Fear is such an innate and naturally occurring emotion that we may write off irrational fear, or even living in a constant state of fear as normal. What impact do your acquired or ingrained fears have on your life, success, and finances? How do we acknowledge, come to terms with, and ultimately overcome our fears to reach our full human potential? Joining us to tackle this important topic is our friend and host of the So Money podcast, Farnoosh Torabi.
In our headline, we explore a study that shows the impact of spending “spikes” and the resulting loans/debts incurred on retirement readiness.
And in honor of October’s arrival, Doug brings some fear-related trivia.
Deeper dives with curated links, topics, and discussions are in our newsletter, The 201, available at https://www.stackingbenjamins.com/201
Enjoy!
Our Headlines
- How Spending ‘Spikes,’ Credit Card Debt and Plan Loans Impact Retirement Readiness (National Association of Plan Advisors)
Farnoosh Torabi
Big thanks to Farnoosh Torabi for joining us today. To learn more about Farnoosh, visit farnoosh.tv. Grab yourself a copy of the book A Healthy State of Panic: Follow Your Fears to Build Wealth, Crush Your Career, and Win at Life.
You can hear more from Farnoosh on her podcast, So Money Podcast – Farnoosh.
Doug’s Trivia
- What is the most common phobia?
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- Alex is preparing to separate from the military and wants our input on what to do with his government’s retirement plan for public employees, the Thrift Savings Plan.
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Written by: Kevin Bailey
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Episode transcript
You know, I don’t understand this podcasting thing. How come you boys can’t have those keg parties and chase the girls like all the other nice boys do? Y’all are
nerds.
Live from Joe’s mom’s basement. It’s the Stacking Benjamins
show.
I’m Joe’s mom’s neighbor, Doug, and on today’s show, you’ll learn how to use fear to make better financial decisions with the host of So Money, Farnoosh Torabi. In our headline segment, what is the root cause of 401k loans? Well, maybe not all of them, but we’ll share the stats and help you decrease the chance you need to borrow.
Plus, we’ll throw out the Haven Lifeline to Stacker Alex, who wants to know whether he should roll his military TSP account into an IRA for better control. And then I’ll share some downright frightening trivia. And now two guys are scared of me and my sick karate skills. It’s Joe
and oh,
nothing og iss more afraid of than, uh, Doug’s nunchucks. Everybody,
he almost nunchucked me. He
didn’t even know. Just right across the noggin. Hey, everybody. Welcome. You made it. You found us. Sit back and relax because we are ready for another hour of fun. And OG, I am in such a good mood today because Farnoosh Tarabi is joining us.
That’s always a great time. She’s going to talk about how fear might need a better PR rep, but. Before that, a great headline. Doug, how are you doing? Big smile on your face today. Fabulous! It’s amazing. We got a great show for everybody, but before that, I think, uh, I think it’s time that we seriously had a discussion about getting into mom’s brownies.
Nom, She wanted me to take you guys aside. and let you know, uh, well, she wanted me to let you know this. I don’t really
care about the brownies, I’m digging this, uh, gyro that I’m trying to shovel in my pie hole real fast in between brownie talk and headline talk.
You got a, OG, you got a little tzatziki sauce hanging, that is what that is, right?
On the side of your mouth? Zaki Zeki. I don’t know how you say it. There’s, okay, we’re gonna take it. There’s consonants where they shouldn’t be.
That’s a little hummus. We’re gonna take a second to motto minus, OG and uh, teach Jug how to Doug Teach Jug. Teach Doug how to say that word. Jughead. How to say that word.
All right, we got Uch. Tara Robbi here with og in our own Jughead . Let’s get to show movement.
Hello, darlings. And now it’s time for your favorite part of the show. Our Stacking Benjamins headlines.
Does that make you Archie and OG Betty?
Why does he get to be Betty? How come I can’t be Betty? He’s so much cuter than you.
You know, it’s funny. I always remember that, uh, those comics is good. And, and every time I’ve gone back, they’re horrible. They’re horrible. And then I listened to the old time radio. Sometimes we’re traveling on XM Radio Classics. It’s also horrible. I just, yeah, nothing good there. Hey, our headline today has a lot of good stuff in it.
Um, and unfortunately not for somebody because they’re taking out loans when they don’t need to be. This written by Ted Godbow over at NAPA NET, the National Association of Plan Advisors. How spending spikes, credit card debt, and plan loans impact retirement readiness. Here’s what they’re diving into here, OG.
Ted writes, new research by the Employee Benefit Research Institute, conducted in partnership with JPMorgan Asset Management, reveals that households with spending spikes more likely to increase their credit card debt or take a 401k plan loan. This study leverages data from 29 million Chase households and 11 million 401k plans to show us that if you’re able OG to keep your spending about the same every month, you’re much less likely to go into debt.
You’re much less likely to need either a 401k loan or go into credit card. Let
me just restate what you said just so that I understood it. If you don’t spend more over long periods of time, you’re less likely to go into debt and
take money out of your retirement accounts. That is not at all what I said.
What I said was people who have spending spikes when you have something out of the… I’m not talking about long periods of time. I’m talking about things are going along and then BAM! I have a big spending spike. That is what sends me into credit card debt. Much more, much more than not having a budget, right?
Which means we can do this in our head in an average month, but we shouldn’t because it’s when those unplanned expenses hit that we get into trouble. The Taylor Swift
concert you had to go to. I wonder how
this data also compares if you overlay. Emergency fund access on top of that, you know, like if you had an adequate emergency fund and you have the spending spikes, how more, how much more likely are you to be able to withstand that?
I don’t have that data, but what I do have is the impact on retirement outcomes, which you can imagine ends up being far uglier than, uh, the dishwasher breaking down or whatever the thing is over the short term. Not surprisingly, Ted writes how your credit card utilization is associated with lower savings rates and balances and 401k plans.
even when controlling for tenure and income. For example, for participants with 10 years of more than 15 years and incomes between 75, 000 a hundred thousand medium 401k account balance is 184, 000 for people with credit card ratios of zero. And for those with credit card ratios of 80 to a hundred percent, the median account balance is 80, 000.
In other words, half as 401k account balances are lower if you haven’t done a good job of controlling that day to day budget. Do they define
what a spike is in terms of like above median, uh, uh, spending? I mean, is it something like, you know, the average consumer is getting hosed by a 5 percent increase in, you know, an outlier in terms of standard deviation?
Or is this like, uh, all of a sudden I had a 10, 000 expense. My normal spending is
4, 000 a month. I’m looking through this and the definition that I’m finding is It’s an amount that can’t be covered through current income. So the answer is that you have to go to your emergency fund, which plays into the fact that people probably don’t have one.
Yeah. And then
they go to credit card debt and then the debt piles up and then they go, I’ll just pay this debt off with this other debt because I’m paying myself 401k loan, the 401k loan. And then I’ll reduce my savings because now I need to pay the payment. And I can’t make a 500 401k loan payment and put 500 a month in my 401k.
