Speaker 1: Hey, hey, hey, we're back. We're black, We're boo.
Speaker 2: Boo boo bo.
Speaker 3: Come on out.
Speaker 1: Round and they should ambition And Amanda, I feel like
Speaker 1: we haven't been in this stew together in a little while.
Speaker 1: How are you?
Speaker 2: I'm like the Chris Kirkpatrick of this singing duo, do
Speaker 2: you know what I mean? Like the en Sync member
Speaker 2: doing the least while like you, you're just not doing
Speaker 2: like the whole life dance, just like bye, oh man,
Speaker 2: did I see some flights flickering flickering? Or did I
Speaker 2: see some lights flickering? Or am I having a see shirt?
Speaker 1: No, let's hope neither.
Speaker 2: But it was just how okay, okay, all right, it's fine,
Speaker 2: everything is fine. Have you been I've been good. I
Speaker 2: feel like I haven't seen you in ages.
Speaker 1: What happened?
Speaker 2: Oh my kid was yes, Oh god, we've been in enough.
Speaker 2: Remy started daycare. I just it was so funny because
Speaker 2: after the show where I came on the day that
Speaker 2: he started daycare, I was just I was effusively happy.
Speaker 2: You were annoyingly so I'm sure giddy af and I
Speaker 2: had people who respond like send messages like we're so
Speaker 2: happy for you. Da da da da da and then
Speaker 2: you know, what goes up must come down, and that
Speaker 2: just means daycare germs hit us with a vengeance last week,
Speaker 2: poor kiddo. Yeah, so anyway, I lost a week of
Speaker 2: work productivity. But I think you and I talked, and
Speaker 2: it's the constant reminder that I'm privileged to be able
Speaker 2: to just set aside the work and be there with
Speaker 2: my kiddo and the one silver lining. And I think
Speaker 2: a lot of moms with partners, might you know, might
Speaker 2: not judge me too harshly for this, but I was like,
Speaker 2: ooh when husband got sick too, I said, ooh, childcare.
Speaker 2: So I was still able to do the podcast. But
Speaker 2: you know, since the season, how are you, my little Daisy?
Speaker 1: I know I'm going to keete lit okay, day, I
Speaker 1: am good. I actually so I went to Boston because
Speaker 1: I was a bastard. I was taping the Mail Robin's show,
Speaker 1: which was amazing. She's so great, honestly, you put me on.
Speaker 1: I'm still behind so super nice. It's like, who's Jesus
Speaker 1: Christ Main. I didn't know this, but she she of
Speaker 1: course you mentioned Brianna Vission. She had the number twenty
Speaker 1: five podcast, No. Twenty one podcast of all podcasts, like
Speaker 1: in the United States last year, no, no, no, I
Speaker 1: think last year she was number five, but as of
Speaker 1: right now, she's twenty one overall. So I was like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, this is kind of a big demo being.
Speaker 2: The number one book on Amazon. I feel like girl podcasts.
Speaker 1: Yes, But when I was out there, actually had so
Speaker 1: when I go different places, I try to have meetups
Speaker 1: with my mentees, and so I had a meet up.
Speaker 1: It was last minute, so two menties who were available.
Speaker 1: We had dinner at this place.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: I stayed in this hotel called the Envoy and they
Speaker 1: had like a restaurant below and they were both avid
Speaker 1: Brian and Vishion listeners. So I told them Marcy and Tomisha,
Speaker 1: don't get me even say your name. I'm sorry, girl, I.
Speaker 2: Mean you're having a whole meal with her and still
Speaker 2: and not me. But they were so the exact same thing.
Speaker 1: But they were so excited. They're like, oh my god.
Speaker 1: We listened to Brian and bishon Amanda. I said, I
Speaker 1: love you got so much. I know, so I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna shout you out. They were like, I'm like,
Speaker 1: it's your shadow. So that was really awesome. I love that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, in Boston, let me say, because I've got several
Speaker 2: Boston I just don't think of like Boston being the
Speaker 2: capital for Black America. I don't think it is. But
Speaker 2: I'm always like, ooh, black women in Boston, what's it like?
Speaker 2: And I've got a variety of answers. But I know
Speaker 2: this past summer, when one of my Mandy money makers
Speaker 2: went to Boston for the Renaissance show there, she linked
Speaker 2: up with she was just posted in the slack our
Speaker 2: slack channel like any other Boston Makers is going to
Speaker 2: be around, and they were able to meet up. And
Speaker 2: I love that. It's like we've built these communities, so
Speaker 2: now we get to go around and too and have
Speaker 2: friends and like hang out.
Speaker 1: Yes, it was great, honestly, we talked about money, talk
Speaker 1: about businesses. It was just a really great conversation. But
Speaker 1: I just love that people were like it was crazy
Speaker 1: because I told you I went to Puerto Rico for
Speaker 1: that ROI conference held by Rachel Rogers, and the woman
Speaker 1: was like a brand A vision always always delights me,
Speaker 1: not much insta but like, oh my god, Branda Vision,
Speaker 1: which is always crazy to me because I'm just like
Speaker 1: I don't know how many people actually watch us visually.
Speaker 1: I feel like brown a vision.
Speaker 2: Is more like, you know, like we have a lot
Speaker 2: of YouTube. We're like a few thousand YouTube subscribers. I
Speaker 2: think now by the way.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm like, is that on YouTube? So I
Speaker 1: never know, like, oh, okay, you warned. I know you
Speaker 1: listen because the girls listening according to our numbers.
Speaker 2: I don't know how much longer we're going to get
Speaker 2: away with that whole Taylor Swift, you know, when she
Speaker 2: used to get so much shit for being so humble,
Speaker 2: Like I can't believe I won my thirty fifth Grammy. Wow,
Speaker 2: you know little me, But come on, now, we've been
Speaker 2: in the game for a minute.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we weren't known for it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's speaking of being in the game for a minute.
Speaker 2: I told you. I woke up like I couldn't sleep
Speaker 2: because Remy was up again. He was sick for some reason.
Speaker 2: I was like, I wonder what I sounded like during
Speaker 2: the pandemic with a baby, And I went back a
Speaker 2: few years to our catalog and listen to the episodes
Speaker 2: before and after that. I'm so grateful that we have
Speaker 2: this show. It's like a time capsule and I do
Speaker 2: think I sounded younger, but I also sounded so tired.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: I was really struggling with anxiety then, and I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: I forgot I cried in that episode. Anyway, show has
Speaker 2: just been But what really cracked me out. The show's
Speaker 2: been so great for so long. But what cracked me
Speaker 2: up was that the this is back when I was
Speaker 2: editing before Emani. We hadn't gotten our new podcast partner.
Speaker 2: I forgot to cut the beginning of the show when
Speaker 2: I was like, Okay, Tiffany, do it again, get closer
Speaker 2: to the mic. So if you go back to that episode,
Speaker 2: you're gonna hear some stage momming. And I sound stern too.
Speaker 2: I'm like, dang I did. I was like, I sounded
Speaker 2: like you had done it before.
Speaker 1: First of all, I love it, you know what you
Speaker 1: brought out? Like, do you remember I didn't? Really, you're
Speaker 1: just saying it now. Remember there was like like a
Speaker 1: year where every episode I'm tired, That's what like I
Speaker 1: was saying, Yeah, Like, you just brought it back, and
Speaker 1: I was just tired.
Speaker 3: I didn't.
Speaker 1: I was so overworked and overwhelmed, and it literally just
Speaker 1: brought it back because I don't feel like that now.
Speaker 1: But every opening we're like, hey girl, how you doing? Wow?
Speaker 2: What a skip this question?
Speaker 1: What a difference therapy makes? Like for real? Yes, I
Speaker 1: was so overwhelmed worked. I was so overwhelmed. I didn't
Speaker 1: not have said boundaries. So I felt like I was
Speaker 1: always exhausted because I was. But I don't feel like that.
Speaker 1: I just look now thinking about it, I'm like, Wow,
Speaker 1: I used to always be tired, and I used to think,
Speaker 1: is this how it always is? That You're just gonna
Speaker 1: always be exhausted because business got you like this? And
Speaker 1: I'm like, naw, I rebuke that.
Speaker 2: So I rebuke it in the name of the Lord.
Speaker 2: There's one thing that I said in that show that
Speaker 2: really resonates with what you just said, which is when
Speaker 2: I was going through that crazy, that like really difficult
Speaker 2: postpartum time on the show, I was articulating it really well.
Speaker 2: I said, I was pound the back. I said, right now,
Speaker 2: the fog or the fog feels opaque, the fog feels
Speaker 2: like it's never going to clear. But and then a
Speaker 2: week later, I'm like, the fog or however long. A
Speaker 2: couple of weeks later, I had started seeing a psychiatrist,
Speaker 2: my therapist more regularly, and I was like, okay, so
Speaker 2: the difference is the fog feels like eventually it will lift,
Speaker 2: like I see the other side, which is so it
Speaker 2: just is so indicative of how when you're in this
Speaker 2: like depressive episode or anxiety spiral, do you feel like
Speaker 2: it's going to always be that way or can you
Speaker 2: get yourself to a place where you at least recognize
Speaker 2: this is a moment in time, it will pass. And
Speaker 2: once I once that clicked for me, that helps so
Speaker 2: much with any kind of and those anxiety loops that
Speaker 2: those little rides I go on sometimes because we're never
Speaker 2: for me, I'm never perfectly un anxious. You know, it's
Speaker 2: always going to come back. There's going to be life.
Speaker 2: Life is always going to life. But what really has
Speaker 2: carried me through those times is just like, Okay, this
Speaker 2: is not forever. Don't get in that spiral of like
Speaker 2: shout out to.
Speaker 1: Growth, I know, like the Kelly Growth. We're doing the
Speaker 1: Kelly hands from well I speaking of growth and good news.
Speaker 1: Me and Mandy we're talking with line as we always
Speaker 1: zoop for this about Wall Street Journal, that awesome article.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, let's read that headline because I had not
Speaker 2: seen this yet because I listen. I don't subscribe to.
Speaker 1: The Low Street either, but I just saw a lot
Speaker 1: of people posting it.
Speaker 2: Black investors Yeah, oh you go you read no.
Speaker 1: No, no, god, oh, they they're so polite.
Speaker 2: Black investors are the biggest new group of stock buyers.
Speaker 2: Nearly forty percent of Black Americans own stocks in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty two, up from just under a third and twenty sixteen,
Speaker 2: according to the Federal Reserve. That's that's like almost a
Speaker 2: ten point Can I do math? It's like an eight
Speaker 2: or ten point, I don't know, increase. That's huge.
