from them and do coffee with them each week or whatever. And you become a sponge, and then eventually you get qualified to be a real estate agent, and a couple of those real estate professionals who've mentored you eventually become your broker, and you get into it.

So if I'm going to sit down with Mom and Dad, I want to be able to make a practical case as to why I'm not going. But, John, I want you to speak to the relationship component here when Mom and Dad are really passionate about him going to university. So, Sean, do you love your folks? Yeah, man. I mean, I love them to death. They did all this just for one reason, to get me into education. That's awesome. Saying, hey, you know, I understand you guys want me to go into computer science, but I'm more interested in being an entrepreneur.

Right, right. And real estate, that's kind of like, hold on. So you're telling me we have to travel all around the world, spend all that money, get here when our immigration status changed in California just so you could tell us this? Right. So I understand where they're coming from. It's just how can I, you know, give this to them in a good way? I'm going to tell you something that's going to be hard to hear, okay?

So are you tracking with me? My promise to you is this. I've talked to thousands of high school kids over the last couple of decades, and I love high school kids, and I'm not going to lie to you, okay? Mm-hmm. All right. I'm going to tell you a couple things. Number one, you're 16, and I want you to remember that.

So when you talk to somebody who is an elder, somebody who loves you, I want you to just default to they've got wisdom that you may not have, and that humility will serve you relationally forever. Okay? Now, I know it's hard to hear because right now you're just absolutely dominating things. Number two, you got to get some friends and enjoy being 16. Okay? Working, working, working.

I love the hustle. Right? I love the hustle. Number three, you know there's a cultural component to education. As Ken said, when you approach your parents, do it humbly and with gratitude and with a firm plan. And number four, Dave Ramsey himself went ahead and went to college and sold houses while he was a student. It wasn't an either-or thing, and so don't box yourself into have to or don't have to.

You can accomplish both of them at the same time if it's going to be something your parents are going to require of you as a kid. But I love Ken's idea. Have a firm plan and sit down with humility and grace don't spend the money to do computer science because mom and dad want you no not computer science especially this is the dave ramsey show 2021 is finally here which means 2020 is over and now you get to decide how this year goes. Rachel Cruz's new book, Know Yourself, Know Your Money, is also finally here. And this book will help guide you to faster progress with your money,

no matter which baby step you're on. For years, we've taught you that personal finance is 20% head knowledge and 80% behavior. This is the book for helping you grow and control your behavior. Know Yourself, Know Your Money goes beyond the baby steps and gets to the root of your money choices and mistakes. 2020 probably gave you a pretty clear view at what your personal money fears are. This book will help you channel those into a healthy money mindset so you can make 2021 a year worth celebrating. Get your copy of Know Yourself, Know Your Money today at the online store at DaveRamsey.com or call our Ramsey Show.

I'm Ken Coleman, joined by my colleague, Dr. John Deloney. As we take your questions, 888-825-5225. Talking life, talking money, talking relationships, talking work. You know, one of the ways to get out of debt faster is to get a bigger shovel. And that's what we talk about on the Ken Coleman Show is getting promoted. You know, we see, John, day after day with Debt-Free Screams, that the income range always goes up. It's fascinating.

I've never heard a Debt-Free Scream where the income didn't go up some, and that intense focus. So John and I are here to talk money, life, work, relationships, tension over political talk, toxicity in the workplace. John and I love to take on those together. But let's talk about the fact that many of you are still trying to pay off debt and you feel like it's going to take forever. But now that we're into a new year, it's time to get some new energy and new focus.

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Text the word trial to 33789. Let's go to Dayton, Ohio next where Kyle joins us. Kyle, how can we help? Good afternoon, Dr. D and Ken. How are you guys today? We're having a blast. What's going on? So, well, me and my wife have been doing a day of Ramsey plan now for about five years.

We're finishing up baby step two, and we've had to hit pause because of a bit of a family crisis. Anybody who watched the reset event will understand this. So I have a 43-year-old yellow pig brother who just retired from the military after 22 years. On the day of his retirement, his wife asked for a divorce and left him three weeks later. And after that, he didn't receive a paycheck for about six weeks. The military messed up his pay. And so him and his daughter, I drove out to Delaware to pick him up, and him and his daughter moved into my big brick house.