The problem of course is that you’re paying yourself back with after tax money. And the number two problem is you’re not getting the company matched during that time. So even though you’re contributing, you know, maybe the same amount you used to put 500 a month in your 401k. Now you’re doing a 500 loan payment to your 401k.
You’re not getting the company match on that, which is, you know, going to cascade that problem a whole bunch. So it sounds like the moral of the story is, uh, build the base the right way to begin with, right? Emergency fund, live within your means.
I do definitely like, uh, both of those emergency fund. I think people go, well, I don’t have.
Money to put away toward emergency fund, but just putting away a little bit every month. So that when these, I mean, you really, Oh, gee, you got two choices, right? You can either make sure nothing bad happens for the next, uh, several years. Uh, and there never is a spike, or you can realize that you’re human.
There will be spikes. And if there is. We have a contingency plan ahead of time. I think that makes sense. I think there’s also though a way to handle this in the budget. It’s funny when I first heard this advice, I thought this was really little advice, but the more you can take like your utility bills, make those the same, go on the annual plan that doesn’t, by the way, save you money from month to month.
But what it does is this one more thing in your budget that is exactly the same and boring and you don’t have to worry about that spike in that area. If you can keep the grocery bill to a same number, if you can keep your, the more you can keep expenses that are predictable the same every month, the easier it also gets to handle those spikes.
I used to think that was like 2 advice, but the more you see the long term effects of not doing stuff like that. the easier it is to get things messed up in your brain. Next thing you know, the spike creates this horrible debt snowball running downhill. Well,
look at the way that bankers deal with any sort of big purchase that you can’t pay for in cash.
Do they make the payment bounce all over the place? Or do they go, it’s going to be the same 199 a month every single month for the next 36 months. Don’t even sweat it. It’s the same. They don’t go, well, this month it’s 199, next month it might be 399, month after that, it might be 42. No, they make it the same.
And the reason why is because it’s predictable. Like you said, it’s easier to digest in your budget. It’s easier to recognize, you know, and build around that
predictability for sure. We will link to this piece and the study in our show notes page at Stacky Benjamins dot com. We’ll also dive even more into great budgeting techniques, how to build an emergency fund and more in our two Oh one newsletter that comes out tomorrow.
Stacky Benjamins dot com slash two Oh one to sign up for that. Of course it is free. And Kevin does a great job of making sure he’s curated the best links online from reputable sources so that you get the whole 201 on all this. Coming up next, Farnoosh Tarabi. What do we say about her? Farnoosh has worked with some of the greatest names in personal finance from Gene Chatsky to Jim Cramer.
She actually hosted, imagine hosting a show with Jim Cramer. That would be slightly intense, I think. Of course, she’s the host of So Money. She’s written several books. Her new one It’s all about fear. And the second that I heard that she was going to talk about making fear, your friend and your ally to make better decisions, or I really wanted to talk to her about it, but before we get to talking about fear, Doug, I think, um, you’re going to talk to us a little bit about fear.
Sure am Joe.
Hey there stackers. I’m Joe’s mom’s fearless neighbor, Doug with Farnoosh Dharabi joining us to talk fear. I’ve been racking my brain all morning, but I cannot think of a single thing that I’m afraid of. Sharks? I can out swim them. Heights? I’ve dabbled in parkour. And I’m obviously not scared of the abandoned house at the end of my street.
The one with the weird noises coming from inside. That would be ridiculous. Most people are afraid of something. Again, not me, but a lot of people have phobias that range from common things like arachnophobia, which is the fear of spiders. to more bizarre things like ephebophobia, which is a fear of teenagers.
Yet another phobia I don’t have, no matter how much the kids in my neighborhood make fun of me and I run. You know, it’s part of the game. Another common one, chromatophobia, is an intense fear of spending money. According to psycom. com, it typically comes from past monetary trauma and can be debilitating.
Sheesh, that one sounds bad. I don’t know what I’d do if I suddenly became too scared to spend money maintaining my beloved El Camino, my poor baby. Today’s trivia question is, what is the most common phobia? I’ll be back right after I explain to those teens up the road why it’s actually very cool to wear a Def Leppard t shirt.
Hey there stackers, I’m soon to be skydiver and astonishingly brave guy, Joe’s mom’s neighbor, Doug. I just sprinted, I mean, um, sauntered. Casually passed the abandoned house in my neighborhood again, and I gotta say I don’t understand why anyone’s scared of it It’s just a dumb old house might be occupied by drifters or ghosts or probably both probably like drifter ghosts Nothing scary at all.
Not that I’d even be scared if it was scary because I’m not scared of anything I’m actually freakishly brave freakishly brave. Anyway, today’s trivia question is what is the most common phobia? The answer? Glossophobia, which is the fear of public speaking. The second most common fear? Fear of dying, which means most people would rather be dead than give a TED Talk.
And now, here to help transform your financial apprehension to financial success, it’s Arnoosh Tarabi.
I’m super happy she’s joining us again in the basement. It feels like it’s been way too long for Arnoosh Tarabi’s here.
At least you got air conditioning down here. I mean, it’s really hot outside, but it’s great that you’re accommodating.
Welcome to Texas. It is, uh, you don’t, you know, it’s funny people ask that, like, how do you get used to it? You’re like, you don’t, you just endure it.
Yes. Yes. You wear it like a badge of honor.
Yeah, absolutely. All right. I love languages. I love accents, which is why I kind of like the fact that we moved to Texas.
Like I love just different things. I don’t know this word. I’m not going to pronounce this right. Tarsu? Tar Tarso? Tarsu?
Tarsu. Yes. Tarsu. Tarsu. Mm hmm. You were called Tarsu as a kid. I was. It means scaredy cat in Farsi. It’s uh, literally it means a scared one, but it’s often reserved for children, like teasing, mockingly, you know, you’re a Tarsu.
And that was my personal brand. Before I was a personal finance expert. I was a Tarsu growing up. I was feared. I go way back. We go way back. And I was that kid who was just terrified. And I think it was, I know, I don’t think I know it was because my parents purposely made me afraid of so many things. It was how my 19 year old mother who didn’t speak English, who was here from Iran, raising me, as she says, to use her words, it was the only way I knew how to keep you safe.
She didn’t know how to drive. She didn’t know how to communicate. And we were living in Worcester, Massachusetts, Worcester, which back in the eighties was pretty rough. And of course it was the eighties too. So a lot of fear mongering in the, on the news behind milk cartons, all of that just created this perfect storm where me as a little girl grew up being suspicious and skeptical of everybody and everything.
