{"id":321462,"date":"2025-04-29T06:03:27","date_gmt":"2025-04-29T11:03:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/episode-206-i-quit-my-job-to-care-for-our-son-but-can-we-afford-it"},"modified":"2025-04-29T06:05:42","modified_gmt":"2025-04-29T11:05:42","slug":"episode-206-i-quit-my-job-to-care-for-our-son-but-can-we-afford-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/episode-206-i-quit-my-job-to-care-for-our-son-but-can-we-afford-it","title":{"rendered":"Episode 206. \u201cI give up my job to look after our son, however can we afford it?\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div readability=\"2038.06579409\">\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/he4qAj-wM9Y?si=BeTJlnHh1lipFeGk\" width=\"100%\" height=\"400\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><span data-mce-type=\"bookmark\" style=\"display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;\" class=\"mce_SELRES_start\">\ufeff<\/span><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p aria-level=\"4\">Anna (36) and Will (39) are married with two kids, including a young son who was born with a serious heart condition. Between unexpected medical expenses, emotional stress, and inconsistent financial planning, their savings have steadily drained\u2014and now, they&#8217;re spending more than they earn just to keep up. Will brushes off concerns, saying \u201cWe\u2019re fine,\u201d while Anna feels like she\u2019s the only one confronting reality. Now, they want to build a home and create long-term security for their family\u2014but until they can get aligned, that dream may be out of reach.<\/p>\n<p><b>This episode is brought to you by:<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Aura Frames | Use promo code RAMIT to get $35 off the best-selling Carver Mat frames at <a href=\"https:\/\/auraframes.com\">https:\/\/auraframes.com<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Facet | For Money for Couples listeners who enroll with Facet, they will waive the $250 enrollment fee for new annual members and they\u2019ll add $500 into your brokerage account when you invest and maintain $5000 in the first 90 days of membership for Core, Plus and Complete members (promo does not apply to Foundations members). Check out their membership options at <a href=\"https:\/\/facet.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/facet.com\/ramit<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Notion | Try Notion for free at <a href=\"https:\/\/notion.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/notion.com\/ramit<\/a> and experience the powerful, easy-to-use Notion AI today.<\/p>\n<p>Shopify | Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at <a href=\"https:\/\/shopify.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/shopify.com\/ramit<\/a><\/p>\n<p>ZocDoc | Download the ZocDoc app for FREE at <a href=\"https:\/\/zocdoc.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/zocdoc.com\/ramit<\/a> then find and book a top-rated doctor today.<\/p>\n<h2 aria-level=\"2\"><b><span data-contrast=\"none\">Links mentioned in this episode<\/span><\/b><span data-ccp-props=\"{&quot;134233117&quot;:false,&quot;134233118&quot;:false,&quot;134245418&quot;:true,&quot;134245529&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559685&quot;:0,&quot;335559737&quot;:450,&quot;335559738&quot;:0,&quot;335559739&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:768}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/iwt.com\/moneyforcouples\"><span data-contrast=\"none\">Order my new book: Money for Couples<\/span><\/a><span data-ccp-props=\"{&quot;134233117&quot;:false,&quot;134233118&quot;:false,&quot;335559685&quot;:2010,&quot;335559737&quot;:2010,&quot;335559738&quot;:0,&quot;335559739&quot;:0}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 aria-level=\"2\"><b><span data-contrast=\"none\">Transcript<\/span><\/b><span data-ccp-props=\"{&quot;134233117&quot;:false,&quot;134233118&quot;:false,&quot;134245418&quot;:true,&quot;134245529&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559685&quot;:2010,&quot;335559737&quot;:2010,&quot;335559738&quot;:375,&quot;335559739&quot;:375,&quot;335559740&quot;:768}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/drive.google.com\/file\/d\/1Cy1Ami1EwDl4e-86oZ8fxKxhAWVvpCh0\/view?usp=sharing\"><span data-contrast=\"none\">Download the full transcript PDF<\/span><\/a><span data-ccp-props=\"{&quot;134233117&quot;:false,&quot;134233118&quot;:false,&quot;335559685&quot;:2010,&quot;335559737&quot;:2010,&quot;335559738&quot;:150,&quot;335559739&quot;:150}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:00:00]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0He could end up in heart failure on Friday, and we would need to move into the hospital. That is our reality. It was too much, so we made the choice to have me stop working.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:00:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I&#8217;ve doubled my income, but I feel like we have way less money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:00:10]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0If I compare our net worth to other people with our similar backgrounds, we are behind.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:00:18]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It felt like we were just taking our foot off the gas a little bit, but now it feels more like we shifted into neutral.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:00:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I worry about everything. He worries about everything. We just don&#8217;t align on what to do with that worry.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:00:30]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You are weaponizing the tropes of this podcast against me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:00:35]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Can I pause things for a second? I don&#8217;t think the point of this podcast is to win Ramit over.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:00:42]\u00a0All\u00a0right.\u00a0I&#8217;m looking at Anna and Will&#8217;s CSP today.\u00a0They are 33 and 37 years old. Let&#8217;s see the numbers.\u00a0Assets, $654,000. Investments, $366,000. Savings, $188,000. Debt, 495,000. For a total net worth of 714,000. All right. That looks amazing. Gross monthly income is 15.5k for 186k. Also very impressive.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:01:12]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0At first, I was like, why am I talking to this couple? But in their application, Anna writes, &#8220;Our family dynamics have changed drastically since 2022. We were earning $260,000 a year with one child. Then we bought a home and had our second child. He was born with a severe congenital heart defect, and our lives were upended. After two open-heart surgeries and with months in and out of the hospital, I left my job because I had too much on my plate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:01:42]\u00a0&#8220;We are now spending more than we make every month, though we are not spending it on anything fun.&#8221; This is a reminder of why the numbers alone do not tell the story. I&#8217;m very much looking forward to speaking to Anna and Will, figuring out what happened, where they are today, and where they can go in the future.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Interview]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:02:02]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Can you help me understand the dynamics of your family finances? What changed since 2022?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:02:09]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So 2022, we had one kid. We were dual income, both earning over six figures. 2023, I was 20 weeks pregnant with our second baby, and we went in for our anatomy scan and they discovered that there&#8217;s something wrong with his heart. It was obviously an extremely earth-shattering moment.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:02:33]\u00a0There was before the anatomy scan in my life. And then there&#8217;s after. And I was trying to figure out what to do with having a baby that, quite honestly, we didn&#8217;t know if he was going to survive. We were going in for checks every two weeks, meeting with cardiologists and surgeons and all of these things and building up our community.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:02:53]\u00a0And during that time, I was trying to ramp up my career and I couldn&#8217;t anymore. There was a part of my brain that was in constant panic and fear, and just trying to survive every moment. So he was born. Amazingly, he has survived two open heart surgeries, and about three months in the hospital in total over the past year and a half. Really defied the odds in a lot of ways, but will be a heart patient for the rest of his life.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:03:21]\u00a0He&#8217;s going to at least have one more surgery. But anyways, he&#8217;s doing great. We&#8217;ve been through a kind of incredible turmoil. And back to the income, when I did go back to work, it was after his second surgery. So I had been off for six months in and out of the hospital, all of those things.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:03:38]\u00a0When I did go back, I was brought back part-time, which was working really great, but ultimately he was still having so many struggles. It was too much. And so we made the choice to have me stop working.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:03:52]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Wow. Thank you so much for sharing. I&#8217;m sorry what you&#8217;ve had to go through. And also, I&#8217;m really happy that your son was born and that you&#8217;ve been able to see him grow. Are you comfortable talking a little bit more about your son and the medical issues? I want to get to the finances, but it helps me understand what&#8217;s going on if I can ask a few more questions.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:04:17]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:04:18]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay.\u00a0You seem very conversant about it. You&#8217;ve obviously thought about it and talked about it a lot. How did you get that way?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:04:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I&#8217;ll toot your horn for you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:04:27]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Go for it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:04:27]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0She processes her feelings through writing a lot, and so Anna started a blog that was primarily for friends and family, just to get them up to date. And through that, she started getting connected with a lot of other families that were going through the same thing, and she also made a lot of great connections in the hospital with other families that had children with heart defects.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:04:54]\u00a0And I think that both of us, going through that experience, really developed a lot of empathy and concern over how difficult it is for so many families when they have children with chronic conditions and they&#8217;re spending a lot of time in the hospital. And I think Anna&#8217;s really taken that as a passion of hers, and she&#8217;s now involved with two charities and volunteers at the hospital.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:05:16]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I love the mission that you, Anna, and both of you have taken on. Honestly, I&#8217;m so glad I asked. Forget the finances. This is way more interesting.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:05:28]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Obviously, it&#8217;s easy to get swallowed up by fear and the overwhelm of this life that we now lead, but what we&#8217;ve learned together, and me specifically by writing this substack is if you just tell people what&#8217;s going on, it will help you process it. And what I&#8217;ve learned is that there&#8217;s so many people out there who need so much help.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:05:50]\u00a0And I have the skill, and so does Will, to connect with people, speak with doctors in a really, productive way, connect with nonprofits, all of these things. We are extremely privileged, and I think we have a duty to serve this community, and it&#8217;s been extremely rewarding.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:06:07]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Honestly, thank you for bringing me into your world. Everybody goes through something rarely as serious as this, but the overwhelming feeling I know, having gone through certain things in my own life and certainly talking to the people who speak to me, is how lonely it can feel.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:06:24]\u00a0And I love that you&#8217;ve found a purpose even in a way that&#8217;s totally unexpected. You wouldn&#8217;t have predicted it three years ago.\u00a0So thank you for sharing that. I want to turn to what the effect of this was on your finances.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:06:40]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We went from earning 265 a year to 150. And we thought it was going to be a little more temporary than it&#8217;s been. Things with our son are incredibly great right now. So in January, I&#8217;ve started taking on some contract work that I am absolutely loving. My hope is that I can ramp that up and then be able to ramp it down if and when needed for my son&#8217;s care.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Narration]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:07:10]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Listening to Anna and\u00a0Will share their story,\u00a0we can all hear how fragile our lives can be when something unpredictable happens, especially with kids.