Speaker 1: Welcome to Out of Money. I'm Joel. Today I'm going
Speaker 1: to talk about how you can never worry about money
Speaker 1: again with Jesse Meekham. Okay, So, frugality is a quarterstone
Speaker 1: of personal finance advice. Cut back, spend less, reduce waste,
Speaker 1: and for the average American drowning and debt. That's often
Speaker 1: solid money advice. But money isn't just meant to sit
Speaker 1: there untouched. It's also meant to be spent, to be experienced,
Speaker 1: and to be enjoyed. In fact, even the money you're
Speaker 1: saving now, well it's really just a third spending when
Speaker 1: you think about it. And let's face it, money is
Speaker 1: not easy to come by. We work hard for every
Speaker 1: dollar we earn. So maybe the answer isn't simply just
Speaker 1: spending less, right, Maybe that's not the answer to all
Speaker 1: of our money questions. Maybe just maybe it's spending with
Speaker 1: more intention. And my guest today he wants you to
Speaker 1: worry less about money. He argues that the path there
Speaker 1: is not endless deprivation like you might have heard about
Speaker 1: on some personal finance shows in the past. It's about
Speaker 1: changing the way you think about spending all together. Jesse
Speaker 1: Meekham is the best selling author of many books. He's
Speaker 1: a founder of wine app You Need a Budget, the
Speaker 1: beloved budgeting app that's helped millions take control of their finances.
Speaker 1: Jesse glad to have you back on the show, man.
Speaker 2: I'm glad to be here. I feel like your intro
Speaker 2: did all the work. Like you nailed it.
Speaker 1: Let's send it, Let's end this now we learned everything
Speaker 1: we need to learn. This is a quick one. No,
Speaker 1: there's ton man. I really enjoyed reading your book, and
Speaker 1: there's a lot I want to get into with you,
Speaker 1: and also just there's some interesting things I want to
Speaker 1: touch on based on our conversation from many years ago.
Speaker 1: It's just going to follow up with you see how
Speaker 1: things are going. But the first question we ask everybody
Speaker 1: who comes on the show is what they like to
Speaker 1: splurge on, Like what's your We call it the craft
Speaker 1: beer equivalent here on how to money, because it's like, hey,
Speaker 1: you're living in the here and now while also saving
Speaker 1: money for your future self. What's that thing you splurge
Speaker 1: on that people might think is a little insane.
Speaker 2: For just me personally, it is anything to do with woodworking,
Speaker 2: any any tool that I think I might potentially perhaps
Speaker 2: use at some future point. I cannot get it, even
Speaker 2: like a little jig to help with a certain little task,
Speaker 2: I can't get enough of. Family wise, I would say
Speaker 2: where the family splurges, where Julie and I are kind
Speaker 2: of tactical and combined is with travel.
Speaker 3: That's where we pull out all the stops.
Speaker 2: You won't you won't see us eating out around where
Speaker 2: we live, but once we're traveling.
Speaker 3: We're like, where where are the spots? What are we
Speaker 3: going to hit? You know? So that's that's a big
Speaker 3: one for us. Yeah, making those memories.
Speaker 1: And I think woodworking was your answer last time. So
Speaker 1: this has been a hobby passion for a long time.
Speaker 2: You know, I tend to kind of bounce from one
Speaker 2: thing to another, but woodworking is kind of settling, and
Speaker 2: it's it's totally opposite of computer work. It's slow when
Speaker 2: normally I'm kind of wired to make decisions quickly and
Speaker 2: move quickly and see progress quickly, and woodworking demands that
Speaker 2: you don't do that, And so I enjoy it as
Speaker 2: kind of a counterbalance to my natural state. You might say,
Speaker 2: I know I'm not really good at it. I'm getting better,
Speaker 2: but I just enjoy the like the novice phase of it.
Speaker 2: I feel like you can always take some new angle
Speaker 2: of woodworking and be a complete novice again, and I
Speaker 2: enjoy I enjoy that.
Speaker 1: I think there's I was literally just talking about this
Speaker 1: with a friend this morning. There's something about in middle
Speaker 1: aged life, being feeling like you're starting over at something
Speaker 1: you feel little inept, but then you cross over and
Speaker 1: you're like, oh, I'm not like a complete bozo at
Speaker 1: this thing anymore, and there's something really good for our brains.
Speaker 1: And oftentimes I think in middle age we stick to
Speaker 1: the things that we're good at, and there's something really
Speaker 1: good for our brains about kind of starting over and
Speaker 1: feeling like an idiot as we're beginning a new endeavor.
Speaker 3: I absolutely go.
Speaker 2: I had a friend of mine that said he didn't
Speaker 2: he wasn't afraid anymore. He was this very successful realtorney.
Speaker 2: He's just like, just I'm not I don't feel any
Speaker 2: fear like you would maybe in high school with something new,
Speaker 2: or heck, in grade school for sure, or right out
Speaker 2: of college. And so he started doing like improv classes
Speaker 2: and he was full of fear, but he was searching
Speaker 2: for something where he was just inept, you know, and
Speaker 2: then kind of feeling these feelings.
Speaker 3: Again that hey hadn't felt for a while. Interesting idea.
Speaker 1: Okay, so now you're making me think about the book
Speaker 1: and like what I wanted to get into, and I
Speaker 1: specifically wanted to start off by talking about worry. And
Speaker 1: I think we live in a culture where like worry abounds, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it feels almost like an American pastime, worry. It's his
Speaker 1: American as apple pie baseball. I think, I guess, why
Speaker 1: are you trying to take away something that's near and
Speaker 1: near to Americans? Dressing our hearts is to worry about stuff.
Speaker 1: And if we didn't worry about money, would money even exist?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Yeah, oh there you go. That. Absolutely.
Speaker 2: Money's an interesting thing because it tends to pop up.
Speaker 2: We don't went invented. It's just a thing. I've studied money,
Speaker 2: the thing quite a bit, and it's interesting how it'll
Speaker 2: just appear, you know, like the a thing to hold
Speaker 2: value until you need the other thing.
Speaker 3: That's what money is, essentially. But the worry bit.
Speaker 2: We've thought about worry and different framing of that for
Speaker 2: literally twenty years, like what is it we're trying to do?
Speaker 2: And sometimes we would say we're trying to eliminate stress.
Speaker 2: We're trying to help people gain control, you know, we're
Speaker 2: trying to help them to you know, like achieve their
Speaker 2: financial goals. But at the end of the day, the
Speaker 2: worry captures kind of both ends and everything in the middle,
Speaker 2: where they're worried about maybe sending their kid to college,
Speaker 2: or they're worried about just finishing college, these big things.
Speaker 2: They're worried about their job situation, they're worried about paying
Speaker 2: a mortgage, big worry. But then also they're worried about
Speaker 2: like they they literally, you know, buy a coffee and
Speaker 2: they're worried like, ah, should I be Can I afford that?
Speaker 3: Can I?
Speaker 2: And so it's this it's this ever present, low grade
Speaker 2: hum like you know, when the power goes out jol
Speaker 2: and you realize your house is actually quite noisy, Like
Speaker 2: all the humming is gone, the fridge is shut down.
Speaker 2: You're you know, you're maybe worried about the meat or
Speaker 2: whatever in the fridge, but it's coming back on a
Speaker 2: figures Yeah, no ac Like there's just no hum, and
Speaker 2: I feel like worry For a lot of people, it's
Speaker 2: just this low grade, taxing, subtly taxing hum that they
Speaker 2: aren't even aware is there until it's gone.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I do want to get rid of it, whether or not.
Speaker 2: It's very American. I say we try a different way.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, yeah, No, I'm with you. I'm with you,
Speaker 1: and I think there is something It's interesting, like worry
Speaker 1: seems to be a part of how people interact with
Speaker 1: money at all income levels. Yes, yeah, at all network levels,
Speaker 1: Like it doesn't discriminate. I think lots of people assume, well,
Speaker 1: once I hit this certain number on my net worth
Speaker 1: or a man of my income, if my income were
Speaker 1: to double tomorrow, I wouldn't worry about money again. And
Speaker 1: that's just not true.
Speaker 2: It's not true. I know too many. I've been on
Speaker 2: both ends. I've been like scraping by. Julian and I
Speaker 2: just scraping by, and we were, you know, trying to
Speaker 2: figure things out. And we were able to eliminate worry
Speaker 2: with very little income. And I make far more income
Speaker 2: than I did then, and I still am tasked with
Speaker 2: the same overarch goal, which is I need to decide
Speaker 2: what my money's for. And I'm sure we'll get to that.