Good for you, Kyle. You're a good brother, man. Way to step up. Well, thank you. So we gave him a couple weeks to kind of take all of this in, and then we sat him down, kind of talked to him about getting back on his feet money-wise and watched the reset event. We're starting to go through, um, financial peace with him. We, me and my wife have a Ramsey plus. And so we're doing the online classes with him.

I told him, I said, you got to get a job. You can't mope around forever. I said, I don't care if you don't find a career right now, but I need to get a job. So he did, he did finally get a job. Um, but what we're, what I'm trying to out to to find out today is if there's different things we should be doing or if what we're doing is the correct thing we've told him there we're we're going to have him stay here till at least june when his daughter's out of school uh she's in fifth grade um that way she's not having to switch back and forth between new houses and all of that along with all of this through all of this we've learned that she has had a lot of trauma mentally, a lot of damage, as he has as well.

But we've learned hers has gone on for quite a few years. We're working on getting her into some therapy. We're going to get him into some therapy. I'm just trying to see what else would you guys recommend for us to do with them, or does this sound like a great plan? There's a couple of things here. Number one, I want to reiterate, man, you're a brother who stepped up in a time of need, and I'm grateful that there should be – I wish there were more brothers like you in the country.

So I'm grateful to know you're in our community, man. So I want to step back 30,000 feet and look at your brother, And you probably know this intellectually, but I want you to hear this empathetically. I want you to hear this in your heart. Your brother has lost everything but his daughter. And I don't mean tangibly. I mean identity. He did the military for this long. That is who he was, right?

Absolutely. That's an identity. And he the military for this long. That is who he was, right? That's an identity. He'll tell you that. He was a married man with a co-pilot, and when you're married that long, somebody else is an arm and a leg, right? And so he is recovering out of ash, and it's easy to see that and say, man, you got a couple of weeks, brother. You got to get up

and shake it off. I need you to hear and feel that he has had every single leaf shaken off that tree and he's going to have to grow from the floor up while also raising a daughter. Now that should be enough why, but I don't want to minimize what a big deal this is. The second thing is I want you to orient yourself in this way. I want you and your wife to get some really firm boundaries about dates, about time, about money. And then I want you to keep this in the forefront of your head. Your brother is not a problem to fix. I don't want you to use the word damage when you're talking to his daughter as though she's a truck that hit a tree.

Absolutely. Yeah, I would never mention that to her. Right, but I want you to think of your brother and your niece as somebody, as people to be with, not as puzzles to solve. And you're going to help be a part of their healing journey. You can't heal him, man. He's got to decide he wants to do this. But you can connect with him. So you've offered him a place to stay, which is above and beyond.

You're going to provide some boundaries and structure for him and some encouragement. And then you're just going to be with him. So you've offered him a place to stay, which is above and beyond. You're going to provide some boundaries and structure for him and some encouragement. And then you're just going to be with him and you're going to hold firm to those boundaries, but you're going to be with him. And if you can afford counseling for his daughter, great. If you can lean into some of those things, great. But I want you to let him know you are there to talk to him. But man, he needs to go find a group. He needs to, he's got to have a professional to walk through this season with him. And you can't do that walking for him. You can just encourage him and be with him and be with him, right? Yeah.

Kyle, you're doing great. The answer is that's an unbelievable amount of things you're doing for your brother. And because you're in Ramsey Plus, I'd bring him in, make sure he's gone through FPU. Stay on the line. We're going to give you Ramsey Plus for your brother. Look at that. Stay on the line. Zach's going to give you Ransby Plus for your brother. Look at that. Stay on the line. Zach's going to get his contact info so he has his own.

He can have his own app, and he can learn to use this stuff on his own and not be hitched to his little brother. But other than that, I mean, you've got a great plan here, and that's wonderful. The only other thing is over time, you know, as he's just reentering the workforce, I would tell him to listen to my show. Let him listen to it. It's a podcast. Just recommend it.

