Speaker 1: Welcome to Head of Money. I'm Joel and I am
Speaker 1: Matt and today we're talking the Stoic Path to Wealth
Speaker 1: with Darius Feroux.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So you might be tempted to think that an alternative
Speaker 3: name for this episode could just simply be Emotionless Investing,
Speaker 3: but there's a lot more to Stoicism and finances, specifically
Speaker 3: investing than just that. And we're excited to be joined
Speaker 3: by Darius Feroux. He is a prolific author and entrepreneur
Speaker 3: and productivity expert known for his work on personal development.
Speaker 3: Much of his writing can be found over at his
Speaker 3: site by the same name dariusferux dot com, where he
Speaker 3: focuses on wealth building, productivity, and finding meaning and work.
Speaker 3: And these are all topics that we're hoping to cover today.
Speaker 3: And Darius has written several books, including the newly published
Speaker 3: literally was just published yesterday, The Stoic Path to Wealth,
Speaker 3: which blends ancient Stoic philosophy with modern financial wisdom. And
Speaker 3: that's what we're mainly talking about today. It turns out
Speaker 3: Marcus Aurelius, he's got something to say about your four
Speaker 3: win k. But Darius, thank you so much for speaking
Speaker 3: with us on how to money today.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you for having me really appreciate.
Speaker 1: It of course. Yes, interesting subject and you're the expert
Speaker 1: on it. So looking forward to this combo, Darius. The
Speaker 1: first question that we ask anybody who comes on the show, though,
Speaker 1: is what do you like to splurge on? Because Matt
Speaker 1: and I we like to spurgeon craft beer, and we
Speaker 1: figured that's a good release anybody, even if they're doing
Speaker 1: the stoic the whys the smart thing saving investing for
Speaker 1: their future, they got to have something to spend on
Speaker 1: in here now too. What's that for you?
Speaker 2: Yeah? So the thing that I splurge on is Apple products,
Speaker 2: something that I struggled with for a long time because
Speaker 2: I always try to talk myself out of it, saying, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: do I really need to have a new iPhone And
Speaker 2: the answer is no because the previous one works perfectly,
Speaker 2: But deep inside I just love to play with those
Speaker 2: gadgets and my house looks like an Apple store. So
Speaker 2: that's something that I splurge on and fortunately doesn't happen
Speaker 2: that often, but still I really enjoy using the products. Nice.
Speaker 3: Okay, So were you happy or disappointed with the new
Speaker 3: headset that came out last year?
Speaker 2: Well, that's the only product probably that I don't have, okay,
Speaker 2: because that was just a little bit too much for me.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I honestly I have of course the phone,
Speaker 2: the iPad, the MacBook, the iMac. I even got a
Speaker 2: MacBook Pro. I have two laptops. Who needs two laptops?
Speaker 1: Well, the only the biggest problem I think with anything
Speaker 1: Apple or just the biggest electronic gadget that people replace
Speaker 1: more frequently than they want to now the earbuds, like
Speaker 1: I figure with Apple calls them, but I have the
Speaker 1: cheap kind myself. But think about those, there's like one
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty bucks or something like that, maybe even more,
Speaker 1: and they lose, they fall out of your ear like
Speaker 1: it's those to me here. I don't know the biggest
Speaker 1: problem right now with electronic waste.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I had some issues with the first one, but
Speaker 2: now since I have the Pro or not the big one,
Speaker 2: I don't have those either, the Max but the in
Speaker 2: air earbuds. Fortunately I bought them once and they still work,
Speaker 2: so nice. I've been lucky with those, very nice.
Speaker 3: Darius is an Apple fanboy. We want to hear a
Speaker 3: little bit about your background, Darius. Though your family it
Speaker 3: sounds like they basically mean y'all started from nothing. So
Speaker 3: can you just kind of share with us the impact
Speaker 3: of leaving like a war torn country basically, and then
Speaker 3: the impact that it had on you and your family.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely. So I was born in nineteen eighty seven
Speaker 2: and Tehran, and at the time there was a war
Speaker 2: between Iran and Iraq, and my parents fled the country
Speaker 2: to the Netherlands in eighty eight when I was one,
Speaker 2: and they basically had to start from zero. We almost
Speaker 2: had no family, and my father had to go to
Speaker 2: school and get educated and have a start a career,
Speaker 2: and he always worked blue collar jobs, and my mother
Speaker 2: stayed at home to raise me and my brother, and
Speaker 2: we always lived paycheck to paycheck, and my parents always
Speaker 2: did their best to make sure that we didn't know
Speaker 2: the height of the financial struggles in the house, but
Speaker 2: it was always present, you know, we could just feel
Speaker 2: the energy even as kids. So that was something that
Speaker 2: really created a sense of urgency in me, because as
Speaker 2: a child, I knew that I had to become wealthy
Speaker 2: because I just didn't want to go through life worrying
Speaker 2: about money. So that was really something that really my
Speaker 2: outlook on money.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you said that your parents tried to kind of
Speaker 1: guard you. They try to protect you from knowing kind
Speaker 1: of what they're going through. And I think most parents,
Speaker 1: the best parents, try to do that, but even still
Speaker 1: it's insufficient. Like kids are perceptive and they're going to
Speaker 1: pick up on the things that are going on behind
Speaker 1: the scenes, even with parents trying to do their best
Speaker 1: to make sure their kids aren't impacted by it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I'm curious you mentioned how that kind of sets
Speaker 1: you up for desiring financial security in your own life. Yeah,
Speaker 1: how did kind of what was going on with your
Speaker 1: family's finances impact your career path, your view on money,
Speaker 1: and then this kind of belief that you needed financial
Speaker 1: security for yourself.
Speaker 2: So when I was like twelve or thirteen, my friends
Speaker 2: started to have jobs, and I went to my parents
Speaker 2: and I said, look, everybody has a paper route or
Speaker 2: works in a supermarket. I need to have a job
Speaker 2: because I want to start making money. And they said, no,
Speaker 2: you should focus on getting your degrees, focus on school
Speaker 2: because if you get distracted, you might risk doing what
Speaker 2: we did, which was to not educate it because in
Speaker 2: my direct family, no one ever went to college, and
Speaker 2: that's what my parents wanted for me, so I struggled
Speaker 2: with it because I always saw my friends not only
Speaker 2: it wasn't really about having a little bit of income
Speaker 2: for them, but it was more that they had this responsibility,
Speaker 2: and I felt like I was kind of missing out
Speaker 2: on something. But looking back, I'm really glad that my
Speaker 2: parents always encouraged me and my brother to focus on school,
Speaker 2: because when I finished high school, they said, okay, fine,
Speaker 2: just go and work during the summer, and that's what
Speaker 2: I did. So I got a job at a call
Speaker 2: center and I worked almost every day for the entire summer,
Speaker 2: and I basically saved everything that I made. So looking back,
Speaker 2: I think that was a good experience for me to
Speaker 2: wait for so long until I could have my first job,
Speaker 2: and then they really saved that money because at that time,
Speaker 2: I was still thinking that you need to just hold
Speaker 2: on to everything that you earned because that's how you
Speaker 2: get wealthy. And of course I had no clue about investing.