Speaker 2: But whether or not you make a lot or a little,
Speaker 2: I would only argue when someone says, hey, if you
Speaker 2: make a lot, you don't have to worry about money,
Speaker 2: and you won't fill it all, I would say, no,
Speaker 2: you're tasked with with something around, you know around. The
Speaker 2: more money you have, the more responsibility you bear to
Speaker 2: decide what it's for and to deploy it in a
Speaker 2: way that's aligned with what you really care about with
Speaker 2: you know, who you really are. It would be a
Speaker 2: tragedy if someone thought, oh, I have enough, so let's
Speaker 2: just let it be frittered away by every marketer with
Speaker 2: a new tagline.
Speaker 3: You know, we don't want We don't want that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we still want to be intentional with every doctor,
Speaker 1: even if it just means yeah, we were able to
Speaker 1: be more generous right with with what we've been given, like.
Speaker 3: Whatever it may be, more can bring a lot of
Speaker 3: working tools.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, okay, So you started wine now a long
Speaker 1: time ago, and people often associate budgeting with saving, but
Speaker 1: you wrote a book about spending, which is interesting, like
Speaker 1: why did the budget guy? And I know you can
Speaker 1: even talk about I guess you don't seem to like
Speaker 1: the term I loge to work.
Speaker 3: Yeah, let's just sell it what it is. Yeah, okay, Yeah,
Speaker 3: it learns much baggage. It has too much baggage.
Speaker 2: If people understood the word budget the way I do
Speaker 2: and the way many many other people do that have
Speaker 2: been with us for a long time. I'm cool with
Speaker 2: the word. But we want to find people that want
Speaker 2: to decide what their money's for and live intentionally and
Speaker 2: eliminate worry and get really good at money.
Speaker 3: And they come.
Speaker 2: With preconceived notions around the word budget that I just
Speaker 2: don't want to deal with anymore.
Speaker 1: Budget spend anymore? What how, what's a better way to
Speaker 1: think of it?
Speaker 2: Budgeting is knowing deeply what your money is for and
Speaker 2: then watching it do that thing in my In my mind,
Speaker 2: budgeting is spending well. In my mind, budgeting and you
Speaker 2: it's like you and your money are perfectly lined up.
Speaker 2: But I just you know, we tried for about five
Speaker 2: years to redefine the word for the English language, and
Speaker 2: I don't know if you've tried that, Joe, But it's
Speaker 2: not easy to just change the definition of a word.
Speaker 2: So you won't see us mention the word budget very
Speaker 2: often unless we're just someone saying I hate budgeting, and
Speaker 2: we might say we hate it too.
Speaker 3: You know, come see what we're doing over here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean yeah, trying to change the
Speaker 1: dictionary definition is that's a that's a big goal.
Speaker 3: It's hard to do. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then when it comes to some of the standard
Speaker 1: personal finance advice, that gets uttered too, Like you mentioned
Speaker 1: this in the book that you hate this spend less
Speaker 1: than you earn. It's been uttered millions of times, right,
Speaker 1: It's it's kind of seen as like a benchmark of
Speaker 1: if you can do that, like you can start to
Speaker 1: make progress with your money. And there's a lot of
Speaker 1: Americans who aren't even crusting that hurdle. But why do
Speaker 1: you hate that advice? Though?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I mean you know here we are like money can
Speaker 2: only be spent, that's its only purpose. So when someone's like, no,
Speaker 2: I'm saving it, it's like, well, no, you're just going
Speaker 2: to spend it later. Like if you have a dollar
Speaker 2: in your pocket, are you spending that money or saving
Speaker 2: that money? And you're like, well, I'm going to buy
Speaker 2: groceries tomorrow, Well are you saving it until tomorrow? Is
Speaker 2: it savings right now? Like we have this weird thing
Speaker 2: where if we aren't going to spend it right now,
Speaker 2: it's savings, but not like three days from now, three
Speaker 2: days from now, it's still spending. So it's a weird thing.
Speaker 2: So what you're really saying is no money is just spending.
Speaker 2: And someone's like, no, no, no, I'm investing and you're like, well, yeah,
Speaker 2: you're buying something. You're buying a stock or whatever, and
Speaker 2: you're hoping that you get money back for it.
Speaker 3: And then what do you do with that money? Or
Speaker 3: what are your kids gonna do with that money?
Speaker 2: Because you're long gone, they're going to spend it, right,
Speaker 2: Or someone's like no, I don't spend, I'm going to
Speaker 2: give and imagine, like just trace that for a second.
Speaker 2: You give money to a charity, we're not going to
Speaker 2: call it spending for a second. You give money to
Speaker 2: a charity, and what does that charity do with the money?
Speaker 2: You better hope they don't just sit on it. They're
Speaker 2: supposed to spend it. They're actually by law required to
Speaker 2: spend I think some percentage of their assets or they
Speaker 2: aren't a bona fide charity per the irs. So even
Speaker 2: the IRS is like, listen, if you want to be
Speaker 2: a charity, you better be spending your money at you know,
Speaker 2: a five percent draw down rate or whatever. It is
Speaker 2: so you would be mad if you found out that
Speaker 2: charity was just sitting on your money because they're supposed
Speaker 2: to be spending it. Because that is how money, that's
Speaker 2: what money does. That's the only thing money can do
Speaker 2: is be spent, be exchanged. So when you go back
Speaker 2: to this idea of spend less than you earn, if
Speaker 2: you know that the only thing money can do is
Speaker 2: be spent, then what you're saying is do the thing,
Speaker 2: do less of the thing that is the thing's only purpose.
Speaker 2: And that's where it starts to break down. Now when
Speaker 2: we're talking about like, hey, we want to set aside
Speaker 2: some money for the future. Of course we're all in
Speaker 2: on that, Like whinab is built around that idea.
Speaker 1: This book is appreciating yolo philosophy.
Speaker 3: Yeah no, not at all.
Speaker 2: But the idea that you just save and save and
Speaker 2: save and never get to enjoy the fruits of that,
Speaker 2: I think is just totally off base.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, I think if you're if you're thinking about
Speaker 1: it like that, and then it's perpetually pushing the joy
Speaker 1: that money can bring out into this far off future
Speaker 1: that you can't even imagine. And that's why I think,
Speaker 1: like when you're talking about investing. There was that Fidelity
Speaker 1: study way back in the day that if people took
Speaker 1: a picture and morphed it into an older version of themselves,
Speaker 1: they were more likely to invest money for their future
Speaker 1: selves because they can identify with what they were going
Speaker 1: to look like.
Speaker 3: There was a purpose, yeah, exactly. Attention to the money
Speaker 3: was made real.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, and so there's something important about that so
Speaker 1: that we can be thoughtful about having money to spend
Speaker 1: later down the road for ourselves. But I think there's
Speaker 1: also this hyper frugal mentality that can set in where
Speaker 1: you're like, I'm just kicking the can and yeah, maybe
Speaker 1: i'll but if you're not thinking about it as future spending,
Speaker 1: it can almost feel like this this legalistic rule that
Speaker 1: you have to live by and you haven't really connected
Speaker 1: it to something tangible and real that you're going to
Speaker 1: experience in the future. I mean, like that's important, right,
Speaker 1: It is important.
Speaker 2: I mean, we're just trying to get people from bad
Speaker 2: at money to good at money, and it's a skill.
Speaker 2: I mean, you're talking about how to money like, we're
Speaker 2: talking about doing it well, and you are not doing
Speaker 2: money well if you are just frugal because you're afraid.
Speaker 2: And there are a lot of people that are frugal
Speaker 2: out of fear. Now, if someone comes to me there
Speaker 2: like Jesse, I am frugal because a game is a
Speaker 2: foot and I want to win at this game, and
Speaker 2: they describe this game where you can see them just
Speaker 2: lighting up inside, and I'm like, Okay, that person, they're
Speaker 2: just they're like loving the game.
Speaker 3: Let them play the game.
Speaker 2: Yes, but a lot of people are out of fear
Speaker 2: just saying I can't spend, I can't spend. And what
Speaker 2: we get them to do is answer the question of
Speaker 2: what their money is for and really start to press
Speaker 2: on that.
Speaker 3: What is it really for? What is it really for?
Speaker 2: And when they really start to press they learn more
Speaker 2: about themselves, they learn more about money's true purpose, and
Speaker 2: they start to spend without the worry, without the fear.
Speaker 2: They aren't making more money, but they have more clarity.
Speaker 2: And then they're putting their newfound intention right against that
Speaker 2: clarity and they're spending well, they're feeling like they're getting
Speaker 2: good at money finally, and like they're spending without guilt.
Speaker 2: You will have people that will save up money, go
Speaker 2: on a vacation and feel guilty that they are spending
Speaker 2: the money. I just feel like that's an absolute tragedy.