He can watch it on YouTube. Let's help him figure out what his sweet spot is outside of the military, what his contribution zone is, because that will bring tremendous meaning. You know, we talked about this earlier. John and I, John texted me something on Saturday morning, and we know from psychology studies and the neuroscience and all this, you were reading some stuff, that being without a job or not having some type of connection to your work is trauma on the level of losing a loved one. And he's already gone through trauma with the divorce.

Right. And so he's in a heavy, heavy time. So helping him find some joy in his work will allow him to heal, I believe, faster with the therapy, of course, and coming home and be able to give himself fully to his daughter where he feels like, okay, I've got this. But coming home to a brother who's judging him is going to hurt. No. This guy's not. Kyle's not going to judge him.

But Kyle's a guy who's going to come up with a good plan. Yeah. And he's going to say, you following the plan? You following the plan? And I want Kyle to be a great boundary setter. I want Kyle to be that great brother. But I want him to come home and say, dude, it's so good to see you, man. Yeah, of course.

I'm going to give you a hard hug. Yep. Hard hug, man. And then once we get the kids to wed, we're going to go on the back porch and just hang out. Yeah. Because you're my freaking brother. Yeah.

I love you. I love you. Does that make sense? Of course it makes sense. I think it's the right thing. I don't sense any judgment in Kyle. And I think, John, what you're saying, and Kyle, what you've got to get here is don't be overzealous. You're not dad now.

Yeah. You're brother. You've offered him these things. He's a big boy, to your point, John. On the back porch, you're going to say, brother, you've got two months left. Yeah. You can remind him that he's got big boy to your point john and uh you know on the back porch you're gonna say brother you got two months left yeah you can remind him that he's gotta go but you're loving on him and go man i'm so excited about the next chapter and reminding himself doing some fun things with him you know what you guys used to do as brothers i think it'd be fun to recreate some of that you know i know

my brother came in town for thanksgiving and did yall toilet paper at house? We did not. Oh, man. You can't do that anymore. You're in jail now. I love that that's where you go. I'm taking this as some Hallmark moment, and you interrupt and say, did you guys go teepee somebody's house? No, we went and played putt-putt miniature golf because we used to compete. And so we were out there with my dad. It was like time had suspended, and we went back.

Do some of that brotherly love stuff where you guys remember being innocent and there wasn't divorce and there wasn't all kinds of problems. It was just, we're bros, man. You and me. That's right. You know, and I think that's a really good thing to do. But you're a good man, Kyle. What a good guy I do. I'm going to nominate Kyle for brother of the year.

So send your votes to I don't know where. Pocatello, Idaho. Pocatello, Idaho. Pocatello, Idaho. Yes, I need that hoodie, man. Alright, listen. We're still just getting warmed up. We're not even close to done. More of your calls. More of your questions. More breakthrough. More hope.

Coming up on the Dave Ramsey Show. Over the years, I've heard countless horror stories from listeners about being harassed by debt collectors, receiving calls at work on their cell phones, and some even getting yelled at and threatened. That is not okay. There are laws against this, and there are people, attorneys, that can help make this stop if they are in fact breaking the law. Go to CollectionBully.com to learn more. Fill out a quick questionnaire that will identify if you are a victim of this type of illegal harassment. That's CollectionBully.com. The Dave Ramsey Show continues.

I'm Ken Coleman, joined by my colleague, Dr. John Deloney, as we take your calls, 888-825-5225. Hey, you need to find out for yourself why Blinds.com is the number one online retailer of custom window covering. You get free samples, free shipping, and with the new promos they run every month, you'll save even more. Use the promo code RAMSY to get the best deals.

