Charming and Straightforward Advice you can use Today to Master Your Money
EPISODE 221
Dave Ramsey is a well-known author, radio host, and financial expert famous for his practical advice on personal finance, wealth management, and debt elimination.
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Here are some of the themes and topics that Dave Ramsey commonly writes about:
Personal finance and budgeting: Dave Ramsey is known for his advice on managing personal finances, creating a budget, and saving money. He emphasizes the importance of living below your means, building an emergency fund, and avoiding debt.
Debt elimination: Dave Ramsey advocates getting out of debt and staying debt-free. He provides a step-by-step plan for paying off debt, known as the "debt snowball method," which involves paying off the smallest debts first and then moving on to larger ones.
Investing and retirement planning: Dave Ramsey advises investing, retirement planning, and building wealth over the long term. He recommends investing in low-cost index funds, diversifying your investments, and taking a long-term approach.
Business and entrepreneurship: Dave Ramsey also writes about starting and running a successful business. He provides advice on business planning, marketing, and financial management.
Leadership and personal growth: Besides personal finance and business, Dave Ramsey also writes about leadership and personal development. He encourages readers to develop leadership skills, pursue their passions, and live purposeful lives.
Dave Ramsey's writings focus on practical, actionable advice for improving your financial situation, building wealth, and achieving your goals.
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INTRO
Dave Ramsey introduces the 7 Baby Steps within the Total Money Makeover, by focusing on steps 1 and 2
Save and Snowball (3m27)
MINDSET
Swedish Investor helps us accept that we need to be realistic with our finances
No More Denial (2m19)
WHERE TO START
Dave and Jess from the Ramsey Show talk through the need for patience and resilience
How to stay motivated (4m25)
Dave breaks down a caller’s situation, and how money is a tool
Get rid of the debt (3m41)
OUTRO
Dave closes the show with a call to action: take ownership of your money decisions, and the value of KISS
The secrets of the rich (3m40)
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Buy Summary of Total Money Makeover from Blinkist
Transcript
[00:00:00] Mike Parsons: Hello and welcome to the Moonshots Podcast. It's episode 221. I'm your co-host Mike Parsons. And as always, I'm joined by Mark Pearson. Freeland. Good morning, Mer. Good
[00:00:13] Mark Pearson Freeland: morning, Mike. Good morning listeners and good morning members. I can't wait to announce and get into our brand new episode in this brand new series on money
[00:00:25] Mike Parsons: we are so deep in.
[00:00:26] Mike Parsons: The money is like reign and dollars and dollar bills all around me here. Mark we had the chance to go last week very deep into the psychology, the motivations, the story behind the money, and today we're taking a big turn. We are really going in a different direction. I am super keen to jump into today's show,
[00:00:45] Mark Pearson Freeland: mark, aren't you?
[00:00:47] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yeah, I certainly am. And to set the scene even more, I think we're gonna be not only littering ourselves with a reign of money and cash, but also of insights and lessons from some of these big thinkers, some of these big moonshots individuals. Last week, kicking off the series, we had Morgan Housel's, the Psychology of Money.
[00:01:06] Mark Pearson Freeland: There was a lot of practical tips, a lot of essential breakdowns to help us. Honest with ourselves. But this week, Mike, we're going one level deeper, perhaps with a man who's even more enthusiastic than you and I on the Moonshot Show. And that's Mr. Dave Ramsey, who wrote a fantastic book called The Total Money Makeover.
[00:01:26] Mark Pearson Freeland: And this is a pretty substantial best selling book. Mike, not only does Dave Ramsey have a substantial YouTube studio and following where he answers live questions for customers and individuals around the world who are concerned about their finances. Just to say, this book has also a New York Times bestseller that's also helped out millions of people develop their money habits into things that they can adopt and maintain every day.
[00:01:52] Mark Pearson Freeland: So I think he's a pretty good voice in the space of money management, wouldn't you say?
[00:01:57] Mike Parsons: I would say so. I think he's like the Yoko willing of finance, cuz he's gonna give us a good kick up their ass. Yeah. Hold us through account. He's gonna make sure that we are doing the hard work because I think.
[00:02:10] Mike Parsons: We've got so much to learn from him. He was bankrupt and now he is a seriously wealthy guy, and he did that through hard work and discipline and he's decoded that for us all to learn from. And he is. He is a guy from Tennessee who tells it as it is Mark. So for you, me, and all of our members and listeners, we get the chance to get the truth and perhaps the hard facts about accountability and what it takes to build wealth.
[00:02:39] Mike Parsons: Now, what I love about his notion very much alike, we see in other money and wealth gurus is it's not about fast cars and big houses. It's about financial independence. It's about the freedom as an individual. It's about being able to be the best version of yourself. And he. Talks about the purpose to acquire money is to be generous with it, with family and friends.
[00:03:05] Mike Parsons: So I love this take on money. I love all of the practical tips and I like the ask kicking, we're about to get from Dave Ramsey. So where should we kick off this adventure mark as we go back to school to learn how to manage our money?
[00:03:22] Mark Pearson Freeland: I think, look, we've gotta listen to the professor, the class teacher, and the leader, the headmaster himself.
[00:03:29] Mark Pearson Freeland: Let's kick off with Dave Ramsey setting the scene for us as we dive into this book of his and the C Key seven Baby steps that he calls out within Total Monkey make makeover by focusing on the first two, which are safe and
[00:03:43] Mike Parsons: snowball.
[00:03:44] Dave Ramsey: 30 years ago when I started teaching this stuff, I was first teaching people how to get outta debt live on a budget.
[00:03:51] Dave Ramsey: Be generous. Live on less than you make. So you have a plan, you avoid debt, you save money for emergencies and later for investing. And all of those principles work. But people kept saying, which one do I do first? And so I started laying out you should do this first and that first you should have an emergency fund before you start your 401k.
[00:04:10] Dave Ramsey: And then I figured out it is easier to have an emergency fund if you don't have any payments. And so you need to get out of debt first because of course I learned my lesson the hard way going bankrupt and getting out of debt and learning how important it was to be debt free as a proc, as a part of building wealth.
[00:04:26] Dave Ramsey: So all of that started to formulate after a few years of teaching in various settings. And what became Financial Peace University, it used to be called Life After Debt and it started becoming what we now call the baby steps. And the interesting thing is that now the baby steps have gone into the Total Money Makeover book, which has sold almost 10 million copies, and they have become the proven plan, the shortest distance between where you are now and wealth where you are.