Speaker 1: And I've been there, man, I've been there. I remember
Speaker 1: like some of the biggest, bigger expenses that were just
Speaker 1: I knew it was the right thing for our family,
Speaker 1: but I just had this. I mean, I remember almost
Speaker 1: having a panic attack one time making signing a contract
Speaker 1: to add on to our house. And we knew it
Speaker 1: was the right thing for our family, and we knew
Speaker 1: that we had saved and like we were able to
Speaker 1: pay for it in cash, which is on American in
Speaker 1: and of itself, but even still, I was like, I
Speaker 1: remember being like, this is the right thing, signing the
Speaker 1: documents and then freaking out and then I just had
Speaker 1: like it took a conversation between my wife and I
Speaker 1: to kind of like, oh, let's where are these emotions
Speaker 1: coming from? And there is but there is something about
Speaker 1: that that low grade hum and worry and then sometimes
Speaker 1: it can even reach a fever pitch. One of the
Speaker 1: things you talk about in the book, too, is you
Speaker 1: say that like a lack of respect for money has
Speaker 1: made us worry about it more. I'm curious, like what
Speaker 1: you mean by that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, a lot of times in order to get rid
Speaker 2: of this worry that we think money is causing, we
Speaker 2: will kind of relegate money to a corner. One of
Speaker 2: my favorite books, your Money or Your Life. It's it
Speaker 2: bifurcates money and life. It's like it's either this or this,
Speaker 2: and that book has a great message. Don't don't let
Speaker 2: me steer anyone from a week from reading that. But
Speaker 2: it's the bifurcation of money or life. Or you'll have
Speaker 2: people say, like my financial life. I mean, I got
Speaker 2: books upon books where it's just like, you know how
Speaker 2: to build a financial life or whatever, and that the
Speaker 2: premise of it, to me is is wrong. The idea
Speaker 2: that money is somehow separate from us, that it's just
Speaker 2: a chore, it's just a tool. It's this thing we
Speaker 2: just have to learn to manage now we're adulting, or
Speaker 2: whatever phrase we're going to use. If we can start
Speaker 2: to see money truly for what it is, which is
Speaker 2: that it is us.
Speaker 3: Like when you, like.
Speaker 2: You Joel, when you are getting an education raised by parents,
Speaker 2: learn all these things as a kid, start to network,
Speaker 2: start to gain skills and expertise, start to exchange that
Speaker 2: in the market you are getting money back. I mean
Speaker 2: what else could we say you are offering, except like
Speaker 2: you're in higher raising your entire childhood, everything you know,
Speaker 2: all your blood, sweat, tears, calorically, what you ate this
Speaker 2: morning to make the brain go. Everything is feeding up
Speaker 2: to you adding value in a market and someone giving
Speaker 2: you money. So it's like, all you're really offering is
Speaker 2: here is Joel, Here's everything, he knows, everything he is,
Speaker 2: Here's what Joel can do, Here's how Joel thinks. And
Speaker 2: then the person's like, I like all of this that
Speaker 2: Joel is bringing. I will give Joel money.
Speaker 1: That's one star review on the podcast appah.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, and we will not have that everyone. We will
Speaker 3: not have that.
Speaker 2: So what you get is money for that thing. And
Speaker 2: that's why I feel like the best thing you can
Speaker 2: say that money is is you.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: It's it's like this the listener right now on the
Speaker 2: podcast like what you give and then what you get
Speaker 2: it's just you back, and it's stored in this thing
Speaker 2: we called money, and it just will sit there for
Speaker 2: a bit, stored up like your economic energy. And I
Speaker 2: hope everyone understands. I don't mean like we value people
Speaker 2: based on money, not even we have inherent value. But
Speaker 2: what I'm talking about is how we think of money
Speaker 2: itself is you. Then we're starting to elevate money in
Speaker 2: someone's eyes, like, that's not just a chore, that's not
Speaker 2: just a task, that's not something evil, that's not something
Speaker 2: that's wrong to want.
Speaker 3: That's me. And when it's you, then money management, that
Speaker 3: boring phrase we use, is really more about self care
Speaker 3: and really about taking care of self and I hope
Speaker 3: a level of self respect because that is you. And
Speaker 3: then when we've elevated money up there, we can start
Speaker 3: to be like, Okay, this really important thing that you're feeling,
Speaker 3: where you feel like it's important, it has value, what
Speaker 3: is this for?
Speaker 2: We've kind of raised the stakes and then we ask
Speaker 2: the core key question to get people.
Speaker 3: To start to think.
Speaker 1: Basically, it's not just a quadrant of your life. Money
Speaker 1: is touching every element of your life, and so you
Speaker 1: have to realize that and think of money in that
Speaker 1: way or you're going to be like, if your thoughts
Speaker 1: about money are going to be degraded, they're not going
Speaker 1: to be high enough, they're not going to be you're
Speaker 1: not going to treat money as intentionally as you.
Speaker 2: Should exactly, And people right now might think like, I
Speaker 2: don't want money in my entire life. I don't like it.
Speaker 2: It stresses me out. But I'm telling you, if you
Speaker 2: can learn to love money, and I'm talking about in
Speaker 2: this really healthy, great way where it's it's self respect,
Speaker 2: if you've learn to see money as just you, then
Speaker 2: it's not wrong to have money in every part of
Speaker 2: your life.
Speaker 3: It just is.
Speaker 2: But now you have this thing, you have a little
Speaker 2: bit of you in every part of your life, in
Speaker 2: the health and the relationships and those things we all
Speaker 2: can agree are extremely valuable. Money isn't those things, but
Speaker 2: it does affect all of those super important things in
Speaker 2: our life. And when we can see it for what
Speaker 2: it is, it's just us, then we can start to
Speaker 2: treat it the way we should, which is just as
Speaker 2: you said, intentionally.
Speaker 1: What are some of the hurdles of that, because I'm
Speaker 1: thinking of like even just maybe growing up and you
Speaker 1: heard some money maxims right that that made you think,
Speaker 1: well that if you thought about money too much, or
Speaker 1: if you were too in love with money, right, or
Speaker 1: they're like, there's greed is good, right, Gordon Gecko right
Speaker 1: from ye from the movie Wallster. I mean, there's all
Speaker 1: of these things that have made us. We either respond
Speaker 1: to that and we're in the affirmative way, or we
Speaker 1: respond to it in the negative way. And so maybe
Speaker 1: we've subtly let a lot of these influences as we've
Speaker 1: grown up, like color the way we think about money
Speaker 1: in a way that's maybe we're too attached to it, sadly,
Speaker 1: or we're not attached enough.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Yeah, it's it's extreme. Someone who might
Speaker 2: try and like they might feel like they're going to
Speaker 2: try and land in the middle. They're like, I don't
Speaker 2: love it, I don't hate it, and then they'll say
Speaker 2: something like it's just a tool. They'll say that it's
Speaker 2: just a tool and they're trying to land in the middle.
Speaker 2: It's neither good nor bad. It's agnostic, and it is
Speaker 2: not neither good nor bad because people aren't either good
Speaker 2: or bad.
Speaker 3: People are people.
Speaker 2: They're complex, you know, they're they're dynamic, and money is people.
Speaker 2: So however you use the money, we hope if you're
Speaker 2: getting really good at money, it's just more and more
Speaker 2: an expression of you. Of you, whether you're the woodworker,
Speaker 2: the runner, name your thing, it's more of you. But
Speaker 2: these maxims that these stories we've been told and the
Speaker 2: stories we tell ourselves. I would want to just have
Speaker 2: people recognize that they can tell their own story like
Speaker 2: they can. Isn't it funny? Drill, Let me just like
Speaker 2: a little aside. It's so funny how we'll all be like, well,
Speaker 2: I'm not greedy, I don't want money, like I don't
Speaker 2: love money. I've been told I shouldn't love money. And
Speaker 2: yet look at the amount of time we all spend
Speaker 2: trying to get.
Speaker 1: A little yeah, you know, yeah, and so.
Speaker 2: We're at least all hypocrites. But I don't want to
Speaker 2: call hypocrites. I think we're doing the right thing. We're
Speaker 2: trying to figure out how to add value in the world,
Speaker 2: and money is a place where we can kind of
Speaker 2: intermittently hold that value. So we're we're just doing our thing.
Speaker 2: We're all just out here surviving, hopefully thriving, and we
Speaker 2: spend a lot of time trying to get this thing
Speaker 2: that we're and I think we don't need that second part.