Rules and restrictions apply. Today's question comes from Kristen in Indiana. She says, I've been in my job for almost 10 years, and I make about $65,000 a year, and I'm about halfway through baby step three. I enjoy most of my job, but I have some very stressful duties that I don't enjoy about my job as well. Is it worth looking elsewhere and taking a pay cut to reduce stress and ultimately be happier at my job? Currently, I'm looking at a pay cut of about $20,000. All right, in this situation, Kristen, because you are so close to getting

through baby step three, which gets that fully funded emergency fund, that's three to six months, is what we teach here at Ramsey Solutions. That's such a big milestone, and it's a game changer financially. In this situation, I would not currently take a pay cut of about $20,000. I'm okay with pay cuts only when you have to go backwards to get in, but there is a short-term sacrifice, and you know that you're going to climb the ladder and eventually replace that income, and you're in a financial position, i.e., you're not in debt, you've got an emergency fund,

and you've made some changes in your budget to be able to absorb that pay cut, and you're not in debt, you've got an emergency fund, and you've made some changes in your budget to be able to absorb that pay cut and you're not going backwards. So in this situation, here's what I want you to do. Is it worth looking elsewhere? Absolutely. But let's keep on looking because you enjoy most of your job. That's a good thing, Kristen. I talk to people every day on the Ken Coleman Show who hate every part of their job.

So can I weigh in here? Yeah, in just a second. Okay, all right. Last part. I'm good. No. But here's the last part on this. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because she enjoys most of her job, what I'm doing is I'm looking for something that she can step into that doesn't have as big of a pay cut. $20,000 is a little bit too big. I'm wanting her to look around some more and then do some other things to try to reduce that stress that she is dealing with. That would be my position on that one. Yes, sir. Go ahead. Weigh in, please. You take calls about jobs all the

time. I used to have conversations with my college students for years and years about job quality. I may be out to lunch here, so help me. Is there such thing as a perfect job that doesn't have parts of the job that are stressful? No. Is a dream job mean there's not certain forms

that you have to fill out that you hate that part? No. Or that you've got to do budgets at the end of a term? No. Or, or, or? Well, I'm in my dream job, and there's stuff I have to do here at Ramsey Solutions sometimes. There's certain days where I've got to do about 5% to 10%.

Yeah, that's one. That itches our face. I have to sneeze for three hours. I don't know how women do that. It's incredible. Because I can't wait to take that makeup off. It is itchy. First of all, I don't know what I'm doing.

If you get up close to me, and please don't, social distancing and all. Exactly. It looks like I've put it on like cake batter because I don't know how they do it. All I do is I just rub that thing around. And Dave conveniently left that part out of any of my interviews. That was not in any of the interviews that we would wear makeup when we're on stage under the lights or in these bright studios. But we digress. We lost.

We got off track. But there are things in every job. Yes. Just because it's hard, just because it's crappy, just because you have to do it every day or every month, doesn't mean it's not your dream job. That's right. That's exactly right. That's why I said, look, you love most of your job.

Be a big girl. Put your big girl pants on, and let's figure out how to deal with that. But if it is something that is toxic, and she loves most of the job, but there is toxicity, that's eventually going to wear you down. You know that. that situation i go let's start looking but until then let's have an attitude of gratitude so that's my feeling what are my emotions need to be i'm grateful for this job and what it provides to me right uh stability and safety and a launching pad if we need to move and then my mindset needs to be you know know what? I enjoy most of my job. I can figure out a way to deal

with difficult people or difficult circumstances. Yes, you're absolutely right. And by the way, people say all the time, Ken, is it okay if it's a dream job if I love 80% of it? I go, yeah.

Absolutely. Again, you do what you have to do to do what you want to do. Love it. You know? I really like making money. I hate paying taxes. I don't get to just say, well, now, this tax thing, it really stresses me out.

I don't like this. Right. See how that works out for you. Or the marriage part. We had our first fight. I'm out. Obviously, you weren't the one because we had a disagreement. I love date night and romance.

I don't like this fighting and you reminding me that I left my socks in the bathroom again. Oh, you want me to bathe every week? Well, then you're not the one. No, dude. Everything's got hard stuff in it, right? That's it. Be a grown up. Man.

All right, let's go to- We're solving problems. We are. Washington needs to call us. Yeah. And the depth of that advice, by the way, was, you know... It's exactly... It's worth every penny people paid for it.