[00:04:59] Dave Ramsey: If you'll live like no one else later, you can live and give no one else. What is the shortest distance? A And we need a path to run on because the way you eat an elephant, it's overwhelming. Do I do my 401k with the match or my kids' college? Or do I have an emergency fund or do I pay on this 18% credit card debt?
[00:05:22] Dave Ramsey: Or, and nothing gets done. You get paralysis of the analysis. You get frozen. Absolutely. And this step these baby steps have worked for me. They've worked for millions. And it's really simple. If you do it, they work. And it all starts with baby step one, having this foundation saving $1,000 for a starter emergency fund.
[00:05:38] Dave Ramsey: This is just a small buffer between you and life before we start tackling the debt. Exactly. And if you have a thousand dollars already, great. Just set that aside. That's your baby. Step one. Any money you have, that's not retirement. Anything you can sell that is not retirement, you're gonna liquidate. If it's not retirement, you got some stock over here that grandpa left you.
[00:05:58] Dave Ramsey: You got a gold bar under your bed. I don't know what it is, but you got any money that's above a thousand dollars. Maybe you got $10,000 in savings account. That's $9,000 you've got that you don't need past baby. Step one. We're gonna put it all on baby. Step two. And baby step two is the famous one. That's the debt snowball where you list your debts.
[00:06:16] Dave Ramsey: Smallest to largest. You pay minimum payments on everything but the little one and you attack the little one with a vengeance. Side note, baby. Step one should not take you more than 30 days. Maximum. You need to work extra. Sell some stuff. Have a garage sale. Put the kids on Craiglist. Whatever you gotta do here, let's get it done.
[00:06:33] Dave Ramsey: A, and you know we're gonna get busted into this. Get a thousand bucks quick baby. Step two. You should be debt free. But your house now you may have to sell a stupid boat. You may have taken an extra job, but most people that have followed the Total Money makeover, baby Steps in Financial Peace University.
[00:06:50] Dave Ramsey: Our debt free inside of two years. Yeah. And that's with doing it with some gazelle intensity, like you talk about in Financial Peace University. And once you pay off all that debt, now you freed up all those payments. You have that income back. Think about what it'd be like to have no payments, but a house payment.
[00:07:04] Mike Parsons: Wow. Or breathing easy. Breathing easy. Mark. Oh my gosh. Is this not what we all strive for? Living and giving Is this not really the life we should be living? The truth is though, what Dave touched upon there is the paralysis. And I think we should spend some time on that one. This paralysis mark. I've seen it in myself, family and friends.
[00:07:28] Mike Parsons: It's when you know you are spending more than you got. When you're like, I can't really afford this. Yet we go ahead with the transaction. Credit. How easy is credit to get at the moment, mark? It's so easy, isn't it?
[00:07:42] Mark Pearson Freeland: I'd say it must be easier than it's ever been. Not only are.
[00:07:47] Mark Pearson Freeland: They're challenger products and services and players within the market who are offering, a very easy to access credit, but also the traditional institutes and the trusted banks and so on that we have, it's become far easier, I think a across my lifetime. It's easier now than ever before.
[00:08:06] Mark Pearson Freeland: And I think the problem with that is, as you've just said, and as I think we're gonna mention, it becomes too tempting to get into the the funnel, of debt the whirlwind of buying things that you don't necessarily need. And also it removes the ability to actually think about the purchases that you're making when you've got access to arguably anything.
[00:08:28] Mark Pearson Freeland: That's right. What consideration do you really put, is that something that's really gonna help me? Yes. Is this something that my family needs? Yes. Or is it just
[00:08:34] Mike Parsons: something disposable? And the trouble we get into when there are products literally called buy now and pay later, is that not code for you can afford this, but you can have it now.
[00:08:47] Mike Parsons: And we're so naive to think that there's not a catch attached to that. And I think it is so easy to make a few of those steps and find yourself in that paralysis. Like I got a bunch of different debts, I got credit lines here, there, everywhere. Carhouse, credit card, you name it. And I think this paralysis is where we need to begin our work.
[00:09:15] Mike Parsons: Like holding ourselves. To account standing in front of the financial mirror and saying, am I really living within my means? And one of the things is, he mentions this idea, we all wanna strive for living and giving. And something that we Mark, have talked about a lot is that the acquisition of wealth is a means to having freedom and choice in your life.
[00:09:43] Mike Parsons: So if you want choices, if you wanna be free to pursue the things that are calling you, whether it's knitting, painting, running marathons, or working in a FinTech startup, if you wanna pursue those dreams, you need to. That capacity to make those choices. Cuz the worst thing is when you do not have the capacity to actually follow the path that you wanna follow in life.
[00:10:12] Mike Parsons: And I think that paralysis of not taking the action, not doing the hard work. Now, there's this great saying if you have easy choices, if you make the easy choices, you're gonna have a hard life. If you're prepared to take the hard choices, you're actually gonna have an easier life.
[00:10:29] Mike Parsons: And I think this is so true with money, and I'll tell you what, mark this paralysis is something that if we can help our members and our listeners really conquer to start. This snowball effect to start saving, to start reducing some of those debts, they'll be on the way, not only to some financial independence, but they will then give themselves to live the life that they really dream of to actually pursue the very best version of your themselves.
[00:11:01] Mike Parsons: I believe that the hard work of living a fulfilling life starts with not hitting the snooze. Button eating right and spending less than you earn. What do you think, mark? Yeah,
[00:11:13] Mark Pearson Freeland: I think you're totally right. And I, we're really gonna get into some of those habits and some of those key steps to get ourselves into that way of thinking.
[00:11:21] Mark Pearson Freeland: But I think you're right, Mike. We've gotta pay account to those individuals who, like us, have such a glowing desire to keep on learning, to keep on holding ourselves accountable, to not find ourselves in that analysis paralysis, or maybe get ourselves into holes that we don't necessarily wanna get out of.
[00:11:40] Mark Pearson Freeland: And that's through, continual learning. So let's take a moment to really celebrate those individuals who are joining you and I and the moonshots family every week. Who are learning out loud with us include Bob, John, Terry Maral in Ken Dimar, Marja, and Connor, Lisa, Sid, Mr. Bonura and Paul Berg and Kalman.
[00:11:59] Mark Pearson Freeland: David, Joe Crystal, Ivo, and Christian, Sam, Barbara, Andre, and Eric, Chris and Deborah Lase. Steve Craig, Daniel, Andrew, Ravi eVet, Karen Ralo, PJ Ni, Ola Ingram, and Emily. Harry Karthik and Vanatta, mark, jet Roger, Steph Gaia, Anna Raw, Nien. James, Eric, Diana Wade, Anna Manda. This list, Mike, again, I'm gonna have to stop putting on a bit of a Tennessee accent soon.