Speaker 2: Let's keep getting the thing, Let's keep getting money, Let's
Speaker 2: keep figuring out how to earn more, how to add
Speaker 2: more value in the world, how to do what we love,
Speaker 2: all those things. But let's not then have this amazing
Speaker 2: professional who's at the top of their craft, adding value
Speaker 2: left and right and just killing it. And then when
Speaker 2: all of their value is transformed into money through the market,
Speaker 2: then they say things like, Oh, money's just a tool.
Speaker 1: Isn't that interesting you talk about that? And it's so
Speaker 1: true that we spend so much time, we give over
Speaker 1: a lot of our lives, something like what eighty thousand
Speaker 1: hours of our lives to a career is I think
Speaker 1: the projection? And we're talking about offering so little time
Speaker 1: on the back end once we've turned those hours into
Speaker 1: money to think about it, or even to think about
Speaker 1: whether or not we want to work eighty thousand dollars
Speaker 1: to get that money, or we want to live a
Speaker 1: different life that is simpler. That means we don't have
Speaker 1: to work quite that much or dedicated as much of
Speaker 1: our lives to our career. What is it about us
Speaker 1: putting so much effort into the effort to make money,
Speaker 1: to bring money into our lives, and so a little
Speaker 1: effort about how to use and funnel those dollars intelligencely.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I don't want to be a conspiracy theorist.
Speaker 2: My tinfoil had is somewhere around here, I should probably
Speaker 2: throw it on. But I mean, the system is built
Speaker 2: to get you to consume. The system is built for growth, growth,
Speaker 2: almost for its own sake. I think growth is good,
Speaker 2: but growth at any cost is unhealthy. That starts to
Speaker 2: feel and sound like cancer if you think about it
Speaker 2: in that way. So where the system is built for consumption,
Speaker 2: it's built for not delayed gratification, but instant gratifications. It's
Speaker 2: built for having something now and worrying about it later.
Speaker 2: And all that tends to just make something actually quite
Speaker 2: simple apparently complex. And when you have you know, you
Speaker 2: can put genes on a payment plan. You can put
Speaker 2: a burrito on a payment plan. I mean, I just
Speaker 2: bought something the other day from Amazon. I noticed now
Speaker 2: they're doing the for payments or whatever, and what I
Speaker 2: was buying was twenty two.
Speaker 3: Dollars, you know, So if you don't want to put
Speaker 3: it in.
Speaker 2: For easy installments, as the late comedian Mitch Hedberg said,
Speaker 2: I've always loved this. He's like, there'll be for easy payments,
Speaker 2: and he's like, and then one a hard. We don't
Speaker 2: know which one that one is. So it's it's an
Speaker 2: interesting thing where they make it complex. They meaning this
Speaker 2: system that we've built for growth at any cost, promoting consumption,
Speaker 2: and it is a treadmill. And if you don't actively
Speaker 2: or maybe it's a maybe it's a stream. If you
Speaker 2: don't actively kind of notice I'm being pushed this way,
Speaker 2: you will be moved. If you stand still, you're actually moving.
Speaker 2: And so there takes some intention and I hope that
Speaker 2: the book teaches people you can be intentional. You can
Speaker 2: answer that question that's so important, question of what your
Speaker 2: money is for, and start to kind of walk against
Speaker 2: that stream. It doesn't take a ton of effort. Like
Speaker 2: we spend eighty thousand hours a year earning money, we
Speaker 2: don't have to spend a commenser amount figuring out what
Speaker 2: our money is for. It's a fraction of that, but
Speaker 2: it's a high leverage activity.
Speaker 3: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: All right, I got more. I want to get to
Speaker 1: with you, Jesse. Clearly I'm gonna ask you. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: ask Jesse what keeps him up at night. We'll get
Speaker 1: to that and more right after this talking with Jesse Meekon,
Speaker 1: we're talking about reducing, maybe eliminating how much we worry
Speaker 1: about money. Eliminating. Okay, so then tell me it, all right,
Speaker 1: we'll just get personal here. Do you worry about money?
Speaker 3: Now?
Speaker 1: When's the last time you worried about money? And what
Speaker 1: would you say? What it was? Is the key for
Speaker 1: you that helped make money worries go away? And then
Speaker 1: how has that change your life?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: My first, the first bit I talked about in the book,
Speaker 2: where Julie and I had these goals. We were making
Speaker 2: ten twelve dollars an hour, newly married, twenty one to
Speaker 2: twenty two years old, young like almost kids, right.
Speaker 3: And we were worried about money.
Speaker 2: So I built this little spreadsheet that eventually became software
Speaker 2: and eventually is the thing that pays the bills for
Speaker 2: us and all the other people that work here at
Speaker 2: why app. But at that point it was just for
Speaker 2: me and Julie and we had these just these rich
Speaker 2: like these goals that were so aggressive. We got to
Speaker 2: save for a car. We didn't want a car. We
Speaker 2: had to save for a computer. We needed a computer.
Speaker 2: I was going to be in the accounting program. You
Speaker 2: need a computer. So we're sitting there just grinding away,
Speaker 2: and I'm on my way to class. One day I
Speaker 2: walked past this little bakery and they had these old
Speaker 2: fashioned donuts this are the best kind. You could ask
Speaker 2: them to microwave, but for fifteen seconds, which is a
Speaker 2: little hack, it becomes perfect. And it was a fifty
Speaker 2: cent don't It's probably like ten dollars now, who knows
Speaker 2: what inflation's doune to that donut, But it was fifty
Speaker 2: cents back then. And I remember walking by there and
Speaker 2: being like wanting it, you know, just a little car boost.
Speaker 2: I on my way to class. And I was twenty two,
Speaker 2: so I was immune to sugar, you know that time
Speaker 2: of the day. So I'm sitting there and I'm just like,
Speaker 2: I want that, and I felt like I couldn't buy
Speaker 2: it fifty cents. I had enough money for it, but
Speaker 2: I didn't feel like I could. I just felt all
Speaker 2: of this constraint, this restraint. I don't know what it was,
Speaker 2: but this bearing down on me. And I'm like, man,
Speaker 2: this is there's something off here. And I came home
Speaker 2: to Julie and I was like, something's off, and we
Speaker 2: relooked at our plan and we kind of renswered what
Speaker 2: is our money for? And we made it more for us.
Speaker 2: We had just been kind of taking the advice live
Speaker 2: on less how much less less? Right, It's just always
Speaker 2: less and it's just like less less, less, save, save, save,
Speaker 2: invest compound interest, and it's just like, what do we
Speaker 2: want our money to do? And it was like we
Speaker 2: finally asked ourselves that question for the first time, and
Speaker 2: it didn't It wasn't a radical thing, like we weren't like, oh,
Speaker 2: now we just spend everything. It was more like, Okay,
Speaker 2: we're going to do a date every week and it's
Speaker 2: gonna probably look like a five dollars little Caesar's pizza,
Speaker 2: but it'll be a date every week. And that that
Speaker 2: to us, was actually substantive if you if you know
Speaker 2: and you can believe it, but people, people know that
Speaker 2: a lot of people have been in that spot. Or
Speaker 2: we would say things like we're gonna do a gym membership.
Speaker 2: We know it's expensive to us, but we're gonna do it.
Speaker 2: That's important. And we just carved out a few things
Speaker 2: that made it more ours. And I did carve out
Speaker 2: money literally for donuts, and we carved out money for
Speaker 2: Julie where she could just spend without worrying. It's like
Speaker 2: we have money here for you, just a little bit
Speaker 2: of spending money.
Speaker 3: It made all the difference.
Speaker 2: And we realized that we were just having money be
Speaker 2: what we thought it should be for instead of asking
Speaker 2: ourselves really, like what is it for for us? Yeah,
Speaker 2: and even well meaning people reading you know, the best
Speaker 2: advice that you still need to ask yourself the hard
Speaker 2: question of like, for me, what is this precious resource for?
Speaker 1: And there are great rules of thumb, and there's great
Speaker 1: advice out there, but if you can't connect it to
Speaker 1: how you're living your life, and you feel like you're
Speaker 1: living somebody else's system like that is that gets demoralizing
Speaker 1: after a while. You can only keep it up for
Speaker 1: so long.
Speaker 3: And then got to make it to those.
Speaker 1: Real life outcomes. Yeah, I love this line from the
Speaker 1: book you wrote, money does its best work when it
Speaker 1: enables experiences and disappears. Can you unpack that?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: So people are like Jaz Jesse's obsessed with money, you know,
Speaker 2: like that must be all he thinks about, right, And
Speaker 2: when I'm here on the podcast, Mike, you bet I'm
Speaker 2: thinking about it.
Speaker 3: I'm thinking about it on behalf of all your great letststeners.