\u00a0What strikes me is not just how resilient they are, but the fact that they had actually planned for this. They&#8217;re still in survival mode though, understandably, but it&#8217;s quite impressive, quite amazing all the preparation that they had done before this moment.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:07:39]\u00a0This is one of the reasons that I stress\u00a0how important an emergency fund really is because when you need it, you&#8217;ll be so thankful you planned for it.\u00a0But with Anna and Will,\u00a0you can tell that they aren&#8217;t sure how to pivot from survival to something a lot more intentional, and I can tell you that answer is going to surprise you. That is what we are here to uncover.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Interview]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:08:02]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don&#8217;t think we made the right adjustments of like, okay, you&#8217;re not working anymore. Pull both kids out of school. We were like, &#8220;We have the buffer. We&#8217;re going to use the buffer.&#8221; And now we&#8217;re like, &#8220;Ugh.&#8221; Little nervous about where we&#8217;re at.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:08:15]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. I have to say that, most couples when they experience a layoff or one person stops working, most of them don&#8217;t know their numbers at all, first of all. Most of them don&#8217;t adjust. And they certainly don&#8217;t make as strategic of a decision like, &#8220;Hey, we have this buffer. We are going to use it.&#8221; So yes, you probably overused it. We&#8217;ll talk about that and look at the numbers. But just the fact that you even knew it is quite a good sign. Will, I want to hear from you. What did it feel like to go from two incomes to one?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:08:48]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It felt like we were just taking our foot off the gas a little bit, which is fine, but now it feels more like we shifted into neutral.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:08:56]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Anna, what about you? What did it feel like to take that household pay cut?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:09:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Horrible. It felt horrible. It felt bad because I&#8217;m a career-driven person and it was really hard to step back. I think there&#8217;s an anxiety and stress that drags me forward, whether it&#8217;s taking care of my son in the hospital and advocating for his needs or hitting a deadline at work. I thrive in that crisis mode. Giving myself free time was scary.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:09:27]\u00a0And I&#8217;m still panicking about it a little bit, like, did I completely derail my career? How am I ever going to recover from this? Oh, by the way, but also I want to be an amazing mom and present to both of my kids. It&#8217;s like there&#8217;s two versions of me that I want to be perfect at. So when I can&#8217;t do that, it feels bad.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:09:46]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. You alluded to, you&#8217;ve thrived on accomplishing things and achievement, tinged with a little bit of anxiety, probably for a long time. Do you enjoy relaxing? I think that answer tells me all I need to know. All right. Thank you. And Will&#8217;s over here shaking his head subtly. He&#8217;s like, &#8220;Mm-mm.&#8221; Will, tell the truth. The partner always knows best. Does she?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:10:16]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. No, relaxing for her is like, &#8220;Oh yeah, I went to the park with the kids.&#8221; But that&#8217;s not relaxing because she was like, &#8220;I checked off the box that we went outside today.&#8221; Kind of thing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:10:26]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. So when it comes to your finances today, I think, Anna, you described it as &#8220;survival mode&#8221;. Do you both agree that you are in survival mode when it comes to your finances, Will?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:10:39]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don&#8217;t think we&#8217;re in survival mode. I think we&#8217;re in a planned, negative cash flow.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:10:47]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think that he&#8217;s saying it in order to downplay the severity, but I think that the math will still show that if we keep going on this trajectory, it&#8217;s not great. I also think I wrote that we&#8217;re in survival mode because of the hospital.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:11:01]\u00a0There&#8217;s still like that element of us, and it&#8217;s this weird moment of waking up, like, &#8220;Okay, we actually might be able to count on things happening that we plan on happening in the next month.&#8221; Which is not how you can live when you have a child who&#8217;s in the hospital. So I think we&#8217;re still in that mindset in terms of our finances because I&#8217;m not back to full-time work.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:11:23]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How long did you go through complete uncertainty in your life?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:11:28]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I would argue that from April 23 onward, we are in a state of uncertainty. There are different degrees of that uncertainty. Some of them are in the ICU, everyone rushing in and all the beeps beeping and saying, &#8220;Is this bad? How bad is this?&#8221; That uncertainty. And then there are much lesser levels of uncertainty of like we&#8217;re at the chillest point we could possibly be. He still needs to have another open heart surgery at some point.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:11:56]\u00a0He could still develop heart failure in the next week. So I don&#8217;t know how to answer the question about how long we&#8217;re in uncertainty because I think there&#8217;s always a level of uncertainty that we as a family need to learn how to live with and hopefully for the rest of our lives, because that means that he&#8217;s still alive.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:12:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, that&#8217;s a fair answer. Your baseline for uncertainty will always be higher than another family&#8217;s.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:12:22]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Absolutely, yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:12:23]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And I think I&#8217;m hearing you say like, we have to accept that. Now the question is where is that floor? Will, would you agree with the way that she&#8217;s characterized where you are today?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:12:35]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No. I think this is one of our core issues when we approach not just money, just our lives in general, is she&#8217;s still operating in that survival mode. And to me, I think, yes, our baseline level of uncertainty has risen, but when we were in super high uncertainty, to me that ended when he was about a year old, and we&#8217;ve slowly been getting less and less uncertain.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:13:02]\u00a0And when I look at our finances, we&#8217;re not racking up debt. I still contribute to my 401(k). We still have a lot of money in savings, although we are spending more than we take in every month.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:13:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Anna, I see you nodding while Will is speaking. Do you agree with him?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:13:17]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I do agree. I&#8217;m saying my version of the truth, and then you are saying your version of the truth, both of which are true. The way that you are saying it, Will, is by taking down the intensity and removing the emotion.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:13:34]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Is the emotion the bad thing? Is that the toxin we need to cleanse from this situation?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:13:40]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0The emotion that comes into it when we have these discussions is always negative emotions. There&#8217;s never a positive emotion of where we&#8217;re going to go, what we&#8217;re aiming for. A lot of times it will be like I&#8217;ll try to talk about longer term plans and for Anna, it&#8217;s like, yeah, but we could be back in the hospital by that time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:14:00]\u00a0And so for me, I&#8217;ve taken emotions out of it because if I start bringing in those positive things, then it, I feel like I just get shot down. And so if I&#8217;m getting shot down, then it must not really matter what I&#8217;m aiming for, what my vision is for the long term. And so I think I just shut down. And my defense mechanism is to just look at the numbers at themselves and say, &#8220;We&#8217;re going to be fine.&#8221; And try to take the emotion out of it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:14:29]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Do you say, &#8220;We&#8217;re going to be fine.&#8221; to Anna?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:14:31]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:14:32]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. I going to ask, does that ever work? But I already know it never works. Anna, does it work?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:14:38]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:14:39]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No, it doesn&#8217;t work.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:14:41]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think if we sit down and look at our conscious spending plan or look at our account balances, I think in the moment, Anna I can see the numbers and agree I don&#8217;t think we have a disagreement on facts of the numbers, but how we interpret them and especially how we interpret them day to day, and how that emotion impacts us day to day, we&#8217;re in different places.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:15:04]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. I&#8217;d like to get it to a specific example. Can you think of a time recently where the two of you were not on the same page about money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:15:11]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0One of the areas that we have had a number of conversations about is with childcare. Our older son goes to preschool, and our plan is to have our younger son go to that preschool starting in the fall. And childcare is expensive.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:15:31]\u00a0And our biggest question is, does it make sense to spend that money for them to go to childcare when Anna is not working full-time? But asking that question, it&#8217;s very easy to say, no, it doesn&#8217;t make sense, so we should stop that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:15:45]\u00a0But if we look at the potential and where we&#8217;re trying to get in the future, she doesn&#8217;t just want to stay at home. She wants to do things with her time. She wants to grow the consulting business that she&#8217;s brought in. She wants to be involved in the charities that she&#8217;s involved in.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:16:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Who&#8217;s saying which position, just so I understand?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:16:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think that I&#8217;m more committed to pay for childcare. And I think Anna is very much torn by her identity as a mother versus her identity as a professional and also stressed about the money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:16:20]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Anna, let&#8217;s hear from you. What&#8217;s your take on this?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:16:22]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I get panicky when I look at the numbers, and the easiest thing to do is to say, &#8220;We got to pull them from childcare, and I need to just stay home with them.&#8221; Even though I have other aspirations. But in order to make the numbers work out, it seems as if that&#8217;s the answer. Whereas for Will, he&#8217;s saying like, &#8220;It&#8217;s not a question. We will continue to make our numbers look bad until we get our income up. Why are you still talking about this?&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:16:50]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And how do you respond when he says that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:16:52]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I guess I don&#8217;t believe him. He can tell it to me, and look at the numbers all you want. It still doesn&#8217;t feel right to me. I still feel like I am being pulled in so many different directions and I&#8217;m not making a decision. And feeling uncertain about the way I should be spending my time feels uncomfortable to me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:17:11]\u00a0If I commit to sending them to childcare, then I am missing out on time with them and potentially risking being in another stressful work environment that I might have to pull myself out of for medical reasons, all of that. And if I do the opposite and I keep them home for whatever reason, there&#8217;s millions of reasons why we might do it, not just for money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:17:36]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So you all have had this conversation for how long about going back to work?