Speaker 2: And I did watch the movie Wall Street in my teens,
Speaker 2: so that's one type of education exactly, so I did.
Speaker 2: So I already knew at that stage, Okay, I need
Speaker 2: to somehow become like Gordon Gecko I just don't want
Speaker 2: to end up in jail. But I need to become
Speaker 2: a stock trader or investor because that's where all the
Speaker 2: money is. But yeah, it took me a long time
Speaker 2: before I really figured out how to get into that.
Speaker 3: Darius learned the exact obbsos lesson of what they're trying
Speaker 3: to portray, which is like, look at this terrible, wretched
Speaker 3: human being. Yeah, Garius is like, I want to be
Speaker 3: that exactly my hair in that same beautiful way. So
Speaker 3: how do you bridge the gap then? From being frugal, like, hey,
Speaker 3: I see my parents struggles. They stress the importance of
Speaker 3: education that way I can make a solid income.
Speaker 1: But then I need to be an investor. I need
Speaker 1: me building wealth and the Gordon Gecko thing that seems
Speaker 1: like it's like the seed of something. But then how
Speaker 1: did you become an educated investor? And what was that process? Like?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I have my first taste of investing in
Speaker 2: two thousand and seven. So at the time, I was
Speaker 2: in college, and this is before the financial crisis. So
Speaker 2: I was twenty years old and you could have a
Speaker 2: side job at a bank, and I started in the
Speaker 2: personal banking division, just handing out credit cards and processing
Speaker 2: applications for credit, et cetera. And there was a position
Speaker 2: to become a mutual fund advisor and all you had
Speaker 2: to do was get a four week training and then
Speaker 2: you could just call clients of the bank and offer
Speaker 2: them the latest mutual funds. So my Gordon get go
Speaker 2: censor goes off and I'm like, yeah, this is what
Speaker 2: I need to do, and almost instantly I think I'm
Speaker 2: this genius. So I also start to invest with my
Speaker 2: own money, and I bought stocks of the bank that
Speaker 2: I worked at ing and within a year, of course,
Speaker 2: the financial crisis happens and I'm down like sixty percent.
Speaker 3: Tough time to get invested in the market for the
Speaker 3: first time, Yeah, exactly. It.
Speaker 2: I honestly bought at the height of the market. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So that experience taught me a very important lesson that
Speaker 2: money and investing is very emotional because it felt like
Speaker 2: a gut punch. And I didn't sell at the bottom
Speaker 2: because at that time I was still learning and I
Speaker 2: knew that you shouldn't sell during these moments. However, I
Speaker 2: didn't know what else to do because I was picking stocks,
Speaker 2: which in hindsight wasn't a smart thing to start with
Speaker 2: but I stayed in the market for a few years,
Speaker 2: and then I just couldn't handle it anymore because every
Speaker 2: time I looked at my account it was just down
Speaker 2: and I wanted to stop the pain. So I sold
Speaker 2: and I said, look, I need to figure this thing out,
Speaker 2: and when I figured it out, I'll come back to investing.
Speaker 2: And I just started on this educational spree. I went
Speaker 2: to business school and specialized in finance and started reading
Speaker 2: all of these investment books and yeah, still nothing really happened.
Speaker 3: To be honest, I'm sure that was a period of
Speaker 3: time where you wish you would have had a degree
Speaker 3: of stoicism in your life that you would have been
Speaker 3: able to abide by. But I guess on that note,
Speaker 3: I feel like, generally speaking, it feels like stoicism. It's
Speaker 3: a little bit more in Vogue's days. I'm sure Ryan
Speaker 3: Holliday probably has a lot to do with that's the
Speaker 3: resurgence of the stoics. But why have you found that
Speaker 3: that approach to life resonates with you so much?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so fast forward to twenty fourteen fifteen. At that stage,
Speaker 2: I was still trying to figure things out of my career.
Speaker 2: I had started a business after I finished grad school
Speaker 2: with my dad, and it was in the industrial laundry equipment.
Speaker 2: I wasn't really passionate about that industry. And then I
Speaker 2: started a corporate career in London. I worked at Gardner,
Speaker 2: this IT research firm. I realized this is also not
Speaker 2: for me. I want to start a business for myself,
Speaker 2: but I didn't know what. So I moved back to
Speaker 2: the Netherlands and I thought to myself, I need to
Speaker 2: figure it out. I need to get started with something
Speaker 2: because I have no clue what I'm doing. And at
Speaker 2: that stage I discovered stoicism. Because every time I feel
Speaker 2: like I'm overwhelmed or confused, I always turned to books
Speaker 2: and I remember reading The Four Hour Workweek by Tim
Speaker 2: Ferris and he had this small chapter or section on stoicism,
Speaker 2: and I found that really helpful. So I started reading
Speaker 2: all of the original works. And what I love about
Speaker 2: the philosophy is that you can just explain it in
Speaker 2: one sentence, which is focus on what you control and
Speaker 2: ignore everything else. And it gave me a lot of
Speaker 2: clarity because I honestly had no clue what I wanted
Speaker 2: to do with my career, and I thought to myself, well,
Speaker 2: now that I have a little bit more clarity and
Speaker 2: I can stop worrying so much about my future, let
Speaker 2: me start writing a book. And that's when I wrote
Speaker 2: my first book. And around that same time, I also
Speaker 2: thought to myself, well, I'm reading these works from these
Speaker 2: philosophers like Seneca and Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus, and these
Speaker 2: folks wrote about all of these ideas for better living
Speaker 2: twenty three hundred years ago. But all that I'm thinking
Speaker 2: is how can I use this knowledge to become a
Speaker 2: better investor. So I was lucky that my book and
Speaker 2: the first few articles that I wrote resonated with readers,
Speaker 2: and I started to see a path to earning a
Speaker 2: living with writing books. And that gave me this opportunity
Speaker 2: to really study the stoics more and see how I
Speaker 2: could finally figure out how I could apply it to
Speaker 2: manage my emotions better, not only in my personal life,
Speaker 2: but also with investing. And then slowly the seeds started
Speaker 2: to grow for what I call stoic investing.