Speaker 2: But what you want is when your money is planned,
Speaker 2: when you know what it's for, with clarity, when you've
Speaker 2: introspected and then you've said, Okay, this is what my
Speaker 2: money is for. As you do that, you know more
Speaker 2: and more about yourself, which then informs what the money
Speaker 2: is for. So it's this beautiful little cycle of introspection
Speaker 2: and then more accurate expression of you. When you get there,
Speaker 2: you'll realize that money is doing your bidding. And then
Speaker 2: Christmas Day, when you're sitting there watching your nine year old,
Speaker 2: I'm channeling a little bit from last year watching your
Speaker 2: nine year old open a gift. I'm not thinking about
Speaker 2: the credit card bill coming in January, because I've known
Speaker 2: that some of my money is for Christmas all year long, right,
Speaker 2: and so we've set aside a little bit for Christmas
Speaker 2: every single month, a twelfth of Christmas every single month.
Speaker 2: So in the moment money is not there to cloud
Speaker 2: it and mess it up, it has disappeared. And in
Speaker 2: that moment, I'm just watching the nine year old open
Speaker 2: this massive lego set. But I know we're going to
Speaker 2: build together later later for hours, and that's all part
Speaker 2: of it without me being like, Okay, when's that bill?
Speaker 3: Man? I hope we didn't go too crazy. You know.
Speaker 2: That's the bit where we when you're when you're going
Speaker 2: on vacation. A lot of wine evers are Disney goers.
Speaker 2: A lot of or maybe a lot of Disney goers
Speaker 2: become wine I'm.
Speaker 3: Not sure how.
Speaker 2: It's interesting the causality correlation thing, but a lot of
Speaker 2: them they they want to have this magical experience that
Speaker 2: Disney tries to create, and they want to go in
Speaker 2: and keep making it magical. And you will find this
Speaker 2: big ven diagram where people are. They save up, they're
Speaker 2: using wine up. They know some of their money is
Speaker 2: for this Disney trip, and then when they get there,
Speaker 2: they want the magic. They clearly want it right. They
Speaker 2: don't want money to be there, like are you sure?
Speaker 3: Are you sure? Are you sure? Are you? It's got
Speaker 3: to disappear so it can just be the moment.
Speaker 1: And do you think that produces more joy for those
Speaker 1: experiences for people?
Speaker 3: Absolutely?
Speaker 1: I gotta imagine. Yeah, if it's hanging over you like
Speaker 1: the Sword of damoicles right, you're just like, oh, but
Speaker 1: how how is this bill going to get paid? And
Speaker 1: for a lot of people, if you're the average person,
Speaker 1: whether it's a Disney trip or whether it's Christmas, you're
Speaker 1: freaking out about paying the bill later on.
Speaker 2: Sometimes it's one spouse the other spouse is you know,
Speaker 2: they call them the spender and that one's the saver,
Speaker 2: and they have these little labels. But sometimes just one
Speaker 2: spouse is freaking out and the others kind of somehow
Speaker 2: pushing it, pushing it out of the way. They probably
Speaker 2: learned it from parents or something like that, and so
Speaker 2: that can be that's kind of a double whemming. Now
Speaker 2: the relationship is strained and the present moment isn't quite
Speaker 2: as great as it could be.
Speaker 1: So how do you think then about prioritizing now the
Speaker 1: donuts right versus later? Which is like, at some point,
Speaker 1: maybe you don't want to work anymore Jesse, right, and
Speaker 1: so or you want to spend more time in the
Speaker 1: woodworking shop and fewer hours like running this business, so
Speaker 1: that that has real impacts on the way we live
Speaker 1: in the here and now and also in the far
Speaker 1: off future. How do you know which dollars to allocate
Speaker 1: to which spending bucket?
Speaker 2: Essentially, yeah, if I were to tell everyone mine, they'd
Speaker 2: be like, I don't like it, And that is appropriate, right,
Speaker 2: because it's mine, not yours, And it's like DNA.
Speaker 3: It's a lot that's related.
Speaker 2: But there's this last little bit that makes everyone unique,
Speaker 2: and that's the part that makes it interesting. So like,
Speaker 2: if you and I were to sit over dinner, I'd
Speaker 2: be like, so, Joel, like what lights you up? What's
Speaker 2: what's your money for? I wouldn't want to know that
Speaker 2: it's for the electricity bill, although that is a miracle
Speaker 2: if people pause and think about.
Speaker 3: It for a second.
Speaker 2: But I'd want to hear like, Okay, yeah, we both
Speaker 2: we both like electricity. Cool, but like what do you
Speaker 2: love that I would never spend money on. That's where
Speaker 2: I would get to know, like the last little bit
Speaker 2: of Joel DNA. That would make for a fun dinner conversation.
Speaker 1: That's why I love our first question of the podcast
Speaker 1: every time because it gives me that's like every to everyone.
Speaker 3: It comes on right, Yeah, you get to a little
Speaker 3: a little bit about them.
Speaker 2: Most of the DNA is the same. But there are
Speaker 2: only five answers to the question of what money is for.
Speaker 2: It's it's either for now, for later, for ease of
Speaker 2: the system itself, for you, or for change now. Inside
Speaker 2: those five are an infinite number of possibilities. And you
Speaker 2: questioned what's now versus later? And I would say it's
Speaker 2: versus is an interesting framing. They all what we need
Speaker 2: is to make sure that the person deciding what their
Speaker 2: money is for.
Speaker 3: Sees all five regularly.
Speaker 2: So if we're only ever living in like just the now,
Speaker 2: we are missing out on the fact that Christmas is coming,
Speaker 2: or that car tires need repairing, or that retirement might
Speaker 2: need to happen at some point. So they we can't
Speaker 2: just be thinking about now, even though when we're first starting,
Speaker 2: now is the most important because it's the moment. But
Speaker 2: what you're doing is you're removing worry from the present
Speaker 2: moment by deciding what is literally for now, right now,
Speaker 2: an urgent bill, right something over overdraft situation, something like that.
Speaker 2: So now is handled, the worry is gone. But then
Speaker 2: everyone knows, like, well, hold on, Jesse, like the cars
Speaker 2: making a weird noise, the HVAC is making a unbecoming.
Speaker 3: Of HVAC noise, and we need it right.
Speaker 2: Now, yes, and always right after the warranty, always just
Speaker 2: right after. But what you're just like that, so that
Speaker 2: starts to bring worry back into the present moment. You're
Speaker 2: worried about those strange noises, the car wearing out or
Speaker 2: whatever it is, so you start to address that in
Speaker 2: the moment and you say, well, I'm going to set
Speaker 2: aside money for new car tires, I'm going to set
Speaker 2: aside some money for Christmas and for this HVAC unit.
Speaker 2: And you know you're looking like, oh, and the kids
Speaker 2: do summer camp. Oh yeah, I'll set a set a
Speaker 2: little money for summer camp too. So when those moments
Speaker 2: that are at the moment in the future, when they arrive,
Speaker 2: your present moment is still worry free. Summer camp comes,
Speaker 2: the big bill comes, you just pay the bill. It
Speaker 2: feels like every other day, so that present moment is protected.
Speaker 2: Then when you start looking at ease, what we're wanting
Speaker 2: to do is get people to earn money this month
Speaker 2: that they then spend next month. We're trying to break
Speaker 2: the paycheck to paycheck cycle that causes so much worry
Speaker 2: and stress and anxiety on its own, where people are
Speaker 2: having the time build a paycheck and oh, that bill
Speaker 2: goes with this paycheck, and then a partner is also
Speaker 2: earning money and they're like this, it's just this valueless
Speaker 2: activity where people have to do this dance of bills
Speaker 2: and timing of paychecks. If you can get and whinevers
Speaker 2: do if they can get to a point where they're
Speaker 2: spending money this month that they earned last month. The
Speaker 2: whole system runs smoother, and that's where we're protecting the
Speaker 2: present moment because the system itself is pretty optimal. Then
Speaker 2: this is bersouri gets fun. When you're starting to say
Speaker 2: some of my money is for you or for me
Speaker 2: in this instance, then what we're doing now is saying, hey,
Speaker 2: the present moment is worry free.
Speaker 3: We handled now.
Speaker 2: We know that those later things that come they will
Speaker 2: be handled to our system is operating well. I want
Speaker 2: more of me in this present moment. I want more
Speaker 2: of my money to be an expression of me in
Speaker 2: the moment. That also starts to eliminate worry because you
Speaker 2: start to feel this congruence between who you are and
Speaker 2: what you your money is doing. And then finally this
Speaker 2: money that's for change. It can be like change comes
Speaker 2: out you like I don't know, maybe you text me
Speaker 2: this morning and you're like, hey, I got to move
Speaker 2: the podcast, and so I'm you know, we're changing schedules,
Speaker 2: things that come at you. You just changing around. But
Speaker 2: it can also be change like how do I want
Speaker 2: my life to look?