[00:12:30] Mark Pearson Freeland: Channeling my inner Dave Ramsey. Cause there's just so many members, listeners, active subscribers who are holding us accountable, Mike as well, to go out and make the best version of our product that we can. So thank you very much for all joining us and supporting the Moonshot Show.
[00:12:47] Mike Parsons: And a big shout out for Christian who just had his moonshot's anniversary mark, so he must be feeling rather special.
[00:12:54] Mike Parsons: I hope he's celebrating in style as we get into all matters of money. And to this street shooting Tennessee. Dave Ramsey, who is an absolute heavyweight of the money management wealth creation universe. He's got his fantastic baby steps, which you've already heard about, which we're gonna cover a lot in this show.
[00:13:14] Mike Parsons: But at this moment, I believe, mark, we need to just make sure we exercise the demons here, that we truly get ready to take extreme ownership. We need to make Yoko willing, proud, not only of what we do in the gym, but also how we manage our money. So let's listen to one of our favorite YouTube channels, Swedish investor.
[00:13:35] Mike Parsons: He's gonna do a breakdown of Dave Ramsey's thinking on no more denial.
[00:13:40] Swedish Investor: If you drop a frog in hot water, he will jump out. However, if you drop him in room temperature water, he will swim around and he will be cheerful and gradually you turn up the temperature, he will fail to notice the change and eventually he will be lured to his death.
[00:13:57] Swedish Investor: How do people lose their physical fitness and how do they lose their financial fitness? The answer is gradually. There are many similarities between a great physical health and a great financial one. There are no quick and easy solutions that will make you lose 40 pounds in a week or become a millionaire overnight, no matter how much the late night infomercials want you to believe that you are where you are, both financially and physically because of a series of decisions that you made in the past.
[00:14:27] Swedish Investor: The first part of anyone's money makeover is accepting that there is a problem, and this is where the similarities between your physical health and your financial one can differ. If you're out of physical shape, it's difficult to be in denial, heavy breathing and massive sweating When taking the stairs well out of shape.
[00:14:46] Swedish Investor: Had to buy a whole new wardrobe this year. Adding one more X before the ELs to all your outfits out of shape. People will notice and you will with money. It's more difficult. You can easily fool everyone else and possibly even yourself into thinking that you are in a good financial shape. Just drive around in a luxury car and live in an upper class neighborhood.
[00:15:07] Swedish Investor: Almost anyone can manage to do this if the use enough debt, but reality will catch up sooner or later, and reality will hurt. Would you be able to keep up your current lifestyle for at least three months if you were fired from your job tomorrow without using credit? Of course. If not, you're financially out of shape.
[00:15:29] Swedish Investor: Do you have more debts than you have assets out of financial shape? It's time to face reality and to make some changes around here. It won't be easy, but it will be worth it. A motto that Ramsey repeats throughout the book is this, if you live like no one else later, you can live like no one else. I wouldn't walk across hot cold because I think it's fun.
[00:15:51] Swedish Investor: But if I know that the rewards on the other side are great enough, I'd say bring out the call. Dammit.
[00:15:58] Mark Pearson Freeland: I th I love this phrase from Ramsey living like no one else. We're gonna run into that a few times as well on, on the rest of the show, Mike. But actually, I just wanna focus on something that Swedish investors, Bringing to life there that I think is really valuable for us.
[00:16:11] Mark Pearson Freeland: And this is the idea of losing control gradually. And another word for that is unconsciously. Yeah. It's very easy to slip into habits or behaviors or even mindsets that allow us to give ourselves permission to, let's say, fall outta shape or lose our temper, or in this case, lose complete control over our finances.
[00:16:33] Mark Pearson Freeland: Because some of the time we'll be living lives, which our finances take care of themselves. Oh, I set up an account many years ago, money just goes in there and I pull it out when needed. As Swedish investors calling out in towards the end of that clip, the idea of living without any income for three months, that's gonna be a challenge that I think a lot of us have not necessarily considered before, because.
[00:16:58] Mark Pearson Freeland: I suppose taking it for granted, assuming that the status quo is as good as it can get when actually a big call out that Ramsey has throughout his entire book is the fact that if you take control, if you become like the David Goggins or the Yoko Wilx and just take extreme ownership, you can make it so much better.
[00:17:19] Mark Pearson Freeland: You can accept and be aware of the fact that it's, perhaps below average, maybe as Swedish investor puts it, you are in poor financial health and then you start to realize, okay, maybe I should start to change this day over and day out. But it's something that you need to wake up to, don't.
[00:17:39] Mike Parsons: Yeah. So assume that you wake up, what would be the one thing you would do, mark, if you wanted to avoid being in denial about your finances? Like what do you change? What's a habit you would immediately wanna start if you wanted to avoid denial and take accountability for your finances? I think
[00:18:01] Mark Pearson Freeland: the first step is to similarly to, I think some of the lessons that we've learned on other moonshots actually, is to lay it out.
[00:18:11] Mark Pearson Freeland: Lay it out on paper, lay it out on a spreadsheet. Understand in fact, I did this exercise just a couple of days ago, my wife and I, making some financial decisions about where to live and over the next six or so months with a change of location due to jobs and so on. So what we realized was, okay, let's take a, let's take account of where we are right now.
[00:18:34] Mark Pearson Freeland: Where we'll be in six months based on two different decisions. One of which is the path that we're already on. Where does that take us? Secondly, and this is a classic bit, of second order thinking. Maybe if we were to instead think. Of this route, this path, and these steps within that journey, how might our finances be affected?
[00:18:53] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yeah. What else are we going to need to account for? I think that's a good demonstration, and maybe it's just the first step. It's pretty basic. Taking a look at your finances in extrinsic detail and forecasting where they might be in the future. Perhaps not to the extent of, okay, what happens if I die?
[00:19:11] Mark Pearson Freeland: Or what happens if this unplanned event happens? The car gets set on fire. It's much more basic. I think, at this foundational level, but if you can extrapolate and take a look at where your finances are and how they might stack up over the course of, say, six months, both positive as well as negative perhaps, I think that's a key step in coming to terms with that financial foundation you have, and start to really question the idea of bearing your head in the sand and whether you've got any denial taking place.
[00:19:40] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yeah.
[00:19:41] Mike Parsons: So let's call that step, like making a budget, making a plan. I think the perfect companion to that is check your bank balance every single day. For me, like it's the same as if you want to lose weight, weigh yourself every day. Bill Gates, we learn in the show we did on Bill Gates, he's you get what you measure, right?