Speaker 1: Because I feel like in the personal finance space, I've
Speaker 1: seen a pivot in the opposite direction, which is to
Speaker 1: talk about a lot of things that we can't control,
Speaker 1: and the problem is that's a really deep thing, like
Speaker 1: there are a lot of things we can't control, and
Speaker 1: it's really we could spend hours and hours and hours
Speaker 1: talking about a laundry list of those subjects and the
Speaker 1: ways in which we're impacted by things that we can't
Speaker 1: really have any sort of impact on the outcome of. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: talk to me. Stoicism the way you're describing it, and
Speaker 1: kind of the historical approach is it's a holistic life,
Speaker 1: the way of approaching life. You talk about it specifically
Speaker 1: about the intersection of stoicism and money. What does stoicism
Speaker 1: have to do with wealth building in particular?
Speaker 2: Yeah, So stoicism is a philosophy that really promotes indifference
Speaker 2: to everything that you don't control. And when it comes
Speaker 2: to investing and personal finance, you don't control. Like you said,
Speaker 2: like ninety nine percent of what people talk about. We
Speaker 2: don't control the economy, we don't control inflation and so forth.
Speaker 2: That list is obvious. So basically everything that they talk
Speaker 2: about on CNBC. But when you look at our actual
Speaker 2: investments that we make, we also don't control the outcomes.
Speaker 2: We all know that the S and P. Five hundred
Speaker 2: has annualized returns of around ten percent over the past
Speaker 2: fifty years. Everyone who's into personal finance knows this, But
Speaker 2: the thing is that it's not within our control. Maybe
Speaker 2: it's eight percent moving forward, but it shouldn't matter to
Speaker 2: you as a stoic investor or as a person. I
Speaker 2: feel like because the stoic's really promoted indifference towards outcomes.
Speaker 2: So when you really applies stoicism to your personal finance
Speaker 2: and investing strategy, you'll learn to create some distance between
Speaker 2: yourself and your money. And I feel like that's the
Speaker 2: best thing that you can do for your mental health,
Speaker 2: but also for your career, because when you have some
Speaker 2: indifference when it comes to your money, you can just
Speaker 2: relax and focus on your career and your family and
Speaker 2: your job and everything else that is important while you
Speaker 2: are still doing your best. Because epictetis one of the
Speaker 2: most stringent philosophers, said that you should demand the best
Speaker 2: of yourself every single day, and to me, that means
Speaker 2: that every single day I just need to perform my
Speaker 2: duties as a human being and not complain and try
Speaker 2: to become better not only in my career but as
Speaker 2: a human being. So if I'm so obsessed with money,
Speaker 2: I can't do those things. And that's something that I
Speaker 2: personally experienced because I would say my entire life up
Speaker 2: until around twenty seventeen when I finally started to apply
Speaker 2: all of these lessons, because I discovered it like twenty
Speaker 2: fourteen fifteen, but it took me a few years to
Speaker 2: really apply it in my own life. But when I
Speaker 2: started to apply it, I realized that I was too
Speaker 2: obsessed with money and that caused a lot of friction
Speaker 2: and anxiety and mental blocks. And when I resolved those things,
Speaker 2: I could really focus on the act of investing, which
Speaker 2: is actually just nothing more than a habit. Just like
Speaker 2: we work out and eat healthy, et cetera, investing is
Speaker 2: also a habit. So when you remove all of the friction,
Speaker 2: you can just do it. You can invest without wasting
Speaker 2: your time and energy and just focus on living a
Speaker 2: good life.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're talking about cultivating the sense of indifference, and
Speaker 3: I like what you said about creating some distance between
Speaker 3: you and your money, but like, how do you practically
Speaker 3: go about that. I feel like we're kind of getting
Speaker 3: into more of the meat of the intersection of stoicism
Speaker 3: and investing or your wealth. But like you said, CNBC,
Speaker 3: that's all they talk about.
Speaker 1: All they're talking.
Speaker 3: About is the noise. It's the things that you can't
Speaker 3: really control. So is it as simple as creating like
Speaker 3: an information diet right where you're limiting the inputs that
Speaker 3: are having an impact on your life.
Speaker 2: I'm not a fan of information diets, and I'm also
Speaker 2: not a fan of the common investment advice of become
Speaker 2: a passive investor and never look at your portfolio. I
Speaker 2: love John Bogel, and John Bogel, the founder of Vanguard,
Speaker 2: of course, basically made this whole ETF investing possible. And
Speaker 2: one of the things that he said was, yeah, just
Speaker 2: invest your entire career and just never open your brokerage account.
Speaker 2: But I feel like you should be able to open
Speaker 2: your account without getting swayed. You should be able to
Speaker 2: look at CNBC. You should be able to read the
Speaker 2: Wall Street Journal without thinking to yourself, oh, okay, what
Speaker 2: should I do? Maybe should I I should sell or
Speaker 2: maybe I should buy n Video stock or whatever? Right,
Speaker 2: And I think that's the ultimate goal as a stoic investor,
Speaker 2: that you become indifferent to all of the noise and
Speaker 2: you can just handle everything that people throw at you
Speaker 2: and the media throws at you, because you have the
Speaker 2: sense of calm and you know what you are doing,
Speaker 2: and you've eliminated like ninety nine point nine percent of
Speaker 2: the investment strategies, and you know what you're doing, and
Speaker 2: you're fine with everything that basically is happening because you
Speaker 2: don't have to react.
Speaker 1: Something you're getting to here, I think is being able
Speaker 1: to trust yourself. And like one of the things is, yeah,
Speaker 1: maybe you don't like zone out and watch CNBC for
Speaker 1: like six hours, Like you're probably setting yourself up for failure.
Speaker 1: I'm assuming that a good stoic investor probably isn't doing that.
Speaker 1: But you're also not saying I can't watch at all,
Speaker 1: or I can't even open, you know, the homepage of
Speaker 1: the Wall Street Journal and read a few things without
Speaker 1: without feeling swayed. So how do you You mentioned too,
Speaker 1: that you found stoicism in twenty fourteen but found yourself
Speaker 1: practicing not until like twenty seventeen. What was the gap
Speaker 1: there and what does it look like then to incorporate
Speaker 1: more of that those stoic approaches into your life.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So one of the pieces of advice from the
Speaker 2: stoics is to start small where you want to start
Speaker 2: practicing stolicism. So I think also Epicthetis says something like,
Speaker 2: start with a cup. Let's say your favorite gup falls
Speaker 2: and bread. You should just say to yourself, oh, okay,
Speaker 2: this is just a cup, and then you can slowly
Speaker 2: build it up. So for example, I remember getting in
Speaker 2: a fender bender around that time, and I was really
Speaker 2: worked up. While it wasn't that big of a deal,
Speaker 2: but I was just like the emotions and the anger
Speaker 2: within me was like starting to get a little bit
Speaker 2: out of control. And later on I realized what am
Speaker 2: I doing? Like I have insurance or it's not even
Speaker 2: my fault. Why am I getting worked up about this?