Speaker 3: What do I want?
Speaker 2: What kind of intention am I going to put here,
Speaker 2: and it can be like changing careers, changing locations, having
Speaker 2: a kid, getting married, getting divorced, these big changes. You
Speaker 2: can start to recognize that money can enable those changes too.
Speaker 2: So now not only have we protected our present moment
Speaker 2: from the future, not only have we optimized the system
Speaker 2: for the present moment. Not only have we added more
Speaker 2: of ourselves in the present moment, but we are now
Speaker 2: changing the very moment itself by saying what do I
Speaker 2: really want? All of it is built to have you
Speaker 2: trade off between those five possible answers of what your
Speaker 2: money is for to have that present moment. The only
Speaker 2: place where we can worry is in the present, and
Speaker 2: we eliminate it in that moment. And then you just
Speaker 2: keep working, working that system, keep asking yourself what's the
Speaker 2: money for? And it's one of those five just introspecting
Speaker 2: and then expressing.
Speaker 1: So so I'm on kind of a Larry McMurtry kick.
Speaker 1: If you've ever had Lonesome Dove, it's like one of
Speaker 1: the best books. I not, oh, I'll read it, highly recommend.
Speaker 1: But I was reading another one of Larry Manmrchry's novels
Speaker 1: because that's where I'm at right now, and your chapter
Speaker 1: on ease kind of overlap with this money conversation in
Speaker 1: the book that was happening about like who's actually rich,
Speaker 1: And they were talking about this guy who's always got
Speaker 1: like a wat of bills right that he can go
Speaker 1: spend at the pool hall or whatever, versus this other
Speaker 1: guy who's got his money tied up in investments, and
Speaker 1: they everybody seem to agree that the guy with a
Speaker 1: thousand dollars in cash was richer than the guy who
Speaker 1: actually had like more more assets. So like talk about
Speaker 1: ease and how does ease get in the way of
Speaker 1: investing or both of those things, Like, because like it's true,
Speaker 1: right that there is something about more money we have
Speaker 1: on hand, whether that's an emergency fund, whether that's just
Speaker 1: more free cash to spend in the ways that light
Speaker 1: us up, that can create this sort of like ease
Speaker 1: effect that you're talking about. Yeah, but then there's also
Speaker 1: the reality of like building up assets for future ease.
Speaker 3: I guess, yeah, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 2: And when we when I say ease in the book,
Speaker 2: I mean literally the ease of your money system itself,
Speaker 2: not like sitting on the beach with a Martinez martini.
Speaker 2: That's that's a different kind of ease. So this is
Speaker 2: is like the system itself is easy. Your money system
Speaker 2: is easy, and it becomes easier when.
Speaker 3: You have that wat of cash.
Speaker 2: So when we when we walk people through it, we're like, okay,
Speaker 2: right now, when you earn money on Friday, there are
Speaker 2: already bills waiting for that money. And then you pay
Speaker 2: those bills, the lot of money goes down and you
Speaker 2: just are kind of hoping and waiting for the next paycheck.
Speaker 2: In the meantime, bills accumulate and you're kind of hanging
Speaker 2: on for dear life. Something happens. It's it is a
Speaker 2: it is not an easy situation to live in. There's
Speaker 2: a lot of just valueless timing of things. You know,
Speaker 2: you see a bill that notice you can't pay it.
Speaker 2: Then it just kind of pings you, but you can't
Speaker 2: do anything about it. And then later on you have
Speaker 2: this little pile of bills again you're like, please please
Speaker 2: pay day come it comes, you handle it. We want
Speaker 2: to just flip it around. You should have a pile
Speaker 2: of money just waiting and then a bill arrives and
Speaker 2: you just pay it. And ideally it's even on auto pay,
Speaker 2: like you know, if you're using a system where you're
Speaker 2: aware of what your money's doing. You'll know, you'll see
Speaker 2: bills come through, you won't get you know, hoodwinked or anything.
Speaker 2: So it's on auto pay, it just goes out and
Speaker 2: you're not doing this dance of timing bills and paychecks
Speaker 2: and waiting with like white knuckled on you know when
Speaker 2: the next pay day is. It's funny because a lot
Speaker 2: of people, once they've been doing the system for a
Speaker 2: while and their system really is easy, they forget when
Speaker 2: payday is like the money just lands and it's just
Speaker 2: like it's it's nothing.
Speaker 3: I guess that's what I want.
Speaker 2: I want payday to just fill like any other day
Speaker 2: where you're just like, yeah, okay, money's there, money wasn't there.
Speaker 3: It doesn't matter.
Speaker 2: And so we are talking about easing the system itself
Speaker 2: to where it gets out of the way of decision making,
Speaker 2: basically because we want people to focus on what their
Speaker 2: money is for and that's that's a decision situation.
Speaker 1: So one of the things you mentioned personally, I saw
Speaker 1: you that you you paid off your mortgage early, but
Speaker 1: I think you said that you regretted paying off your
Speaker 1: mortgage early. Yeah, And why is that, and how does
Speaker 1: this and how does this intersect with kind of what
Speaker 1: you're talking about here? Is it because you missed out
Speaker 1: on spending money in the here and now?
Speaker 3: That would have no Okay, it was just a math thing. Okay.
Speaker 2: It was like, yeah, rates are now at a supposed
Speaker 2: you know, supposedly high.
Speaker 3: They're like what at six percent? Like they're so low.
Speaker 2: But we've like you and I, we all grew up
Speaker 2: adult you know, adult wise, we all grew up with
Speaker 2: rates at like two and five eighths or three and
Speaker 2: a quarter, I mean, insanely low. It's essentially like better
Speaker 2: than free money if you you know, you argue that
Speaker 2: INFLA probably eats more of that. And so if you
Speaker 2: have a you know, if you've bought money at two
Speaker 2: and five eighths, you're essentially being paid. And so it
Speaker 2: was just for me a math thing. But that's Jesse
Speaker 2: now saying it. Like people you need to recognize, Like
Speaker 2: I stand by what I said, like, oh yeah, if
Speaker 2: Jesse now was back then, I would make that decision.
Speaker 2: But Jesse now is a different person than Jesse back then,
Speaker 2: and I have to respect that. Like back then, I
Speaker 2: wanted just the roof over my head to be free
Speaker 2: and clear, period a roof over my head and six
Speaker 2: other people you know at that time. We had it
Speaker 2: one more later. But what happened or what happened now
Speaker 2: is I looked and I'm like, I have assets, Like
Speaker 2: I just have more headroom, and for me to hold
Speaker 2: a mortgage now, I don't, But to hold one now
Speaker 2: would be like, oh okay, I do, Like there's assets
Speaker 2: that counteract that, and it wouldn't be a big deal.
Speaker 2: It was just a math thing, you know, like the
Speaker 2: rate was so insanely low, and I'm like, I should
Speaker 2: have just kept paying my tiny little mortgage.
Speaker 1: So was it more of an emotional decision? Like you said,
Speaker 1: it's like you're mad.
Speaker 2: That emotional Okay, yeah, yeah, back then it was emotions
Speaker 2: like I want to do that, and I I think
Speaker 2: we're allowed to say what would I do now and
Speaker 2: respect what we did then and people forget that, Like,
Speaker 2: but I was different then than I am now. I
Speaker 2: hope that I've improved in ways, right, I hope I'm
Speaker 2: better dad than I was back then too. Like that's
Speaker 2: all allowed, that's all fair game. But sometimes bothers people
Speaker 2: where they're like, well wait a minute, you know you
Speaker 2: would change. It's like, well, yeah, because I'm different. I've
Speaker 2: had different experiences, Like literally my net worth is different
Speaker 2: than that guy that made that decision back then.
Speaker 1: That's all, Okay, That's how I mean in just a
Speaker 1: micro version of that, I remember paying off a student
Speaker 1: loan that had like a two point six, seven, five
Speaker 1: or eight or something free money, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I should have maxed out my ROTH that year, Like
Speaker 1: what was I thinking? And that's you can with retrospect
Speaker 1: say I would have done something differently and also be
Speaker 1: like it wasn't that big of a deal though either.
Speaker 3: You got to respect the guy that was in the
Speaker 3: room again.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. Okay, I've got a few more questions. I
Speaker 1: want to get to get a little more personal here.