And it was The sort of thing that, looking back, it was funny at the time. I didn’t feel like it was humorous. I was always like afraid of what was going to be around the corner. I was, I clinged to my mother. I would forget being able to stay with babysitters. I was the kid that was so afraid of strangers that I would.
run into the street, running away from a stranger who I, someone I perceived was a stranger and almost get hit by a car. Like, it’s not like I recommend this to parents to raise their kids this way, but play in the street
and worry about
it. Yeah. But as my mother says, you know, It all worked out, you know.
So it did. And interestingly, you know, fear and I, we go way back and to this day, I mean, I’m a terrified woman. How can I not be? The world is a scary place. And I have been forced to learn how to connect with fear in a more authentic way. Emotionally intelligent way, let’s say, and it’s really shown up for me well in my financial life, in my career, and everywhere else, and that’s where the book, A Healthy State of Panic, kind of picks up, is like talking about how fear can be surprise, maybe a superpower, and that we are underutilizing.
Yeah, let’s go there, because part of what I like about this project, Farnoosh, is there, there are a few people I think of as being afraid of things, and you don’t make that list. And then I open up these pages and I read all the fears, all the stuff, and I have this, you know, personal mantra that gets me through every day, which people who know me may have heard before, which is feel the fear and do it anyway, which was a thing from the 80s.
And I just remind myself of that every time I got, every time I go on stage, every time I start up a podcast, when I got to talk to Farnoosh Tarabi, I’m like, feel the fear. And do it anyway. But you say that fear has a serious PR problem. . Yes. Like fear needs a better PR rep like Mark 40 A or somebody who’s , like one of these top PR people.
Like let’s have a talk fear. I think we can spin this better.
It needs Johnny Cochrane. Lemme tell you. It just needs someone to say it’s okay to listen to your fears. Fears. Like all of our emotions are valid and I think that we are so ready for this. this take because for so long in our self help culture, we have been trained and told and preached at that being happy is the end game.
And it’s the only thing you should focus on. If anything’s making you sad or angry or fearful, well, it’s not worth your time. And I’m in the camp of, I think all emotions are valid. I think that you have to learn how to have a healthier relationship with All of your feelings, your feelings have important messages to share with fear specifically.
I think that when fear shows up, it’s an opportunity to learn more about yourself. Fear is very personal, right? It’s a there to signal to you something that you want to protect. It’s there to remind you of maybe something that you want you value that you have forgotten about. And so for me, I think that’s such a gift, right?
When you’re at a crossroads in life and you’re scared because you’re worried about making a money move or a career move that you’re worried will backfire. We’ll explore that. You know, what is specifically the thing that is frightening you and why? And. Is there a way to honor that fear and still do the thing?
I actually like your mantra. I think that’s healthy. I think to say to yourself, I am scared. That’s okay. I’m going to do the thing anyway. I’m going to bring fear with me as perhaps a healthy adrenaline to get me to the finish line. There are so many examples in my life where I have been scared in the moment and I’ve had to course correct a little bit because I was seeing how fear was overwhelming me, but I had to be like Staring it in the face and being like, okay, I see you.
You’re a little noisy right now. Like, you need to quiet down, you know, I’m trying to personify fear, which I think is always a healthy way to approach emotions that have been taboo, right? I call fear different names in the book. I don’t just say it’s fear. I label it. Is it the fear of money? Is it the fear of uncertainty?
Is it the fear of, is it FOMO? And I think when you can distill fear and personify it a little bit, it’s much easier to then Go into your tools, into your toolbox and understand how to deal with it, how to approach it and how to actually use it to your benefit.
You know, it’s funny. There may be people either watching us or listening to us Farnoosh and they’re going uh, Okay.
This is neat. This is Farnoosh’s take on this, but you point out very early, science is on your side here. Why don’t we, let’s start with Diane Fossey, because this
is pretty cool. Yes. Diane Fossey, primatologist, uh, who studied apes and she did this groundbreaking study where she actually, um, hung around with a group of, um, apes and realized that like humans, there is always a subset that is very protective.
They are sort of like the fearful ones. They’re the Tarsus. And they were committed to living and sleeping on the periphery of the camp to protect the village, so to speak, the fellow apes, from harm, from predators, from you name it. And when those Tarsus were removed as an experiment, the camp was obliterated.
So, going back to just, you know, science, there is a reason fear shows up. Fear, we wouldn’t be here. in your basement if it wasn’t for fear, you know, and fast forward to 2023.
Hold on just a second, Fardouche. When I read that, I’m just putting myself in Diane Fossey’s place and going, you know, she removes them as an experiment.
The camp gets obliterated. She’s like, dude, my bad, my
oops. I know. I know. I, I, when I say that out loud, I’m like, she knew it was going to happen. Right? Like, um, well, thank you for that. I suppose it was, uh, it was a sacrifice. But I think it needs to be done. We need all the reinforcements to remind us of the goodness of fear, because, like we said, it has been so, we have been so brainwashed ever since the Great Depression, when I think it was, uh, FDR who said to everyone at his inauguration that you have nothing to fear but fear itself.
Good luck with that during a depression, right? Like, such a place of privilege to be able to tell someone and to believe that in a time like the Great Depression, just be fearless. No, I’m sorry, I have to eat. I need to find work. And if I’m just going to pretend like my emotions don’t matter, I’m not sure that’s, that’s something that I can afford.
But, speaking of science… Fast forward to today, 2023. I almost fell over when I saw this study because I was like, thank you. I mean, people can take it or leave it for me, but a group of academics from some of the top universities in the country came together and found that, it was in the New York Times, it was published earlier this year, that when people view these quote unquote bad emotions like fear, it’s And anger and sadness as neutral, or maybe even healthy, they are much happier than people who see these emotions and get triggered and think, Oh, no, bad, avoid.
And I think it’s because when you have an open mind about all of your emotions, you’re willing to go there and explore things about yourself that need to be unpacked so that you can, Make decisions that are truly aligned with what you care about in your values. And that’s really, I think, what we all hope for at the end of the day.
We want to make sure that we’re doing the things that matter to us and that will ultimately, I dare say, bring us happiness. You know, so maybe I did write a book about happiness in the end, but I had to go at it a little bit from a different direction.
I think it is. Even if it’s not about happiness, at the very least, it’s about becoming much more comfortable with those times when we might not be happy.
And to your point, instead of burying them under the covers or putting them under the bed or shoving them in the closet, take them out, dust them off, and see why we need to be there. You have a You have a line, this might be one of my favorite lines in the book. It’s you write, Look, you’re afraid not so much because the rejection will sting, but more because, you know, deep down you need to put in more work, time, and patience to get to the yes.
This is you talking about fear of rejection. You go through nine different types of fears. Let’s put a face to this. You have a friend named Sean who kind of lived this And when he unpacked his fear, really used fear to get ahead. Sean
is a great example of when we are willing to face the hard truth that the fear of rejection is, is nudging, is telling us that we can ultimately get to that finish line and, and achieve the acceptance that we want.