Speaker 2: And I feel like emotions are normal. I still get angry,
Speaker 2: for example, when I injure my back or something. You know,
Speaker 2: that's something that I'm kind of prone to because I
Speaker 2: used to play basketball in college and I have this
Speaker 2: lower back issue since then, and every few months or
Speaker 2: sometimes a few years can go by without having issue,
Speaker 2: but then it pops up, and then every time it happens,
Speaker 2: I get frustrated at first. And the key to stoicism
Speaker 2: is that in the beginning, you might be stuck in
Speaker 2: that emotion for a few days. But the more you
Speaker 2: practice and the more you build it up from a
Speaker 2: cup to a fender bender, to an injury to maybe
Speaker 2: at some point losing your job or losing some money
Speaker 2: in the stock market, when you start to build it
Speaker 2: up that way and practice shrugging it off, which is
Speaker 2: also a classic technique of the Stoics. They literally said,
Speaker 2: and this is something Marcus Aurelia said, when bad things happen,
Speaker 2: shrug it off. Simply just the act of doing that
Speaker 2: will put you more at ease. And after a while
Speaker 2: I noticed that I was able to snap out of
Speaker 2: my negative mindset or anxious mindset quicker. So now my
Speaker 2: rule is that I can be stuck in negative emotions
Speaker 2: or being frustrated for a few hours, or I can
Speaker 2: give you an example. I actually injured my back last week.
Speaker 3: This is why this one is fresh in mind, because
Speaker 3: you're feeling it right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm feeling it. And it happened on a Tuesday,
Speaker 2: And it was like at three after three pm. I
Speaker 2: ordered some some some dumbbells for my home gym, and
Speaker 2: I picked them up from the box and I felt
Speaker 2: it in my lower back and I started cursing, and
Speaker 2: I was angry, and you know, talked to my partner
Speaker 2: and she was like, yeah, don't be so worked up.
Speaker 2: And I stayed that emotion for a few hours, and
Speaker 2: then by the evening I finally was able to snap
Speaker 2: back by just remembering the stoics. And a misconception about
Speaker 2: stoicism is that you shouldn't have emotions or it should
Speaker 2: be numb. That's not true at all. The thing is
Speaker 2: that you should be able to detect what you are
Speaker 2: feeling and react accordingly. So translating that to investing, it
Speaker 2: means that let's say a crash happens, you can look
Speaker 2: at it. You don't have to run away from it.
Speaker 2: You can maybe even explain it and understand it if
Speaker 2: you have some historical context, which I always think helps,
Speaker 2: because let's say you're a writer or a dentist, you
Speaker 2: don't really have to have historical background into your profession,
Speaker 2: but as an investor, it really helps. Knowing a little
Speaker 2: bit of history of the stock market and you know
Speaker 2: how crashes happen and corrections, et cetera. But let's say
Speaker 2: you can look at all of that, and your goal
Speaker 2: as an investor is to respond accordingly, and for a
Speaker 2: long term investor, the response is nothing, just stick to
Speaker 2: your strategy. So that was really what I was going
Speaker 2: through in that timeframe, to really internalize the philosophy, see
Speaker 2: how I could apply it in all areas of my life,
Speaker 2: and then actually do it, you know, because I love
Speaker 2: to write about the things that I've successfully accomplished myself,
Speaker 2: and to be honest, I did write about personal finance, etc.
Speaker 2: But it wasn't until after the COVID crash that I
Speaker 2: felt comfortable to come out and talk about stoicism and
Speaker 2: investing because even though I was applying this stuff since
Speaker 2: twenty twenty seventeen, I felt like I needed a stress test,
Speaker 2: and that happened in twenty twenty and then, of course
Speaker 2: the market is down by thirty percent or something and
Speaker 2: what felt like a matter of days, but I was
Speaker 2: finally calm. I wasn't doing anything. I didn't think to myself, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: this is a good buying opportunity. I have to be honest.
Speaker 2: Of course, in hindsight it was. But my biggest win
Speaker 2: came because I just stayed the course right, and that
Speaker 2: was my biggest, biggest win. When I looked at my
Speaker 2: personal life, because my first try didn't work out because
Speaker 2: I sold in twenty ten, and then we all know
Speaker 2: what happened from twenty eleven, you know, went on a
Speaker 2: crazy bull run.
Speaker 3: So yeah, the market blew up. Yeah, there's a big
Speaker 3: difference between having that head knowledge and then actually implementing
Speaker 3: that into your life and controlling your behavior. And I
Speaker 3: like what you're saying here about how does it we
Speaker 3: should be experiencing our emotions, but to not be distracted
Speaker 3: by those emotions. And I'm looking forward to talking about
Speaker 3: some of the different ways, some of the additional ways
Speaker 3: that were able to implement some of the principles of
Speaker 3: stoicism within our financial lives. We'll get to all of
Speaker 3: that and more right after this.
Speaker 1: Our way back from the break, still talking with Darius
Speaker 1: Faru talking about stoicism, how it impacts your ability to
Speaker 1: build wealth, your finances, and it will have a direct
Speaker 1: impact has even just Darius example, selling in twenty ten,
Speaker 1: not selling during the COVID crash, big difference than in
Speaker 1: your net worth at the end of the day. And Darius,
Speaker 1: I think it feels like basically what you're saying, if
Speaker 1: I'm boiling it down correctly, is that that emotions or
Speaker 1: your ability to at least respond appropriately to your emotions.
Speaker 1: It supersedes knowledge. So tell me if I'm wrong here,
Speaker 1: and then how much in depth investing information do we
Speaker 1: need to consume to then be stoic investors? Is it
Speaker 1: more about our behavior or is it more about the
Speaker 1: things that we need to learn in order to be
Speaker 1: great investors?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel like it's a little bit of both,
Speaker 2: and more focused on the emotional plot because knowledge is important,
Speaker 2: but it's not the most important thing. Because if that
Speaker 2: was the case, as Warren Buffett said, historians or librarians
Speaker 2: would all be rich. The key is really to know
Speaker 2: what you're doing and have enough confidence in that knowledge
Speaker 2: that you were able to stay the course. And one
Speaker 2: of the most practical ways that you can do that
Speaker 2: is by investing with money that you really won't miss.