Speaker 1: We'll get to a few more questions Jesse. Right after
Speaker 1: this break back from the break still talk with Jesse Meek,
Speaker 1: I'm talking about never worrying about money again, not even
Speaker 1: sometimes hopefully. And I think we've laid out Jesse's laid
Speaker 1: out some really good advice for how to do that,
Speaker 1: and so much of it really does come down to
Speaker 1: a lot of like personal realities and being thoughtful about money,
Speaker 1: and I think, Okay, Jesse, I'm curious. My wife is
Speaker 1: a therapist, and I feel like the more I've gone
Speaker 1: through this journey with her, I've done more introspective kind
Speaker 1: of looking and it's changed how I think about money.
Speaker 1: Do you think maybe there's something? And I wasn't kind
Speaker 1: of planning on asking you about this, but there's something
Speaker 1: about just our lack of looking into into our interior,
Speaker 1: the interior parts of our lives, that prevents us from
Speaker 1: having a deeper, more congruent relationship with our finances.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, it's work, and I think we're wired to not
Speaker 2: want to do I think we're wired to be a
Speaker 2: little lazy, and that's probably like optimization of caloric expenditure maybe,
Speaker 2: but yeah, we're wired for it. And it is hard
Speaker 2: work to figure out what your money's for. Sometimes it's easy,
Speaker 2: You're like, yeah, it's for groceries, it's for gas, I
Speaker 2: know those things. But it gets harder as you kind
Speaker 2: of answer the easy questions. It's a little bit like
Speaker 2: one of those proctered tests where at first you kind
Speaker 2: of get warmed up. You're like, man, I'm cruising, I
Speaker 2: know all these accounting questions, you know, and I'm having
Speaker 2: flashbacks now and then you get to like the doozies
Speaker 2: and you're like, oh, I better slow down.
Speaker 3: I got to think about this.
Speaker 2: This is some real work, and knowing what your money
Speaker 2: is for takes real introspection. And I mean, bless your
Speaker 2: therapist's wife's heart. When you're dealing with a relationship, it
Speaker 2: takes both, you know, to really be introspective, honest, sharing, open, curious.
Speaker 2: My therapist's favorite word is curious, and I think that's
Speaker 2: a great way for people to approach their money is
Speaker 2: be like, well, I'm just curious. What do I think
Speaker 2: my money's for. No right or wrong answer, but like,
Speaker 2: let's just be curious about it and see what that
Speaker 2: opens up.
Speaker 1: I think that's that's a great way to think about it,
Speaker 1: to get curious about your money. Okay, last time we spoke,
Speaker 1: you had ditched credit cards. You were sticking with debit cards.
Speaker 1: How did that experiment go or are you still doing it?
Speaker 2: It went really well. It went so well that I
Speaker 2: still have just a debit card in my wallet. I
Speaker 2: have a credit card that I use for business expenses.
Speaker 2: But it's just that that's just like stuff on autopole.
Speaker 2: It's kind of boring the debit cards still just doing
Speaker 2: really well.
Speaker 3: I used Chase. I probably shouldn't disclose that.
Speaker 2: I don't know, but Chase is like the biggest bank,
Speaker 2: so that's probably pretty safe. They've flagged a few things
Speaker 2: and been like, hey, did you mean to buy that
Speaker 2: thing over in that other country? And I'm like, yes,
Speaker 2: I did, that was me and then they're like, oh, okay, good.
Speaker 2: So like they're on top of it because people will say,
Speaker 2: what about fraud, that's their biggest worry. But man, the
Speaker 2: best thing about it was it just made it made
Speaker 2: our system talk about ease. It just made the system easier.
Speaker 2: One account, one card, Julie uses it, I use it,
Speaker 2: and it makes the management.
Speaker 3: Just kind of fall out of the way. Yeah. So yeah,
Speaker 3: we haven't gone back. I can't.
Speaker 2: I think I started in maybe twenty two or twenty three. Okay,
Speaker 2: maybe it's hard for me to remember, but yeah, I
Speaker 2: do one year experiments, Like one year I experimented with
Speaker 2: not knowing what my money was for at all for
Speaker 2: an entire year because I thought I just built up
Speaker 2: good habits. That was a total disaster. But that experiment
Speaker 2: just no credit card. It made our system so easy.
Speaker 2: I was just like, oh, we're good to go, and.
Speaker 1: You know you're giving up some rewards, but you're like,
Speaker 1: who cares. It's it's not enough to move the needle.
Speaker 1: And that's how I felt about the just the super
Speaker 1: you can go super intense on the credit card rewards systems, right,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, and some people do, and some people do
Speaker 1: really really well with it, and more power to them.
Speaker 1: But I just thought I did, like for the ease
Speaker 1: of my system, I'm like two cards, you know, and
Speaker 1: and I could keep it basic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that's that's like the person that's being like
Speaker 2: hyper frugal, because you see them light up when they
Speaker 2: talk about it. You have credit card point optimizing people
Speaker 2: like it's a game, and it's like he let them
Speaker 2: play the game. That's that's great. The banks are winning.
Speaker 2: On the whole, the banks win. And you have a
Speaker 2: few people that game it really well and take trips
Speaker 2: and whatever for free. That's fine, but it's being their
Speaker 2: trips are being paid for by all the people who
Speaker 2: are being taken to task by the banks, so like
Speaker 2: the banks aren't coming out of pocket, being like you've
Speaker 2: earned that trip, dear sir, here you go enjoy Malibu,
Speaker 2: like not at all. It's like a collective group of
Speaker 2: people that all paid late fees and interest, that are
Speaker 2: pulling their money together and saying, enjoy your trip, good.
Speaker 3: Sir, yea.
Speaker 2: And some people are and that's enough for them to
Speaker 2: be like, oh I don't want to do that anymore.
Speaker 3: That doesn't feel good.
Speaker 2: And other people are like I love playing this game, like,
Speaker 2: let's do it again. So to each his own. For me,
Speaker 2: it's just a simplicity play. Yeah, you know, that's it.
Speaker 1: Okay, I'm curious. So you have seven kids right now?
Speaker 3: About simplicity?
Speaker 1: Yeah, right, yeah, that's the opposite of it. Right In
Speaker 1: our culture, there is kind of this belief that that's
Speaker 1: the ultimate status symbol, that you can have that many children.
Speaker 3: I'm even aware of that. Okay, you know, gosh, yeah.
Speaker 1: This is a real thing. It's like, no, wait, having
Speaker 1: kids like that's sweet in this economy.
Speaker 3: You know, so you should be struggling more. I didn't
Speaker 3: realize I should be struggling. You're here, I've been walking normally.
Speaker 1: You're the Warren Buffett of like the current economic culture.
Speaker 1: So is that true or not? Like I guess there's
Speaker 1: there's some people who would who would say God. I
Speaker 1: mean you see the headline number about each child costing
Speaker 1: three hundred plus thousand dollars or something over the lifetime
Speaker 1: of raising them. Is that true? Is is having kids?
Speaker 1: Is it that expensive? Is it that much of a
Speaker 1: status symbol? Or have you found a way to buck
Speaker 1: that trend? Or have people just overblown it in their minds?
Speaker 2: Oh man, I'm like, I gott even ready for this question.
Speaker 2: This has got to be so out of left field.
Speaker 2: I had never even thought of about about it being
Speaker 2: a status symbol. But they are my most treasured possessions
Speaker 2: if I'm allowed to possess my kids.
Speaker 3: Right, So I feel the same way like.
Speaker 2: It's they are the They are treasures for me. There
Speaker 2: are a ton of work. They're more work than work. Right,
Speaker 2: you worry about them more. I've never I have not
Speaker 2: written a book called never Worry about kids again.
Speaker 3: Right, that's kind of.
Speaker 1: You can't write them. I don't think I cannot write
Speaker 1: that book.
Speaker 2: I don't know how. I don't know how to do that. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you worry about them because you love them so so
Speaker 2: so much. They're as expensive as you would like to
Speaker 2: make them, and I don't. I guess we haven't made
Speaker 2: them that expensive because I've never felt like it was financial.
Speaker 2: I mean, we were we do well financially, but I've
Speaker 2: even when we were younger, I mean we had our
Speaker 2: first kid and Julie exited the workforce. She was the breadwinner,
Speaker 2: making twelve bucks an hour, So like i've we had
Speaker 2: kids before. Man if I would have known it was
Speaker 2: a status symbol, that would be an easier decision, but
Speaker 2: I was just worried about paying for things.
Speaker 1: So something about that ignorance is bliss starting younger and
Speaker 1: then just like, yeah, I think if it's almost like
Speaker 1: the later the more you hold off, the later you wait,
Speaker 1: the more you have it built up in your mind,
Speaker 1: how much which it's been a cost and the sacrifice
Speaker 1: is going to entail.