[00:20:06] Mike Parsons: I believe that the single best habit you can have once you've said, okay, what is our budget? How do we spend money? Is to then track your spending, like it's going out of fashion. Like you have to be all over that. So set yourself a reminder to check your bank balances, your credit card balances, to give yourself that moment of, hang on.
[00:20:32] Mike Parsons: What's that transaction? I don't what was that for? And then, when you see your bank account drop and you're like, huh, why did that drop so much? The thing is, the paralysis that we often have, or the lack of accountabilities is a lot of people don't check their bank balance every day, right?
[00:20:49] Mike Parsons: A lot of people are like, towards the end of the month, I go, I just gotta make sure that I have enough in there before my next paycheck, right? Yeah. Imagine if you're tracking it every day, pretty soon you're gonna start to see your spending habits pretty soon. If you've done that budgeting step, you're gonna go actually we need to, we're not gonna get takeout.
[00:21:08] Mike Parsons: We're gonna, we're gonna cook tonight because we have been spending a bit too much this week. It is so easy to make the adjustment in the day or the week rather than the nasty surprise. Classic thing. The tax man comes and says, you owe a lot more tax. Classic thing, you have a health event. And you need to pay all these extra unforeseen health costs and everyone's yep, don't have the money.
[00:21:31] Mike Parsons: Don't have the rainy day fund. Check the balance. Absolutely. Do not be in denial. Don't run away from the bank balance. Get after it. For me, it's all about attack. Know those dollars and cents in pretty soon. What's on the other side of that mark is you actually start making the goals that you said, like the really long-term goals you mentioned.
[00:21:54] Mike Parsons: You can start to say what sort of amount of money do we want to save each year? And then if we were to save that each year for 10 years, How much money would we have? Would we put that in our 401k or our pension or our superannuation fund? Depending where you are in the world, do you invest it in the property or paying down the mortgage, like whatever you choose to do.
[00:22:17] Mike Parsons: Because then on the other side of it is once you see your capacity to save and generate wealth, you can actually start to go, okay, what sort of life do I have as a vision in the next 10, 20, or 30 years? And then you can start making critical decisions on where you live, your job. You can start to live the life you've always dreamt about, but it only happens if you look at the bank balance every single day.
[00:22:45] Mike Parsons: There's my firm belief on how we can be the ultimate Dave Rams. Check that bank balance every single day.
[00:22:53] Mark Pearson Freeland: I think the only build I can have on that mic is similarly to where productivity game was making a reference to sports and fitness. I think it's a lot easier to do prehab rather than rehab. I e if you can be ahead of the curve, if you know where your finances are and you know the potential output or situation you'll be in.
[00:23:16] Mark Pearson Freeland: If you do go out for yet another dinner this week, it's a lot harder to build back up a fortress balance sheet or a savings account, yes. Than it is to spend it. So I think the denial piece for us coming from Dave, is really, let's not live in a bubble here. Let's not assume that we have untapped finances.
[00:23:35] Mark Pearson Freeland: Let's hold ourselves accountable and realize, do we really need to spend another 50, a hundred dollars on this? Let's leave it in, because more often than not, when you do give yourself the ability to think and to question, let's say a purchase or a transaction or a saving or an investment, a lot of the time if you reflect on it you'll end up making.
[00:23:57] Mark Pearson Freeland: The better decision than making it right in the heat of the moment. Yes. And I think going back to this idea of untapped credit as well as the ability to just do whatever we want and then not really care or be too considerate over where our financial situation actually is, it's a lot harder to then come back to it and make it back up.
[00:24:16] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yes. Yeah.
[00:24:17] Mike Parsons: Yeah. So I think, what's quite interesting here is we've framed like the opportunity to let compound interest do its magic. We've talked about don't defer responsibility for your finances, which are two really big ideas and practices, not only from Dave Ramsey, but it's been very consistent on all the shows we've done on wealth.
[00:24:38] Mike Parsons: And it is crazy Mac to think the parallels between financial wellness and physical wellness. Eat well, eat less, get up early, exercise. It is. The analogy is so crazy and just like it can be super hard to say, Hey, I'm gonna go for a run on a rainy day. It can be hard to stay motivated to save that money because you think to yourself, oh, I'm going without, poor me, but don't worry.
[00:25:06] Mike Parsons: Dave Ramsey and his cohost, Jess, have some thoughts for us. And you're
[00:25:11] Dave Ramsey: walking around in a culture strutting around you've got some money. You got no money. Shut up. You're broke. Quit acting like you're something. You're broke. And this putting on the crap has gotta stop. And Jade, you've been hearing this thing in baby step two, where people are struggling with motivation.
[00:25:29] Jess: Yeah. I get it all the time, Dave. They go in my e in my dms direct message. Even in our financial Peace university class, I get the same question, which is, Jade you guys did this for seven and a half to eight years. How do you stay motivated? And at first, Dave, I would give like the nice answer.
[00:25:45] Jess: You gotta connect to your why and all of this. And I really got to thinking about it and I was talking to Sam about it. And the more people ask me, it frustrates me because there's gotta be no other option. Y y'all don't
[00:25:55] Dave Ramsey: get Jade frustrated, okay, there's
[00:25:57] Jess: got, that's a bad idea.
[00:25:58] Jess: When Sam and I were getting out of debt, there was no option to not do it. It's a must. I have to, my life will never be what I need it to be, what it should be, what God wants it to be if I don't do this. So this idea that maybe I'll do it and maybe I won't, that cannot exist.
[00:26:16] Dave Ramsey: It's not an intellectual exercise.
[00:26:17] Dave Ramsey: It's not an exercise. You've gotta, it's an emotional, visceral
[00:26:21] Jess: decision. Yes. I must. It's gotta and nobody can do that for you. You listen to this show or you come to a live event and we'll light that match for you, but you've gotta stoke your own flame. My buddy Lucas did a talk about this.
[00:26:35] Jess: He said you could be a spark or you can be a flame and you can tell the difference by when the wind blows. If you're a spark, the wind blows immediately. You go out just like that. But if you're a flame, when the wind blows, you get bigger, you get more aggressive, you get larger and more fierce.
[00:26:52] Jess: And if you're talking to me and you're asking me how can I stay more motivated, I'm sorry to tell you, you're a spark. You're just a little fluttering spark, and you've got to do what it takes. She just
[00:27:02] Dave Ramsey: called you people names, she called you a little spark. You're just a little spark,
[00:27:06] Jess: A wimpy spark.
[00:27:06] Jess: And the moment the wind blows, man, the minute you have to dip into your emergency fund, the minute something happens, you're ready to go. I don't know if I want to do it. I don't know if it's worth it.