Speaker 2: Because there was another big mistake that I made, you know, seven,
Speaker 2: was that I basically poured all of my savings at
Speaker 2: the time into the market in the hopes of becoming wealthy.
Speaker 2: And I think so many young investors or new investors
Speaker 2: start out with investing a big chunk or maybe even
Speaker 2: all of their savings, and then they start looking at
Speaker 2: that portfolio with laser eyes and they just can't look away.
Speaker 1: It sounds like an early story for Met's life. Honestly, Actually,
Speaker 1: when you opened up the roth Ira Matt for real
Speaker 1: and ye.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I certainly neglected my savings and I was left
Speaker 3: in an unfortunate position of needing to tap those savings
Speaker 3: and I didn't because I didn't have that liquidity on hand.
Speaker 3: I drew down on losses and ended up with less money.
Speaker 3: But Darius earlier, actually, I want to kind of circle
Speaker 3: back around here because you talked about forming the habit
Speaker 3: of investing right, and I've heard you talk about how
Speaker 3: it can be helpful to eliminate goals from your life,
Speaker 3: so to you know, essentially think less about becoming a
Speaker 3: millionaire as opposed to being like identifying that you are
Speaker 3: an investor. This is something I'm going to do. I
Speaker 3: do day and day out, say the course. But I'm
Speaker 3: curious to hear your thoughts on that because I know
Speaker 3: for a lot of people, having a big goal can
Speaker 3: be incredibly helpful.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: It's something that they're looking ahead to oft in the future.
Speaker 3: It's this thing that they're like, Okay, this is why
Speaker 3: I'm sacrificing. Now, this is why I'm spending less, is
Speaker 3: because I want to be able to achieve some sense
Speaker 3: of financial independence. Talk about that sort of balance it
Speaker 3: might take to be able to do both.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, that's really a good point, because if you
Speaker 2: think about it, we all invest to have a better future.
Speaker 2: But if I really take the ideas of the Stoics
Speaker 2: and apply it to investing, which, by the way, the
Speaker 2: Stoics were not against money, they were also indifferent to it,
Speaker 2: but they said, if you can make money by remaining
Speaker 2: honest by all means, do it. I love that because
Speaker 2: it really doesn't judge money, and it's okay to have
Speaker 2: goals to become wealthy, become rich. Now, there's another way
Speaker 2: to look at this, which is by looking at the
Speaker 2: present moment. So we all get the math. Okay, invest
Speaker 2: five hundred bucks or invest a thousand bucks, and then
Speaker 2: in thirty or twenty years you'll become a millionaire. But
Speaker 2: we really don't think that far head. I think the
Speaker 2: biggest benefit of investing and living a frugal life is
Speaker 2: that you just become a more complete human being today.
Speaker 2: To me, that's why I actually invest and why I've
Speaker 2: always lived below my means and why I've actually haven't
Speaker 2: upgraded my lifestyle in like six years or so, still
Speaker 2: live in the same apartment.
Speaker 1: I think it's a really good point, Darius. Like I
Speaker 1: think lots of times people see it as a means
Speaker 1: to an end. It's like, oh, I can't wait until
Speaker 1: I'm able to like drive a BMW and live in
Speaker 1: the fancy house. But then ultimately they get to that
Speaker 1: point and they realize that's not very fulfilling either, and
Speaker 1: that maybe they were.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: We all look back on fondness some of those like
Speaker 1: poor college or post college days, or that first high
Speaker 1: school job where we were making six bucks an hour,
Speaker 1: and we're like, but like the freedom that came with
Speaker 1: just having some money in our pockets. So yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't know, Talk to me. Then, what's the point of
Speaker 1: building wealth if you're not planning on upgrading your lifestyle?
Speaker 2: Yea, The point is really freedom, right, because having all
Speaker 2: of that wealth just gives you more freedom. And the
Speaker 2: funny thing is that you don't really have to have
Speaker 2: that wealth to already feel free. I feel like I
Speaker 2: already felt emotionally free in twenty nineteen, when I was
Speaker 2: still on the path, and I wasn't technically financially free.
Speaker 2: And when I achieved a seven figure net worth a
Speaker 2: year and a half or two years ago, I could say, Okay,
Speaker 2: you know, if I quit working now, I can live
Speaker 2: off my wealth and that's fine, right, so technically I
Speaker 2: don't have to work. But the thing is that even
Speaker 2: if you're on the path, you're saving, you're living below
Speaker 2: your means, you have good financial habits, you enjoy your life,
Speaker 2: you enjoy the simple things, and you are content. I
Speaker 2: think you can already count yourself mentally free because it's
Speaker 2: just a matter of time. And if you live a
Speaker 2: life like that, nothing can break you. What's you know,
Speaker 2: what are the threads that you're going to buy a
Speaker 2: Mercedes S Class because you're driving E Class or something.
Speaker 2: You know, Like it's like that that those are the
Speaker 2: common pitfalls of people who constantly upgrade because there's there's
Speaker 2: no end in sight. It's not like they're ever going
Speaker 2: to say, Okay, you know, like I live in this
Speaker 2: four bedroom house, maybe let's buy a two bedroom condo.
Speaker 1: Right, it never goes in reverse?
Speaker 2: Yeah exactly. Yeah. So, like the best way to have
Speaker 2: a happy and content life is just to not get
Speaker 2: on that treadmill. And if you are on a treadmill,
Speaker 2: it's always possible to get off it. The thing is
Speaker 2: just that you can't get on it anymore if you
Speaker 2: want to just be in control of your life. Because
Speaker 2: one I think one of the most important things that
Speaker 2: I learned in my career was that, sure, I can
Speaker 2: earn a good living even with writing and doing courses,
Speaker 2: et cetera. I can earn one hundred or two hundred
Speaker 2: or maybe even three hundred K a year. Can I
Speaker 2: earn a million bucks a year? Is unlikely because there
Speaker 2: are not a lot of folks who do that. And
Speaker 2: the beauty is you don't even have to do that.
Speaker 2: You can have a good income with a job that
Speaker 2: you love. Combine that with healthy habits, financial habits, and
Speaker 2: a solid investment strategy. You know what else do you need?
Speaker 3: You're still going to win financially just by implementing those
Speaker 3: proper habits. And like what I hear you saying is
Speaker 3: and what you're recommending is for folks to find like
Speaker 3: a level a sense of contentment. And you kind of
Speaker 3: alluded to this before as well, but it sounds like
Speaker 3: you've just been able to put money in its proper place.