Good call. Let's go to Mike, who's waiting for us in Los Angeles, California. Mike, how can we help? Hey, guys. How's it going today? We're having fun. What's going on with you? How can we help you?

I'm coming in today to see where I should really take the next step. I'm 22 right now, and I finished up college last year. I don't have a job, and I got my undergraduate degree in a field that I'm second guessing, which is law. And I don't know if I should start a nine-to-five or work for myself by investing since I have about $120,000 in cash available to me right now and paid off all my debt, no car payment, and I live at home. What do you guys recommend? Wow, Mike. Okay, so you're in a good position.

I didn't expect to hear that from the 22-year-old unemployed college grad. When you say work for yourself by investing, unpack that a little bit more. Give me some details. What's that look like in your head? Sure. In my head, that looks more like investing in real estate, either through property flipping or purchasing a home and renting them out, or possibly opening a business. And the thing is, I want to know what that business would be. So I don't know what direction to walk toward. Okay, great. So you have some general ideas,

and so what I want you to do is a process called clarify and verify. And this is in the book, The Proximity Principle, my best-selling book. I'm going to give you a copy of it, okay, when we're done with the call because this is going to walk you through this, all right? But here's the point. I want you to start now. Again, Los Angeles is in lockdown, so we've got an asterisk here with this advice. But when you can start getting out and shadowing some real estate professionals, people who flip homes, maybe some contractors, guys that build

homes, some successful realtors. I kind of like you at 22, you're in good financial shape, and you're living in a home. I kind of like you getting a job for a successful real estate professional, either a developer or a realtor who dips in, kind of sells homes, brokers homes, but also does some flipping themselves. And I like you just taking an hourly job for them and becoming a human sponge. And you learn it all. Everything. And that's where Clarify Verify comes in. I learn everything there is to learn about this particular piece of this, because real estate professional is one piece of it. Right.

Land developer is another piece. Corporate office developer is another piece. Dealing with general contractors. General contractors is another piece. And by you following, excuse me, working for somebody, they're paying you to get a master's degree in actually running that business. And you find out, oh, I thought I wanted to run this for myself. I thought I wanted to flip houses. It's way more fun on HGTV than it really is.

I don't actually like that. Mike, are you tracking with me so far? Yes. So that's what I want you to do. I want you doing a lot of clarifying and verifying. I want you to get – here's what the proximity principle says. And I wrote an entire book on it. And it came out of the Ken Coleman show, Giving Advice. The proximity principle says, in order to do what Mike wants to do, and by the way,

we can keep plugging in some different answers here. I like it being fill in the blank, Mike, because you're 22. Now's the time to explore and discover. In order to do what Mike wants to do, let's call it house flipper, real estate, impresario, okay? Mike's got to be around people that do that and are doing that. And successfully, by the way. Not in title only. And then he's got to be in places where that is happening. So it's people and places.

Here's the formula. The right people plus the right places equals opportunity. Opportunity to learn. Opportunity to do. That would be the experience of the education, real-time education, real street education. Right places equals opportunity. Opportunity to learn. Opportunity to do. That would be the experience of the education, real-time education, real street education. And then real experience. And I go, hmm, I do want to do this.

I've learned how to do it. I'm going to bust it and make some money and be really, really smart. Mike, I want to remind you, I like the position that you're in, but the Ramsey way is you better keep saving. Get to work. You need a 9-5 pretty quick. Keep working, keep saving, pay cash for that first dump, and then flip it. If that is, in fact, the way you want to do it, do it cash so you can win. Hang on.

My best-selling book, The Proximity Principle, is waiting for you. Zach will take care of you. For the rest of you, you hang on too. We have more of The Dave Ramsey Show coming right up. The Dave Ramsey Show continues on. I'm Ken Coleman, joined by my colleague, John Deloney. And we are taking your calls, 888-825-5225. Our scripture of the day, Romans 12, 6. Having gifts that defer according to the grace given to us, let us use them, if prophecy in proportion to our faith.