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:17:41]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s been nine months.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:17:42]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I like spending a lot of time on big decisions, but I don&#8217;t like being stuck. I like to make a little progress one way or another. Is this decision irreversible?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:17:54]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No, there are ways to solve the problem in either direction.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:17:58]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. So it&#8217;s a reversible decision. Can I just ask a really dumb question? What if you just flipped a coin and picked one and did it for a year? What would happen?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:18:08]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I would need some emotional support in sticking with the decision. Shutting down the thoughts of whether it&#8217;s right or wrong.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:18:17]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How much of this is the script like, &#8220;I&#8217;m a good mom if I\u00a0dot, dot, dot.&#8221;?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:18:22]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All of it is about tying it to my worth as a mom and a wife and all of that and a career person.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:18:29]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. And you&#8217;re deeply embedded in this decision, but as guys, there are things that we just can never understand about that messaging. It doesn&#8217;t exist for us. So there&#8217;s something you&#8217;re seeing almost like you have a different set of lenses that Will can try as hard as he wants, and it seems like he&#8217;s engaging, at least on the numbers, but ultimately this will be something that you will have to grapple with.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Narration]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:18:54]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Sometimes when people listen to this podcast, they look at the numbers and they&#8217;re shocked. Why do you feel like you don&#8217;t have enough? Why are you so worried? I would love to have that much money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:19:04]\u00a0What Anna and Will are experiencing is an identity shift. This can happen when you make more money than you ever thought,\u00a0when you lose a bunch of money,\u00a0or,\u00a0like in their case, when the world forces you to change your identity. They used to be purely these high achieving professionals.\u00a0That&#8217;s how they identify.\u00a0But now they have to identify as something else. And changing your identity is incredibly difficult.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:19:34]\u00a0Anna&#8217;s trying to be the present,\u00a0hands-on mom,\u00a0and the ambitious professional.\u00a0Will is adjusting to a totally different role than he ever expected. Until they accept these new identities, every financial decision is\u00a0going to\u00a0feel like it&#8217;s pulling at them, and they&#8217;re\u00a0going to\u00a0be confused. They&#8217;re\u00a0going to\u00a0be second guessing.\u00a0They&#8217;re\u00a0going to\u00a0be trying to make it through the way they used to do it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:19:57]\u00a0Coming up,\u00a0a raw, emotional revealing conversation. Stay tuned.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Interview]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:20:06]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Anna, how would you characterize your discussions about money with Will?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:20:10]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Our discussions about money can get derailed, I would say. We try to have a meeting every week about the week ahead. It&#8217;s hard to do big picture work because of the uncertainty of the numbers. And getting used to the privilege of right now being able to think big picture.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:20:30]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Because before you couldn&#8217;t.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:20:31]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. When you have a child who has so many needs, there is no big picture. There&#8217;s the next hour. And it was like that for months.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:20:41]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Can I tell you something? I can&#8217;t imagine what it was like to be in the situation that you were in when you got the news. I can&#8217;t imagine what it was like to be in the NICU and be in the hospital through one open heart surgery. I can&#8217;t imagine what it&#8217;s like to know that your son is doing better and he still has another surgery ahead of him.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:20:59]\u00a0But I can tell you one thing. I can tell you that if I were in your situation, I would not be able to look at the big picture. I would&#8217;ve done probably exactly what you did, which is focus on my son, pay attention to my other kid as much as I can, try to stay connected with the two of us, and just hold on by the seat of my pants and try to live another day. I just have a lot of empathy for you, Anna, and for the two of you, and there&#8217;s no shame around not being able to do what you would&#8217;ve done before you had your son.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:21:32]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Thank you for saying that. I think that we both have really high expectations for ourselves as individuals and as a family. And we look at the privileges we have and think that in our own little ways that we can be doing better. And for me, I think there&#8217;s a lot of pressure&#8211; we have a child who we didn&#8217;t know if he was going to be born alive and he&#8217;s here and he&#8217;s amazing in every way, and I want to give him the best life possible.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:22:04]\u00a0I don&#8217;t think his life is more worthwhile than other people&#8217;s, but the fact that he&#8217;s had to go through so much and still has to go through so much, we better do our job and be the best parents, have the best life, best schools, best house. Be really, really smart about the things we let in our life, and in his life to create this environment that will help him grow and thrive.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:22:30]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What would be the thing that could make your kids have the best parents they could?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:22:36]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think having parents who are confident in their decision making and aligned in their decision making and present as much as possible. That&#8217;s all they need. And we know that. We don&#8217;t do a great job of it because of stress and all of that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:22:54]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. Will, what do you think?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:22:56]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I totally agree with Anna&#8217;s vision. We want to provide them this amazing life. I often feel that, because I&#8217;m not in survival mode right now and Anna is still in survival mode, that her desire to be perfect and provide this perfect life is strangling our ability to actually do it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:23:20]\u00a0And she&#8217;s worried about every single minute being perfect, but that doesn&#8217;t give us the chance to plan and work towards making sure that the next month is perfect, the next year, the next 10 years are perfect. And it also sets a really high expectation that if something&#8217;s not perfect, that we failed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:23:42]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What do you think about that, Anna?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:23:43]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think that you nailed it. That&#8217;s correct.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:23:46]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Wow. I totally get the idea for wanting the best. I totally get it. Where is this freaking thing? I have this notepad I got somewhere in Italy. I freaking searched for six months to find this notepad. I went to Milan. I found it. It&#8217;s custom. It&#8217;s the best for me. I like that. I like that kind of thing, finding this artisan, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:24:09]\u00a0I also think sometimes it can become very destructive. It&#8217;s like, yeah, it&#8217;s good. I&#8217;m glad I can do this once in a while. I can get that thing I want. But also life isn&#8217;t about finding the perfect X all the time. Sometimes it&#8217;s actually about enjoying the mess.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:24:26]\u00a0Anna, you said, &#8220;I worry about everything. He worries about everything. We just don&#8217;t align on what to do with that worry.&#8221; Is that true? That&#8217;s a little surprising. Will, you sound very calm and cool on today&#8217;s call? Is it true you worry about everything?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:24:41]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I disagree that we both worry about everything. Our roles in the family are different. And so we worry about the things that are in our spheres, and it becomes difficult for us to communicate in a way where we can find alignment on what are the most important worries.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:24:58]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What the [Bleep]? I&#8217;m getting lost. Too much talk about worrying.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:25:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:25:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I got to get you guys out of this worry sinkhole. Freaking philosophizing about my frameworks of worrying, about worrying. No [Bleep] way. Enough of this. That&#8217;s why you guys came to me. And also, are you seeing a therapist?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:25:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We&#8217;re currently seeing a therapist, but in the context of our eldest son who&#8217;s having some emotional issues.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:25:21]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. It&#8217;s an interesting manifestation of focusing on your son, which I totally get. But also, what about the two of you? The two of you who, I would argue, might be the most important in this entire dynamic, is that relationship between the two of you. Not taking the time and effort to nurture that shows up downstream in your kids experiencing their best life. What do you think about that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:25:50]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0100%. I agree with that. And I think we need help on making time for each other and ourselves.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Narration]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:25:58]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I need your help to keep creating these conversations with people all over the world where you can listen in.\u00a0Do me a favor, hit Subscribe. That helps us grow our channel and find more people whose conversations we can share with you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:26:13]\u00a0Something happened that really surprised me. It wasn&#8217;t a huge argument. It wasn&#8217;t some dramatic blowup. It was a trip to Walmart.\u00a0Listen to how something as small as buying a laundry basket opened up a whole new view on their relationship dynamic.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Interview]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:26:38]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I primarily do most of the grocery shopping. I am constantly thinking about what you will think about what I&#8217;m buying, if it was too much or too little. I was at Walmart last week. We need an extra laundry basket. I was standing in the aisle and there&#8217;s one that&#8217;s $5 and there&#8217;s one that&#8217;s $6. And I didn&#8217;t think either of them was perfect, and I didn&#8217;t want to come home with one that was not perfect and have her make a judgment over what I bought. So I didn&#8217;t buy a 5 or a 6-dollar laundry basket because of her potential judgment.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:27:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Perfect kids, perfect house, perfect time in the park, perfect laundry basket. Is there a pattern?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:27:23]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I see the character that we are building right now, an anal type A mom who can&#8217;t sit down and has to micromanage everything and doesn&#8217;t trust anybody to do anything except her, and she&#8217;s burnt out because she doesn&#8217;t ask for help and doesn&#8217;t let other people help her.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:27:42]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, okay. Wow, that rolled off the tongue. Okay. Now is that accurate?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:27:48]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don&#8217;t think it&#8217;s accurate at all. I understand the fear that I might have an opinion about something, but he said, &#8220;I&#8217;m going to go to Walmart and I&#8217;m going to get a laundry basket.