[00:27:14] Dave Ramsey: I've tried that remsey stuff. It doesn't work.
[00:27:16] Jess: What do you mean? What do you mean you don't know if it's worth it to you?
[00:27:20] Jess: Do you wanna change your life or
[00:27:22] Mike Parsons: not?
[00:27:24] Mark Pearson Freeland: Mike? We are getting into some pretty essential truths here. This is where I think Dave Ramsey's book, as well as his co-hosts, can really bring to light this mindset and potentially this behavior or habit shift that we should all go through with regards to our finances.
[00:27:41] Mark Pearson Freeland: And that's as, as Jess was calling out, there is no option. You must do it. There's nobody else you can lean back on or rely on. It is not something that necessarily will sort itself out. Instead, if you want. Let's say financial freedom, or maybe it's just financial control. You want to feel a little bit more ownership of your finances.
[00:28:02] Mark Pearson Freeland: You wanna know what's coming in and what's going out. And when you've just gotta do it, you've gotta get involved. You've gotta choose to be essentially like a Goggins would call us out unstoppable. You don't fall into the fight or flight behavior. You don't turn away from that adversity or those, that discomfort, oh, I don't really know what my finances are doing.
[00:28:23] Mark Pearson Freeland: I'm gonna have to take a look at them. But they might not be as much as I want there to be. That's a little bit uncomfortable. That's gonna make me feel a little bit exposed. What I think Dave Ramsey does a great job of here. Saying to us yeah, but if you don't find out, nobody else will. And even if somebody else does, they're not gonna necessarily prioritize to help you out of it.
[00:28:45] Mark Pearson Freeland: It's something that you've gotta take control of yourself. This is a pretty key behavior shift, isn't it?
[00:28:52] Mike Parsons: Look, I think it's so interesting that the motivation is not a choice. And I guess the question and the exercise you do is like, how do you give yourself that pep talk when you are like, oof, I'm going without beans and rice every night.
[00:29:13] Mike Parsons: No Uber Eats and here's where I go.
[00:29:17] Mike Parsons: I think we often perceive the trade-offs as being really huge. Oh, poor me, I must go without, but what I find interesting with a lot of con consumables and things that we spend our money on is actually you can live well and easily within your means. For example, where you choose to buy your clothes.
[00:29:45] Mike Parsons: I think this is a huge lever that we have, how we choose the frequency by which we go out and eat. So we set a cap for my wife and I, and we say we will have either a dinner date or a breakfast date once a week. And together with our son, we'll ha order takeout once a week. That is the limit. We do not go past that.
[00:30:10] Mike Parsons: And if we do, we go without the following week. Those are simple things that that we do. Choose where you buy your clothes, choose how you spend your money on food. Food is a huge one. And if you get into things like meal planning, not only can you save a lot of money, actually, it's so empowering when you can actually be in control of your food and actually, instead of always having lunch out at work, if you are making your lunch and taking it to work, you have 100, 100% control of the ingredients.
[00:30:45] Mike Parsons: I e you can live actually healthier and for less. So that's a win-win. But all of those things become easier, I believe, when we think about how we want to live. And I do not want to be somebody who, like a lot of people, Who get to retirement age and face a financial crisis that they have not accumulated enough wealth.
[00:31:16] Mike Parsons: They can only live if it's even gonna be there. Mark, when you and I get to retirement, some sort of pension fund, if you look at all the suggestions, it's gonna be minimal to nothing. So if we are not taking care of ourselves, who else will? And I try and it's a bit dark and gloomy to get into these sorts of topics, but it is a kind of reality of life that you need to take care of yourself and there is enormous benefit.
[00:31:47] Mike Parsons: Pride and fulfillment that you can have to know that you built your wealth by yourself to look after you. And it gets even better when you might be able to help others that haven't been as fortunate as you. Whilst we're all young and preppy and running around doing our thing, ask yourself about how you want your legacy.
[00:32:08] Mike Parsons: Ask yourself if you've got family and friends, and particularly family that haven't managed their money, look at the compromises that they have to make in their older age, their access to services. Maybe they need to move way out of the the city in order to go to a more affordable cost of living location, but then they're like 3, 4, 5, 6 hours away from family.
[00:32:31] Mike Parsons: That doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun to me. So I don't wanna be in that situation, and that's where I, that's where I source my discipline and resilience from. How do you. Mark in the world of temptation or in a world of people paralyzed and not making the spreadsheets like you did just recently, how do you get yours?
[00:32:53] Mike Parsons: Keep yourself in the game. How do you not hit that snooze button on wealth management?
[00:32:58] I
[00:32:59] Mark Pearson Freeland: think it comes down to prioritization, and I think that speaks a little bit to where you were just going, Mike, with regards to controlling lunches, controlling your ability to go out and have another dinner out and so on.
[00:33:15] Mark Pearson Freeland: It just comes down to what I, and more broadly, I suppose my team, so to speak. So my, my family situation, my wife and I, what we want to try and prioritize, for example, if. Have our eyes set on let's say an annual big purchase, maybe that's something substantial like a white good, a new fridge, a new washing machine.
[00:33:37] Mark Pearson Freeland: Maybe it's something even more expensive than that. Maybe it's a car. Maybe you're getting to that point where you can actually go out to the bank and get a mortgage going, buy a house. I think it comes down to what you and I, this speaks to your idea of legacy Mike as well. What you regard as a priority that you and your immediate others, I suppose your family are going to want to lean in towards and rely on.
[00:34:02] Mark Pearson Freeland: Because suddenly when you compare the short-term gain, oh, you know what, I really fancy that bite of lunch. Maybe an extra bit of sushi today. I'll push the boat out. Sometimes spending 10 up to maybe even $20 for a lunch every day adds up. And once you essentially do that math, once you start to realize, okay The budget of spending on sushi every month is starting to become a little bit outta control compared to the additional priorities that I wanna try and accomplish.
[00:34:35] Mark Pearson Freeland: Maybe it's flying back to see family. Maybe it's just buying something new for a wedding, a nice new sous, whatever it might be. It just comes down to, I think, prioritization. And that, for me, helps when I am looking at something in a shop or whether I'm online and maybe it's just a medium purchase.
[00:34:54] Mark Pearson Freeland: I'll question does this. Really matter. Is this helping me get to the point that I'm looking for? Yes. Is this contributing towards a wardrobe of clothes that will last? Is this contributing to a house full of furniture that will be here for the next 10 years Or is this something a little bit more disposable?