Speaker 1: And so it says, like, let me see, why do
Speaker 1: they think this is Let's see. Let's see it says
Speaker 1: approximately seventy percent of surveys of survey of the survey's
Speaker 1: black participants under forty were investing. Wow, so under forty,
Speaker 1: it's seventy percent compared to sixty percent of their white
Speaker 1: cow apart, hold up, why do you know? Yes, I'll
Speaker 1: be that again. A survey by Aerial Investments in Charles
Speaker 1: Schwap revealed that the growth is led by young investors
Speaker 1: under forty, Approximately seventy percent of the surveys, black participants
Speaker 1: under forty were investing compared to sixty percent of their
Speaker 1: white counterparts. So they're even out pacing. Of course, we
Speaker 1: don't know how long, I don't know how big the
Speaker 1: survey sample sizes, but according to the survey, they're even
Speaker 1: out pacing white investors. You're seeing topics of money and
Speaker 1: investing coming up at dinner tables slightly more among young
Speaker 1: black families than ever before. They feel like it's fueled
Speaker 1: by mobile apps, commission free trading participation in four one
Speaker 1: K crypto means stocks, and social media experts noted young
Speaker 1: black investors increase access to financial tools and information. So
Speaker 1: two things. One, look what happens when access is I mean,
Speaker 1: because you know they love to tell you, oh, people
Speaker 1: need to not buying Jordans or whatever Shenanigan, Right, Oh
Speaker 1: you want to get that weaker, but you know what,
Speaker 1: the weave can be bought as well. Yes, So what
Speaker 1: happens is that one, we know that there was a
Speaker 1: lack of access before, not only to like low cost investing,
Speaker 1: but also to information. Something in here to me that
Speaker 1: kind of I feel like they missed a mark on
Speaker 1: is that it wasn't just like, oh, there are apps
Speaker 1: and things like that, do you understand, Like we know
Speaker 1: the people including ourselves that have like led the charge
Speaker 1: of like access to financial education, but we're talking about
Speaker 1: specifically investing during the pandemic. I mean Wall Street Chrapper
Speaker 1: blew up earning your leisure with Market Mondays, especially Ian Dunlap,
Speaker 1: the master investor Terry Ijama of Trade and Travels. She
Speaker 1: she's been on the show, but also for two or
Speaker 1: three years straight, she was the number one course creator
Speaker 1: on the teachable platform. Yeah, Like, I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: we both know Tila Hokum Many Broadway, who was making
Speaker 1: eight figures a year teaching investing, especially the black women.
Speaker 1: So there there is a cadre of black educators in
Speaker 1: the space who were literally creating tools, products, resources that
Speaker 1: help people to navigate what sometimes can be the scary
Speaker 1: process of investing in the stock market. In the market. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and so you got to learn from people who were
Speaker 1: culturally relevant as well as experts in their space. That
Speaker 1: part is important.
Speaker 2: Not enough, yeah girl, right?
Speaker 1: That culture right? So I just I like, so I
Speaker 1: wish that they really leaned into that more and here
Speaker 1: that it wasn't just the apps, because the act doesn't
Speaker 1: the app's been here. It was that there was somebody
Speaker 1: to explained to you in a way that made sense.
Speaker 1: This is how you do it.
Speaker 2: Give the black financial influencers their flowers. That is what
Speaker 2: I'm saying. There is this. I remember doing an interview
Speaker 2: for one of the oldest and crustiest and most high
Speaker 2: row magazines, The Economist. Yeah, two years ago, was twenty
Speaker 2: twenty one, and it was an article and then reporter
Speaker 2: and I have a background in journalism, y'all know that,
Speaker 2: so I understand what the angle was. They were trying
Speaker 2: to do a story on TikTok influencers and is it
Speaker 2: safe to get your advice from social media? And I
Speaker 2: was listening to the questions from the writer and it
Speaker 2: was clear that she was thinking, Oh, this is not
Speaker 2: good because like, y'all aren't experts, you're not certified and
Speaker 2: da da da da da, And that is the old
Speaker 2: school traditional gatekeeping. Oh, but spent a lot of money
Speaker 2: to get this, Like what we say is a valid expert,
Speaker 2: a valid source of information. You know, this certified financial planner,
Speaker 2: this investment advisor who's going to sell you a bunch
Speaker 2: of insurance that you don't need so I think that
Speaker 2: media is still coming around to the fact that there
Speaker 2: is legitimate power, legitimate good that can come from the
Speaker 2: wealth of like the you know, democratization of information, the
Speaker 2: availability of it, and the fact that we're taking it
Speaker 2: into our own hands and educating people who look like us.
Speaker 2: And yeah, it's about dan time. I feel like we
Speaker 2: get that validation. Not that we need it, but no
Speaker 2: more of this. But is it really helpful? Is it
Speaker 2: really safe?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I think the best educators, like all the people you named,
Speaker 2: are giving well rounded yes, you know, information so that
Speaker 2: people aren't out there taking huge risks. You know that
Speaker 2: they shouldn't because we care about because they you know,
Speaker 2: we are speaking to our audience and we happen to
Speaker 2: care a lot about them, yes, and not doing a
Speaker 2: bait and switch and not just taking their money and
Speaker 2: running for the hills and saying good luck with that
Speaker 2: we care and that you can't. It's hard to put
Speaker 2: a price tag or a certification on that.
Speaker 1: But because like, what's the alternative? Before you were locked
Speaker 1: out of this space, and so now do I think like,
Speaker 1: certainly discernment still has to be used no matter what.
Speaker 1: That's what's so great that there are a the myriad
Speaker 1: of people to listen to and you can compare and contrast, like,
Speaker 1: well Terry said this, but master Investor said this. So
Speaker 1: you know, what you're finding is a more educated consumer
Speaker 1: who is asking questions now like well, why should I
Speaker 1: just get that in the atf Well should I put
Speaker 1: my money at the marketplace? Because here's the thing. So
Speaker 1: there is this black millionaire. His name is Cedric Nash,
Speaker 1: and he is on the road to make like a
Speaker 1: thousand millionaires. And Cedric is just like this awesome guy
Speaker 1: that I met, like at a conference some of the
Speaker 1: years back and earn your leisures investments, and Cedric is like,
Speaker 1: I have built wealth for myself to a place where
Speaker 1: I really don't even have to work anymore, Like tremendous wealth.
Speaker 1: Not like there's nothing wrong with a few million like me,
Speaker 1: but I'm talking about will will you know? So Cedric
Speaker 1: has been teaching these free classes that I've been like,
Speaker 1: gonna be speaking at one of them every Monday. It
Speaker 1: was speaking of it to Day's Monday, right, Yeah, that's right,
Speaker 1: every Monday. No, but every Monday it's free and awesome.
Speaker 1: Every Monday, Cedric just teaches a free class like, what's
Speaker 1: a budget? I mean that bunch a budget, which is stock.
Speaker 1: What's a bond? It's awesome. So the purpose of the channels. Yes,
Speaker 1: it's fifty two weeks long, it doesn't cost anything. What
Speaker 1: I love about it is that the purpose is you
Speaker 1: kind of do this worksheet to see where your net
Speaker 1: worth is and by the end you get to see, like,
Speaker 1: my networth has grown. So he had people who took
Speaker 1: the challenge last year who were taking it again. They
Speaker 1: were like, it was so awesome, completely free. Cedric is
Speaker 1: just like, I want to look around and see other
Speaker 1: people like me on the private island, on the yacht,
Speaker 1: you know, and that's what you so desire. And one
Speaker 1: guy was on there was like I was able to
Speaker 1: raise my net worth one hundred and forty seven percent
Speaker 1: from before and it was awesome. So he's back for more.
Speaker 1: So I say all that to say that, you know,
Speaker 1: there are people are people who look like us out
Speaker 1: here who are wanting what's best and are wanting to
Speaker 1: share that information so other people have access. Because Cedric
Speaker 1: is like, you know, my mentors didn't look like me,
Speaker 1: and I wonder like, why are they're not more of
Speaker 1: us here? And maybe it's just a lack of access
Speaker 1: to education. And so I just love that there are
Speaker 1: people out here who were just out here wanting what's
Speaker 1: best for us. And so, yeah, you don't have to
Speaker 1: navigate the space by yourself. There's so many financial educators
Speaker 1: in general, but you know, more and more, you're seeing
Speaker 1: more and more financial educators who are focusing on investing
Speaker 1: in its most traditional sense, So you don't have to
Speaker 1: like wonder, like what do I put? What do I
Speaker 1: do with my four one k? Like Centric said something
Speaker 1: really smart in last week's class. He said, there was
Speaker 1: so much wealth loss because there was a mass exodus.
Speaker 1: Studies show of black people from the market when the
Speaker 1: recession hit two and eight one, yeah, and nine and
Speaker 1: ten right, because all of a sudden market crash and
Speaker 1: we were afraid because we didn't have the education, so
Speaker 1: we pulled our money out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because we were.
Speaker 1: Like, oh my gosh, I had ten thousand.
Speaker 2: Now didn't have any money to pull out that baby, oky, So.
Speaker 1: We pulled our money out, and a lot of us
Speaker 1: pulled our money out to just you know, have access
Speaker 1: to Like I pulled my money out just so I
Speaker 1: could pay my mortgage, you know, because you know, so
Speaker 1: we pulled our money out. He said, the problem is
Speaker 1: between two thousand, like nine and two thousand, it was
Speaker 1: like sixteen or seventeen or whatever. Nineteen it was the
Speaker 1: longest bull run of this bock market in our history.
Speaker 1: So a bull run is when the market yields. It
Speaker 1: grows year after year after year. So when it's a bear,
Speaker 1: the market is contracting, meaning like you're losing money. Bull
Speaker 1: runs are when the market grows. So he said, we
Speaker 1: had the longest bull worm in history. And guess who
Speaker 1: wasn't in the market, My people, because we had pulled
Speaker 1: our money out because and I mean I'm not I
Speaker 1: was one of them. I didn't know. But folks understood
Speaker 1: that like ooh, when there's a contraction, the market will
Speaker 1: expand later, just stick with it. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: put even more money in when things are low. And
Speaker 1: so we didn't. And then what do we do. We
Speaker 1: came back into the market twenty sixteen, seventeen after the
Speaker 1: bull wing was over, when the market was back at
Speaker 1: the high, and so we lost all of that potential
Speaker 1: growth and income and wealth. And so when he said it,
Speaker 1: I was like, wow.
Speaker 2: Don't you see?
Speaker 1: Oh, go ahead, go ahead, No, no, no, go ahead.
Speaker 2: I was just going to bring it around to show
Speaker 2: that even if you missed, it's not like you missed
Speaker 2: an opportunity and that was it. Because then I do
Speaker 2: feel like what this data shows is that we were
Speaker 2: ready and educated for the post pandemic you know, bull market,
Speaker 2: because the market tanked when the pandemic hit, but then
Speaker 2: it was like gangbusters. Yes, yes, so it was the
Speaker 2: right And I think that because a lot of the
Speaker 2: experts today like yourself, who experienced that, went through it
Speaker 2: and can say, okay, now we have the we felt
Speaker 2: that we know what that's like, and still we're going
Speaker 2: to do the the you know, the more intelligent way
Speaker 2: of investing, the strategic way, and understand that these lulls happen,
Speaker 2: but you don't want to miss out on the upside.