And this is for him, it was, it was a story about. Being a novice in a newsroom in New York City, and like so many, I was in the trenches with him, we worked together, he really, really wanted to be on camera, which is cutthroat. I mean, in New York City, especially the number one market for broadcast television and media, frankly.
So we had a very, As all news directors are. We had a very tough news director and, and she would see tapes every day. And, and most of them were rej, were rejected. And,
and she’s tough by the way. Rightfully so. I mean, she’s in this major market. She’s got it. If she’s not tough, I mean, she needs to put a superior product on film.
Yeah,
exactly. It’s very, for her, it’s cutthroat. Everyone’s in the pressure cooker. And so, uh, there was a point where he. sort of misunderstood the fear of rejection. He was a fear, he had a fear of being rejected by her, and so he thought, well, I guess I should just Squash that dream, which is I think what often we, our instinct, our impulse is when we sense fear.
It’s like, I have to either avoid it. I have to just stay stuck or I have to dismiss it. And what it really ended up being was that when he recognized like, okay, so let’s face the facts, you know, like to your point, the newsroom director, she has a job, she has to put out quality talent and she’s on the line.
And truthfully, he’s, New, you know, and he may be very talented and has a lot of potential, but it’s yet to be proven. And so he recognized that he could get there, but he would need to go and do all of the things that news directors in New York want to see that just because he’s in the same building as her and he’s She sees them every day.
Doesn’t mean that he’s going to get extra credit for getting on camera at the station. So he moved to Florida and you know, by the way, these smaller markets have incredible stories to tell, right? He went down there and he reported on climate change and politics and so many important stories that ultimately weren’t of national interest and got to make mistakes in a market that wasn’t going to be so cutthroat and was perhaps a little bit more forgiving.
That’s why all of us go to the middle, middle America markets because it’s not as competitive and you can go there and learn in a more, in an environment that’s not going to like push you out after your immediate first mistake, which we will all make. So he came back and had a great tape and eventually got on camera in New York City, his dream.
But it was because he recognized that his fear of rejection wasn’t so much telling him to stop in his tracks or give up. It was that maybe you need to actually. face what it is going to take for you to be accepted. Now, not everybody will want to do that and that’s fine. That’s not going to be everybody’s journey, but are you willing to at least accept that there are a few steps that you could take to increase your chance for acceptance?
That’s just one of the pieces of wisdom of the fear of rejection. That’s not what it’s always telling us, but sometimes the fear of rejection is telling you to go where you are loved, you know, instead to leave as I have done. And it’s not to say like, make peace, try to make peace wherever you are and force the acceptance.
But sometimes it’s saying, okay, this is not a. A trust tree for you, and maybe you should leave the nest. You
know, one thing we’re all afraid of, not just fear rejection, well, really fear rejection, we are afraid of, of showing a piece of ourselves that might not look like our best self, which is amazing that you fill this work with Farnoosh doing Farnoosh, maybe not at her best, giving a Meredith Vieira, a not so.
Not so great compliment, taking one eyebrow and trying to turn them into two. Uh, that’s, that’s, that’s, that’s another one, but you talk about as a kid, you know, your story keeps going back to when you’re a kid and growing up and this fear that you’re not fitting in and that you’re different than other kids.
When did you stop worrying about fitting in? What was your, was it that today’s show moment when you’re like, you know what, Meredith Vieira, I said this. thing to her and they wanted me back right away. Yeah,
that was a pivotal moment. I have to say, I think, you know, the thing about fear is that it never goes away.
You’re never done with it. You’re never done with the fear of rejection or the fear of loneliness. It just creeps up on you. You get better at recognizing it and Respecting it and going, okay, thank you. I needed that. You know, let’s, let’s work together. Uh, and in that moment on the today’s show, when the fear of rejection I, okay.
So to take us back a little bit, it was my very first today show appearance. It was for the launch of my first book. You’re so money and what an opportunity, right? At 28 years old to be able to go on live TV and do this. And this is back in the mid 2000s when this could really. Make your career in some ways, you know, now not to poo poo going on GMA or today’s show now, but back then, I mean, they had a much more captivated audience.
It was much more of a really big deal to go on, especially as a young person. So I was so nervous for weeks before. And then, of course, the night before I was like a mess and just throughout all of my I suppose. I was like, I just need to go there, look good, speak a certain way, like all the other pros. And despite what my producer had even told me, she was like, it’s just a conversation.
Be yourself. I actually ran into Rachel Ray before that event, before that Today Show appearance, I had like. I’d seen her across the room at a, at a charity event. So I like went up to her and she didn’t know who I was. And I said, I’m a big fan and I’m going to be on the today show this week. Like, do you have any advice for me?
And she goes, ah, just be yourself. And I was like, okay, that’s easy for you to say, but I’m a nobody and being myself is not going to be cool enough. I am not enough. I thought. And so I went on the today show. And of course, all of those fears. un reconciled, blew up. And Meredith was really trying to throw me some softballs, let me tell you.
She was teeing me up for what was hopefully going to be a very easy and clear interview, and instead I just overwhelmed myself. And she said, you know, it’s great that you are the voice in this book as opposed to someone like me because you really know your generation. And I go, yeah, we don’t want someone who’s like three times our age giving us advice.
And what? And she’s like, excuse me, wait a minute. And, and she had a smile on her face to hear the producers crackling. The camera guys are like, and I just wanted to go home. And if you watch the clip, which I have, I try to make amends in the moment, like, Oh, I’m so sorry. Just kidding. And I just start speed talking because in my mind, the faster I can get away from this moment, the faster we can move on.
And that wasn’t very helpful. And then I, a little voice inside of me, which I think was the fear of rejection was like stick. Your landing to Robbie. Okay. You’ve got three more minutes here. You know, just speak like I had no more tools in my arsenal at this point. I had no more ways to pretend. I didn’t know any more ways to pretend it wasn’t working for me.
And so I just had to just be myself. And at the end of the interview, Oh my gosh, I was mortified. Meredith gave me a hug, but I was just sat there in the, the beaming hot lights of the set and, uh, waiting to be un miked.
Yeah. That’s like, that’s like the hug they give you before they send you to
be executed. Oh my God. Oh my God. And I see my producer. Oh my gosh. This woman who ended up being like a best friend to me, Patricia walking over and I’m like, Oh my. She’d
advocated for you, right? She didn’t get you on the show. So you’re like, I let her
down. They’re never going to happen. And then I’m thinking about my mother and my friends at work.
Everybody who also like. was secretly hating that I was going to be on the Today Show. You know, there’s always like the jealous people and then they’re like, yes, she screwed up just like we knew. And I just had all this, like, I was extrapolating all these horrible things. And she came over to me slowly and grabbed my arm and said, and I thought she was going to say like, okay, get your things.