Speaker 3: And I think a large part of that is finding
Speaker 3: in discovering your true desires, and that's something that you
Speaker 3: that you talk about or that you've written about as well.
Speaker 3: But how would you recommend because essentially it's difficult to
Speaker 3: remove money, I think, from your mind unless you are
Speaker 3: sort of like doing the Indiana Jones golden statue swap.
Speaker 3: At the same time, you know, like at the very
Speaker 3: moment you have because if you take it off, like
Speaker 3: there's a vacuum, there, there's a void, but some you know,
Speaker 3: you have to replace it with something. And you talk
Speaker 3: about the true desires, how would you recommend for folks
Speaker 3: to discover what those are in their life.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a really good question because Stolicism is also
Speaker 2: not about living a very stringent life. I still want
Speaker 2: to buy a new iPhone every two years, you know,
Speaker 2: but the thing is that I'm not going to eat
Speaker 2: out every week, and I you know, I live a
Speaker 2: simple life and go on vacation once a year, and
Speaker 2: you know, save on other things. So I feel like
Speaker 2: if you have a balance, while there are certain things
Speaker 2: that cost money but give you a lot of satisfaction,
Speaker 2: and at the same time, also is something that really
Speaker 2: enriches your life without going broke. I feel like that's
Speaker 2: a great way to keep things fun, because, as you said,
Speaker 2: we all need money and we have to be honest
Speaker 2: and practical about it, and that's one of the reasons
Speaker 2: that we work and earn and save and all of
Speaker 2: these things. But I really believe there is a middle path.
Speaker 2: And when I started to research Stoicism, I discovered that
Speaker 2: Stoicism was actually the philosophy of the middle path or
Speaker 2: the golden mean. Because at the time in ancient Greece
Speaker 2: and Rome, there were two primary schools of thought. There
Speaker 2: were the cynics cynicism, and there were the Epicureanists. And
Speaker 2: the cynics said life is hard and you need to
Speaker 2: endure it and that's it. No pleasure, no fun, no nothing.
Speaker 2: And the epicurean said life is hard and the only
Speaker 2: way to forget it is to seek pleasure. So both
Speaker 2: of them said that life is hard, but their mechanism
Speaker 2: of dealing or coping was different. Now, the Stoics came
Speaker 2: and said, well, life is hard, we need to deal
Speaker 2: with it, we need to be tougher, but at the
Speaker 2: same time, we don't need to punish ourselves. So that's
Speaker 2: why I think the philosophy has remained popular all these
Speaker 2: years in centuries, because I feel like it's the most
Speaker 2: practical philosophy and something that, as you can see, can
Speaker 2: apply to every area. Like I took the philosophy and
Speaker 2: apply it to investing, I guess because my subconscious mind
Speaker 2: was always focused on investing in the stock market. So
Speaker 2: as soon as I picked up the Stoics, I started
Speaker 2: to think about how I could apply it to investing,
Speaker 2: and other people who wanted to use stoicism to improve
Speaker 2: their personal lives and mindset or relationships use it that way.
Speaker 2: And I think that's really the beauty of this philosophy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I love that you've kind of taken it at
Speaker 1: those time tested truths. You've adapted it kind of for
Speaker 1: the way you live the things you're interested in, And
Speaker 1: it's really cool to see how malleable that philosophy is
Speaker 1: and how it can serve people thousands of years later.
Speaker 1: We've got a few more questions we're going to get
Speaker 1: to with you, Darius, including I'm talking about self development
Speaker 1: and stoicism when we're talking about our career path. We'll
Speaker 1: get to a few questions on that. Right after this.
Speaker 3: We are back for the break, we're talking with Darius
Speaker 3: Faru about stoicism, and Darius, in your book, you've got
Speaker 3: a chapter about how valuable skills. Essentially they're they're better
Speaker 3: than money. And I'm sure there's a lot of folks
Speaker 3: out there who are thinking, Okay, I'd much rather have
Speaker 3: a whole lot of money, you may.
Speaker 1: Five million skills.
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly exactly. It's like, oh, this is easy for
Speaker 3: you to say. It even makes me think back to
Speaker 3: as you're like some of the examples you're you're giving,
Speaker 3: I forget which philosopher, but like, start with a cup,
Speaker 3: allow the cup to break, and then shrug it off
Speaker 3: and realize over time you can kind of build up
Speaker 3: your resilience to losses. But like, I feel like an
Speaker 3: argument to be made against that is like, well, sure,
Speaker 3: that's an easy argument to make if you've got a
Speaker 3: lot of cups. Well that's an easy argument to make
Speaker 3: if you've got a lot of money that like, oh no,
Speaker 3: what you really need instead are skills, not money. But
Speaker 3: make an argument for that, for the ability for us
Speaker 3: to better ourselves as individuals.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, what you said about preferring money is something
Speaker 2: that Seneca also said. He said, if someone told me,
Speaker 2: would you rather be rich or poor? I would of
Speaker 2: course I I'd rather be rich. But if I would
Speaker 2: be poor, that's also okay. And that's the key to stoicism.
Speaker 2: I think they look at all situations as fine. If
Speaker 2: this is my life and this is my situation that's
Speaker 2: been given to me, that's okay. Here's how I'm going
Speaker 2: to deal with it. And the reason that I started
Speaker 2: this book with a chapter on skills is that that's
Speaker 2: where I started. This is where I feel everyone who
Speaker 2: starts from zero, or who's not born into wealth should start,
Speaker 2: because you can make money with nothing else than your skills.
Speaker 2: And if you are starting this journey towards wealth and
Speaker 2: to financial freedom, it can be very overwhelming. And that
Speaker 2: was also the case for me. When I started, I
Speaker 2: thought to myself, Wow, you know, I need to make
Speaker 2: a few hundred thousand dollars a year. How can I
Speaker 2: do that? I don't know if I can ever do that,
Speaker 2: you know, Like, especially when I started writing and my
Speaker 2: first book just sold maybe like two hundred copies in
Speaker 2: the first year or the first six months when it
Speaker 2: came out, I thought to myself, Yeah, there's no way
Speaker 2: I can do this full time. But over the years,
Speaker 2: the numbers, of course kept growing, and if I look back,
Speaker 2: the reason or one of the things that really inspired
Speaker 2: me the most was this idea to work with your
Speaker 2: natural abilities, or to focus on your strengths, simply put,
Speaker 2: and to build your career on top of your strength
Speaker 2: and to get world class at the things that you
Speaker 2: are already good at, because if you try to become
Speaker 2: good at the things that you're not good at, you
Speaker 2: might become average. And that's great. But if you want
Speaker 2: to earn more than average, you need to be great.