[00:35:13] Mark Pearson Freeland: Is it something a little bit more cheap or maybe a little bit more subject to going in and out of fashion? I think that's when you apply this level of, I dunno, extra consideration. And when you wanna do the hard work rather than that paralysis of not really knowing Yes, what decision to make. If you can compare what you are considering versus that long-term idea.
[00:35:37] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yes. That long-term goal, perhaps it's legacy. I think that really helps, doesn't it?
[00:35:42] Mike Parsons: It does. So I think, we've got some long-term techniques thinking about the life you want to live in. Maybe you dream of living by the beach. Then that can be a really good motor. I'm gonna forgo the sushi box, right?
[00:35:57] Mike Parsons: And I'm gonna bring rice and beans to work because I want a beach house. Like another thing that I mentioned in the previous show is my wife and I have this really fun technique where anything I see on Amazon, I just put it in the cart and she's the only one that pulls the trigger. So she'll review it and we will often discuss.
[00:36:17] Mike Parsons: So things will sit in there for days, sometimes weeks. And there's nothing better than deferring the decision to purchase a good, nothing better. And it's amazing. Like even when I find myself trying to justify it, I might actually, no, I don't need it. But it is just like creating those sorts of tools.
[00:36:35] Mike Parsons: Check your bank balance every day, don't buy too quickly, defer, discuss the purchases. The the, there are these simple habits and. The funny thing is, mark, I want to come back to the short-term benefit. It feels there is nothing better when you are working out to say, I'm gonna run 5K today, or seven K or 10 K today, and you do it.
[00:37:00] Mike Parsons: There's nothing better than saying, I'm gonna eat really healthy and clean and lean today. And you do it. And here's the thing. At the end of the month when you go, wow, we actually spent even less than we budgeted the wellbeing, the inner confidence, the pride, the what? Just the good vibes that this creates, knowing that you actually have the capacity of self-control in a world of temptation.
[00:37:29] Mike Parsons: Mark, in a world of temptation, It's a pretty good vibe,
[00:37:34] Mark Pearson Freeland: isn't it? It isn't it? I think the deferring purchase has become a lot more tricky nowadays, similarly to what we were talking about at the beginning of the show. Yeah. This attraction to credit. Fundamentally, the attraction to debt has got us to a point where it's very easy to not defer i e you want those new sneaker.
[00:37:56] Mark Pearson Freeland: Let's go out and buy them. And I think that's a real shift change that's happened particularly recently, may maybe it was my a a product of covid. We were all we felt like we didn't have too much choice and too much freedom. Perhaps this is a bit of a hangover for that, but I think you're right.
[00:38:12] Mark Pearson Freeland: When it comes to really holding ourselves accountable, you can't fall into that pattern because when you do fall into that pattern, what you're doing is shortening your ability to make those finances last. Yes. Into the future. Yes. Into those important life deciding
[00:38:27] Mike Parsons: factors. Yeah. And like in ourselves, if we understand that we can be paralyzed when we just, or avoiding that, that accountability, if that's the enemy on the in inside I think.
[00:38:43] Mike Parsons: Dave's got a clear point of view of what the enemy on the outside is, and it is a nasty thing called debt.
[00:38:51] Dave Ramsey: I just went from part-time to full-time at my job. My income's almost doubled. We only have around $24,000 in a line of credit and leased car. Every question you get usually revolves around someone having multiples of our debt.
[00:39:04] Dave Ramsey: So the question is the advice for someone drowning in debt the same as those who are just wading through it? Yes. The advice is the same. All debt is standing between you and becoming wealthy. Your most powerful wealth building tool is your income, and when you give some of it or a bunch of it to someone else, you don't have it anymore.
[00:39:33] Dave Ramsey: That's a mathematical fact. When you pay car payments on a stupid fleeced car and you have a $24,000 line of credit buying crap you couldn't afford, and you pay payments on that stuff, you don't have the money anymore. If you had that money, you could have used it for investing and for generosity and so yeah, you get very intense.
[00:40:01] Dave Ramsey: The good news is that you can get out of debt quicker. You didn't mention your income in your email request for an answer, but you can get out of debt quicker probably because you don't have the multiples of debt that a lot of people do. Lady, earlier this hour, $225,000 in debt, you probably have more like $50,000 in debt depending on the price of this feast automobile, but the point is get rid of the debt cuz without any payments.
[00:40:32] Dave Ramsey: What you have is. Money and then that gives you options. Now, money is not the end of the world, but not having money sometimes is. Money's what you feed your kids with. Money's what you pay the light bill with and keep the heat and the cool on money's what you keep a roof over. Your family with money is how you help other people.
[00:40:56] Dave Ramsey: Generally speaking, it's hard to feed hungry kids if you're poor. And so this is that. This is what money's for. It's just a tool. It's not got any existential. There's no existential beauty to it. It's only for what it's good for. It's a tool. It's I have a car. What's the car for? Getting to work, taking my family on a vacation, going to see grandma's house.
[00:41:26] Dave Ramsey: This is what your car's. Your car has not got, it doesn't change your life. It's what the car does that changes your life. Instead of walking or riding an oxcart, you have a car. That's all money is, it's just a tool. So the point is, yeah, Barb, let's get rid of the debt, because then you have more money and it's not, again, it's not a spiritual problem to have more money, spiritual problems when you worship it.
[00:41:54] Dave Ramsey: So get after it, kiddo. Get your mess cleaned up and listen. You're in a real dangerous position. Every question you get usually revolves around someone having multiples of death. So the question is the advice for someone drowning in death the same as it is for those waiting out honey, don't wait out.
[00:42:11] Dave Ramsey: Your language reveals that you are not nearly concerned about this enough. I want you to get more angry about this. They're taking your money.
[00:42:23] Mark Pearson Freeland: Mike, I think again, Dave is hitting us with some hard truths here, and there's two particular pieces that, that I'd love to dive into a little bit. The first of which is, I suppose setting the scene and the function that I think Dave's calling out, that money actually has, rather than it being, let's say a a thing that we are all destined to chase.
[00:42:47] Mark Pearson Freeland: It isn't something romantic. It isn't something that we should feel jealous of or have ego over or desire what we don't necessarily have. I think what Dave is doing a really nice job of, which is setting that foundational understanding of what finance and wealth and money actually is. It's just a tool.
[00:43:08] Mark Pearson Freeland: It isn't something that we should compare to other people. It isn't something that we need to feel necessarily. Desire to become tens of millions of e of millionaires and so on. Instead, it's just a method that we can utilize in our lives to get where we wanna be. I think that's a really nice, very quick, very simple breakdown that Dave does for us there, which then builds onto this second point that I think is really coming through in that clip.