And she said, uh, the executive producer would like me to tell you. And I’d still at this point I’m thinking. Go to hell. And she said, they’d love to have you back. And I said, I’m sorry, did he go get a muffin during the last four minutes? Like, was he not in the building? You know what I mean? Did he not just see you show up drunk today?
No, he was of sane mind. And I think one, Look, when someone goofs on live television, it’s great for ratings, and maybe they were hoping that I would come and bring my song and dance again, but I think ultimately what happened was I proved to them that I am real, like everybody else, and I Stuck that landing, you know, I got my points across eventually and I think I was someone who was not like everybody else Ironically, that’s the thing that got me My acceptance was that I think that the producers recognized that the times were changing We need to bring in more voices to talk about money.
Of course now we have so many people from different walks of life sharing their money stories and And I love that. But back then that was, um, that was still very new. We had like three people in the personal finance space that we could recognize. And so I credit the Today Show so much for launching my career and giving me a second and a third and a 100th chance to come back on and talk about money.
But yeah, I think, um, in that moment I was young still, I didn’t quite. I can’t give myself the credit to say like, Oh, I knew I was afraid and worked with it. But later, another high stakes moment, I’m in a boardroom meeting to potentially get the gig to write the monthly column for the Oprah magazine financial column.
And it’s Gail King and the editor in chief, Lucy Kalin, and a few others and me. And I’m one of a dozen people being interviewed for this top job and I’m nervous. And they’re like, first question, why are you the best person for this job? It’s like, do you ever watch Brady Bunch when Cindy is like on that game show and like she just freezes, just freezes, or maybe even more recently, um, Mitch McConnell, Mitch McConnell, yeah, not to make fun of, you know, too soon having, yeah, it’s too soon, but you can picture it.
I was like, you know, and three seconds felt like 30 days. And I finally said, well. I started to talk up some of the other competition instead. I was like, well, I don’t have the millions of followers like this person. I don’t have a CFP like that person. You thought you were losing them, by the way. Yeah, it was 100 percent losing them.
Like, they were like, I could see just the faces, like, they were not impressed. And I was trying to get to the butt, like the butt, but I’m better because, or but I have this to offer. And it wasn’t happening. I just kept talking up the other people. And then I finally just stopped and Recognize that, you know, when you’re in a moment where you feel like you’re facing a lot of competition and rejection is on the horizon, your best bet is to just hunker down and focus on your strengths and, and present those as the wins.
I mean, I recognized, Hey, I’m in the room, they’re already sold on me and this is my opportunity to either sabotage or just encourage them to hire me. And I recognize that I was brought in because I was. One of the first financial podcasters who is a woman who has her ear to the ground about people’s money questions, who’s been in this space for a while, who also has a journalism degree.
I am a writer and I just focused on that and we ended up talking for an hour and a half. They were so fascinated by the podcast and how much I had Produced and the content and the revelations that were being exposed on the show and people’s, you know, money fears and all of it. And I think what I was essentially relaying to them is that like, I can get your content.
Like if you’re going to hire me to answer people’s questions about money and to know what is. What people care about. I’m in it. Like, I’m, I’m in the trenches. I’m not someone who’s like high and mighty, you know, just like assuming what people need to know about money. Like I’m hearing it every day. But I think
the big takeaway there for me was we always think to ourself, our noosh, how do I become more like this person?
How do I become more like that person? How do I become more out? How do I become more? We watch Instagram all day and we see these beautiful people doing awesome stuff. And we’re like, you know what? I’m just little me. And your successes here, here and with the Today Show are when you didn’t lean out, you leaned in.
In fact, you’ve got this great term in the book. You say, we can’t help the gravitational pull toward our more authentic self. And it’s funny because that’s what we’re afraid of. And that’s what creates our
win. And the fear is, is just being like, Nope, Nope. It’s the GPS that’s like, get back to yourself, because that is what is going to be the most authentic and the most appreciated.
And people can sniff someone who’s trying to just assimilate and it’s awkward and it’s not coming across as, as real. So you’re right. I think that with the fear of rejection, we miscalculate it to think that it wants us to assimilate.
Yeah. Where does fear help us manage money better? Oh my
gosh. Well, the fear of money is interesting because it’s not like a lot of the other fears I explore in the book where the, you know, the fear of rejection and loneliness, which is are like states of mind and fear of money is.
is very much a curious thing because money, like what is it even, you know, it’s just this tool, it’s this construct. And so when I say you’re afraid of money, I think what I’m really saying is that you’re afraid of perhaps your relationship to money, the things that you think about money make you afraid.
And when you are afraid of what, let’s say losing your job or losing your money or making a bad investment or lending money to a friend and never seeing that check again, what the fear is telling you firstly is that. Maybe you need to explore where this fear is coming from. The fear is asking you to explore it, to unpack it, to take it to its source.
That’s the first step. And it’s a great exploration when you’re afraid of money, because a lot of times when we’re afraid of money, we’re carrying around these narratives that just don’t serve us and that aren’t even true. But maybe we experienced a semblance of it, uh, long ago. Like if we’re afraid of going bankrupt or losing money, and we might have.
healthy jobs and healthy savings accounts and all things, but there’s still a part of us that’s afraid of losing it. We’re afraid of scarcity, all of that. That’s very real in our community. We hear about this a lot. Well, I think that it’s it merits an exploration back to the beginnings where maybe you can identify how this showed up for you in your life.
Was it because your parents experienced this? Was it because maybe you even had a brush with this? In your earlier adulthood and now because of behavioral psychology and how we have a tendency to like think that things will just repeat all the time that you don’t think that you’ll ever actually achieve financial independence.
I think that when you fear money and you do this exploration, you can usually come to this conclusion that that narrative deserves rewriting and you’re an adult now and you have agency and it’s your job to turn this fear. That is actually a fallacy into something more truthful that represents your life today.
And, you know, it’s not to say that people could hear this and say, well, so ultimately, like, just be fearless. No, no, no. You have to face this fear because what you’ve now essentially done, by going to the root of it, you have learned more about yourself. You might have discovered some of the people you need to get rid of in your life who are sending you unhealthy messages around money, what things to tune
out.
Yeah. But you know what, as I think back to the apes and these apes that think, I think fear often just back to my days when I was a planner, people’s fears often were the best questions to ask. And I feel like if you turn those fears that you have about managing your money into questions, like it’s the same thing you’re talking about, but looking fear in the face and going, how does it, so as an example.
You know, one big thing, people that don’t know much about the stock market say, well, I don’t want to put money in the stock market cause that’s like taking it to Vegas. And you just put it in the, so the number one question then is, if that’s your fear, is the stock market like Las Vegas? Is it truly like, and then you start to, your fear kind of creates a curriculum for you to become more empowered and
stronger.
Oh my gosh, I wish I could have copy pasted that into the book. Fear becoming a curriculum. You’re absolutely right, especially with money because we arrive at our financial lives as adults with not a lot of pretext, not a lot of education or literacy. And of course, that’s going to brew fear. And so the first thing you sometimes need to do, and that this could be part of the exploration of the fear is to understand What you don’t know.