Our quote of the day from Maya Angelou. I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better. It's one of my favorite quotes in the whole wide world. By the way, if you ever just want to feel good, you're having a dark day, you know, and you're just like, I'm tired

of negativity, go just do a little search for Maya Angelo on YouTube and just watch her drop some gold. Man. You know, that was a woman who had a true gift with words and a legend. By the way, I want to mention we lost

a legend today. We did, man. A legend in the sports world. And also a man defined in his latter years and even in his career by as much grace as he had talent. And that's Hank Aaron.

Heartbreaking man. I mean, a true prince of a man. Yeah. You know, he saw things and experienced things that we will never... What he experienced, we can never understand.

And to break Babe Ruth's home run record and the vitriol and the nastiness that he endured and yet by all accounts and I lived in the Atlanta area for 11 years he's a legend of the world but certainly he's a legend in the Atlanta area.

And sad to see that he passed away today. Hammer and Hank. It just keeps coming man. Your son's name is Hank. It is yeah. Hammer and Hank. What a great nickname, man. Your son's name is Hank. It is, yeah. Hammer and Hank. What a great nickname. Yeah, Hank's one of... Hank Aaron's...

Yeah, he's one of the classiest humans to live, man. Really true. Yeah. Really true. 888-825-5225 is the number. Let's go to Burbank, California, right in the heart of Hollywood area. Benjamin is there. Benjamin, how can we help?

Hi, guys. Thanks so much for taking my call. You bet. what's going on hey so i you know being in burbank i work in the entertainment industry i used to be a sound editor for cartoons oh cool and it's a great job totally loved it pandemic hit and you know everything went to went to doodoo and so i was left with uh you know no job went to doodoo. And so I was left with no job. Went to doodoo. I'm not laughing at you.

I'm laughing with you, brother. Benjamin, you need to understand that John, his inner seven-year-old came out when you said doodoo. There was no way he was going to make it through the segment without laughing out loud. I'll give you that one. All right. I appreciate it.

So you were a sound editor for cartoons, and you got laid off due to COVID? Yeah, pretty much. Basically furloughed. So I'm under, okay, whenever work comes back, we'll call you type of thing. Okay. So I was left out to dry with, okay, what do I do?

I had just moved here. I was living here for three months and then the pandemic hit. So I had to move. Yeah. And so I was going great. I'm out of college. Uh, I graduated with, um, two degrees. Uh, I mastered, or I'm sorry, I got my bachelor's in music industry studies and I got another bachelor's in finance. And so this show has been great. Uh, I totally love it. So thank you guys for having me. You bet. So what can we do to help? So my question is, yeah, so I have no debt.

I've got about $24,000 in investments. I have $2,500 in emergency funds. And I am currently in a place where I started a business, an online business, where I sell guitar picks with flowers inside them. It's been doing super well.

And I came up with this idea on my own. And I was leaning okay well if all jobs are out in the middle of nothing I'm gonna have to make my own job and so I was doing this for a while and you know eating into my savings just to stay alive and then all of a sudden in November it began to pick up. And so I, I was running this job, um, by my own and, uh, just innovating and everything like that. Now long, here comes my friend who looks me up with a stay at home job. Um, I'm working part-time there and I was able to kind of gather my feet a little bit. So as I'm kind of gathering my feet, working part-time for this one place, work from home, I'm still running my business. I'm working about one day a week. And so I'm kind of gathering my feet, working part-time for this one place, work from home, I'm still running my business. I'm working about one day a week.

And so I'm seeing a lot of potential for this business and a lot of potential for growth. I'm working one day a week, and I'm making about half of my monthly paycheck at this part-time job. Which is how much? Give me a ballpark number. So working part-time hourly, I make about something around like 2200 a month and if i run my business you know if i put in one day's effort in a week for my business i'll make about at max you know a thousand a month something like that will it scale with you meaning is that all it takes to fill the pick orders you have? Or if you worked every day like that, would it scale up that way?