&#8221; I was like, &#8220;Cool.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:28:03]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:28:04]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don&#8217;t care about the laundry basket. You also need to know, Ramit, that this laundry basket is tied to his Notion document about how to change our laundry setup.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:28:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You are weaponizing the tropes of this podcast against me. You know that you will get Ramit on your side if you mention that we have a Notion to document, because that&#8217;s the easiest way to collaborate on something.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:28:26]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Can I pause things for a second? I don&#8217;t think the point of this podcast is to win Ramit over.\u00a0The point, and the reason I do this is to try to talk to couples about money. And when we talk about money, of course, we end up talking about who we are and what our Rich Life really is.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:28:46]\u00a0And always there&#8217;s a disparity between what we say our Rich Life is and what we are actually doing. And guess what? There&#8217;s nothing wrong with that. That&#8217;s being human. We all say we should call our mom more and go to the gym more and eat healthier, and we don&#8217;t. And for me, the primary fascination is why, and can I help nudge you slightly in a little bit of the right direction?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:29:09]\u00a0I have to say, I [Bleep] love how honest you both are. I love it. I don&#8217;t care if you&#8217;re talking about your laundry basket. The stakes seem so low, I agree. It&#8217;s so absurd. And yet it&#8217;s real. It&#8217;s not about the laundry basket. We all know that. But it&#8217;s an argument that compounds for 30 years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:29:28]\u00a0And in your case, there&#8217;s extra fuel behind it because you had something traumatic that happened to you. And I&#8217;m sure you know from other parents and families who have gone through something similar, there&#8217;s also the potential for it to become a wedge that sets you apart.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:29:42]\u00a0The reason that I want to talk about this laundry basket is it&#8217;s a microcosm of your finances. Can we do something here? Let&#8217;s flip it right now, and let&#8217;s come up with a new way of handling a purchase like the laundry basket.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:29:57]\u00a0Here are the ground rules. Let&#8217;s acknowledge that the laundry basket is so absurd that we&#8217;re actually going to play because the stakes are low. And now I want you to come up with a solution. If you could wave a magic wand and figure out a better way of handling the &#8220;laundry basket,&#8221; what would you do?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:30:13]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0A way we would handle the laundry basket and similar purchases is for me to say, &#8220;Hey, you love going to the store and buying stuff for the house and groceries, and all of those things, I do not like to do at all. And it&#8217;s awesome that you know how to do those things, so go for it. I don&#8217;t need to be involved. And even if I don&#8217;t like it, whatever my opinion is, is not a value judgment of you and your worth at all.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:30:38]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0But I don&#8217;t want to hear an opinion because an opinion is a judgment, to me. And so I either want you to engage with me in what I&#8217;m trying to do and work with me or just not even talk about it. Because it makes me very uncomfortable and makes me feel just not accepted.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Do you all think that&#8217;s a good solution? And do you think you could follow that solution?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0My only question is if you don&#8217;t want to hear an opinion, what if it&#8217;s a positive? I&#8217;m like, &#8220;This is awesome. Thanks for doing this.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:11]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That would be great.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:12]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:13]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And maybe sometimes you should just say that even if you don&#8217;t think it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:16]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Do y&#8217;all lie to your kids?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:19]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:20]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No?\u00a0What the\u00a0[Bleep]?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:21]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes,\u00a0we do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:22]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I\u00a0love lying to\u00a0kids.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:24]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0[Inaudible] define\u00a0lie.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right, hold on. We need to talk about this. Indians love to lie to kids.\u00a0They\u00a0[Bleep]\u00a0love it. They&#8217;ll tell\u00a0them\u00a0like, if you don&#8217;t stop crying, I&#8217;m\u00a0going to\u00a0put you in the back of the car and take you to the police station. They&#8217;ll put you in jail. They actually take\u00a0them\u00a0in the car sometimes.\u00a0They literally will start driving and the kids are like&#8211;\u00a0and then those kids\u00a0[Bleep]\u00a0dominate spelling bees later in life.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:31:45]\u00a0How does it happen? You\u00a0got to\u00a0lie to these kids. I know all these white people are\u00a0going to\u00a0be listening to this podcast. Ramit\u00a0Sethi,\u00a0so unethical.\u00a0Doesn&#8217;t know anything about parenting. Just keep it to yourself.\u00a0Sometimes it&#8217;s cool to lie to each other.\u00a0Why\u00a0not? I love your hair. I love that pink laundry basket. Who gives a\u00a0[Bleep]? What does it cost you? What do you guys think?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:32:11]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:32:13]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, both agreeing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:32:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Totally. I agree.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:32:15]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. Usually when people finish this podcast, I give them a challenge about do this, do that. Today&#8217;s challenges lie to each other in a positive way.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:32:24]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:32:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That&#8217;s it. And you go, &#8220;Wait a minute. That actually really helped.&#8221; And then guess what? Over time, by doing the action that you want, you might actually come to find that you actually feel good doing it. And best of all, it might actually come true. I do love that purchase you made, something I never would&#8217;ve even thought of, and it actually tastes so good or helps our family. Amazing. Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Narration]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:32:47]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How fascinating is this moment of choosing a laundry basket.\u00a0It really reveals something deeper.\u00a0Will&#8217;s hesitation isn&#8217;t about $5 versus $6. It&#8217;s a fear of judgment from Anna whose approval matters deeply to him. It&#8217;s not about household purchases.\u00a0It&#8217;s more about trust between the two.\u00a0And until they trust each other&#8217;s intentions, even these tiny little decisions feel almost existential.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:33:17]\u00a0But you can tell they&#8217;re starting to see it. They&#8217;re showing up, they&#8217;re laughing together. They&#8217;re being honest with each other. They&#8217;re willing to experiment. That is progress. And I\u00a0want to\u00a0say something to some of the commenters. Oh, break up. You should run. I see this\u00a0[Bleep]\u00a0all the time in my comments. Do you understand how difficult it is to come\u00a0on a show like this and share some of these intimate moments?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:33:42]\u00a0I am not looking for people to go from A to Z in one conversation with me. I&#8217;m looking for them to go from A to B. A to B is huge. Just going A to B means that you realize, oh, there&#8217;s a problem here.\u00a0Oh, I can do better.\u00a0Oh,\u00a0I want us to do better and I&#8217;m willing to try just one little thing.\u00a0So please understand the courage that my guests show when they come on here,\u00a0recognize issues,\u00a0and then start to make small steps.\u00a0Small steps turn into big ones.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:34:16]\u00a0Now, speaking of small steps, we are going to look at their conscious spending plan.\u00a0And trust me,\u00a0the advice I give them is not what you&#8217;re expecting.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Interview]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:34:26]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Let&#8217;s see.\u00a0Will, can you read off the word in bold and the number in full next to it for this entire box?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:34:33]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Assets, $654,004.\u00a0Investments, $366,825. Savings, $188,884. Debt, $495,000.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:34:48]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Total net worth?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:34:50]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0$714,713.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:34:53]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What do y&#8217;all think of those numbers?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:34:55]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Good. Could be better.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:34:57]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Anna?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:34:58]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I agree. Not bad. Could be better.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:35:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. All right, that&#8217;s fair. Let&#8217;s continue here.\u00a0Anna, read your gross combined monthly income, please.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:35:09]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Gross combined monthly income is $15,566.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:35:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, cool. So that&#8217;s $186,000.\u00a0Did y&#8217;all know that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:35:20]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Kind of, but Anna&#8217;s income is new.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:35:23]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0From this month, you made $2,983. Let&#8217;s just round up to 3,000. That&#8217;s an extra $36,000 a year gross if you just continue. That&#8217;s quite amazing. What do you think about that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:35:35]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think it&#8217;s amazing too. I am very focused on getting the next contract and making that 70,000.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:35:42]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I know. You are looking at it from what you used to earn, and I&#8217;m looking at it from somebody who, as of recently, earned zero, and you&#8217;ve now added $36,000 while being a mom of two, one child having serious health conditions. To me, amazing. But it&#8217;s a great example of how we can all look at the same numbers and all see something completely different. Okay, let&#8217;s continue going on here.\u00a0Your fixed cost percentage. What is that number,\u00a0Anna?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:36:13]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Fixed costs are 84%.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:36:15]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What do you think of that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:36:16]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Bad. Too high.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:36:19]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It is high. I agree. Let&#8217;s keep going down.\u00a0Your investments are at zero, although I know you&#8217;re doing some pretax investment. How much are you investing,\u00a0Will,\u00a0in your\u00a0401(k)?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:36:28]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s\u00a0$1,000\u00a0a month in a\u00a0401(k)\u00a0and then another, I think,\u00a0750 in HSA.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:36:37]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. Cool. So 20,000 bucks or so per year. Fine.\u00a0And then your savings are at zero. You&#8217;re saving 0%. Although I\u00a0want to\u00a0point out you have $188,000 in savings.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:36:50]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah,\u00a0yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:36:52]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What&#8217;s that reaction?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:36:53]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0My parents were very savvy with their money,\u00a0and they have a lot of extra money as they&#8217;re approaching retirement,\u00a0and they want to use it to help us make their grandkids have a great life.