Speaker 2: It's a maybe it's a little bit of a leap
Speaker 2: of faith. Yeah, but you will figure it out.
Speaker 3: You will have to.
Speaker 2: We figured it out, and I'm not the smartest, you know,
Speaker 2: smartest kid, and you figure it out. Gosh, I can't
Speaker 2: imagine life without that dynamic. But it's such a personal
Speaker 2: decision and it's so meaningful that for me to be
Speaker 2: able to say, oh, let's make it about the expense
Speaker 2: side is terrifying because it's so meaningful, So I would
Speaker 2: I would then just say, if you can get a
Speaker 2: lot of clarity on what your money is for, you
Speaker 2: might see the kid fits in just fine. And I
Speaker 2: have very close friends and wine app team members that
Speaker 2: have followed the method figured out what their money is
Speaker 2: for and what their money is for, and they've gotten
Speaker 2: good at money and they aren't worrying about it, and
Speaker 2: suddenly they decide to have a kid, or another one
Speaker 2: or a third one because they recognize, like, oh, I've
Speaker 2: this money thing was apparently the hold up, but it
Speaker 2: actually isn't. When when that money worry goes away, yeah,
Speaker 2: maybe other other proper you know, possibilities open up for people.
Speaker 2: So I'll stay in my line and say, figure out
Speaker 2: what your money is for and then be open to
Speaker 2: quite quite a ride in life if that ends up
Speaker 2: being your choice.
Speaker 3: Yeah. No, I like it. I like it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I hate to think that money is something.
Speaker 3: That that is terrifying to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, but I understand that concern. But I think
Speaker 1: a lot of kind of what you talk about in
Speaker 1: your book can alleviate kind of some of those worries,
Speaker 1: even to the point of feeling more comfortable expanding your family. Jesse,
Speaker 1: this is one more.
Speaker 3: Thing, one more than Joel.
Speaker 2: You can also just be what I call a rec
Speaker 2: league family and that removes.
Speaker 3: A lot of cost of kid What does that mean.
Speaker 2: Because you're not doing the travel sports and all the things, Yeah,
Speaker 2: like getting your kids private tutors and and you know,
Speaker 2: deciding that they're going to be a lecross phenom when
Speaker 2: they're four and then they need like you know, I'm
Speaker 2: being I'm being a little little facetious, but people can
Speaker 2: spend a lot of money not being a rec league family,
Speaker 2: and if you're a rec lead family, it stays pretty affordable.
Speaker 3: So that's that is.
Speaker 2: One choice that Julie and I have made. It's not
Speaker 2: just the money, it's also the time. And we're just
Speaker 2: like that we're a rec league and uh, you know,
Speaker 2: season's end. You don't play all year round, you don't
Speaker 2: play indoor outdoor, you just let your kids kind of dabble.
Speaker 2: And uh, that's one choice you made. That is if
Speaker 2: people were like looking for a specific thing, man, that's
Speaker 2: a that's a money that's a money pit right there.
Speaker 1: It is, right and also a time suck like so much.
Speaker 1: I have friends and in their kids are it's it's
Speaker 1: three practices a week and two or three games on
Speaker 1: the weekends. And I'm like, yeah, in the more kids
Speaker 1: you have, the less you can actually commit to that.
Speaker 1: It's just impossible and it's ridiculous.
Speaker 2: Maybe shows it. Yeah, we're like, we can't. We couldn't
Speaker 2: if we tried. You know, we have to hire it.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: A bunch of nannies be like, okay, you two take
Speaker 2: those people, and yeah, that's not the way we're gonna roll.
Speaker 3: So maybe consider rec league.
Speaker 1: I'm with you on that.
Speaker 3: I like that.
Speaker 1: That last piece of advice. All right, where this has
Speaker 1: been a joy. I've enjoyed having you on. Where can
Speaker 1: how the money listeners find out more about your new book?
Speaker 3: Man? So never worry about money again? Dot com? That's
Speaker 3: that's the book site.
Speaker 2: If they're curious what this weird acronym you know, wyeab,
Speaker 2: winnab dot com, y nab dot com. I'm not on socials,
Speaker 2: so there's nowhere to follow me, but they're they're welcome
Speaker 2: to write in like they can not write to me
Speaker 2: at Jesse at wineab dot com. And if they have
Speaker 2: questions that were spurred from from listening to how to Money,
Speaker 2: then happy to answer them and we can just have
Speaker 2: a little one on one, you know, conversation back and forth,
Speaker 2: so old school, you.
Speaker 1: Know, sounds good, sounds good. Thanks Jesse, I appreciate it, man,
Speaker 1: Thanks for having me. Oh man, It's been way too
Speaker 1: long since I've talked with Jesse, so glad to have
Speaker 1: him back on to talk today. And just man, I
Speaker 1: love the idea the concept of his new book, and
Speaker 1: I think he's pointing out something that is so ridiculously true,
Speaker 1: that that money is something that we perpetually worry about.
Speaker 1: And I love the way he's talking about eliminating the
Speaker 1: worry that we that low grade hum as he put
Speaker 1: it in the beginning, that we have towards money. And
Speaker 1: he was even just talking about, yeah, be frugal, that's fine,
Speaker 1: but don't be frugal out of fear. And I think
Speaker 1: that's just so wise. And I think many of us
Speaker 1: have at least or probably still live in that sort
Speaker 1: of frugal out of fear, Like I can't buy that
Speaker 1: fifty cent donut because then you just think about all
Speaker 1: these ways it's going to derail you. And then if
Speaker 1: you think, if you stop just for a second, snap
Speaker 1: your fingers and think about it. Rationally, you're like, oh, wait,
Speaker 1: a fifty cent donut. It's not it's not going to
Speaker 1: derail everything I've built. And so yeah, I think he
Speaker 1: talked about knowing deeply what your money is for and
Speaker 1: watching it do that thing that's intentionality. And then that
Speaker 1: last at the last little bit, we talked about getting
Speaker 1: curious about your money. And I think that is at
Speaker 1: the heart that's that's playful, that's really fun. You can
Speaker 1: do that by yourself, you can do that with a partner,
Speaker 1: and that sort of curiosity about what your money can
Speaker 1: do for you instead of just saying, oh, I'm saving
Speaker 1: it for when I'm sixty five and older. That's part
Speaker 1: of it, right, right, And you can be playful with
Speaker 1: the funds you've been able to save kind of in
Speaker 1: those retirement years. But it's also like what's possible now,
Speaker 1: Like what is possible now with the money that's coming in,
Speaker 1: How can I change my lifestyle in ways that Like
Speaker 1: what he said was it's more congruent with who I am, right,
Speaker 1: so that the money, how it gets spent, how it
Speaker 1: gets used, is more congruent with the person we say
Speaker 1: we are or who we are desirous of being. And
Speaker 1: I think that is something that comes later on down
Speaker 1: the line as we do more of that introspection and
Speaker 1: digging and we get a little bit curious. So how
Speaker 1: can you get curious with your money this week? How
Speaker 1: can you ask some of those questions so that your
Speaker 1: money so that you're not just upping your savings, right,
Speaker 1: which is a fine and dandy thing, but so that
Speaker 1: you are using the money that's coming in in a
Speaker 1: way that's effective. And because this money, the money that
Speaker 1: you make, it touches every aspect of your life. And
Speaker 1: that's what Jesse was getting at with the fact that
Speaker 1: your money is you is kind of one of the
Speaker 1: things that he's talking about in this book. It's such
Speaker 1: a reflection of who you are. It's almost like, show
Speaker 1: me your calendar and I'll show you what you care about.
Speaker 1: Show me the way your money gets spent, and I'll
Speaker 1: show you what you care about. And so if you
Speaker 1: think about your money in those terms, like, hey, it's
Speaker 1: a reflection of who I am. This says something about me,
Speaker 1: not just to the people around me, but to myself.
Speaker 1: And that's impacting how I think about me. Get a
Speaker 1: little curious about your money this week, Put some pen
Speaker 1: to paper, start noodle in out. If you want the
Speaker 1: how to Money Money Mission statement, will put that in
Speaker 1: the show notes. I think that can be helpful to
Speaker 1: provoke some of these questions so that you can use
Speaker 1: your money in a way that is just a more
Speaker 1: accurate representation of who you are, who you want to be,
Speaker 1: and you can continue to grow in that and hopefully
Speaker 1: never worry about money again. Thank you so much, as
Speaker 1: always for listening. I appreciate your time and attention. We'll
Speaker 1: put links in the show notes up on the website
Speaker 1: at howtomoney dot com. Until next time, best friend out,