And so often when people are, people are afraid of the stock market or recessions, one of the most helpful things to discover is that it’s cyclical. And especially with, with investments. Yes, it’s cyclical, but also good news, better news. The boom markets last longer than the bear markets. And there are more boom markets than there are bear markets.
And if you know, you look at the charts, the historical charts, 30 years, you’re going to end up with. far more money investing consistently in a diversified portfolio over that timeframe than even in a high yield savings account. So you sometimes just need to understand that fear of money is really just a, a nudge to get more
education.
Yeah. And exactly where to get it. Yeah. Fantastic. The eyeopening. It is funny. I can’t tell you the number of times I was, I was laughing. I was telling my wife, the Meredith Vieira story on our, on our walk this morning. It’s called a healthy state of panic. Follow your fears to build wealth, crush your career and win at life.
And it’s available everywhere.
Thank you so much. What an endorsement. I appreciate you so
much. Thanks for helping our stackers, uh, well, not conquer their fear, but maybe be a little less, uh, tarso. How about that? Tarsu, yeah.
Bam! Or, you know what? Tarsus unite. Let’s unite. You need a t shirt
that says that.
Tarsus unite. Tarsus
unite, yeah. Hi, I’m Mitchell Walker, and when I’m not teaching people how to find hidden money, I’m out stacking Benjamins.
Big thanks to Farnoosh for joining us. Oh, gee, I love the idea that if you know where fear is and you can look that in the eye and protect against that. Your
laser beam eyeballs.
Yeah. I mean, it’s one thing to say that we shouldn’t be afraid. It’s another to just face it and go, yeah, I’m afraid of that. And then figure out how it works. I mean, I remember when I first rode on airplanes. And I remember every time that, that we would take a turn, right? Cause we’d hit the next segment of our, of our flight.
I remember the pilot would turn. I’d, I’d hear the, the, the, the whatever. I don’t, you know how it works. I don’t, you’re staring at me like, get it right, man. I’m never going to get it right. But like the flaps come down a little, whatever. We start to turn, we bank a little bit. And I’m like up there, they’re panicking at the end.
The pilots are both panicking. They’re like, Oh my God, we got to turn left. I’m not trying to turn left. We’re all going to die. And then I learned that that’s the way planes fly, and once I looked it in the eyes, and I learned how planes are operated, I can sleep on flights
now. Wasn’t it Eisenhower who said something like, Courage isn’t, you know, not being afraid of anything, it was…
Doing the thing that you’re afraid of with wet pants. Oh, yeah. Yeah. You know, like, just kind of go into it, basically.
Much better than the one that, uh, that for our new shrimp. All we have to fear is fear ourself, itself. She’s like, nope, there’s lots more to fear than that. Like, there’s lots more to fear than fear itself.
Like teenagers and
vacant
houses. Exactly. Two things, Doug, you’re not afraid of at all. No, not afraid of them. Nuh uh. Public speaking, number one on that list. Not surprising, not what I would have guessed, but not surprising at all.
I always thought dentistry was way up there. I’m, yeah, I thought it was public speaking and going to the dentist.
I didn’t know about the death thing. Who’s afraid of dying? Why would you be afraid of that? Maybe we’re
afraid of, what if we’re afraid of dying during a speech at the dentist?
Oh my gosh.
at a dental convention. That’s like Dante’s fifth level of the Inferno.
Yes. That’s when you know
you’re in hell.
Getting your teeth drilled without Novocaine while on stage at a TED Talk. Lummeting to your death from a, from a high
point. Let’s throw out the Haven Lifeline and tackle some of life’s most important questions. Our friends at Haven Life Insurance Agency OG, they put what you value first.
You know, a nice healthy lunch after a little bit of exercise in the morning, kind of get the blood flowing.
I’m, uh, I’m excited for all of this healthy rice and pita. Right. And, what? Four
pitas.
I mean, you gotta reload with carbs, bro.
And all the sour cream. It’s
science. It’s science, Doug. You gotta
reload. Mediterranean. Everybody knows those people live till they’re like a thousand. They
live forever. It’s a
Mediterranean diet.
A loaf of bread with
hummus. Doug, it is a blue zone. It is a blue zone. And I’m eating just like them. It’s your loved ones and your time. That’s why I didn’t buy a gallon
of
wine. Quality
term life insurance. Actually simple. You got to stack your Benjamins dot com slash Haven life. Now for a free quote, love what they’re doing to Haven life.
Cause they’re committed to offering a modern way to buy life insurance application. Simple. It’s online. You get an instant coverage decision, affordable prices, and all policies issued by their parent company, MassMutual, which is more than 160 years old. Today, let’s throw out, let’s get all kinds of nuts and let’s, uh, throw out the Haven Lifeline to Alex.
Say hi, Alex.
Hey, Joe and OG and the real star of the show, the Fintern, I have a question for you. I am separating from the military next year and trying to decide what to do with my TSP account. Right now I’m sitting at about 75 grand in it, and I’m not sure if I should leave it there or roll it over to an IRA for better control.
I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but the government websites tend to not be very user friendly, and this definitely applies to the TSP account. Now, I know the TSP used to be regarded as the best 401k out there. I’m just not sure that’s true anymore and it’s worth the hassle of having one more account rather than just rolling it into a Schwab IRA.
Now, my one concern is losing access to the G fund. What do you think?
I think you might have thrown that in just to stir the OG pot right there at the end. G is the government bond fund for people not familiar with the TSP, uh, the thrift savings plan. Oh gee, does he roll it or keep it?
Well, a couple of things here.
Firstly, uh, when it comes to retirement plans that exist at companies that you don’t work at anymore. So this would be for any workplace plan that you’ve ever worked at. You generally have three different options when you stop working at that place. And that includes the government stopping working for Uncle Sam.
You have your TSP, you can do something with it. So you can keep it where it is. Generally, that’s allowed as long as you have a certain balance. Most, most plans require a balance of 5, 000 or more to be able to keep your plan on the platform. And, uh, and you can keep investing the way it was and easy peasy lemon squeezy.
Uh, the second option is, is that you can take it and roll it into a IRA that’s outside of that plan. So, you know, Alex mentioned putting it in a Schwab IRA. You can put it in Betterment or Fidelity or whatever, as long as it goes from one company. In this case, the TSP to another company. That’s the Schwab in this, in Alex’s case, you don’t touch the money.
It happens electronically. That’s technically called a trustee to trustee transfer. You’re just moving, you know, you’re just moving from one, one custodian to the other. That’s the second option. A lot of people do that because of convenience or you already have accounts of Schwab in Alex’s case, perhaps maybe, uh, investment options are better or more, you know, there’s more of them.