\u00a0And so they had some insurance product that was in my name that was just sitting in cash,\u00a0and we finally just ended up transferring it to us so that we can use it for our kids.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:37:18]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How much?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:37:18]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0This was 55,000.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:37:20]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Do you feel like you have to apologize for your parents giving you this?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:37:24]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Five years ago, just before we had our first child, we were both working where our careers were really heading in a really awesome trajectory. And now I feel like it&#8217;s the opposite and I&#8217;m back being a child again and they&#8217;re providing money. And they want to give it because they love their grandchildren. And we&#8217;re both only children. And so our kids have four grandparents who only care about them, and that&#8217;s amazing. And so it&#8217;s just taking a little bit for me to adjust to that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:37:58]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. Your identity has to shift.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:38:00]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:38:00]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Just as Anna&#8217;s identity, yours has had to shift, and it is [Bleep] hard.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:38:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:38:06]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s the hardest thing there is. Anna, in your case, from being high-achieving employee, to still being high achieving and being mom who stayed at home for a while, that identity, incredibly difficult. Will, also high earner who was planning to take care of his parents, and now his parents are &#8220;taking care of him or giving $55,000-dollar gift.&#8221; Can I ask you guys a question? One day, do you want to hand some money to your kids?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:38:34]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:38:35]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Every single person I talk to, &#8220;I want to create generational wealth. I want my kids to do better than I did.&#8221; And then the minute they actually receive something from their parents, they&#8217;re like, &#8220;Haha, this is so uncomfortable. I&#8217;m stricken with anxiety.&#8221; Does anybody not see how ridiculous this is? It&#8217;s a whole thing. And yet we turn around and want to do the same thing to our kids.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:38:53]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0In the past few weeks, since they gave us this money, I&#8217;ve been thinking about that. And I was thinking about the same thing, like, oh, well, I would do that for our kids. But like you said, it&#8217;s like my identity as this independent person who&#8217;s making it for himself is at odds with getting this gift. And I&#8217;m only now really willing to grapple with that and integrate that into my current identity and make that okay and not feel shame about all of this.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:39:24]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Honestly, I love this journey that you&#8217;re both going on. It is the journey of, yes, finances, but fundamentally is a journey of your identities individually and together. The fact is you&#8217;re both individually successful. Financially speaking, you have been successful together, but I know just from the stories you&#8217;ve told me about your life that you didn&#8217;t do it alone.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:39:48]\u00a0You had parents. You had a social infrastructure around you. Probably went to pretty good schools. These are all things you cannot do yourself. We may be successful individually, but we are embedded in a society. What&#8217;s wrong with that? What&#8217;s wrong with saying like, &#8220;Yeah, I [Bleep] work hard, and I feel proud of what I&#8217;ve accomplished, and I get help.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:40:08]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:40:09]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All of those can be integrated. I know it&#8217;s easier said than done.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:40:13]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:40:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0There&#8217;s a huge stigma in America about accepting money from your parents. Although ironically, every parent wants to give it to their kids. I&#8217;m on a quest to get rid of that. Let&#8217;s be open about it. Shine a light on it. The only shame that should be felt here is why did your parents buy a [Bleep] insurance product? That&#8217;s the real problem. And truthfully, it&#8217;s better you all have this money now when you actually need it than 40 years from now. What are you going to spend it on then?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:40:39]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That&#8217;s exactly what my mom says.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:40:40]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Your parents are very wise. That&#8217;s actually quite progressive. These days, wealthy people, they&#8217;re smarter about distributing their money. They don&#8217;t wait till they die. They know their kids need it in their 30s and 40s. It&#8217;s much more valuable, especially in your situation. So if anything, Will, I hear you. I simply would work hard on rewriting that script, and it sounds like you have. Okay?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:41:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:41:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right, let&#8217;s keep going down the list.\u00a0Guilt-free spending says 16% or 1,500 bucks a month. Is this accurate?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:41:10]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That only may be accurate going forward. Until this month, when Anna got paid for this first tranche of her freelance&#8211;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:41:20]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It was whatever&#8217;s in Will&#8217;s column.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:41:22]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. And that&#8217;s why all the expenses are in my column, because up until this month, my paycheck was going into our joint account and covering everything.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:41:31]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. Fine. You guys are disciplined. I believe you. A lot of times I don&#8217;t believe people when they show me their guilt-free spending. I&#8217;m like, &#8220;This is [Bleep]. There&#8217;s no way you&#8217;re only spending this.&#8221; But I love that you were responsive.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:41:42]\u00a0Meaning, when we had one income and we really had to buckle down, we cut from where we are supposed to cut from, guilt-free spending, and you spent effectively nothing. It&#8217;s good to see it here. I&#8217;m going to go out on a limb and say, I don&#8217;t think you&#8217;ve spent $1,500 this month on guilt-free spending. True?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:41:58]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Absolutely true. We have not.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Exactly. Y&#8217;all very good at intellectually putting it on the CSP, but you haven&#8217;t gone out to a nice dinner, huh?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:07]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:08]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Is there a world where the two of you would go out to dinner?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:11]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We want there to be, yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:13]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0In the next two weeks, what if I challenged you to go out to dinner, the two of you? Would you both want to?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:20]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:22]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:22]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Who&#8217;s going to plan it?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:24]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I want Anna to plan it because if I plan it, I&#8217;ll get stressed about if it&#8217;s the right restaurant or not.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:29]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I&#8217;m so glad you said that because I was so hopeful that you would say that you would plan it, because I plan everything else in our life. So it would be really meaningful to me if you planned it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:38]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:40]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. First of all, that was awesome. I love both of you advocating for yourself. Amazing. And do you all see the similarity between the laundry basket and the restaurant choice? It&#8217;s the same thing. So Will, it sounds like you agreed to choose the restaurant. Anna, what is your commitment?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:42:56]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I will be happy. Because he would get something that he likes, and I would enjoy that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:43:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I love that. All right. Cool. What I&#8217;m really going for here, it is responding to the changes in your life. Anna, you are now earning $3,000 a month, which is awesome. And should you save and should we talk about your fixed costs? Of course, yes. We&#8217;ll do that. But also can we step back from survival mode and adjust? We can adjust one degree at a time. That&#8217;s okay. It&#8217;s totally up to the two of you how you want to adjust. But let&#8217;s adjust.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:43:33]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:43:33]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, let&#8217;s go back to the CSP. I want to talk about the fixed costs. We&#8217;re at 84% here.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:43:40]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:43:40]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Take a look at what&#8217;s going on.\u00a0You have a mortgage for 3,700 bucks. The mortgage was more reasonable when you had two incomes, and now that it&#8217;s one income, it has become proportionally much higher. Is that right?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:43:52]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:43:52]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So honestly,\u00a0it&#8217;s not the house.\u00a0It&#8217;s childcare.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:43:56]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:43:57]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Childcare is incredibly expensive. It&#8217;s 2,500 bucks. I&#8217;m going to assume that you&#8217;ve looked around and this is the best option for the two of you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:44:07]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:44:07]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, fine. So we have to have this cost in here. Let&#8217;s keep it. We&#8217;ll work the rest around it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:44:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. And the gift from my parents, we&#8217;ll just use that to pay for childcare for the next year. And that eliminates that for this year.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:44:22]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s roughly $30,000 a year. And your parents gave you 55,000. All right. Anna, any comments on that? It looked like you wanted to say something.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:44:32]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I&#8217;m not super convinced that&#8217;s the best use of a lump of cash. I actually wonder if it would be better if we invested a decent amount of it and just kept being tight each month, so that we could make up for some lost 401(k) investment time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:44:48]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Is there an optimizer in the room here? Someone who&#8217;s going, &#8220;Hey, we have two kids, one of whom has a serious heart condition. We need to invest all this [Bleep] money in our 30s, even though we&#8217;ve already invested $366,000.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:45:02]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:45:03]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Anna, how do you know you&#8217;re behind? I know you are &#8220;behind&#8221; compared to what you used to make, but are you behind?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:45:10]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0If I compare our net worth to other people with our similar backgrounds, we are behind.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:45:19]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh. Who would those people be? Can you just tell me the name of their kid who has a congenital heart condition? Can you tell me that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:45:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No, that&#8217;s not what I&#8217;m talking about. I&#8217;m talking about people that we went to school with and grew up in the same upper middle class.