Speaker 3: Yeah, right time. I know.
Speaker 1: I'm just like, look at us, like, honestly, black folks,
Speaker 1: I'm just if you're not black, you know, just come
Speaker 1: on into the room. You can have some cake too. Well,
Speaker 1: it's like this this is so salvatory, you know, like
Speaker 1: look at us.
Speaker 2: My daddy got his first four oh one k see
Speaker 2: in the past, I opened it for him and he
Speaker 2: recently asked me to check on it, and I was like,
Speaker 2: you're up ten percent, look at you. Yeah, he's sixty.
Speaker 2: So I'm just saying, for you late investors, there's no
Speaker 2: such thing you have time. That's a really good segue, though,
Speaker 2: because today's guest. Today's guest is someone who I met
Speaker 2: a couple of years ago and is one of the
Speaker 2: newer influencers like you were just saying, tip and specifically
Speaker 2: is making huge waves and focusing on the Latina Latino
Speaker 2: Hispanic market, I hate to say market, Hispanic community, and
Speaker 2: is just doing extraordinary things. And I think in addition
Speaker 2: to the strides that we've seen and black investing, I
Speaker 2: want to know how's looking for all the minorities, you know,
Speaker 2: for all of us over here who are making up
Speaker 2: for lost time. So we're to be joined by Gigi Gonzalez.
Speaker 2: You has a brand new book out called in Cash,
Speaker 2: and she is going to be here live in the studio.
Speaker 2: Look at that. Yeah, hold hey, hold it up. Let
Speaker 2: people take a screenshot to watch it on YouTube. All right,
Speaker 2: So we'll take a quick break and be right back
Speaker 2: with our guest. Okay, hid, but.
Speaker 1: We have to come back and say, oh, you know,
Speaker 1: I've got a high school equivalent to Spanish. So although
Speaker 1: Mandy speaks like she's straight the Midicanka, but I got
Speaker 1: my little like me Nueva liber Liberal.
Speaker 2: I love that you put the black s on the
Speaker 2: end of Henday.
Speaker 1: She said, Oh my god, it's like Shrimp's Walmart's aldis
Speaker 1: write the black ass.
Speaker 3: I am so to be in your presence, and I
Speaker 3: remember thinking like, what if one day I get to
Speaker 3: be on the brunt ambition? And I honestly thought I
Speaker 3: was so out of my like reach because you guys
Speaker 3: are so big and man day got to meet you
Speaker 3: at fin Con, Tiffany, when you recently followed me, I
Speaker 3: was like, oh my god. So I'm just very thankful
Speaker 3: honestly to be here. I'm a big fan of both
Speaker 3: of you.
Speaker 2: Oh like wise, I was so sad I didn't get
Speaker 2: to see y'all again at fin Con this year. But
Speaker 2: you know, my honeymoon girl.
Speaker 3: I had a good Excuseaby, Yeah, yeah, you had.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you had a lot going on.
Speaker 3: I had my honeymoon and overdue honeymoon, and Tiffany, you
Speaker 3: boycott think on right if I remember.
Speaker 1: No working on I'm like, let's just say I will
Speaker 1: be kind of scared if I came around. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: said the first year, I would, I would, girl, I
Speaker 1: feel like they would score me off.
Speaker 3: No, they wouldn't. I think they would make it right.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's enough of the news.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, people to they would be lucky to have.
Speaker 1: I like fin Con.
Speaker 2: Yeah, if you want to be treated like the first lady,
Speaker 2: I think you should go because you don't understand Tiffany,
Speaker 2: you are.
Speaker 1: The queen of.
Speaker 2: Everybody looks. I don't You're just gonna be you just
Speaker 2: have to like have a no hug sign and.
Speaker 1: Just maybe I will. Maybe I will go back because
Speaker 1: I would like what I love about Finn one. The
Speaker 1: breakout sessions are great, but I don't see the people
Speaker 1: aren't just really amazing. Like that's where I met all
Speaker 1: my financial mestide, that's where me and Manny started to
Speaker 1: go together.
Speaker 3: I love that I didn't know that.
Speaker 1: I propose, Yeah, that's origin story a podcast and I
Speaker 1: was like, I don't know what that is, but okay.
Speaker 3: I love that I didn't know that that's magic. Wow.
Speaker 1: Yes, but honestly I would love to learn, Like, okay,
Speaker 1: so like more about kind of like your history. How'd
Speaker 1: you get here. Yeah, like, what's the Brown and your Ambition?
Speaker 1: Like yeah, like, cause, first of all, I was like
Speaker 1: Eva Longoria, Wow, oh you to come out swinging?
Speaker 3: Who is she dm me a video too? I don't
Speaker 3: know if you got to see that I share that recently.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So people like to say we're besties, but she
Speaker 3: doesn't follow me back yet. So until she follows me back,
Speaker 3: I can't claim that we're besties.
Speaker 2: I have followed your relationship, your relationship, Can I call
Speaker 2: it that with Eva Longoria from when you went to
Speaker 2: her screening? Yes? And I anyway, but yeah, what Tiffany said,
Speaker 2: tell us all about you, Gigi, and about the book
Speaker 2: and everything you have going awesome.
Speaker 3: Thank you both so much, and again, I'm honored to
Speaker 3: be on the Brown Ambition podcast. I am such a
Speaker 3: big fan. For those that don't know me, my name
Speaker 3: is Giovanna Gonzalez, but most people know me as Gigi
Speaker 3: or the first gen Mentor. I'm a TikTok influencer, speaker
Speaker 3: and now the author of the best selling book and Cash.
Speaker 3: So I'm so excited to be here and talk all
Speaker 3: things money. But let's see, how did I get my start?
Speaker 3: I think like most of us that are in the space.
Speaker 3: We started in the traditional corporate route, at least that's
Speaker 3: my story. I did things as I was told, right,
Speaker 3: I go to college, get a good degree, get a
Speaker 3: nice office job. So I did that. I majored in
Speaker 3: economics when teach Santa Barbara go Gauchos, and then I
Speaker 3: got a job, first in insurance, then I switched to
Speaker 3: investment management, where I spent the majority of my career
Speaker 3: and during my twenties, even though I was making decent money,
Speaker 3: I still struggled a lot with money, which was really
Speaker 3: frustrating to me because I'm like, I did everything right.
Speaker 3: You guys told me to go to school, you told
Speaker 3: me to get a good job. Why am I still
Speaker 3: laying patrick to paycheck and living in financial chaos? And
Speaker 3: it's then that I realized that it was because I
Speaker 3: wasn't managing the money that I had a well, and
Speaker 3: that was because obviously the education system doesn't teach us
Speaker 3: this stuff. And I'm the daughter of Mexican immigrants. My
Speaker 3: parents were living in survival mode, so they really didn't
Speaker 3: have the space to pass any sort of financial teachings
Speaker 3: to me, and they were learning the new system all
Speaker 3: on their own. So that's when I kind of had
Speaker 3: that wake up moment of like, oh, I need to
Speaker 3: learn how this stuff works, otherwise I'm always going to
Speaker 3: be on the struggle bus. And uh. The way that
Speaker 3: I did that was I consumed as many money books
Speaker 3: as I could. I read over fifty personal finance books
Speaker 3: until I felt that I mastered the language. And then
Speaker 3: once I learned what I learned, I implemented my financial
Speaker 3: plan to get out of debt, build my investing, all
Speaker 3: that good stuff. But there was definitely a fire inside
Speaker 3: me that was mad. I'm like, why wasn't I given
Speaker 3: this information before? Like I wasted years that I could
Speaker 3: have been moving differently. So I looked to share this
Speaker 3: new knowledge with other women of color, and I got
Speaker 3: in touch with the White WCA SO nonprofit destors women
Speaker 3: of color, and I became a volunteer financial educator. So
Speaker 3: that was my life for a long time. In twenty nineteen,
Speaker 3: I was a corporate boddy working in my investment management job,
Speaker 3: and then on the side I was volunteering and it
Speaker 3: was my passion and I love doing it. But all
Speaker 3: of that changed in March of twenty twenty one, when
Speaker 3: I started putting TikTok content on financial tips, so similar
Speaker 3: to how I was already doing in my community. I
Speaker 3: started sharing this content on TikTok, and because of the
Speaker 3: bigness of the Internet, that took a life of its
Speaker 3: own and I became the first gend mentor. This all
Speaker 3: happened in March of twenty twenty one. I quit my
Speaker 3: job three months later. A lot of people were like, wow,
Speaker 3: that's so fast. Were were just like dying to be
Speaker 3: a content creator? Absolutely not. I love my job. I'm
Speaker 3: one of the rare people actually liked my job. I
Speaker 3: like my boss, but I wasn't allowed to be a
Speaker 3: TikToker and to be working in my very old school
Speaker 3: traditional job. So I had to make a choice.
Speaker 2: Could you even invest working in you? Because some people
Speaker 2: don't even get to invest, which is.
Speaker 3: You do, but you have to get your transactions approved
Speaker 3: ahead of time, so it takes like a two day delay. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 3: everything has. It's very very regulated, as it should be,
Speaker 3: as it should be. I wish our contest was that regulated. Honestly,
Speaker 3: let's talk.
Speaker 1: About that on podcast.
Speaker 3: But buddy, who's yeah, so I've been I quit my
Speaker 3: job in June of twenty twenty one and I've been
Speaker 3: doing this for two and a half years now, and
Speaker 3: I love it and I'm making an impact. I'm starting
Speaker 3: my community, and I know that I'm living in my purpose.
Speaker 3: And I've met so many amazing, like minded women like
Speaker 3: you too. So it's it's just I can't believe this
Speaker 3: in my life. I still get to pinch myself.
Speaker 2: I think it's so great because you're part of this
Speaker 2: new class of Latina or Latino you know, financial educators.
Speaker 2: What's what's the right thing to say is to ask
Speaker 2: latino latina. Honestly, it seems to me saying LATINX. No,
Speaker 2: we do not mean something.
Speaker 3: Like no, we're not saying LATINX because people will throw hands.
Speaker 3: They can they Oh my goodness, they Okay, we hate that. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I hate that too. So you're probably say saying hispanic
Speaker 3: or Latino. I like to say Latine because that's exclusive,
Speaker 3: that includes you know, non binary folks. But people will still.
Speaker 2: Find me that's what I'm trying.
Speaker 3: Latina's Yeah, but people will still find also.
Speaker 2: Don't want to assume your gender because the Latina I'm like, oh,
Speaker 2: is that her? Know?
Speaker 3: She her?