Speaker 2: And that's the thing that sounds very obvious, and it's
Speaker 2: very obvious, but I feel like not enough folks are
Speaker 2: really living. And that was true for me. It was
Speaker 2: really true for me until I discovered stoicism, where I
Speaker 2: finally realized, you know, like I just need to forget
Speaker 2: about everything else. You know. Having this family business is great.
Speaker 2: I love it, but it's not really aligned with my
Speaker 2: strengths because I don't love this industry. Climbing the corporate
Speaker 2: ladder is great, but I'm an introvert. I don't like strangers,
Speaker 2: I don't like people. I just like to be alone.
Speaker 2: So being a writer is perfect for me because.
Speaker 1: We get it, Darius. We'll let you go in just
Speaker 1: a second.
Speaker 2: Okay, that was my message, and I'm just kidding this interview.
Speaker 2: But the thing is, like my strength is just to
Speaker 2: sit alone in a room for like hours and days
Speaker 2: on end. I can just do that for a very
Speaker 2: long time. You know. I have close friends who say
Speaker 2: that sounds like the worst thing ever.
Speaker 1: We're opposite human Yeah, we're opposite people.
Speaker 2: Right, So when I tell them what I do, they're like, oh, man,
Speaker 2: I wish I would never I never have to do that.
Speaker 2: And I think this is why I became a writer,
Speaker 2: because I finally had permission, let's put it that way,
Speaker 2: from not only the stoics, but also like management thinkers
Speaker 2: like Peter Drucker, who famously said that that you should
Speaker 2: improve your strengths and ignore your weaknesses. And I really
Speaker 2: took that advice to heart. And as I started to
Speaker 2: become better at writing and only focused on writing, I
Speaker 2: also got better rewards from it and better reach. And yeah,
Speaker 2: now this is my eighth book, so I feel like
Speaker 2: that that was a good decision to ignore everything else
Speaker 2: and and just focus on writing.
Speaker 3: Very nice, So for you the skill, Like we're literally
Speaker 3: talking about the skill of writing and how you were
Speaker 3: able to improve there. And yeah, are there some general
Speaker 3: skills for folks out there that kind of go across industry,
Speaker 3: across different jobs that you think individuals should likely develop.
Speaker 3: Do you think there's some different practices that you think
Speaker 3: are undervalued when it comes to our ability to just
Speaker 3: not only become better human beings, better people, but also
Speaker 3: just to make more money too.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think one of the best income generating skills
Speaker 2: is actually every day writing, not writing books or articles.
Speaker 2: But I feel like the better you are at translating
Speaker 2: your thoughts into words, the better you will become at communication.
Speaker 2: So writing is a meta skill. And I'm a little
Speaker 2: bit afraid that more and more people will think that
Speaker 2: writing is for ai But wow, yeah, you know that's
Speaker 2: something that I wish people would not think, because writing
Speaker 2: is really just communication. It's just translating your thoughts, which
Speaker 2: are almost always abstract, into clear and concise words. And
Speaker 2: if you want to become a better communicator or leader, storyteller, salesperson,
Speaker 2: someone who wants to ask for a raise at any job,
Speaker 2: I feel like the better you are at that process
Speaker 2: the more odds of succeeding in your career.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's advice, and I think you're right
Speaker 1: that the human process of organizing our thoughts our minds
Speaker 1: can be a big jumble mess sometimes, and writing can
Speaker 1: help you put those things out in order so you
Speaker 1: realize what you think, why you think it. If you're
Speaker 1: able to write down those those thoughts, you're able to
Speaker 1: bring clarity to yourself and then hopefully to others at
Speaker 1: some point too.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And it's as simple as just journaling, right, It's just
Speaker 2: as simple as journaling daily, And just that practice of
Speaker 2: journaling will really improve your writing. So a lot of
Speaker 2: folks think, oh, how should I do that? You know,
Speaker 2: I don't want to go to writing workshops. I don't
Speaker 2: want to, you know, take courses. I also don't think
Speaker 2: that's necessary. Just taking or buying a physical journal or
Speaker 2: opening your notes app on your phone is enough to
Speaker 2: just start translating your thoughts into words every day. And
Speaker 2: if you do that every day, you'll automatically get better
Speaker 2: at it.
Speaker 3: What other ways, Darius, have you seen stoicism impact your life?
Speaker 3: You kind of gave some examples of whether it's maybe
Speaker 3: how you treat other people right, So the fender bender
Speaker 3: sort of scenario that maybe allows you to kind of
Speaker 3: keep your cool there when it came to personal injury
Speaker 3: as you hurt your back. Like, have you seen other
Speaker 3: areas of your life where you've been able to apply
Speaker 3: the principles of stoicism other than personal finances and growing wealth.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So in my relationship with my partner, it's been
Speaker 2: one of the most important things because when we met,
Speaker 2: she was not familiar with stoicism, but of course it
Speaker 2: was one of the first topics that came up where
Speaker 2: we met, and yeah, she really enjoys the idea and
Speaker 2: slowly started applying it as well, to the point where
Speaker 2: she reminds me to be stoic in certain situations when
Speaker 2: I'm not. So I feel like, if you have a relationship,
Speaker 2: I think it's a great way to keep each other accountable.
Speaker 2: And yeah, when it goes both ways, it's an extra
Speaker 2: a layer of or an extra reminder to just not
Speaker 2: get get too emotional and not get out of control,
Speaker 2: because yeah, life is already so hard, you know, Like
Speaker 2: life is complex and we all have these responsibilities and
Speaker 2: I am definitely one of those people who tends to
Speaker 2: or has this natural tendency to make things harder, and
Speaker 2: stoicism helps me to combat that feeling.
Speaker 1: Darius, there's been a great conversation. Man, love the book,
Speaker 1: and I love kind of what you're putting out there
Speaker 1: into the world. Where can How to Money listeners find
Speaker 1: your book and purchase it if they're interested?
Speaker 2: So the best way to find out more about the
Speaker 2: book is to go to stoicpath to wealth dot com
Speaker 2: or on DARIUSFORU dot com. Very nice.
Speaker 3: We'll link to both of those in our show notes. Darius,
Speaker 3: thank you so much for talking with us today.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you for having me really what this all right? Matt?