[00:43:36] Mark Pearson Freeland: And that's the idea of money being available once you remove the reliance on third parties. I e if my car is leased if I've got a loan from, say app, I bought a brand new, maybe Apple, Mac and or MacBook, and I've got it on lease I'm paying it off over time, over credit. Over my credit card. All of those things are relying on a third party on somebody else who is outside of my immediate circle When I'm doing that. What it means is I'm always gonna have a little bit less control because a certain percentage of the monthly income I'm gonna have will disappear. It won't necessarily disappear from site I'll, if I have good control over my finances or good budget, I check my bank balance every day.
[00:44:22] Mark Pearson Freeland: I'm gonna know where it's going. But at the same time, it creates a bit of a gray area. When you think about your money and your net worth, because you have it in the back of your mind that there's still this outgoing coming out, and I think what Dave has really made the case for so far in the show and in the clips that we've heard, is this idea of removing yourself from that problem.
[00:44:44] Mark Pearson Freeland: If you remove the debt as much as you can, if you can consolidate, if you can create that little bit of. Breathing space and certainty that's around your finances, in your wealth, and in doing so, potentially remove some of those debts. You're gonna be in a more positive and possibly more enthusiastic situation.
[00:45:05] Mark Pearson Freeland: Because Mike I'm not sure about you, but there's certainly been times in my life when money anxieties and decisions that really have made me uncomfortable and argue with those I'm closest to comes down to money. And yeah, ordinarily it's not something that is necessarily a product of your behavior.
[00:45:24] Mark Pearson Freeland: It's just a product of maybe having less control. Is that something that you've run into
[00:45:29] Mike Parsons: before? Oh, listen, money is I like this. I totally have been in that situation and it's invariably because we talked about the avoidance or the lack of ownership. So you're just deferring, you've heard the, of the saying, kicking the can down the hill, like you're kicking it away, but it's always gonna come back and get, it's always gonna come and get you.
[00:45:50] Mike Parsons: And I think that's often the moment where we find ourselves arguing with those that are closest to us because we didn't take that ownership. But the thing is that we learnt from Dave there, that you pointed out is it is just simply at all. It's not the destination, it's the means freedom, choice are all on the other side of good money management, good wealth creation.
[00:46:16] Mike Parsons: That's the real point here. And it's not like a, a real, my. It's just like being fit and healthy is not a real mystery. You need to eat well, sleep well and work out and make sure that you don't eat too much, do that, and you are really on track. There's, whether you're into protein shakes or whatever, the reality is, you need to burn more calories than you take in.
[00:46:38] Mike Parsons: You need to have a balanced diet, good sleep, good range of exercise, of cardio and strength. And actually, that's the simple part. The hard part is not hitting the snooze button in the morning. Yeah, same thing. Same thing with finances. We all know that things add up and you should have less, you should be spending less than you earn, but it's when you are in that moment, when you expose yourself to the easy sushi lunch, to the fancy jacket, it's all those things, right?
[00:47:10] Mike Parsons: Those are the, that's actually the hard thing. And so it's not about the latest protein shake. And the same thing with. Millionaires is the secrets that they hold are not complex. They are not sophisticated vehicles. In fact, often those sophisticated financial instruments get you into a lot of trouble.
[00:47:37] Mike Parsons: Hello? Credit derivative swapping, leverage, all of that kind of stuff. No, the real thing is that there are not only mindsets, but behaviors that people who've accumulated wealth have. And so we get to listen now to Dave, explain to us what really are the secrets of the rich
[00:48:01] Dave Ramsey: somehow among some newly wealthy people, there's a, an ethos, this idea in the air that somehow building wealth must be complicated.
[00:48:11] Dave Ramsey: You must have some in the secrets of the rich lemme tell you what the secrets of the rich are. They're not a secret. They do what you've been doing. They invest in things they understand. If you don't understand it, don't put money in it. Don't put money in something because it sounds cool and some go that you think is cool is telling you to do it or has done it himself.
[00:48:42] Dave Ramsey: This is how people lose their money with Bernie Madoff. They got recommended by a friend to get in something cool that was an inside deal that no one knew about. It was a secret. He was sophisticated
[00:48:56] Mike Parsons: and everybody
[00:48:57] Dave Ramsey: doesn't know about it, and this is how the rich do it. It's all behind the curtain. It's just not.
[00:49:04] Dave Ramsey: I was with a guy the other day who is worth about 200 million. And you know what? He's invested his money in farmland. He's a rancher. It's what he knows. I said, you don't have any money. Mutual funds? Nope. Don't like that stuff. Don't understand it. Not putting money in it. That's not sophisticated.
[00:49:27] Dave Ramsey: Dave said, A guy who has a 10th of the net worth or a fourth, the net worth, or one mon, Jillian, the net worth that guy has, he's got $200 million. What you have is an opinion,
[00:49:37] Dave Ramsey: put money and stuff you understand and you're comfortable with. If that's all you ever do, you're gonna be fine. As far as the investing side, I have three investments. That's all I have, and I'm fairly knowledgeable about the investment world. I have three my. Paid for real estate with no mortgages and mutual funds.
[00:50:03] Dave Ramsey: I don't play single stocks. I don't screw around with gold. I don't mess with Bitcoin and I don't need your stock tip from your broke golfing buddy with an opinion. You missed out on getting in on this deal. Ramsey didn't miss a thing. I'll set my net worth down beside yours while you mouth off.
[00:50:25] Dave Ramsey: Didn't miss a thing you didn't either. Don't try to get, this is not time to get cool. Cool. Didn't get you here. Cool. Won't take you there. And don't try to follow these cool goobs around because I gotta tell you, man this crap. I see these things. Come to the seminar and learn how to do
[00:50:42] Mike Parsons: a fam, a limited family partnership with a
[00:50:45] Dave Ramsey: double back flip trust and I just made that up.
[00:50:47] Dave Ramsey: But it sounds, it's crap like that. And people get all tangled up in stuff and they lose their butts. Don't. Do it. Don't do it. So it's real simple. Sean, invest in things you understand? It's okay to use the KISS principle? I do. I use the keep it simple stupid principle. I keep mine very simple, very clean, and if I don't have the money, I can't buy it.
[00:51:16] Dave Ramsey: Wow. It's insightful, it's primitive. How do you get by on that? With a, with hundreds of millions of dollars of net worth. That's how I struggle through.
[00:51:25] Mark Pearson Freeland: Keep it simple, stupid. Mike, again, I think this is a great way of rounding out Some of the work of Dave Ramsey in, in, in his book, the Total Moneymaker It because he's calling it back and putting it in front of our eyes.