Speaker 2: Okay, listen, better to sound dumb asking the question, y'all
Speaker 2: than to be dune to not ask right anyway, this
Speaker 2: new class of Latine influencers and educators, because there were
Speaker 2: I mean were there back in back in two thousand
Speaker 2: and forty when Divany and or Hidingnestly it feels like
Speaker 2: there were barely any black educators at the time, let alone,
Speaker 2: or maybe I just wasn't looking, but for sure at
Speaker 2: FINCN twenty twenty one or twenty twenty two, yeah, twenty two,
Speaker 2: when I was there, it was I mean, it's you.
Speaker 2: We got Genice. Now we have stephaniquin Zalez, Like, there's
Speaker 2: just these really great like forgetting.
Speaker 3: A bar, we bravely go, Maribell from mar Matters, Maria
Speaker 3: fir Living. There's a lot of wonderful women, And I
Speaker 3: don't think it's any best in Latino. Which one, Yes,
Speaker 3: investing Latina, I've had, I've gotten to me have finn Con. Yeah,
Speaker 3: a lot of wonderful women, and I don't think it's
Speaker 3: any surprise that it's recent because I think a lot
Speaker 3: of us kind of uh awakened after George Floyd, the
Speaker 3: murder of George Floyd, and we're like, Okay, we need
Speaker 3: to show up as ourselves and stop playing small and
Speaker 3: take up space. So I think that definitely motivated me
Speaker 3: to be louder. And I'm here and I have my
Speaker 3: own issues to talk about and I don't care if
Speaker 3: you don't want to listen to them, but I want
Speaker 3: to talk about them.
Speaker 2: And you're fully embracing.
Speaker 1: Go ahead, Sorry, Mandy, What do you think is like uniquely?
Speaker 1: There are some things that like are uniquely I feel
Speaker 1: like the black experience brings out there are some unique
Speaker 1: challenges that like being black presents itself when it comes
Speaker 1: to you know, financial like access, right, Like we know
Speaker 1: that there's a black wealth gap, we know that there's
Speaker 1: red lining. There's just like this uh visceral racism that
Speaker 1: even now, I mean like a social media friend of
Speaker 1: mine has something called the Fearless Fun that just raises
Speaker 1: money for black women in entrepreneurship, and they suit her
Speaker 1: to say, no, you can't do that, and so there's
Speaker 1: just this like campaign against black people getting ahead. But
Speaker 1: I love that, Like you know, Cultura.
Speaker 4: Cash, Okay, let's cool, cool cool, oh cool, okay, cool Toura,
Speaker 4: Yeah there you go, Okay, cool Toura.
Speaker 1: Meanwhile, my my my niece meet me. I didn't even
Speaker 1: tell you this of Mandy. So my I have I
Speaker 1: have two nieces, but one of them goes to a
Speaker 1: school that is like I want to say, like sixty
Speaker 1: or seventy percent Latine, right, and so all her friends,
Speaker 1: like her best friend. I forget her little best friend's names.
Speaker 1: So anyway, she told her mother, my niece is six.
Speaker 1: She said, oh, mommy, for my birthday, I want to
Speaker 1: go to DR. I was like, where is DR. She's
Speaker 1: all women's the public. I was like, what do you
Speaker 1: know about? But she said her best friend. She's like,
Speaker 1: that's what she's from. And she says so beautiful. I
Speaker 1: just because I just came back from perto Rica. So
Speaker 1: she was like, girl, the girls be going out. I
Speaker 1: want to go to And I love that because her
Speaker 1: accent because like when she starts sitting, says certain Spanish
Speaker 1: word is so on potant because at school, like she's
Speaker 1: only hearing it the correct way. So anyway, I just
Speaker 1: thought that was not the girl.
Speaker 3: She knows what.
Speaker 1: Wait till she finds the internet, right, But I just like,
Speaker 1: what you know? You wrote this book who touur Cash?
Speaker 1: And like, so what unique experiences you know? Do you
Speaker 1: recognize as being a Latine yourself that you bring to
Speaker 1: the table when it comes to personal finance, Like why
Speaker 1: should there be because somebod somebody might say like, well,
Speaker 1: why is it black?
Speaker 2: You guys?
Speaker 1: Why are guys talking about Latine? Why gay or LB like?
Speaker 1: But what is it like? What are some of the
Speaker 1: challenges They're like, No, this is unique to this community.
Speaker 1: It needs to be like highlighted.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And honestly, that's why I respect both of you
Speaker 3: for going to publishing route because I know you guys
Speaker 3: had a fight for your book. I did not have
Speaker 3: that fight in me. I have fights for other people
Speaker 3: in other ways, but I just did not want to
Speaker 3: have to fight a white publishing house on why this
Speaker 3: book was needed. So so I went traditional sorry, hybrid publishing,
Speaker 3: And thank goodness for the TikTok Latx Creative grant that
Speaker 3: allowed me to do that. It gave me the funding
Speaker 3: to be able to hire a hybrid publisher because it's
Speaker 3: not cheap. But yeah, there's a lot of unique issues
Speaker 3: in the first gen money experience. And for anybody that
Speaker 3: isn't familiar with that term, first gen is typically the
Speaker 3: first to be born in America, the first to maybe
Speaker 3: they immigrate here with their parents as children, so really
Speaker 3: all they know is the American way of life, but
Speaker 3: they still have strong cultural ties to their immigrant roots.
Speaker 3: So for me, for example, I'm the daughter of Mexican immigrants.
Speaker 3: My parents immigrated here in the nineties. I believe you're
Speaker 3: first gen Tiffany, Are you first gen? You are, right? Yeah?
Speaker 3: I Amia Nigerian, right, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So there's a lot of unique challenges that come with
Speaker 3: being a first generation wealth builder. First, I like to
Speaker 3: point out that we have a different starting line than
Speaker 3: a lot of our middle class white peers, and that's
Speaker 3: because we don't get access to financial education at home. Because,
Speaker 3: like I mentioned, our parents are just immigrants in a
Speaker 3: new country, trying to learn a new language, experiencing racism,
Speaker 3: trying to get by on these low income jobs. They
Speaker 3: do not have the space to master the financial system
Speaker 3: and then pass on those teachings to their children, where
Speaker 3: a lot of white middle class Americans maybe they do
Speaker 3: learn the basics about hey, this is a checking account,
Speaker 3: Hey you should probably avoid that. We don't ever hear
Speaker 3: any of those money conversations at home. If anything, money
Speaker 3: talk is very taboo in our culture. There's a phrase
Speaker 3: that's very popular. No, we don't talk about money like No,
Speaker 3: that's rude. And I know that we're not the only
Speaker 3: culture that experiences it, but it's definitely very prevalent in
Speaker 3: the Hispanic Latino Latink community as well. As we are
Speaker 3: not on the receiving end of generating wealth because our
Speaker 3: parents came here with nothing. They came here for the
Speaker 3: opportunity for us to have more, and that's what we're
Speaker 3: doing by getting college educations and professional jobs. But you know,
Speaker 3: a lot of our white middle class peers, they do
Speaker 3: have this advantage of having some level of generational wealth.
Speaker 3: And I point this out because I used to think
Speaker 3: it was only the one percenters that got to benefit
Speaker 3: from this stuff, but I learned through research that no,
Speaker 3: it's also you know, your typical white middle class Americans
Speaker 3: that's been here a couple of generations. Maybe the grandparents,
Speaker 3: the great grandparents are the ones who immigrate to this country.
Speaker 3: So yeah, the more entrenched you are in the US
Speaker 3: financial system because you've been living longer, you will pass
Speaker 3: on those financial teachings to family, right and pass on
Speaker 3: generational wealth to help pay for college or if Grandma
Speaker 3: Gertrude kicks a bucket, you might get a little windfall
Speaker 3: of a little inheritance. Yeah, I love saying that one,
Speaker 3: and the book too, so so yeah, we don't. That's
Speaker 3: a completely different experience from what's going to happen with
Speaker 3: me when my might not. Now that's what I call her,
Speaker 3: what I dread the day she dies, because not only
Speaker 3: will we lose the matriarch of our family, but we
Speaker 3: will also be expected to pitch in to help cover
Speaker 3: burial costs and any other sort of expenses that come up.
Speaker 3: And again that's very different from white middle class America
Speaker 3: that gets some sort of small inheritance. And then lastly,
Speaker 3: a lot of us because our parents come from immigrant
Speaker 3: roots and they didn't have the ability to save for
Speaker 3: the future, for retirement or anything like that, we have
Speaker 3: additional financial responsibility, similar to the black community with the
Speaker 3: Black tax, which I'm sure you talk about a lot.
Speaker 3: And yeah, for us, we're so family oriented, so we
Speaker 3: can't just turn our back on our people. So we
Speaker 3: want to give, but we also can't give to the
Speaker 3: point where we don't have nothing left for ourselves at
Speaker 3: the end of the day. So that's a big focus
Speaker 3: of the book.
Speaker 2: I mean, married to a Dominican here, and it's like
Speaker 2: his parents are building a house now, they're renovating their
Speaker 2: house in dr And they had a washer drwer delivered
Speaker 2: to our house because then they have to ship it
Speaker 2: to dr and somehow that's cheaper than just buying a
Speaker 2: washer dryer on the island. I guess you can't anyway.
Speaker 2: And I was like, okay, cool, you know, and then
Speaker 2: my husband's like, yes, we're paying for that washer dry Yeah.
Speaker 2: I was like, oka, like yeah, I've had to uh yeah,
Speaker 2: I've had to like factor that into our budget. But
Speaker 2: that being said, like they have been generous with us
Speaker 2: in the past, with like helping a little bit with
Speaker 2: our wedding. And like, I mean his dad like just
Speaker 2: like you said, he's first generation and his dad came
Speaker 2: here and worked I mean several jobs before finally scrounging
Speaker 2: up enough money to like buy a grocery store in
Speaker 2: the Bronx. And I mean and he never saw his
Speaker 2: kids because he was he worked up until last year.
Speaker 2: The man was still working till eleven pm, not there
Speaker 2: on Christmas, not there on you know. Anyway, And I
Speaker 2: have with marrying my husband sort of also married that
Speaker 2: married into that mindset of they brought themselves here. They
Speaker 2: made it possible for my husband to you know, create
Speaker 2: the American dream that he has and to pay it forward. Yeah.
Speaker 2: But my little, my little Grenga heart was a little
Speaker 2: bit like, but that's my But.
Speaker 1: That's how it is. And I mean, honestly, so much
Speaker 1: of my parents' money went back home, you know, like
Speaker 1: to Nigeria because there's just not the access. And so
Speaker 1: I mean I paid off my parents' house. You know,
Speaker 1: my husband was still here. I was like, just the
Speaker 1: many ideas to love to pay off their house. I mean,
Speaker 1: he was down for it because his father wasn't his life.