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:45:33]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s really funny because we all hear about comparing ourselves to the Joneses and we&#8217;re like, &#8220;That&#8217;s so stupid. I would never&#8211;&#8221; And then we all do exactly that. It&#8217;s a saying for a reason. We can&#8217;t help ourselves. We are social animals. We compare ourselves to others. I get that. I&#8217;m not going to tell you to stop comparing yourself because it&#8217;s pointless.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:45:50]\u00a0You&#8217;re still going to, no matter what I say. But I will add a layer on which is comparing where we are today to the Rich Life that we want to lead today and tomorrow. A Rich Life could be taking your kids to the park and playing with them. Whether it&#8217;s checking the box off or not, you&#8217;re outside. You&#8217;re playing with the kids. Is that part of a Rich Life for you, Anna?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:46:12]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes, it&#8217;s a small part of the Rich Life for me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:46:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Great. Give me the bigger part. What is it for you today?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:46:17]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0My wish life today is feeling excited about living each day and feeling secure in our decisions, feeling aligned as a couple and confident as parents. And it would also include more frequent self-care stuff, like manicures and hair stuff and time with girlfriends, time to invest in my non-profit work and engaging in the heart community, sustaining connections there. I still think I&#8217;m getting off track. I don&#8217;t know. I&#8217;ve been so focused on Rich Life of the future that it&#8217;s hard for me to do it for now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:46:58]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, that&#8217;s a really good insight. Articulating what your Rich Life is doesn&#8217;t happen perfectly the first time. It&#8217;s like asking a kid to draw something. They suck. They don&#8217;t have any skills. They don&#8217;t know how to do it. But that&#8217;s not the point. The point is they just put a pencil to paper and they&#8217;re trying it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:47:13]\u00a0Truthfully, I don&#8217;t know any parent who would be able to do all of the things you said. It&#8217;s awesome. I don&#8217;t mind getting it all out on paper. Let&#8217;s do it one more time, and this time I&#8217;m going to give you a little constraint. I think constraints help you. Three things, just three, that would be part of your Rich Life today. One of them has to include your kids. One of them has to include Will, and the third one is totally up to you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:47:40]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Going on a walk with me and just the kids, or playing outside with them. With Will, it would be that after bedtime is done, we have a few minutes sitting together and talking without all of the noise of life and social media and the Internet and the news and all that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:48:04]\u00a0And then time for myself would be extra time in the morning to get ready instead of just throwing clothes on. So I actually feel good about what I&#8217;m wearing and what my hair and face look like no matter what is happening that day.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:48:19]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How did it feel to say those three things?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:48:21]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It felt good to say those three things. It also feels vulnerable to be like, oh, you don&#8217;t get ready every day.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:48:28]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I love that. I think a lot of people, parents listening to this, are like, &#8220;That&#8217;s me every day.&#8221; And I do think it was incredibly courageous of you to say, I want to have some time in the morning for myself, regardless of what I&#8217;m doing that day. That&#8217;s [Bleep] awesome. That doesn&#8217;t seem outrageous to me. You&#8217;re not asking to fly on some private jet all the&#8211; it&#8217;s like, yes, let&#8217;s figure out a way to make that happen. Okay, great. Will, how did it feel to hear Anna say those things?\u00a0Does that not make you excited?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:48:59]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, it does, because she doesn&#8217;t put herself first, and I want to support her and do that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:49:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Love it. Some of this is wanting the best for yourself and your partner. Part of it is recharacterizing what best means. Best doesn&#8217;t always mean the most expensive. Best doesn&#8217;t always mean the highest achieving. Sometimes best is just a thing that fits you in your stage of life the best. Anyway, these are things that a good therapist can help you work through, and I would encourage you to do it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:49:28]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I agree.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:49:30]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, I agree too. That feels correct and good.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:49:33]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Love it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Narration]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:49:33]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0For the vast majority of couples who are spending more than they make every month, they&#8217;re in a\u00a0huge, huge red flag position. But once in a while, I will meet a couple who is spending more than they make on a given month or even for months at a time,\u00a0and I say,\u00a0&#8220;Keep doing it.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:49:51]\u00a0Why would I, Ramit\u00a0Sethi,\u00a0say that? Well, because sometimes they have saved enough that they can afford to do that for a while. Sometimes they&#8217;re in an extraordinary situation where they absolutely have to do that and they can fix things later.\u00a0That&#8217;s what&#8217;s going on right now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:50:09]\u00a0They planned, and this advice works for them because they built up a sizable reserve fund. They actually didn&#8217;t even realize how well they planned for it. My job is to help them see that and to act accordingly.\u00a0I&#8217;m reminded of what happened\u00a0during COVID\u00a0when a number of people had major, major emergency funds, and they would write me saying,\u00a0&#8220;Should I use my emergency fund?\u00a0I&#8217;m really nervous?&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:50:33]\u00a0I&#8217;m like,\u00a0&#8220;What the\u00a0[Bleep]? People are literally dying. This is the time to use your emergency fund. Stay home from work or get your parents medical care or safety.&#8221;\u00a0Emergency funds are meant to be used in an emergency.\u00a0Now,\u00a0the bigger question here is not just about numbers.\u00a0It&#8217;s about really defining what&#8217;s enough.\u00a0I can tell they&#8217;re\u00a0going to\u00a0earn more money,\u00a0and it is my job to help them zoom out and see the big picture<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:00]\u00a0After the break,\u00a0we&#8217;re\u00a0going to\u00a0dive into the question of enough. We have more to talk about.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Interview]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:08]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Have you calculated how much money you&#8217;re going to have at retirement, Anna?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:12]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:13]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How much?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:14]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don&#8217;t remember, but I think that the calculation is around 5.6 million.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:21]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Will is furiously shaking his head no. Will, what number do you know?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think it&#8217;s about 3.4, I think the number that Anna&#8217;s quoting is before our income changed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:31]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I&#8217;m actually pleasantly surprised that you have run the numbers. A lot of times when I talk to people who are worrying constantly, they don&#8217;t even run the numbers. Okay, great. Let&#8217;s just look at the CSP again because we got to nail these numbers.\u00a0You have $188,000 in savings,\u00a0which,\u00a0by the way,\u00a0is well over a year. The rest of your fixed costs are quite nominal. I just\u00a0want to\u00a0point out your groceries are at less than 800 bucks.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:56]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:51:57]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Your subscriptions are $31. There&#8217;s nothing else you&#8217;re spending on except your mortgage and your childcare.\u00a0Those are the two primary things. Your investments, even though it says zero, you are investing about 18,000 or so ballpark.\u00a0And your savings are at zero, which I understand.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:15]\u00a0And then you do have 1,500 bucks a month leftover for guilt-free spending, which is 16%. Of course, that&#8217;s new. You&#8217;re not spending it yet, but we know that you&#8217;re\u00a0going to\u00a0try to go and do a date night.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:26]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We got to understand if you have enough or not, first off. So you currently have $366,000. We&#8217;re going to plug it into the calculator. How many years?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:35]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Like 30 something.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:38]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Well, you are 37.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:41]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So 28 years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:43]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:43]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0At least, yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:44]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. Let&#8217;s just say that. And then you&#8217;re adding $18,000 a year for now. What&#8217;s that number right there?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:50]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a03.89 million.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:52]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a03.8 million. What do y&#8217;all think about that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:55]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s a lot of money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:57]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s low.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:52:57]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Whoa. Will says that&#8217;s a lot of money. Anna goes, way too little. All right. How much is enough?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:53:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We need in the five to six range to have comfortable annual withdrawals.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:53:10]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Will, you agree or no?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:53:12]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It is a lot of money. But I agree that if we wanted to maintain our current spending levels, it&#8217;s not enough.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:53:20]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You&#8217;re not going to have childcare forever. Your house is going to theoretically be paid off. Isn&#8217;t that almost all of your fixed costs?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:53:28]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:53:29]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:53:30]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Listen, high earners don&#8217;t want to compromise. I wouldn&#8217;t in your position either. I&#8217;m like, &#8220;I&#8217;m not trying to live on $130,000 when I&#8217;m [inaudible].&#8221; [Bleep] that. I want options. However, high achievers can also only live for the future and not live for today. So I&#8217;m going to pose a hypothetical to you. What if you took that $18,000 a year that you&#8217;re currently investing and you actually just spent it for your family?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:53:55]\u00a0Let&#8217;s look. Right now it&#8217;s 3.8 million. That&#8217;s with $18,000 a year. If we drop the $18,000 off, the number drops to 2.4 million. I agree, that&#8217;s a big drop. Not sustainable. So let&#8217;s do this. Let&#8217;s say that for one year, in this hypothetical, you did not contribute the 18,000. You&#8217;d have 3.6 million instead of 3.8 million. What do you take away from that, Anna?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:54:23]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don&#8217;t think it&#8217;s significant.