Speaker 1: I love conversations like this because you and I behind
Speaker 1: the scenes were always talking about how the truth about
Speaker 1: personal finance is there's always so much you can learn,
Speaker 1: and the truth about like our the depths of our
Speaker 1: human emotion and reactions to things or like limitless and
Speaker 1: the more we can control those. Yeah, a healthy amount
Speaker 1: of knowledge is good. But at some point, like the
Speaker 1: biggest thing we have to control in our lives as
Speaker 1: human beings is ourselves, and market's gonna do what it's
Speaker 1: gonna do. We'll build wealth over time, but we have
Speaker 1: to be able to control our reactions to do that.
Speaker 1: So I love this conversation. Was what was your big
Speaker 1: takeaway from it? So I think this is what do
Speaker 1: you call it recency bias?
Speaker 3: But it was right there at the end when he
Speaker 3: was talking about journaling and he was specifically talking about
Speaker 3: writing because we were taking I had asked him about
Speaker 3: skills and I'm thinking, okay, networking or never burning bridges,
Speaker 3: I don't know, just different things that you want to
Speaker 3: keep in mind when you're out in the world, out
Speaker 3: in the business world, regardless of the industry that you're in.
Speaker 3: And he immediately started talking about writing, and so that's
Speaker 3: why I kind of clarified. I was like, well, what
Speaker 3: about for everybody, like, aside from you, obviously you are
Speaker 3: a writer, and he kind of doubled down. He was
Speaker 3: just like, no, I actually think I think for everybody,
Speaker 3: everybody should likely be journaling, they should be writing more.
Speaker 3: And the reason that he gave for that, I think
Speaker 3: was so true, which is that we need the ability
Speaker 3: to process our thoughts. And you know what I immediately
Speaker 3: made think of was like, over the past couple of years,
Speaker 3: everyone's been talking about the vibes, right how the vibes
Speaker 3: are off. But like vibes is what is vibes? Nobody
Speaker 3: really knows. It's just like this collective feeling. Yes, it's
Speaker 3: like this amorphous thing. And it almost feels kind of
Speaker 3: lazy if you think about it, right, because it's like, well, no,
Speaker 3: what is vibes? Like you need to identify what that
Speaker 3: is and communicate better to me what you're feeling or
Speaker 3: put your finger on it. And I know sometimes it's
Speaker 3: hard for us to put our fingers on things, but
Speaker 3: I think it also comes at the expense of us
Speaker 3: not taking the time to process what we're thinking about things,
Speaker 3: how we're feeling about things. And I totally agree with
Speaker 3: what he's saying here. I have looked back at different
Speaker 3: times in my life and I feel like I've had
Speaker 3: the most clarity when I have written the most in
Speaker 3: my own journal, which is I don't think it's something
Speaker 3: we've ever really talked about here on the show, but
Speaker 3: it is the synthesis and the formation and the processing
Speaker 3: of your own ideas and the more that you are
Speaker 3: going to be able to do that and to distill
Speaker 3: that down and communicate that to others in your life,
Speaker 3: regardless of what it is that you do. I think
Speaker 3: you're going to find yourself in a much more successful position.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I have like some intuitive thoughts about personal finance for
Speaker 1: a long time, but until I started like writing those down,
Speaker 1: formulating those things, it was just kind of helter skelter.
Speaker 1: And then it's like, wait, but what do I actually think?
Speaker 1: And I think that's true of so many things.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so very non money related takeaway for me, but yeah,
Speaker 3: what about for you.
Speaker 1: I love when you said, like, put some distance between
Speaker 1: yourself and your money, so good, and I think it's
Speaker 1: spot on. I think we need a healthier detachment from
Speaker 1: our money, where we're doing the right things. We're making
Speaker 1: sure that we're growing the gap, we're funneling money into
Speaker 1: those retirement accounts, we have enough set aside in saving,
Speaker 1: but that when it comes to the outcome and the results,
Speaker 1: maybe we're obsessing about those things a little too much.
Speaker 1: And I think maybe he's right, like, we don't have
Speaker 1: to blind ourselves from the outcome, but the more we
Speaker 1: can become zen with whatever happens, realizing that hey, the
Speaker 1: rest of twenty twenty four might be like the first
Speaker 1: half might be awesome, or the stock market could experience
Speaker 1: like some big tantrums like we don't know who knows?
Speaker 1: But and then part of that is what's your goal.
Speaker 1: If your goal is as a long term investor, not
Speaker 1: even doing anything with this money until decades down the road,
Speaker 1: then it doesn't even matter. And so I think that
Speaker 1: healthy detachment is so crucial to handling money. Well, I
Speaker 1: feel like it's been harder for me as I think
Speaker 1: of myself as a fairly emotional dude. But the more
Speaker 1: I've been able to kind of take motion out of
Speaker 1: some of my money, it doesn't mean I'm emotion less,
Speaker 1: but it just means I'm not putting as much of
Speaker 1: my emotional focus on what's going on with my money
Speaker 1: at that particular moment.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're not denying your feelings, like feel the feelings,
Speaker 3: but just know what it is you need to continue
Speaker 3: to do having also field the feelings. But uh, yeah,
Speaker 3: that's good man. But let's introduce the beer that you
Speaker 3: and I enjoyed during this episode. It was a field
Speaker 3: Trip wheat beer. This is by Monday Nights Brewing.
Speaker 2: You. What are your thoughts on it? Joel?
Speaker 1: I thought it was refreshing, had a light lemon zest vibe.
Speaker 1: It had a nice mouthfeel, which wheat beers often do
Speaker 1: bring to the table. So this it's laid back in
Speaker 1: some ways, but in other ways it's got like it's
Speaker 1: got a little bit of that pepper spice going on too.
Speaker 1: It's got some interesting flavors going on that you might
Speaker 1: not get and just kind of your basic run of
Speaker 1: the mill person.
Speaker 3: I feel like the entire time I was enjoying this,
Speaker 3: I kept looking at the cane because it's got mushrooms, yeah,
Speaker 3: all over it, And so I wasn't necessarily picking up
Speaker 3: on like earthy, wet soil kind of vibes or anything
Speaker 3: like that. It really was pretty light and citrusy and bright,
Speaker 3: and I didn't taste any fun. Guy, Yeah, I didn't either,
Speaker 3: and so I wouldn't. I was trying to figure out
Speaker 3: why it is that they stuck mushrooms on here, other
Speaker 3: than the fact that they look really cool, and maybe
Speaker 3: that's all they looked cool. Maybe that's all they're going for.
Speaker 3: But uh, yeah, glad that you and I got to
Speaker 3: enjoy the one today. This is a local brewery Monday
Speaker 3: night brewing here in Atlanta, but that's going to be
Speaker 3: it for this episode. Listeners can find our show notes
Speaker 3: up on the website at howdomoney dot com. And so
Speaker 3: until next time, best Trinds out, best Friends out,