You feel like you can do a little bit more, uh, different style trading or lots of different reasons or just simplicity, one less place to look for your money. And then the third thing that you can do is you can move it into the existing plan. So if you change jobs, your new plan, assuming that your company has a plan and that it’s allowed.
So you have to, you have to check those. I bet, I don’t know the stats on this, but I bet 85 percent of people move it from their old plan to an IRA. And that’s for a lot of reasons. Number one, like Alex mentioned, it’s one less place to think about in terms of money. Number two, you have full control over it.
So if you want to invest it in, you know, AMC futures, you can do that. If you want to invest it in low cost, passive ETFs, you can do that too. You know, there’s really no limit to your investment choices. Once you have control of it. And simplicity, having all of your money in one place. Most people prefer that.
I don’t know very many people that move it into a new plan, you know, their new company plan, unless it’s a relatively small dollar amount, then sometimes that’ll happen. Relative to, uh, Alex’s question here about the TSP or not TSP, TSP in particular, super easy. There’s Bleh!
So stay away from those. But really, you’re talking about the C, S, and I, common stock fund, the small cap fund, international fund. Those are your three. And you’re right. It used to be well regarded as the least costly, simplest plan to, uh, to have out there. But now companies are competing with that from a pricing standpoint.
So you can go out and get a C fund, basically an S& P 500 fund at Vanguard or at Schwab or at Fidelity or whatever for relatively the same price in terms of internal costs. So that That leg up that they had probably not there in the experience that you have from TSP in terms of behind the scenes, all the technology and that sort of stuff.
It does seem like it’s stuck in the eighties. So I’m with him on that part, but still the
OG, just to be clear here, that 401k still not a bad 401k. You’re not saying move it because it’s a 401k. You’re saying that you could easily consolidate, have the dashboard, get everything that Alex wants for the same price and with probably a better interface, but we’re not ripping that 401k.
No, TSP is great in terms of all things considered relative to 401k plans. If that were the model that everybody had to follow, I think most people would be pretty happy. Simplicity wins. You know, you don’t need to have 550 different fund options. You know, you don’t have to have a ton of cost structure.
You know, the costs are low because it’s subsidized by the government. So that’s the trade off. It’s really a toss up 50 50 your choice if you want to have the simplicity of having everything in one place You already have a relationship at Schwab and you want to put your money at Schwab just because it’s easier for you Have at it.
No problem about 30 days after you separate from service You can contact TSP and start that process from within the Schwab app As a matter of fact, you can say here’s my new account and I want to roll it over from TSP Here’s the stuff and we’ll fill out all the forms for you If you want to keep where it is I would suggest that you make sure that you keep your address updated Check every year to make sure the beneficiaries are updated correctly.
Guess what the government loses paperwork to sometimes and make sure that you’ve got a system for keeping track of those dollars I know it seems really impossible to say I’ll never forget my 75, 000 but it happens all the time because you’re probably a young guy and you know you’ll work 10 or 15 different places between here and 70 probably and and It’s it is very simple to forget.
So make sure you’ve got a system for checking up on it Whether it’s a dashboard or you know an online Linking of accounts or something like that.
Great question, Alex. Thank you so much. If you’ve got a question for us, head to StackingBenjamins. com slash voicemail and uh, we will for being brave and asking a question probably a lot of other stackers are asking themselves right now.
Uh, we’ll send you a Haven Life Stacking Benjamins greatest money show on earth circus t shirt, which I was sporting around this weekend. Uh, it was nice, comfortable, good times, stackingbenjamins. com slash voicemail. In Bali? And I was absolutely, you gotta, you know, we’re trying to get listenership around the world up, Doug.
Well, that’s an untapped market in Bali. It’s so untapped. There are dozens of people there. who could listen to it. Seriously, did you take any pictures of yourself on the beach or in your cabana or being eaten by sharks? Right. With uh, your
t shirt on? I got my, I got my head in the mouth of the Komodo dragon.
It was fantastic.
Nothing, I’m not afraid of that. Komodo dragons.
Of course not. Uh, time for our last segment of the show. This is what we call The Back Porch, where we talk about all the things going on in our community. Oh, gee, Doug and I talk about TV shows, video games, movies, everything we’re thinking about that’s on our mind.
You know, O. G., things that normal people talk about. He’s still stuffing his pie hole.
First thing is, now that I am back in the basement, we are back to sending out books. And, well, I don’t want to give people books for reviews. I do want to give away these books. I’m like, hey, you give us a review. But if you make a review, we’ll give you a book.
You send it to me. Well, officially, O. G., I’ll put your name in a hat and draw once a week. But what I’ve been doing… is trying to give away all of them. And if, by the way, if you have not gotten a book from me yet, that’s because I ran out of time. They are on the way and, but I still have lots and lots more.
So here’s the deal. Leave us a review and send me a note with that review. And you know what, officially we’ll put your name in the hat, but there’s. If you do it quickly, good possibility that I’m, uh, I’m just going to give you a choice. You might be the only person in
the hat.
Right. I tried to give you a choice of five books and, um, I sent out seven books just before I left for Bali.
So we’ll get back on that train. So if you’re like, Joe, where’s
mine? I should send some with like a golden ticket in it.
Oh, I want a golden ticket now, daddy.
That is the good, the review is your golden ticket, isn’t it? To get a book from one of the, one of the people that appear on the show. The book. I think it probably is.
What else do we want to give him, OG? On top of the book?
Picture a dog or something. Oh, yes! I ordered a
book one time from a really funny comedy writer named David Thorne. Inside of it was a bookmark. It was like some chintzy bookmark, and it literally, he literally wrote on there. This is a bookmark. It’s one of a kind.
It’s like when Doug was on, uh, on the book tour with us last year and he would write, congrats on meeting me on the inside of a book. He didn’t write, by the way, which made it
awesome,
made it remember that made it even better. So, uh, Doug, speaking of that, I think we had a review that, uh, that you were just looking at.
Yeah, this is a really, really nice one. And I’m fairly certain that nobody related to you wrote it actually, which makes it even more legit. I’ve never seen it before. How do I know? Yeah. So here we go. Uh, this podcast is a must listen for everyone looking to become more comfortable with their money situation through meaningful conversations.
Strategy and humor. Joe, O. G., Doug, guests and panelists do a phenomenal job making money fun and easier to talk about. Thank you for building an inclusive community and the education you provide to us all. That’s from, uh, EP
Audio. Thank you, EP Audio, for that. And, uh, thanks for hanging out with us. Our goal, we have two goals.
Goal number one is to prove to you that you can do it. So you’re right on there. And goal number two is to point out brands that might be against you doing it. And if we can shine a light on people trying to prohibit you from going where you’re going and also times like today, OG, where we say, you know, fear, fear, maybe not your enemy, fear might be your friend, like change your thinking.