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:54:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. The money compounds, of course. We all know that at the end. 18,000 in a year turns into relatively lot, 25, 30 years from now. But also sometimes, especially with young parents, that money is more valuable now, way more valuable. And what if that 18,000 could be used to fix some deck issue that you&#8217;ve all been arguing about for two years? What if?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:54:48]\u00a0Wow, a lot of smiles around the room. Suddenly everybody wants to dip into their 401k. Hey, [Bleep] a 401(k). Fix this deck. What about the idea of taking the money in your savings account and investing it because we&#8217;re losing money right now? You all want to do that? Oh, they&#8217;re both nodding. Yes. Yes, we want to do it. All right. Fine. So what do we want to do here?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:55:12]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We need about 50k for a six-month emergency fund. We have to have that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:55:16]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. So you have $155,000 in savings. You told me that 50k you need for an emergency fund. So let&#8217;s just take 55 out. Put that aside. You have 100k left. Your childcare costs are $3,000 a month or 36,000 a year. Out of a 100k, how much do you want to invest?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:55:36]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So let&#8217;s say 50,000.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:55:38]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, so 50,000, meaning you would have a little bit over a year&#8217;s worth of childcare costs in your savings. All right. Fine. So instead of 366, we&#8217;re going to do $416,000, what you&#8217;re starting with. And what is that number you see at the bottom?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:55:55]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a04.2 million.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:55:56]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Instead of 3.8, it&#8217;s 4.2. What do you make of that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:56:01]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Not as big of a change as I would think.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:56:04]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:56:04]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:56:04]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Because it&#8217;s like 50,000 turns into 400,000 over that many years. That&#8217;s less than I would&#8217;ve imagined.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:56:12]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0There&#8217;s two things I want to point out that I take away from this. First off, one-time investments, of course, they compound, but what really moves the needle is consistent investing over a long period of time. That&#8217;s the first.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:56:25]\u00a0The second is, honestly, to make an extra $400,000 when I&#8217;m 60-something years old, I&#8217;d rather have that money in my savings account at this high intensity time as young parents with a lot of uncertainty in my family. What do you guys think of that? That&#8217;s my approach, but I don&#8217;t feel the need to optimize everything. Sometimes I want to have a little extra cash just to know that I can weather the storm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:56:50]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:56:51]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I agree with what you&#8217;re saying. Having extra in savings now means it covers if I don&#8217;t renew a contract, if he loses his job.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:57:00]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That and? What happens next year with childcare?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:57:04]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:57:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Right now, at least you have the breathing space. Why put yourself in a position where in December you both are scrambling. You&#8217;re like, &#8220;[Bleep]. We have no money left. No cash cashflow.&#8221; Because of a decision you made several months ago. Why not give yourself a little bit of runway, and the tradeoff is you&#8217;re losing $50,000 compounded over 30 years?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:57:26]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:57:27]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0But we&#8217;re behind on retirement. I need to see that retirement number getting into the 6-million-dollar range. It&#8217;s very hard for me to accept what you&#8217;re saying without a way to get there.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:57:38]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, fine. I&#8217;m with you. Again, and I love the honesty. This is so good. Anna&#8217;s like, &#8220;Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, whatever. But get me to six. We can do it.&#8221; What I&#8217;m saying is the approach to a Rich Life is not always going all in. I don&#8217;t want for the two of you to go all in on everything. I want you to be selective.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:58:01]\u00a0So we know that you could take one year of 401(k) funds and use it for something if you want it. You don&#8217;t have to, but it&#8217;s in your toolbox now. We know that you could theoretically take $50,000 from savings and invest it, but at least from my perspective, I wouldn&#8217;t do it because it&#8217;s very risky, and I would rather have the money sitting in a savings account knowing that I&#8217;m going to need it next year.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Narration]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:58:31]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Most people listening are not in Anna and Will&#8217;s exact situation, but we have the ability to interpret and adapt it for our own lives. In fact, what&#8217;s happening is actually extremely relevant to what&#8217;s happening right now in America.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:58:45]\u00a0This episode was recorded before Trump&#8217;s new rounds of tariffs sent the market spinning again.\u00a0But\u00a0even with all that major tumultuous moves in the market, my advice here does not change. Have money in your savings account. Keep investing,\u00a0yes,\u00a0but make\u00a0sure you have a large emergency fund.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:59:05]\u00a0I&#8217;m currently recommending 12 months of an emergency fund. The only other time I recommended that large of a reserve was during COVID, which I hope suggests to you how seriously I take the situation.\u00a0Build that emergency fund up. If you can&#8217;t get to 12 months right away, very few can,\u00a0start aiming for three, then six.\u00a0But build your emergency fund up.\u00a0If you need it,\u00a0you will be glad you have it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:59:29]\u00a0Now let&#8217;s get back to Anna and will.\u00a0Listen as I show Anna how,\u00a0despite her reduced income, she can still help them hit their retirement goals.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Interview]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:59:37]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. So what else can you do? Well, you could earn more money. Shall we talk about that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:59:41]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:59:42]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. You have this consulting business that you recently started. How much did you earn from it last month?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[00:59:49]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0This is my first time ever doing anything as a non full-time employee, so it&#8217;s brand new. I&#8217;ve signed on for a project with a client, and I&#8217;m earning $35,600 or something like that, over five months.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:00:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Hold on. What the [Bleep]? Are we all getting lost in the details that you just earned a 35,000-dollar project? Is that what I heard?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:00:12]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Correct.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:00:13]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. What the [Bleep]? Round of applause. Does anyone else think like big pat on the back time? This is [Bleep] cool.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:00:20]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes. Actually, I&#8217;m really glad you&#8217;re saying that because yesterday I saw the marketing for my project on the client&#8217;s website, and I sent a text to Will, and I was like, &#8220;I&#8217;m really proud of myself that I did this.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:00:31]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0[Bleep] yeah. I love that. Okay, great job. Amazing. We teach this in our Earn 1K program, is like how to take the skills you already have and earn money on the side. People often start off making an extra $1,000 a month, and then if they want, they can turn it up to 2, 5, 10,000, or more. You got a $35,000 project, which is incredible. Do you think you will continue doing this and maybe start earning more with this freelance business?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:01:02]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That&#8217;s a great question. I want to. My hope is that the client will sign on for a second project this year. The leap is, how do I get another client? Ultimately, in these good times with our family, I&#8217;m scaling up. I am exceeding the salary I was making as a full time. And then I can say no to things if I need to.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:01:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You want some help?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:01:26]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:01:27]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. I&#8217;ll send you my Earn 1K program. I&#8217;ll give you access to it. Take your idea that you&#8217;ve already seen the marketplace wants. We&#8217;ll help you slice and dice it so you can understand why it worked, where to find other people like this client, how to charge, how to scale it, and then how to turn it into something where you control how much money you make. Okay?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:01:53]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Awesome.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:01:53]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Let&#8217;s plug in some numbers just to see how it might affect the finances. Let&#8217;s say, Anna, that you&#8217;re able to make&#8211; let&#8217;s be conservative here. How much are you going to be able to make per month?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What I currently have listed, which is, what, about three grand. You could double that, and I think that would be conservative.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:12]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, six grand per month.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:15]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:15]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Love it. Okay. How much would we be able to invest of that money? Let&#8217;s remember things like taxes, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:21]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0At least 1,000 of it, if not 1,500.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:25]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think that&#8217;s right. Let&#8217;s say 1,000. So we got $30,000 a year. 18 of Will plus 12 of yours, that&#8217;s $30,000 a year. Shall we take a look at how it changes the numbers? What&#8217;s that number down there?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:40]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a04.8.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:41]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You just went up a million dollars, just with $1,000. That&#8217;s pretty good. What do y&#8217;all think?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:48]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:48]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:49]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s really good.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:49]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s awesome.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:50]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I actually think, by the way, 4.8 is pretty freaking good. Have you all calculated what the 4% on that is?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:57]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:02:57]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No, of course not. It&#8217;s $195,000 a year.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:02]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:03]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:03]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s way higher than I thought.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, wow. All this worrying. Never ran three calculations. Tell me, Anna, what&#8217;s going through your head right now?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:11]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don&#8217;t know. I still thought we were in that 150 range. Getting close to 200 feels really good.