Speaker 1: His mother had passed away. But that's just the expectation
Speaker 1: is that you are going to help. Even now I've
Speaker 1: got you know, WhatsApp, you know, you know, our foreigners
Speaker 1: love what's hey, cousin, I'm like, who is this? Everybody
Speaker 1: want to coin and what's that? So yeah, that's certainly
Speaker 1: something like first gen. And I wonder too because when
Speaker 1: I taught in Newark, I had a lot, a lot
Speaker 1: a lot of Hispanic young children and their parents spoke
Speaker 1: mostly Spanish, a little bit of a mostly Spanish, and
Speaker 1: I just was always so amazed at how my three
Speaker 1: and four year olds would be these amazing translators. You know,
Speaker 1: my mommy said that, Mommy, you know, let's close, and
Speaker 1: I'm like looking back and forth, like meanwhile, gino, I
Speaker 1: told you to tie your shoe, but you over here
Speaker 1: like you one translator, because these kids are so smart. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and so I wondered that that also play a room
Speaker 1: because financial education is not often translated. Yeah, like in
Speaker 1: a way that is culturally relevant, you know, like whether
Speaker 1: it's the language itself or just even in a meaningful way.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, And you very much spoke to me. I
Speaker 3: was a child, and a lot of my audiences translating
Speaker 3: at parent teacher conferences, or translating doctor appointments, or even
Speaker 3: translating tax documents that come in the mill that the
Speaker 3: parents are.
Speaker 1: Like, what is this?
Speaker 3: It looks important and then you're just like a ten
Speaker 3: year old, you know what it means, but you speak
Speaker 3: some English.
Speaker 2: Apartment internal revenues.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So a lot of us have been parentified in
Speaker 3: that way. I'm fortunate that I don't. Maybe I need
Speaker 3: to do more, more deeper dive into my inner child,
Speaker 3: but I don't remember any bad memories from that, but
Speaker 3: I know a lot of people in my community do
Speaker 3: of having to deliver bad health news at the doctor, right,
Speaker 3: So it's it's it's tough, it's tough for a kid,
Speaker 3: and and yeah, that's just been for a lot of us.
Speaker 3: It's a it's a collective experience that we experienced. But
Speaker 3: on top of that, you know, with yes, us having
Speaker 3: to be translators, sometimes I look like us being translators
Speaker 3: at the bank too, right, So that often leads to
Speaker 3: our community, specifically our elders being unbanked, underbanked because they
Speaker 3: don't trust the banks because they don't have enough bilingual
Speaker 3: speakers that can help them in the language that they
Speaker 3: feel most comfortable, and they can't even offer a translation language.
Speaker 3: When I used to work at Progressive Insurance, we at
Speaker 3: least had that it was better than nothing. But yeah,
Speaker 3: we definitely need more bilingual folks to be able to
Speaker 3: help us. So yeah, in the meantime, our folks are underbanked,
Speaker 3: they're not investing because they don't understand the system. So
Speaker 3: that's why I think it's so important for me to
Speaker 3: reach these first generation professionals, which are the children of
Speaker 3: these immigrants, educate them on how to do better with
Speaker 3: money even though they weren't taught. And then I encourage
Speaker 3: them to teach back right to go to their parents. Hey,
Speaker 3: this is what I learned. We should be doing this right.
Speaker 3: Let's talk about what you're planning to do for retirement.
Speaker 3: You should probably put these savings in the HIO savings account,
Speaker 3: because again, that wasn't the experience of our immigrant parents, or.
Speaker 2: They can, at least if they're anything like my parents.
Speaker 2: It's like they don't want to hear from me with
Speaker 2: my advice. But if I'm like they're missing out me,
Speaker 2: look at her, say yeah, read her book. They're like, oh,
Speaker 2: some great information. So you can be their proxy.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: They can be like, well, don't listen to me, listen
Speaker 2: to gg. She has this book, gig.
Speaker 1: Look at this.
Speaker 3: TikTok video that she made on this and they asked
Speaker 3: me a lot, can you transay this to Spanish because
Speaker 3: I want to send it to my mom. So, yeah,
Speaker 3: when I have the capacity to, I do.
Speaker 1: I was going to say that, like, I'm not really
Speaker 1: want to on TikTok do you do Spanish? And anyone no,
Speaker 1: So I was going to ask you about this.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a great question. You know Netflix. Oh my god, Tiffany,
Speaker 3: I have to tell you what she's referring to. So
Speaker 3: I made a TikTok this summer where I said, that's it.
Speaker 3: I'm sick of Ben Affleck speaking better Spanish than me, Like,
Speaker 3: how is this possible? I'm Mexican, that was my first language.
Speaker 3: But Ben Affleck is out here promoting his film in
Speaker 3: Spanish and I still don't feel comfortable enough to show
Speaker 3: up speaking Spanish in professional spaces. So this is the
Speaker 3: year that I'm going to put in the work. I'm
Speaker 3: going to take lessons and I'm going to improve my Spanish.
Speaker 3: And I actually did I you know, I put it
Speaker 3: into the universe and then guess what happened. I did one.
Speaker 3: Now we're all Spanish webinar with Fidelity. It took a
Speaker 3: lot of work, thank you. It took a lot of work.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 3: It took a lot a lot of work, and but
Speaker 3: I'm so proud that I put that resource. It's a
Speaker 3: free resource out for the community through Fidelity.
Speaker 2: But sorry Fidelity for investing in a speaker and in
Speaker 2: that Spanish.
Speaker 3: But we did it in the English and language, so
Speaker 3: they got a two for one deal. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I love it. It's funny because I'm doing the Fidelity
Speaker 1: one because they've been doing it a lot. I'm doing
Speaker 1: my Fidelity one in a couple of weeks, so I
Speaker 1: know exactly the thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, very highly produced. A lot of people on the call.
Speaker 1: It's a all productions.
Speaker 2: I listened to those calls. They got Mandy Kalin on those,
Speaker 2: all kinds of celebrities.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: But regarding the question if I make content in Spanish,
Speaker 3: because my the person that I'm trying to target is
Speaker 3: mostly English dominant. So again, there's somebody that grew up
Speaker 3: in America, but they have they probably learned Spanish as
Speaker 3: their first language, or maybe they didn't learn Spanish at all.
Speaker 3: It's why my content is in English. But when I
Speaker 3: get those viral videos that they're like, please translate these
Speaker 3: in Spanish, I will. It's just an extra lift for me,
Speaker 3: you know, because I'm the only one creating content at
Speaker 3: this point. But but but yeah, I would love to
Speaker 3: do more future content and Spanish because it'll only helped
Speaker 3: me practice and get out there in the community.
Speaker 2: Such a good point. You're you're speaking to my husband
Speaker 2: because he is he's a little a shame DNA Verguenza.
Speaker 2: He has some shame around his his Spanish because he
Speaker 2: basically unlearned it so he could be the translator and
Speaker 2: like thrive in this American society. And he is nervous
Speaker 2: talking to his parents sometimes and his family who I'm
Speaker 2: so he's in it. I had to understand that the
Speaker 2: way that I'm so comfortable calling my dad up or
Speaker 2: calling my mom up or having a deep conversation with them,
Speaker 2: he will hesitate because he's like, how much you mentioned
Speaker 2: the emotional and the emotional with the mental lift to
Speaker 2: take a subject matter and then think about it in
Speaker 2: two languages, and he'll like, never mind too much money.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I actually get bullied by my brothers all the
Speaker 3: time that I was in Mexico because both of them
Speaker 3: am still in Mexico, and they make fun of me
Speaker 3: because my finish, my Spanish will slip up. But not
Speaker 3: only that, not only did we have to get used,
Speaker 3: but there are a bunch of brats. There are brads. Yeah,
Speaker 3: we're yeah, let's don't even Oh my god, if you
Speaker 3: knew girl, if you knew stories, like, yeah, i'll DM
Speaker 3: you later because it's another show.
Speaker 1: I'll dem you lator.
Speaker 3: But let's see. But well, the thing is, not only
Speaker 3: is it hard because we assimilated and became English dominant
Speaker 3: by being in this country and doing all our education
Speaker 3: and working in all English spaces, but on top of that,
Speaker 3: financial literacy is a new language of itself. Right, So
Speaker 3: there's all these terms, yeah, that we have to learn
Speaker 3: for the fidelity w I when on for example, I
Speaker 3: had to learn all these terms financial literacy terms in
Speaker 3: Spanish that even my family doesn't know because they're not
Speaker 3: financially literate in Spanish. So it's it's a double lift.
Speaker 3: It really is a double lift. So I really I'm
Speaker 3: thankful for the creators.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 3: The one that I can think about the top of
Speaker 3: my head is Louli Finances called Louli. She does all
Speaker 3: Spanish content and Marivel also our Wealth Matters does bilingual.
Speaker 3: She's fully fluent in English and Spanish, so she does
Speaker 3: both videos in English and Spanish. And yeah, I hope
Speaker 3: to get there one day. But I know that I'm
Speaker 3: serving my people by by being English only at the moment.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I love that. You know, it's very clear
Speaker 1: about who your audience is, but that makes sense, like
Speaker 1: this is the audience. This is like a little like
Speaker 1: left turn because my business brain was like, huh, I
Speaker 1: heard that. You said you did a hybrid publisher. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and so I did a hybrid publisher when I published
Speaker 1: my children's well Every Birthday Molly Moore. And so I'm
Speaker 1: curious as to like who was the publisher and how
Speaker 1: did that work, because I don't think that our audience
Speaker 1: gets a lot of exposure to, like you haven't. You know,
Speaker 1: you can self published, which is just do everything yourself.
Speaker 1: You can go traditional publishing route, which they're gonna distribute
Speaker 1: and print and things, and then take a big part
Speaker 1: of the pie. And then there's hybrid Oh can you
Speaker 1: tell us about like that process.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm so glad you're asking about this because it's
Speaker 3: definitely a viable option that we should be aware of.
Speaker 3: And to be frank, when I first heard of it,
Speaker 3: I was like, no, because the way hy red publishing
Speaker 3: works is you pay them to publish your book and
Speaker 3: they still get to keep typically thirty percent royalties, so
Speaker 3: they still get a.
Speaker 2: Cut, And like, how does that work?
Speaker 3: Right? This doesn't make sense that I'm paying you and
Speaker 3: you still get to keep a cut. But it's the
Speaker 3: way that they have skin in the game right, so
Speaker 3: that they truly care about the production quality of the book.
Speaker 3: And the reason I decided to do higher publishing and
Speaker 3: I did it with green Leaf Book Group, was because
Speaker 3: of my book coach. My book coach, shout out to
Speaker 3: Stacy Ennis. She's wonderful and she's the one that when
Speaker 3: I first started working with her, I was planning to
Speaker 3: self publish. And the more that we work together and
Speaker 3: she learned about my goal and my business, she said,
Speaker 3: you know what, I think you might be a better
Speaker 3: candidate for hybrid publishing. So she told me why, and
Speaker 3: she said, you know what, You're really busy with your business.