Like
the sharks from Nemo. That Doug’s totally not afraid of. Fish are friends, not food. Fish are friends, not
food. You know, the other thing is that I do all the time, when I meet a shark, you just punch them in the nose. Just right in the nose. Just let them know who’s who. Remember, that’s what bull, that’s how you
handle a bull.
Remember Doug, the old comedian, uh, uh, Robert Schilling? Yeah. Robert Schilling, uh, talked about that. He said, you know, they give you that advice. If you’re in the water and a shark comes up, punch it in the nose, and if that doesn’t work, punch it again with your stump. Ha ha ha ha! Perfect. Speaking of fear, by the way, I saw, I saw a movie this last week, guys, that had, uh, quite a trailer.
This is, uh, A movie starring Kenneth Branagh on a bunch of people you’ve seen before. Yeah, this is, uh, Agatha Christie’s A Hunting in Venice.
I’ve found something. I’ve looked at it from every which way. I am the smartest person I ever met and I can’t figure it out, so I came to the second.
You are up
to something, my friend.
I’ve
seen a million of these so called things. Each one of them is psychics, each one a
fake. I do
not
believe in psychics.
Come with me to a seance. Spot the car and I can’t.
Detective,
you are here to discredit me, but I can talk
to the dead. I’ll
give all I have to hear my daughter’s voice. If someone wants to be heard, we are here. Listening.
Mama? Felicia? What is, yeah, Michelle. It’s called a jump scare. Yeah, that’s the voice of Michelle Yeoh, by the way, who lately has been in everything. She was in a Disney Plus series just now. Of course, she was in the Academy Award winning, uh, Everything Everywhere All at Once. She of course was in a long time ago, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, which also won an Academy Award.
And, um, she’s back again is this, uh, woman who can speak to the dead. Supposedly the voice you heard that said, uh, I’m the smartest person of any of us was Tina Fey, who apparently has a lot in common with OG, uh, both the smartest person in the room.
I guarantee you, you will all be hearing him say that.
Frequently from
now on. I haven’t seen Tina Fey in a movie in a little while though. And it was good to see her, uh, in this film. You know what, this, whether you like this movie or not, it’s going to depend on how much you like Agatha Christie, frankly, if you’re into the Agatha Christie, whodunit, you’re trying to figure it out that just like.
every single Agatha Christie book and movie made after her books. It’s all presented in front of you. It is right fricking in front of you the entire time. And when you find out what truly is going on, it’s a whole different story than what you thought it was. So, uh, when I came out of the theater, I said, that’s about a 75, 80%, like a small movie, well done, didn’t try to overplay it’s welcome.
And you know what? I went to the Metacritic score and I think it was like 78%. It was right, right, right in the same spot. Right. Who’s the smartest
guy in the room? Nice pat on
your own back. Bam. I am a movie critic. Is this the same thing?
Um, I think I’ve seen the, the actor in there. He’s like, uh, uh, he’s got the big mustache.
Yeah. Kenneth Branagh. So is, uh, is this the same, I don’t want to say series, but as like, There was a, it was a train movie, and it was kind of a whodunit, and it had a ton of like A list
people in it. Yeah, the Orient Express, and then they did the Death on the Nile.
Yes, I didn’t see that yet. Hercule Poirot, that’s an Agatha Christie character that’s, he’s like a detective, right?
Yes. Yeah, yeah.
So he just ran a,
I don’t know if he bought the rights, but he’s done a bunch of those.
I don’t think with Agatha Christie, do you have to buy the rights now to Agatha Christie? I think that that’s old enough. Like Sir, uh, Arthur Conan Doyle, if you want to print a Sherlock Holmes series now, my understanding is you could do it.
There was a change to that law. You’re right about that. Yeah. I don’t know. But I just know that he’s locked in on that
character. Yeah. Any, any, any plays Perot very well. And, uh, super, I don’t know. It was, it was a fun movie. It was a, uh, a Saturday late morning. We went to the cheap flick, which meant my, Tickets to go see the movie were like five bucks and the popcorn was 38.
So
that’s generally, isn’t that one of those spike in emergency spendings that you just said not to do?
It’s okay. I took out a 401k loan. Oh, okay.
All right. Good.
And if you’re here, so that the next time you go see an Agatha Christie based movie, you don’t have to take out a 401k loan. Well then maybe you need help from OG and his team.
They are taking clients. So head to stackingbenjamins. com slash O G if you need to make better decisions. The year, man, we’re rounding, we’re rounding third. We’re rounding third and coming for home on 2023. It’s crazy. We just started 2023 and we’re in the fourth quarter. Stackingbenjamins. com slash O G to get your financial game moving.
All right, that’s going to do it for today. Doug, you got it from here, man. What should we have learned today? Well, Joe, first,
take some advice from Farnoosh Tarabi and identify your emotional connections to money so you can make your financial fears better. work to your advantage. Second, learn from our headline segment.
The key to curb borrowing is to even out expenses whenever possible. Set your utilities on level pay, lock down the grocery budget, and set a cap on dining out, and you’re off to a good start. But the big lesson… If you guessed during today’s trivia that Joe’s mom is the number one thing people are most afraid of, don’t ever tell her that.
That’s just a fun fact I learned. Mom! I was kidding! Jeez. Thanks to Farnoosh for joining us today. Check out her book, A Healthy State of Panic. Follow your fears to build wealth, crush your career, and win at life. But also, take a listen to her podcast, So Money, wherever you’re listening to us right now.
Pretty sure she named her podcast after she heard Joe say, Doug, yo, you are so money! Anyway, we’ll include links in our show notes at stackingbenjamins. com I’m so money. This show is the property of SB Podcasts LLC, copyright 2023 and is created by Joe Saul Sehy. Our producer is Karen Repine. This show was written by Lisa Curry, who’s also the host of the Long Story Long Podcast.
With help from me, Joe, and Doc G from the Earn Invest podcast. Kevin Bailey helps us take a deeper dive into all the topics covered on each episode in our newsletter called the 201. You’ll find the 411 on all things money at the 201. Just visit stackingbenjamins. com slash 201. Wonder how beautiful we all are?
Of course you’ll never know if you don’t check out our YouTube version of this show, engineered by Tina Ikenberg. Then you’ll see once and for all, that I’m the best thing going for this podcast. Once we bottle up all this goodness, we ship it to our engineer, the amazing Steve Stewart. Steve helps the rest of our team sound nearly as good as I do right now.
Want to chat with friends about the show later? Mom’s friend Gertrude and Kate Youngkin are our social media coordinators. and Gertrude is the room mother in our Facebook group called The Basement. Say hello when you see us posting online. To join all The Basement fun with other stackers, type stackingbenjamins.
com slash basement. Not only should you not take advice from these nerds, don’t take advice from people you don’t know. This show is for entertainment purposes only. Before making any financial decisions, speak with a real financial advisor. I’m Joe’s mom’s neighbor, Doug, and we’ll see you next time back here at the Stacking Benjamins show.
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