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:17]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It&#8217;s pretty cool. Will, what about you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:19]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I&#8217;m really surprised, in a good way.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:23]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. You know what I love about the two of you is you are thinking about these things and you have a lot of time. And what that means is that little perturbations, they don&#8217;t knock you, off course. They allow you to course correct gradually. And so we&#8217;re not doing this, &#8220;We&#8217;re 58 years old. Oh my God, we didn&#8217;t retire. Ah.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:44]\u00a0It&#8217;s like, okay, we are strong. Nothing is going to knock us off course. We might go a little left. We might go a little right. But as long as we are doing this together, we&#8217;re going to get where we want to go.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:03:56]\u00a0The other thing is you two experience something that almost nobody else has experienced, and you&#8217;re still, financially speaking, on a great track. Yes, you are spending 84% on fixed costs. Yes. But I looked at it. It&#8217;s not like you&#8217;re going out to dinner every night. No. It&#8217;s house and childcare. That&#8217;s going to be for a while. You have the money in savings. You know what I always say? Strawberries are meant to be eaten.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:04:25]\u00a0When I was a kid, we hardly ever got strawberries. And when we got them, I would try to keep them for as long as possible. Then they go rotten. It&#8217;s like strawberries are meant to be eaten. Your savings are meant to be used. Money is meant to be spent on a Rich Life. Yes, have your emergency fund.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:04:39]\u00a0You have that though. But what about things like childcare? The final thing that I observe here is part of accepting your Rich Life and thriving in it is accepting that you&#8217;re not comparing yourselves to where you were as too high earners with no kids. That&#8217;s a past chapter. And that&#8217;s okay. You both had kids. If you compare yourself to where you were back then, you will forever be behind.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:05:05]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:05:06]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0But gosh, when I hear your story, I don&#8217;t hear two people who are behind. I hear two parents who have had something traumatic and incredible happen to them, and the two of you have had to develop an entire new language and skillset and set of experiences that nobody else can. And I&#8217;m like, &#8220;You&#8217;re not behind.&#8221; [Bleep]. You know things that none of us can ever know. So if anything, it makes me appreciate the two of you more and see the possibility in your numbers rather than being behind.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:05:34]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, it&#8217;s a big mindset shift for me. I didn&#8217;t realize how often I am comparing my current self to my past self. Even though our experiences with our son and heart disease and all of that, I don&#8217;t view it as a setback, I think that in that constant calculating in my brain of comparing my old contributions to my current contributions, I am viewing it as a setback. So I need to stop counting the numbers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:06:02]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I love that. That&#8217;s a great realization. Will, how about you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:06:06]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I worked really hard to not compare where we are now with where we could have been. But because I&#8217;ve been able to do that, I&#8217;ve put up a wall. And because Anna&#8217;s still doing that, I haven&#8217;t been supportive enough, and we haven&#8217;t been in the same place mentally together. And that has been pushing us apart. I&#8217;m really motivated to bring down that wall and bring her inside my wall with me where we can work together instead of feeling like combatants or opponents on these decisions.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:06:38]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes. Wow. Big realizations all around. Some final thoughts here. For you, Anna, definitely do the Earn 1K program. Your income will go up. You&#8217;ve already accomplished something amazing. A $35,000 contract, that is validation that the market wants what you have to offer.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:06:56]\u00a0If you do a couple of more projects like that, you&#8217;re going to build a lot of confidence, and secondly, you can always decide, do I want a full-time job? Am I enjoying this income on the side? What fits in with my vision of a Rich Life and our vision of our family? It&#8217;s up to you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:07:14]\u00a0For the two of you, I would encourage you to find time for each other. Whether it be date night, highly encouraged. Couples therapy, highly encouraged. But finding time where you have to carve it out and make it part of a family structure. Create that culture. And I think that the two of you, it&#8217;s really important. You want your kids to have a great experience? They need to see their parents having a great experience.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:07:36]\u00a0And final thing is what you&#8217;ve gone through, no one else can tell you what it&#8217;s like to go through that. I certainly can&#8217;t. But I can tell you what I see as a third party. I see a ton of love, and I see that you two have handled it in ways that I don&#8217;t think I could&#8217;ve.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:07:52]\u00a0And sometimes taking a second and appreciating how far you&#8217;ve come, looking at old memories, whether they be positive or hard to see, and just saying like, &#8220;We did that. We went on that journey and that brought us here today.&#8221; That will provide a whole new frame for looking at the numbers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Narration]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:08:10]\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Sometimes when you are deep in a chaotic situation, whether it be shifting roles, medical challenges, uncertainty, you have to narrow your field of view. You have to focus on what is directly in front of you, and that&#8217;s why sometimes zooming out, stepping back, can be so helpful. Whether it&#8217;s speaking to me, speaking to a therapist, speaking to any third party can be so helpful.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:08:34]\u00a0Anna and Will, they&#8217;ve been through a lot.\u00a0And they&#8217;ve done something that a lot of couples don&#8217;t do. They really faced it head on. They were honest.\u00a0They were vulnerable. They were willing to try something new. Anna doesn&#8217;t have to go back to work. If she wanted to stay home and earn nothing, they would be okay.\u00a0That&#8217;s the level of financial stability they&#8217;ve built.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:08:56]\u00a0But she wants to work. She wants to grow something that&#8217;s hers. That&#8217;s part of her\u00a0Rich Life.\u00a0And my job is to help her and\u00a0Will\u00a0live their Rich Lives.\u00a0I want acknowledge the topic of childcare because\u00a0I made a really dumb mistake in a previous episode, 195. I told this couple that childcare was a luxury.\u00a0It was part of guilt-free spending.\u00a0Why did I do that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:09:23]\u00a0My conversation around that point was trying to encourage this couple, a couple who admitted they were cheap,\u00a0to see how they were already spending on things they value and that it&#8217;s okay to spend more. Unfortunately,\u00a0I picked a really dumb example.\u00a0Thank you for the many comments correcting me, and I apologized.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:09:42]\u00a0I will always be honest when I&#8217;m right and wrong. Thank you so much for those comments and for watching my material.\u00a0That is so important here because Anna and Will have the money to be able to spend on childcare,\u00a0and it&#8217;s clearly part of their\u00a0Rich Life.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:10:00]\u00a0Remember, a\u00a0Rich Life\u00a0is lived outside the spreadsheet. You\u00a0got to\u00a0know your numbers, yes, but you also have to decide what is important to you. And sometimes that doesn&#8217;t show up on cell C16. I&#8217;m very proud of Anna and Will for having these conversations directly with each other. Now let&#8217;s check in and see where they are now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:10:23]\u00a0<\/span><b>Will:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0The call with Ramit has totally unblocked my relationship to our finances. But now I realize that we have a lot of options, especially when it comes to using our savings to offset some of those fixed costs, especially the temporary ones, like childcare costs. And that has allowed us to take that expense out of our CSP, which has just been a weight totally lifted off our shoulders.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:10:46]\u00a0And now when I look at those numbers, I don&#8217;t feel like I&#8217;m wading through mud. I feel like we are back in control of our future, and we&#8217;re going to use a lot of that new flexibility to really cement the connection we have within our family. I think that&#8217;s something that has fallen by the wayside the past couple of years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:11:06]\u00a0We&#8217;ve already gone out, taking the kids out to get ice cream and dinner, and it was just amazing to do that. And Anna and I have a reservation to go on our first date night, and we&#8217;re really looking forward to that. I am definitely doing a lot of soul searching when it comes to my identity and relationship around asking for help with finances and also accepting help, especially with my parents.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:11:30]\u00a0Anna and I have scheduled time to talk with them about their finances and how they want to help us and come up with a plan that helps all of us, and not make it something that we have to do all in our own and in a silo. I feel like I can breathe now. The call was very emotionally exhausting, but afterwards, I think brought the sun flying back into our day-to-day lives. So thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:11:56]\u00a0<\/span><b>Anna:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It was awesome to talk to you. I think we both feel really good about keeping the cash we have. It feels like a relief. And I don&#8217;t think that our spending habits lead us to being at risk of blowing it all. So even though there&#8217;s still a lot of unknowns and a lot of decisions that we have floating around, I think that for me the intensity has decreased slightly.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:12:20]\u00a0We&#8217;re both working hard to be more united and empathetic before being right about things regarding money and decisions about our life and the way we spend our time and money. I want to say that I feel a 100% better about money than I did before our call, but that is not true.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:12:38]\u00a0I think that what has gone away is like, oh my gosh, we&#8217;ve ruined everything. All of that fear, I realize is not realistic at all. So I&#8217;m glad to not be at that level. You were a lot more encouraging than I thought you were going to be. And I realize now, after talking with you, that the context around our numbers really does matter a lot.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:13:01]\u00a0You were more accepting of us in our very unique situation than I ever have been. I think that using Earn 1K is really going to help me get some of the pieces of my identity back that I&#8217;ve been missing, just earning money and being invested in projects with clients and all that. I&#8217;m very, very excited about doing that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:13:22]\u00a0So thank you for giving me access. It&#8217;s already going super well. Aside from that, I did just want to say congenital heart disease is the number one birth defect, and there is no cure. If you&#8217;re interested in helping out there, an organization that I work with is called Lilypads Housing that helps people who are bringing their kids from afar to our local children&#8217;s hospital.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[01:13:48]\u00a0Another one is called Miles of Love, and they help families, like if they needed to quit their job to stay in the hospital, which happens all the time. Finally, on the research front, there&#8217;s an organization called HeartWorks, and they are very aggressively working toward finding actual cures for congenital heart disease, and they&#8217;re a great organization. So thanks so much for listening. We have a lot to do, and we feel pretty motivated to do it. Thanks.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/206-anna-will\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\ufeff Anna (36) and Will (39) are married with two kids, including a young son who was born with a serious heart condition. Between unexpected [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-321462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321462"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321462\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":321464,"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321462\/revisions\/321464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=321462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.etrafficlane.com\/60dollarmiracle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=321462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}