I believe it would scale up because I'm constantly selling out of stuff. The only reason I'm not making more sales is because I run out of stock. Okay. What are you doing in that one day that's driving all of those sales so that if you put in, let's say, two days a week or three days a week, you feel like you're going to see the sales come with that. What are you doing? Right. So my day-to-day of working, I manufacture them. And so that takes about, I don't know, an hour or two a day.

And then the rest is just managing the online store. The online store is up. I just have sales coming in. Okay. So you're making the guitar picks yourself so to john's point you know you're saying when you make them um but the orders are coming in even on the days you're not working correct correct yeah so if you make a thousand dollars a month just working one day a week if you were to work five days a week you you'd make $5,000 a month?

Potentially. There's a big difference between yes and potentially. No, I'm going to tell you, no, that's not the case. Because, Benjamin, you're making the picks. So you're sitting there in your apartment or wherever, and you're making the picks. And the orders are coming in regardless. So you making the picks themselves doesn't make the orders come in more. So that's the scary part. It's not going to scale like you think it will.

It's not going to scale like you think it is because what's going to happen is you need to figure out what would cause the orders to pick up. So maybe I spend a little bit more time working on the marketing piece or the social media advertising piece or whatever, and let's get some more orders in. But before we do that, let's go, what happens if my orders went up 10%, 15%, 20%? Maybe go 5, 10, 15, 20, and go, oh, that means I'd have to make this much. At what point do you become limited in your ability to make the picks, and now you've got to train somebody else to do it? Does that make sense, Benjamin? Yeah, totally. And I've been thinking about all that too.

Well, then here's my point. I would start easing into it. So once you've done that homework and you said you've done it, I'd go, all right, I'm going to spend a little bit more time than one day a week, or I'm going to add an additional three or four hours on that one day a week and I'm going to focus on driving more orders. And let's see if that works. I would not commit to this thing full time yet. I would ease into it. Let's see if we can incrementally, because you're the only manufacturer right now, correct?

Correct. So that could be eventually a problem, a good problem, but it could also sink you. So you've got to think through this, and let's go incrementally on, all right, let's see if I can raise my orders. And if I raise it by this much, I can still keep up with it. At what point do I get to a point where I need to train somebody how to make these picks with flowers in them? And as you're building this thing, Dave spoke to the company, Dave Ramsey spoke to the company a few weeks ago talking about how he used to have to go early to events and set all the chairs up to himself, speak at the event, sign books and talk to everybody. And then when everyone went home, take all the stuff down himself.

And so this idea that you've got to be doing a lot of both-hand is what I'm saying. And when you're building a new niche market, you've got to do both a lot of both-and is what I'm saying. Yeah. And when you're building a new niche market, you've got to do both-and, both-and. And you have late nights, early mornings for a long season before this stuff takes off on its own. And here's the temptation, Benjamin, and other entrepreneurs. Listen to me. There's a big temptation.

Because what he's doing has got some real mo. It's cool, man. He's got some momentum. I mean, he's making half. He's making about $1,000 a month. And he starts to feel like, oh, I can go do this. I can scale this now. No.

Stick every nickel that you're making now back into the business to prepare for the long haul. And the biggest mistake that entrepreneurs make is they try to go full-time too soon. Yes. Because we're excited about it. It's our idea. People are actually buying it. Oh, I want to get it out there. And it's like, whoa.

It's my favorite scene from Braveheart where the English army is thundering down on William Wallace and his merry men from Scotland. They got those long spears and he goes, hold. Hold. And the horses get closer. Hold. It's like, hey, hold.

There'll be a time to go full time and it will be very, very evident. You'll know it. That's right. Hey, we had a blast. Appreciate you, Dr. John. You hey, hold. There will be a time to go full time, and it will be very, very evident. You'll know it. That's right. Hey, we had a blast. Appreciate you, Dr. John. You too, man. Deloney, I want to say thanks to our producer, James Childs, our associate producer today, Zach Bennett.

And we want to thank you, America. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Have a friend or family member that needs a daily dose of Ramsey advice in their life? Let them know about the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast. It's a quick hit of advice about life and money in under 10 minutes. Check out the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast wherever you listen to podcasts.