[00:51:40] Mark Pearson Freeland: Keep it simple. It can be super straightforward. It doesn't have to be an intimidating. Complicated mechanic in your life whereby you have to invest all your money repeatedly, log on every day, move your money around. Instead, you just keep a tab on it. You look at it, you may make sure to research any of the decisions that you are tr considering making when it comes to your finances.
[00:52:06] Mark Pearson Freeland: You're not one of those individuals, and I've been there before. When you fall into the temptation to follow or invest in something that seems like a get rich quick scheme, it's similar to six pack abs overnight and so on. We know that those all require more skin in the arena than perhaps they initially say.
[00:52:26] Mark Pearson Freeland: So again, Chris is just a very straightforward shooter here, isn't he? He's saying to us, take owner. Remind yourself of what you're doing. You're investing your hard earned money, the thing that your kids, the thing that your family could benefit from. If you're gonna throw it up into a an investment or a decision or a behavior that fundamentally you don't really get, put yourself in the shoes of those who are around you.
[00:52:53] Mark Pearson Freeland: Would your child, your son, appreciate you being so frivolous? Maybe shortsighted in doing it. I think there's a lesson that we can build on from Dave's work here, which is, not only holding yourself accountable and going down the very simple path, but attaching it into this idea of it, you have an impact.
[00:53:12] Mark Pearson Freeland: There will be an outcome to this. Hold yourself accountable to it, and then that'll help you make that decision. I think that's what's really speaking to me here, isn't it? Yeah.
[00:53:21] Mike Parsons: And divert your energy towards building. Like really strong resilience on your financial habits rather than trying to decode the latest financial instrument options mechanism crypto coin currency, funny business.
[00:53:41] Mike Parsons: You don't have to divert your energy to complex, pioneering new things. There are age old principles of compound interest. Understand what you are investing in and everything Dave Ramsey talked about in that last clip is a proxy of Warren Buffett's thinking and Charlie Munger's thinking that we've studied.
[00:53:59] Mike Parsons: They only invest in companies they understand, only put your money in places where you understand what is happening with it. The classic thing is folks that get a first year on their fixed mortgage rate and then it goes variable after. And so the first year is really good and then all of a sudden when they come off the fixed rate, it goes variable and they're like, oh my gosh, we're paying a lot more and we don't have the means to pay.
[00:54:25] Mike Parsons: That's a classic example of where you got yourself into an instrument or a vehicle that you didn't understand. So spend your effort in simple things, understanding them, mastering them. You don't have to be the next Wall Street Day trader. No, it's sound, sound principles of keeping. It's simple, which I think is relieving when you think about all the effort you have to do and put in and invest to live within your means.
[00:54:55] Mike Parsons: It's nice that it's not like trying to get some complex double master's degree in finance and economics. No, it's very sound principles,
[00:55:06] Mark Pearson Freeland: right? Yeah you're totally right there. I think what's a relief, I suppose you could say, Is the fact that any of us can do this. Yeah. The key lessons that Ramsey's really calling out as we reflect on this book, it's not necessarily a deep dive into, key behaviors in the stock market.
[00:55:28] Mark Pearson Freeland: It's not about focusing or investing in certain areas. Instead, what I think he's calling out to us here and inviting all of us to trial is just keeping it more straightforward. The basics of money management. Keep an eye on it. Don't overspend, keep a budget and don't get yourself into debt.
[00:55:46] Mark Pearson Freeland: Isn't it interesting how that is, he, we need somebody like Dave Ramsey to almost remind us. Yeah. He's
[00:55:54] Mike Parsons: like our drill sergeant, isn't he? Yes. He's we're like these ducks who are slowly getting distracted walking off and he's. Getting us back into line, right? Yeah. And that's
[00:56:03] Mark Pearson Freeland: how I feel digging into Dave Ramsey's work.
[00:56:06] Mark Pearson Freeland: It's, he's very focused and single-minded. And it works. If you can be that single-minded, you can stay the course, you can be disciplined, you can get rid of your debt. He's inviting us to then say, from that point on, you can build wealth. Yes, you can get closer to that ultimate goal of achieving or purchasing the things that you've always dreamed of.
[00:56:26] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yes.
[00:56:28] Mike Parsons: There's some big there's some big takeouts learnings, enhancement tweaks I can make. But I first wanna ask you, Matt what changes? Now? You've had a good dose from Tennessee. What changes from my Pierce and Freeland?
[00:56:41] Mark Pearson Freeland: It's, it, this is a bit of a challenging one, Mike, because actually I really enjoyed.
[00:56:46] Mark Pearson Freeland: Initial steps and lessons we were learning with regards to the compounding effect to borrow Dar Darren Hardy's work with the saving and snowballing, those key baby steps that we were introduced to at the start of the show, I think spoke a lot to me. So really taking advantage of building a little bit of a let's call it a fortress balance sheet, paying off those debts in order to have that level foundation is the key behavior that I'm gonna continue striving for.
[00:57:13] Mark Pearson Freeland: What about you, wh which one's standing out for you?
[00:57:15] Mike Parsons: I just love it all. More than anything, I've just got a massive turbo boosto about financial accountability and it goes perfectly with what we learned from Morgan Houseman is, which was really like the thinking behind it. These. These seven baby steps, these are things you can do right now.
[00:57:32] Mike Parsons: You can literally press pause on this podcast and get busy building some wealth, which is fantastic. And I think what is so fantastic is at the end of all of this, he actually highlights that giving and generosity are at the top of the pyramid. That's the whole reason you want to do this, to take care of the people that mean the most to you.
[00:57:56] Mike Parsons: So that's what a prospect. Yeah. Mark, I wanna thank you for sharing your thoughts, your ideas here as we get to the bottom of managing our money. And I wanna say special thank you to our members and to our listeners too here on Show 221 where we studied the mastery of Dave Ramsey in his.
[00:58:16] Mike Parsons: The Total Money Makeover. And he gave us those little baby steps where we need to save and snowball. And in order to do that, you cannot deny your financial reality. You need to take extreme ownership. And as you go on the journey to building wealth, you need to be patient and resilient. Do this because you have no other choice.
[00:58:37] Mike Parsons: Because if you want to live your best life, you have to own it. Get rid of that debt and keep it simple. And you'll be on the way to giving yourself fulfillment, freedom options and choices in life. And I reckon that is a guaranteed path to being the best version of you. And that's what we're all about here on the Moonshots podcast.
[00:58:58] Mike Parsons: That's a wrap.