Speaker 3: You really don't have the time to be vetting all
Speaker 3: these publishing professionals. You're going to need to self publish
Speaker 3: all these different types of editors, the cover designer, the format.
Speaker 3: I mean, unless you have those contacts good for you,
Speaker 3: then please self publish, right. But I didn't and I
Speaker 3: didn't want to put in the time because I'm still
Speaker 3: growing my business. So because I had the support of
Speaker 3: the TikTok LATINX Creative grant, I was able to cover
Speaker 3: a lot of those costs. It was a fifty thousand
Speaker 3: dollars grant. So yeah, at first, just to start my
Speaker 3: higher publisher, I believe it was thirty five thousand dollars,
Speaker 3: a nice trunk of change. And then I've added additional services.
Speaker 3: I've added the audiobook, the hardcover. I think we're probably
Speaker 3: at fifty thousand dollars right now. And for production costs, Yeah,
Speaker 3: it's a lot.
Speaker 2: Does a grant that's text for you?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Because it went straight to expenses.
Speaker 1: Oh we like that.
Speaker 2: Okay, But did the grant come before the book idea
Speaker 2: or did you have to have the book idea to
Speaker 2: get the grind?
Speaker 3: The book idea has been in my mind since December
Speaker 3: of twenty twenty. Yeah, so again posts George Floyd and
Speaker 3: kind of seeing there needs to be diverse voices in money.
Speaker 3: That was before I was a TikToker. I was nobody
Speaker 3: when I first thought of this idea of like, oh,
Speaker 3: let's do a personal finance book from the lens of
Speaker 3: the first gen experience. Uh, and then TikTok came surprisingly
Speaker 3: three months later. So TikTok came. I know it's that
Speaker 3: it's magic, right, it's a universe.
Speaker 2: I love a girl who gets shit.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Well, you know what's funny is I actually
Speaker 3: started writing the book in December twenty twenty, and I
Speaker 3: see starting because I didn't even have an outline. You
Speaker 3: both are authors, so you know how it goes like
Speaker 3: you have to have a writing plan. I didn't do
Speaker 3: any of that.
Speaker 1: I was just bla la la la la.
Speaker 3: So now I know that I wasn't really starting anything.
Speaker 3: But when TikTok popped.
Speaker 2: Off, you were doing something kind of it wasn't gonna
Speaker 2: go doing it. I was going to get still believing
Speaker 2: in yourself. Now, I know I was going to get
Speaker 2: stuck because I had no blueprint. Right now, I know
Speaker 2: that you very much need an outline to keep you
Speaker 2: focused and a writing plan and a routine, because otherwise
Speaker 2: you would just not get the manuscript done.
Speaker 3: Yeah you both know, yeah.
Speaker 1: So yeah no.
Speaker 3: And then TikTok popped off in March of twenty twenty one,
Speaker 3: and I slowly started introducing my audience to the idea
Speaker 3: of ooh, like, I want to write this book. Would
Speaker 3: you guys be interested? And they're like, yes, yes, we
Speaker 3: need it. But I couldn't write it because I was
Speaker 3: just starting my business. I had to build a solid
Speaker 3: financial foundation. The opportunity for the grant came up in
Speaker 3: April of twenty twenty two, a year later. So with
Speaker 3: that funding, that's when I was able to kind of
Speaker 3: take a step back in my business and be able
Speaker 3: to handle those publishing costs and go into a writing cave.
Speaker 3: I've been turning down a lot of speaking work and
Speaker 3: stepping back my business to be able to give the
Speaker 3: energy that I needed to writing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the hard part when you're doing it because
Speaker 1: there's like you have to it's like the bow and
Speaker 1: go back, like go back. Yeah, and sometimes it means
Speaker 1: less money, yeah, less opportunity, you know, temporary fomo.
Speaker 3: Can we talk about the fomo? Yeah, I am experiencing
Speaker 3: the phone right now, Mandy.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm a mom, so like half my life
Speaker 2: is followed. So a book is just adding you mentioned
Speaker 2: a routine and I'm like, yeah, even even for the
Speaker 2: if it adds another layer when you have tiny humans,
Speaker 2: because it's like I've had to get comfortable. But there's
Speaker 2: never going to be a routine. It's just going to
Speaker 2: be It's going to be guerrilla warfare, is what it's like.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So if that's in the car on the hill in
Speaker 2: front of my my in law's house with their babysitting
Speaker 2: for one hour and twenty four minutes. Well, I'm gonna
Speaker 2: see how many words I can do in an hour
Speaker 2: and twenty four minutes. And that's that's how the book
Speaker 2: is going.
Speaker 3: I've heard that, I've heard the strategy of doing voice
Speaker 3: notes and then having those transcribed. Have you heard of that,
Speaker 3: Mandy too?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love Otter. I use Otter, which is my
Speaker 2: transcription AI bought, and yes, I will try. But the
Speaker 2: editing is impossible to do when you know, so I
Speaker 2: can like put a bunch of word vomit out there,
Speaker 2: but the actual like it's really art for me. It's
Speaker 2: it feels like a creative, artistic process when I am
Speaker 2: like words from here and putting them there and adding
Speaker 2: some more like adding some more description. For me, it's
Speaker 2: like it really is like cooking or painting for me
Speaker 2: the way that I approach writing. So, yeah, it's really
Speaker 2: hard to do when I can't just sit down and
Speaker 2: be laser focused.
Speaker 3: Because the voice is so important. If you just put
Speaker 3: something vanilla out there, that won't hit. But both of
Speaker 3: you guys have such big personalities, right, so it's important
Speaker 3: that your voice is also infused in there. And that's
Speaker 3: a feedback I've gone from my readers. I feel like
Speaker 3: you're like saying this to me, Yeah, because I infuse
Speaker 3: my voice in there.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Okay, So talk more about the highway. So you pay,
Speaker 2: you pay thirty five, now fifty thousand dollars into the process.
Speaker 2: So what's your expectation because I think in traditional publishing,
Speaker 2: we all, you know, because we have friends like Tiffany
Speaker 2: has been great and other friends of minew written books.
Speaker 2: Like my expectation is you ain't gonna make money from
Speaker 2: this in like for a minute, if ever, et cetera,
Speaker 2: and it's really hard and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2: But what's your expectation with the hybrid process? Do you
Speaker 2: expect to get the money back?
Speaker 1: Are you okay?
Speaker 2: If you don't like? What is that?
Speaker 3: Yeah? So luckily you know out of so let me
Speaker 3: give you a breakdown of the money spent. So out
Speaker 3: of the fifty thousand dollars grant, thirty five went to
Speaker 3: my hyperd publisher and then the rest went to my
Speaker 3: book coach. So out of my own pocket, I have
Speaker 3: probably spent thirty thousand dollars on the book marketing. I
Speaker 3: had a book launch party and other efforts and additional
Speaker 3: add ons that I've done with the publisher. Right, So,
Speaker 3: am I worried about those fifty thousand that I got
Speaker 3: for free? No? Right there there were grant it'd be
Speaker 3: great to get them back. But really I really would
Speaker 3: love those thirty thousand back, and I'm more than comfortable
Speaker 3: I will because my strategy is not to get the
Speaker 3: money back through book sales, because we all know well,
Speaker 3: unless you're a New York Times bestselling author like Tiffany
Speaker 3: over and over again, then yes, you will make that
Speaker 3: sh money. But the rest of us, we typically don't
Speaker 3: make money off book sales. So we have to think
Speaker 3: of how are we going to use this cloud that
Speaker 3: we're getting as authors to monetize? And for me, I
Speaker 3: don't already been speaking. I'd already been speaking on financial education,
Speaker 3: on career advocacy for latinas, on influencer marketing, financial inclusivity
Speaker 3: for financial institutions. So I've revamped my speaker page. I
Speaker 3: have a new speaking brochure now with my evil Longoria blurb,
Speaker 3: endorsement and all these things. So yeah, now they're getting
Speaker 3: the they're not getting the TikToker Gigi they're getting the
Speaker 3: exactly put some respect on my men best selling author
Speaker 3: Giovanna Gonzaniz exactly. So so so yeah, and that's how
Speaker 3: I very much intend to recover my investment and then
Speaker 3: some and that's where I want my career to go.
Speaker 3: You know, I love TikTok is how I started. I
Speaker 3: would not have started any of this had it not
Speaker 3: been for TikTok because of the authenticity and the rawness
Speaker 3: of what it takes to show up and just be yourself.
Speaker 3: I love that about TikTok. But honestly, you know, with
Speaker 3: the political environment that we're in, TikTok can go away tomorrow.
Speaker 3: So I can't have TikTok be my forever. I have
Speaker 3: to have several irons in the fire, and for me,
Speaker 3: I really want to land some more speaking, and.
Speaker 1: I will say too, just so you know, Gig, it's
Speaker 1: not so typically for those who are listening who are
Speaker 1: considering the traditional space usually get like whatever that upfront
Speaker 1: number is. So for me, it was a few hundred
Speaker 1: thousand dollars. Well, I'll just be honest. I'm like it's
Speaker 1: over now, six hundred thousand. It was a six hundred
Speaker 1: between Yeah, it was a lot. I'm not gonna lie
Speaker 1: even oh well, because there was a little bit of
Speaker 1: a bidding war because when I came out, there were.
Speaker 2: She had to fight.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there were no they had their trail, but.
Speaker 1: There were no financial books that were like pending. It
Speaker 1: was a perfect time. Right now, there's a lot coming out.
Speaker 1: But it was like right before pandemic is right, so
Speaker 1: it was like there was a gap. They were like, girl,
Speaker 1: you're the only game in town right now. So it
Speaker 1: was perfect time.
Speaker 3: Amazing.
Speaker 1: So so I got a lot of money upfront. But
Speaker 1: the thing is is that you know, I wanted to
Speaker 1: make money on the back end, and so you get
Speaker 1: seventy percent to keep. I only get fifteen percent. That's
Speaker 1: the that's typical of the of the space. And then
Speaker 1: you have to pay back the six hundred thousand. Now
Speaker 1: here's the thing. Let's just say they gave me the
Speaker 1: money and I didn't sell the books. I still get
Speaker 1: to keep the six hundred thousand, you know. And it's
Speaker 1: not like the record business where he's like no, no, no,
Speaker 1: you owe it, no matter what, why about it. It's
Speaker 1: just kind of like yes, it's kind of just like
Speaker 1: we hope we get it back. And so it took
Speaker 1: me two years. And some people never pay it back,
Speaker 1: but it took me about two years to pay back
Speaker 1: through book sales the six hundred thousand, and just so
Speaker 1: we're clear, I didn't even realize this. I have to
Speaker 1: pay it back in the fifteen percent increments. So yeah,
Speaker 1: that's my mind. I was like, oh, yes, So let's
Speaker 1: just say I sell my book and it's a dollar.
Speaker 1: So normally my take of that dollar is fifteen cents
Speaker 1: for every dollar that I sell. They're like, okay, but
Speaker 1: we're not going to give you fifteen cents for every
Speaker 1: dollar you sell, Tiffany, until you pay us back the
Speaker 1: six hundred thousand that we gave you. But she did,
Speaker 1: no problem. Yes, but it's not like this book is
Speaker 1: a dollar. I paid you back a dollar. They're like, no,
Speaker 1: this book is a dollar. You paid us back fifteen cents.
Speaker 2: What do you say, girl?
Speaker 1: So that's so when people so I did not know that.
Speaker 1: I wanted you to explain, girl, I did not know that.
Speaker 1: But that's how book math goes. And so that's why
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you're introducing this a hybrid model available
Speaker 1: they're self publishing. Certainly am I regretful of traditional publishing.
Speaker 1: Now I'm really grateful because I self published before. I
Speaker 1: self published like five books and I could, and I
Speaker 1: hybrid published before, and I decided to traditionally publish, not
Speaker 1: for the money, but for a certain like there were
Speaker 1: certain things that I wanted to have access to, yea,
Speaker 1: you know, so I was like, okay, I'm going to
Speaker 1: do this. So I knew in general. I'm joking about
Speaker 1: not knowing when I signed a contract. I did because
Speaker 1: at my attorney was like, are you sure? Because book contracts,
Speaker 1: you know, they're not so great in your favor because
Speaker 1: essentially you have to pay back way more than you're
Speaker 1: so you have to basically pay back millions of dollars
Speaker 1: for me for them to get their six hundred thousands, right,
Speaker 1: you see what I mean?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 1: Because I just take that math.
Speaker 2: That means you had to self four million dollars worth of.
Speaker 3: Oh my goodness, girl, look at my face.
Speaker 2: I went.
Speaker 1: Fifteen, I've done it already, so I gave them, so, yes, girl,
Speaker 1: they had to make millions before they're like, oh, thanks
Speaker 1: for the six hundred.
Speaker 2: Thousand and over one hundred and thirty thousand copies of
Speaker 2: your book.
Speaker 1: Well, girl, we're at two sixty.
Speaker 2: I love math, yeah yeah, yeah, no no, but to
Speaker 2: get there, to get there.
Speaker 1: The other thing, and so that took me two years,
Speaker 1: and so I'm just sorry. And so I just want
Speaker 1: people to understand, like, you know, there's benefits, pros and cons.
Speaker 1: And then I just like, you know, now that I'm
Speaker 1: starting to get my I guess it's every two twice
Speaker 1: a year, I'm starting to get those like whatever checks are.
Speaker 1: But there's still only fifteen percent of the books sold.
Speaker 1: And so I didn't do it for the money. I
Speaker 1: did it for the It raised the value of the
Speaker 1: brand over all. To your point, gg, I raised my credibility,
Speaker 1: I raised my spokesperson with I raised all of that.
Speaker 1: So yeah, so I got paid. It was worth it
Speaker 1: to me to do it for.
Speaker 3: That, Yeah no, And I and I love it. I
Speaker 3: love it. And I actually encourage my audience to request
Speaker 3: her book from the library or to borrow it from
Speaker 3: a friend, because yeah, like for them, I want to
Speaker 3: make it cheap. It's these organizations that have the big
Speaker 3: budgets to pay us right, to pay us back for
Speaker 3: our investment. One last thing I love to add about
Speaker 3: hybrid publishing, and again, There are pros and cons to
Speaker 3: every type of publishing model. But what really sold me
Speaker 3: on hybrid publishing was that I had a final say
Speaker 3: on title, cover, editorial, everything. I was final say on
Speaker 3: and thank goodness for that. Let me tell you, because
Speaker 3: the first batch of titles that they try to give
Speaker 3: me for this book, it was giving like white Boomer Vanilla.
Speaker 3: I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, none of this works.
Speaker 3: You misunderstood the assignment. Go back to the drawing board
Speaker 3: and come back with something better. And they came back
Speaker 3: with Duran cash by cultural title that my community loves
Speaker 3: right and the cover.
Speaker 2: I thought you came up with it.
Speaker 3: I wish I know. I paid them a titling service
Speaker 3: to help me cook that up. Yeah so again everything
Speaker 3: costs money with the high red publisher. Yeah yeah, but
Speaker 3: I'LLAKRK exactly, but you get final say so. Like I said,
Speaker 3: I like this title, I like this cover. When my edit,
Speaker 3: my white editor try to whitewash my writing and said
Speaker 3: that this part is insulting to white people, I said,
Speaker 3: I don't care. They're not the intended audience. So I
Speaker 3: was able to hold that control and write the book
Speaker 3: that my reader needs to hear not with some white
Speaker 3: publishing house we thought would do good with the market.
Speaker 3: So I'm really really proud of that, and that's why
Speaker 3: the book is resonating. I has already sixty six reviews
Speaker 3: on Amazon and it hasn't even been a week.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's only about to have sixty seven. I forget
Speaker 2: all the things I have to do to support all
Speaker 2: my authors. Yeah, I'm like, I didn't leave a review.
Speaker 3: You did?
Speaker 1: You tell them that, like if they Amazon gives them
Speaker 1: a little extra push if they do a video or picture.
Speaker 3: I got that tip from you, Tiffany, from the men
Speaker 3: from the Mentorship, a mentee program that you have, so yeah,
Speaker 3: I actually I haven't had them do videos. Are you
Speaker 3: a menthi yes girl, Yes, Oh my goodness. I listened
Speaker 3: to you did a like a you did like a
Speaker 3: webinar on what you did for your book launch.
Speaker 1: I took notes.
Speaker 3: I implemented a lot of the advice the Street Team.
Speaker 3: For anybody that is not a part of the Mentorship,
Speaker 3: please join her mentorship on Patreon. It's so worth it.
Speaker 3: The advice on the Street Team alone. That's how I
Speaker 3: got all those reviews because of the power of the
Speaker 3: Street Team.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, yes, sixty eight. By the way, about ah
Speaker 2: so sweet?
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, so I have.
Speaker 1: I had a couple of them.
Speaker 3: I gave them the book in advance so they had
Speaker 3: a physical copy and they could post a little cute
Speaker 3: aesthetic picture with the coffee next to it or the
Speaker 3: computer next to it. Because I learned from you, and
Speaker 3: thank you for not gate keeping that information. That's why
Speaker 3: I love both of you, because you're so open and
Speaker 3: honest and transparent and really about uplifting women. Because that
Speaker 3: helped me tremendously and making this launch successful.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, Tiffany, never stopped, never stop giving those book jumps,
Speaker 2: because until you, with your candor, came out and really
Speaker 2: laid them all out, like there wasn't another free U
Speaker 2: gate kept not behind to pay, well, not behind it.
Speaker 2: Give me your email address, take this course. I know
Speaker 2: the book that the book coaches out there were like
Speaker 2: god damn.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I'll bet people they're like, you can do a
Speaker 1: two buy. I'm like, my bag, girl, it's just that
Speaker 1: I get so excited about teaching.
Speaker 2: No, no, you're not doing You're a giver.
Speaker 3: You're a giver for me and for anybody that's interested
Speaker 3: in my insights that I had to share as a
Speaker 3: Latina in a very white publishing industry. I do plan
Speaker 3: to hold a free webinar for any women of color
Speaker 3: that like to join, and that's just for me to
Speaker 3: pour back into the community. It'll be a one hour webinar.
Speaker 3: You can ask me anything. Also have a little outline
Speaker 3: of topics that I want to discuss. And for me,
Speaker 3: that's like, this is here for you to learn from
Speaker 3: what I am not available for are for all these
Speaker 3: people that are dming me, girl, I love to pick
Speaker 3: your brain. No, I would love to, but there's no
Speaker 3: time for that, right So so for me, that's my
Speaker 3: resource to and remember pouring into the community having this
Speaker 3: free webinar, which I'll probably have in May May twenty
Speaker 3: twenty four.
Speaker 1: I love that you hear the bag.
Speaker 3: Thank you. You guys are are starting.
Speaker 2: I forgot your power. Like there's just something like and
Speaker 2: I haven't.
Speaker 3: Seen you in a why I have a sing you
Speaker 3: know what, that's why I know.
Speaker 2: But I'm like, oh, I just want to be in
Speaker 2: your I want to be in your orbit, Like you
Speaker 2: know when you meet people and you're just like the shot,
Speaker 2: the brightness, the warmth, the power I felt I met
Speaker 2: true Yeah, you're just this this like just this bullet.
Speaker 2: That's how it feels like. And there's nothing that you
Speaker 2: can't do. What makes you that way? That's what my
Speaker 2: therapist asked me. She's like, so what is it?
Speaker 3: I don't really hard question. I don't know how real
Speaker 3: you want to get here?
Speaker 2: Because I want I want you to get real because
Speaker 2: I just it's so palpable to me. Your your presence,
Speaker 2: deep breath that had to take you. Thought I was
Speaker 2: gonna wrap.
Speaker 3: No, no, no, no no no, Let's talk about it. Let's
Speaker 3: be real, because I know your podcast is all about Roala.
Speaker 3: So what makes me this way?
Speaker 2: That?
Speaker 3: My mom is my biggest enemy? Unfortunately I've gone public
Speaker 3: about this on a Refinery twenty nine article about Haha,
Speaker 3: I'm estrange for my mother. But my mom, I love her,
Speaker 3: but she's toxic and instead of being proud of me
Speaker 3: and cheering on and being supported, she does a complete opposite.
Speaker 3: And Thank goodness for therapy because I would not be
Speaker 3: able to say this right now without crying. And thank
Speaker 3: goodness for prozac because I would definitely be crying too
Speaker 3: if I was not on prozac, medicated and motivated. Yeah,
Speaker 3: But the fact that my mom has been as challenging
Speaker 3: as she has been with me. And if you read
Speaker 3: the book, you'll see one personal story where I share
Speaker 3: about the importance of credit building because there was an
Speaker 3: incident with the car. I won't give away the story.
Speaker 3: You'll have to read the book, but you kind of
Speaker 3: get a sense for some of the challenges that I
Speaker 3: have with my mother. And yeah, we've been no contact
Speaker 3: for two years now. The last straw was she was
Speaker 3: physically abusive, and I'm just like, I can tolerate the
Speaker 3: you know, the verbal abuse, the condescending everything, the criticism,
Speaker 3: the judgment, the judgment, but physical abuse is just something
Speaker 3: that I will never tolerate from anybody, even if it's
Speaker 3: my own mother. Yeah. Yeah, so that's what, honestly, like,
Speaker 3: that's when makes me strong, because it's funny when when
Speaker 3: I get haters and my TikTok comments section, people are like, Gigi,
Speaker 3: how how does it not affect you? Like, you know,
Speaker 3: the the and I actually enjoy doing the clapbacks. That's
Speaker 3: like the unhealed part of me.
Speaker 2: I do.
Speaker 1: I do.
Speaker 3: I'm not gonna lie. People are like, don't waste your energy.
Speaker 3: I'm like, sometimes I like to waste my energy.
Speaker 2: This way, like, let me, let me create space for
Speaker 2: that pettiness, because I'm the one hand to two you
Speaker 2: want to choose wild, I got time to be petty.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I don't think that I'm not going to
Speaker 3: respond back. Yeah, if I have time, I will. But
Speaker 3: my answer to when people say, how does this not
Speaker 3: affect you? When people can be nasty in the comment section,
Speaker 3: it's always the strangers, you know, when the when the
Speaker 3: TikTok goes viral, it's never your own community members. It's
Speaker 3: just some random on the internet with a five two
Speaker 3: two nine nine username and no profile picture. Right, And
Speaker 3: I say, nothing that these people can say is worse
Speaker 3: than when my own mother has already said to me.
Speaker 3: You know, so, I'm sorry, kind of got darker than
Speaker 3: I hope we can end on a positive note. But
Speaker 3: that's the realness, honestly, of how.
Speaker 2: You are the positive note.
Speaker 1: You're so sweet just because look how you reflect joy
Speaker 1: despite I mean, we all, I mean, you cannot go
Speaker 1: through life without challenges. It's just that's just not how
Speaker 1: you know. And my therapist always shares that trauma is
Speaker 1: when something happened that should not have or something should
Speaker 1: have happened and it didn't, you know, so we all
Speaker 1: have trauma that we navigate and look how like look
Speaker 1: at the light. You are, you know, as a result
Speaker 1: of or despite despite that trauma. So we're just so grateful.
Speaker 1: Thank you you are here, you show fully like you know,
Speaker 1: because you're here, You're gonna have a bunch of daughters.
Speaker 1: Right when someone comes to me and they're like, oh
Speaker 1: my gosh, I started like Burner, I love burn Yeah,
Speaker 1: oh my god, that's I'm like, that's my daughter, you know,
Speaker 1: Like I love that though, because you know, she's like
Speaker 1: because if you know Berner, I mean you think I'm crazy.
Speaker 1: Berna is we've mad so Burna. You know, She's like,
Speaker 1: I didn't know that I could be my full silly,
Speaker 1: crazy self online and then one day sift me I
Speaker 1: saw you. I was like, wait a minute, I recognize crazy.
Speaker 1: I could be crazy to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you did it to another level.
Speaker 1: On the internet.
Speaker 3: But I love it. I love it because some people
Speaker 3: need to see Bernard t working on the internet to
Speaker 3: pay attention, you know, otherwise.
Speaker 2: I'm that people exactly, I'm people.
Speaker 1: But you, as a result of you showing up fully
Speaker 1: as yourself, if somebody is like nodding like, oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: that's my dad or that's my brother or that's my whatever,
Speaker 1: and I'd be like, wait, so I can show up
Speaker 1: fully and wonderfully and with joy and beauty while also.
Speaker 3: Navigating family estrangement.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's so taboo, So thank you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And you know, I would also like to technowledge that,
Speaker 3: thank God, I have an amazing father. My father is
Speaker 3: like my best friend, so at least I feel that
Speaker 3: I have some sort of parental support.
Speaker 1: I also have.
Speaker 3: An amazing grandmother and my aunt, and I actually dedicate
Speaker 3: the book to both these women because I wouldn't be
Speaker 3: who I am without them, So I have other family
Speaker 3: that I can lean on for support. But yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean the Evil Loungore endorsement that we talked about earlier.
Speaker 3: That's something that my mom knows more than anybody. Now
Speaker 3: I'm going to cry. My mom knows more than anybody
Speaker 3: how much that means to me because we used to
Speaker 3: watch Desperate Housewives together, and the fact that I can't
Speaker 3: can I cuss here, the fact that I can't share
Speaker 3: this one with her toxic as it hurts, you know,
Speaker 3: But I'm learning to celebrate myself, so I'll show you
Speaker 3: this ring if for anybody that's watching visually. I went
Speaker 3: to Tiffany when I got the news, and I bought
Speaker 3: myself a very expensive Tiffany ring and it's an everyday
Speaker 3: piece of jewelry. So now I don't need my mom's validation.
Speaker 3: I have my own validation that I treated myself to
Speaker 3: as well as the launch party. You know, most people
Speaker 3: don't make to spend on the launch party, but I said,
Speaker 3: because of the challenges that I've been through in my
Speaker 3: life and health, recent health issues that I've had, is
Speaker 3: important for me to take the time to pause and
Speaker 3: celebrate this big milestone. And it was one of the
Speaker 3: happiest days of my life. It was last Monday, and
Speaker 3: I had people fly in from like five different states.
Speaker 3: There was about sixty people at a Mexican restaurant. It
Speaker 3: was such a good time.
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, I told you half my life it's fomo
Speaker 2: because I wish I.
Speaker 3: Could be the gig.
Speaker 1: Where do you live.
Speaker 3: I'm in Chicago, Chicago based and Mandy, you were invited,
Speaker 3: but I don't think you can make it, and I know
Speaker 3: you had the babies and no.
Speaker 2: I definitely was invited and I knew and I would
Speaker 2: if I had said yes, I would have had to
Speaker 2: disappoint you because my son, of course got sick.
Speaker 3: But I know it's hard with the kiddos.
Speaker 1: We next, I come to Chicago because myself listen to Deerfield,
Speaker 1: so I go a few times.
Speaker 3: Well, Tiffany, the reason I signed because I was already
Speaker 3: a montee and your Patreon, but I was a month
Speaker 3: to month and then when you started saying if you
Speaker 3: sign up for the annual, you'll get first DIBs for
Speaker 3: when I come to your city, I like immediately signed
Speaker 3: up for the annual membership. So I'm waiting for you
Speaker 3: to come to Chicago to meet your life.
Speaker 1: Come back. I'm gonna definitely for sure, because like I said,
Speaker 1: i'd go visit her a few times a year, So
Speaker 1: next time I come, yeah, we're gonna have because we
Speaker 1: have such a good time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I can't wait to meet everybody. I'll like minded
Speaker 3: women and to meet you that'd be amazing.
Speaker 1: Yes, Well, thank you for coming gig. Is there anything
Speaker 1: like where can people buy the book? Where can they
Speaker 1: connect with you?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: You're so sweet and thank you again for having me on.
Speaker 3: The book is available on all major online retailers Amazon, Barnes,
Speaker 3: and Noble Bookshop dot org, which supports independent bookstores. You
Speaker 3: can also request a book from the library to access
Speaker 3: it for free, or from your local bookstore to support
Speaker 3: a small business owner. It is available to order through
Speaker 3: what's called ingram sparks. You don't have to memorize. I
Speaker 3: just say, hey, I want this book, can you stock it?
Speaker 3: Give them the IPN number, the name of the book,
Speaker 3: and cash to learn more about the book and where
Speaker 3: to buy. These are all linked on my page cash
Speaker 3: dot com. And again that's Tiffany. You taught me that.
Speaker 1: What's that website looking like?
Speaker 3: Yeah, you don't tell me because you're not a gatekeeper.
Speaker 3: So you said, don't send people to Amazon, create your
Speaker 3: own website where you control. Yeah, So if you go
Speaker 3: to duran cash dot com you will see all those
Speaker 3: online retailers linked, as well as some fun freebies and
Speaker 3: the blurb from Eva and all these other wonderful women,
Speaker 3: including Mandy who let me cloud chase off them so
Speaker 3: that I could get my book out into this community.
Speaker 1: And we're going to put it in the description, like
Speaker 1: the link in the description We're going to give you
Speaker 1: for Forkutu and cash. Well, we'll put that link and
Speaker 1: then where can they find you. They're like.
Speaker 3: So sweet and actually I forgot to mention also about
Speaker 3: the kudur and cash dot com website. There's also a
Speaker 3: freebie which is access to the first the introduction chapter,
Speaker 3: the full introduction chapter of the book in pedia format
Speaker 3: and in audio format. So that way, if you're kind
Speaker 3: of like I'm still on the fence about the book,
Speaker 3: that's completely free. You can accessit there and by visiting you.
Speaker 2: Read your book. What did you read the audio book?
Speaker 3: Not yet. I'm going to read it in May. And
Speaker 3: I'm terrified.
Speaker 2: Because wait, you're going to record it, okay, because I'm like,
Speaker 2: I want to listen to you read the book to.
Speaker 3: Me, I know, tell me her story. Yeah, they wanted
Speaker 3: me to record in November, but I talked to a
Speaker 3: voice coach and she said, you're not ready. You have
Speaker 3: to wait. You have to do some lessons because it's
Speaker 3: a skill, and I understand that. I didn't want to
Speaker 3: make it cringey for people to listen to. I'm like,
Speaker 3: let me take my time, take my voice lessons, and
Speaker 3: I'll do it in May and it'll be out in
Speaker 3: September of twenty twenty four, so that's coming. It'll be
Speaker 3: a while, but it'll come.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And if you go to the first Gator dot com,
Speaker 3: which is also work with and cash Lives, you will
Speaker 3: see all my socials. I'm very active on TikTok, Instagram
Speaker 3: and LinkedIn.
Speaker 1: Okay, you're so, you're the first gen mentor on TikTok, and.
Speaker 3: On TikTok is the first gen mentor on Instagram. Somebody
Speaker 3: had already taken it and they're not using it. They're
Speaker 3: not doing anything with it. So it's gig the first
Speaker 3: jad mentor Yeah on Instagram gg the first sad mentor.
Speaker 1: Yeah it is. It is so me and me and
Speaker 1: Mandy and we're like, we're the BA podcast brought a
Speaker 1: busy here, but we were so paid.
Speaker 2: They're not doing what they do still to this day.
Speaker 2: That's why on TikTok, I'm many money with free.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, that's so much fun.
Speaker 1: Maybe myself made you know how?
Speaker 2: Such a joy, Gigi. I can't wait to talk to
Speaker 2: you again and just catch up and.
Speaker 3: Hopefully thank come this year or sooner.
Speaker 1: Okay, who knows.
Speaker 3: Yeah, where do you live again?
Speaker 2: I can't I can't plan anything. That's what I'm saying. Oh,
Speaker 2: I know, I live in New York. Oh, New York
Speaker 2: City and Tips and Jersey Girl, I will be adjacent.
Speaker 3: Okay, I will be in New York City the first
Speaker 3: week of April, so I would love to reach out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you got my number? Please?
Speaker 3: All right, thank you, thank you for having me on